8/8 Self-Reflection

August 9, 2012 at 12:08 pm | Posted in E3 | Leave a comment
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During the reading about child abuse and what your responsibilities are if you are a mandatory reporter, there was a section that said you have to provide the child’s and parents’ names, address, as much detail as you can but also if they are of Indian ancestry. That really blew my mind. A few pages later I found out that Native Americans have their own child welfare and safety act that I had never heard of before. Then during the class we watched a video saying how black families are reported twice as much as white ones, and Native Americans are reported three times as often as white families! I want to know how many of these reports were substantiated though. Just because a report is made doesn’t mean there is abuse going on. My initial reaction to hearing those stats was that they had to be inflated. But if they aren’t, are the stats a byproduct of racism? Or is it simply because those who are doing the reporting are not culturally knowledgeable? If I see something in my class that could be abuse, I would want to talk to the school counselor right away. Maybe even talk to administration to make sure I am not jumping to conclusions. Until I have many more years of experience, I want to make sure that what I am seeing is worthy of making that phone call and starting the entire process.

While the rules are clear when it comes to child abuse, it is not so clear what steps to take when you suspect a child may have an eating disorder. We have to remember that we are not doctors (most of us at least) and we are not qualified to make a diagnosis. This would probably be another one of those times I would want to talk to the counselor and explain my observations. These are very sensitive topics, especially as a student teacher. We still need to be aware and look for the signs, but thankfully we will have our mentors there to help us.

Intro to teaching reading reflection

August 9, 2012 at 11:39 am | Posted in E1 | 2 Comments
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At the ARC Program student orientation, we were told this summer quarter would be a crash course to prepare us for being in a real classroom. I am a little over two weeks into the MTMS program, and it is no joke. The amount and variety of material we are covering has been a shock to my system, but I am now starting to get my “sea legs” and I can see how all this material connects from class to class.

 

In Dr. Algera’s Introduction to Teaching class, we had two very insightful readings that made us look at teaching from a point of view I never would have considered. I began with “What’s my Job? Defining the Role of the Classroom Teacher” (Wiggins, 2010). I enjoyed his honest point of view and the questions he asked of his readers. Early in the reading he talks about how making students feel confident in themselves and their abilities is crucial for successful learning (Wiggins, 2010, p. 14). He then asks “How many teachers spend the first week of school really getting to know the strengths, weaknesses, talents, interests, and styles of all their learners, and then take a few days to plan accordingly” (Wiggins, 2010, p. 14-15)? I love this idea. Getting to know all our students strengths would allow us as teachers to differentiate our instruction to play to those strengths. When students see that they can make progress, their confidence will soar and successful learning will be the result. But could this ever be reality? Is a week even long enough to get to know 150 kids, figure out where they excel and devise lessons that help students see their own strengths?

 

Later on in this section, Wiggins says “…the job of teaching is meant to cause understanding through meaning and transfer” (2010, p. 18). He explains that too many teachers believe that just knowledge and a toolbox of skills is all students need to get out of school. I believe what he is saying here is that we need to teach for understanding, not just knowledge. If kids are able to understand one concept and then transfer their knowledge along with their toolbox of skills and apply them to a new concept to generate understanding of it, then those students have learned on a deep level. We watched a video in Dr. Soine’s class that talked specifically about trying to get students to understand on this deeper level. But our education system now seems to be focused more on breadth of learning rather than depth. This is why we have fallen in the world rankings. However, after doing a research project in Amy’s class comparing our current state standards with the new common core state standards, it appears these new standards seek to narrow the focus and delve deeper into many content areas. As a preservice teacher now, I will basically have front row seats as we switch from our old standards to the common core standards. I’ll only have a year of teaching under my belt when the new standards come into effect, and then I get to use them and see what kind of an impact they will have.

 

As I moved into the reading by Marzano & Marzano, I was struck by what they called a “basic operating principle” (Marzano, R. J., & Marzano, J. S., 2010, p. 347). This was precisely what our guest speaker Rosemary Leifer spoke about in Dr. Soine’s class. Rosemary called it our core beliefs that guide our actions. She asked us to take a moment and think about these beliefs, to get a good grasp of what they mean to us. I struggled to find the exact words, but I could feel what they meant to me. They felt like a mixture of equality, justice, compassion and ambition. Even now it is still very difficult to actually describe that feeling. These first few weeks in the ARC program have helped me to self-reflect with much more clarity and purpose. If someone were to ask me now why I am switching careers to become a teacher, I would tell them that I was pulled towards teaching because this is the profession where my core beliefs fit and where I can use them hopefully to change lives.

 

 

Marzano, R. J., & Marzano, J. S. (2010). The inner game of teaching. In R Marzano (Ed.) On excellence in teaching. 345-367.

 

Wiggins, G. (2010). What’s my job? Defining the role of the classroom teacher. In R Marzano (Ed.) On excellence in teaching. 7-29.

 

8/7 Self-Reflection

August 8, 2012 at 9:44 am | Posted in E1 | Leave a comment
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How in the world can I possibly meet the needs of 150 of my students?! On this large of a scale, it seems impossible. But I can break this down into manageable chunks and start to see that it is doable. We talked in class today about getting to know your students better. Greeting them at the door, asking them about their weekends or any recent news they might have. Like we saw in the Wong video, taking the time to setup procedures is also a time to involve the class and build connections with the students. From our reading in Dr. Algera’s class, specifically an excerpt from What’s My Job, why don’t teachers take that first week of class to really get to know all the students and find out what they like or dislike, where their strengths are at, what motivates them and then applying this knowledge to setup your curriculum and assessments? Coaches do this all the time to make their team as competitive as possible and yet teachers are still there trying to cover all the content they are told to cover.

Now as our student teaching time rapidly approaches, I’ve been trying to think of ways to connect with the students that won’t change or disrupt how my mentor teacher usually does things. I am there to learn as much as I can from my mentor, and I want to build and maintain a good relationship with him/her. If at all possible, I want to make use of my observation time to not only observe but be able to get to know as many students as I can. Similar to the name placards we made in this class, I could have the students do that and also add one thing they enjoy. Then when I am talking to them later we would have a conversation starter. At the very least, having my big knee brace will help initiate conversations. What I worry about going into this year of student teaching is how can I get the most out of the experience? There is so much to see, hear, and do along with getting to know a whole bunch of students. I feel more and more excited but also more and more overwhelmed. How do I juggle developing my teaching style, teaching the content and causing learning? These are the major questions kicking me in the gut right now and I just need to have faith that this program is designed like this for a reason and I’ll come out at the end prepared to be a full-fledged teacher.

 

 

8/6 Self-Reflection

August 7, 2012 at 9:49 pm | Posted in E1, H4 | Leave a comment
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Family involvement is yet another key component
towards impacting student learning. From the article by Joyce Epstein, we know
there are six types of involvement and for those families who have little to no
involvement now, it is crucial that we get them engaged in at least one or two
types right away. One thing we can do as teachers is to send home a brief
newsletter with direct tips like “set aside a time and place to allow your kids
to study and do homework each night”. Another idea could be to invite families
to activity nights where the kids can do fun stuff while the teachers ask
parents what they think would help impact their own kids’ learning the most.
For these parents, it is important to show them just how easy it can be to get
involved. Sending emails to the teacher with questions or concerns is opening
up a line of communication and now they are investing in their child’s
learning. On the other hand though, what do we do when there are parents who
may be over involved? How will we know when their involvement is having a
negative impact on learning? As with many other things we deal with, we must
strive to find a healthy balance of family involvement. Remember, the reason we
want to engage family and community is to have a positive impact on student
learning. Keep this in mind when making decisions regarding family and
community involvement.

Chapter 10 reading reflection

August 6, 2012 at 1:37 am | Posted in H2 | Leave a comment
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Chapter 10 discusses self-directed learning. This style of learning is designed to engage the students and also helps them develop their higher order skills on Bloom’s Taxonomy (p.330). Self-directed learning helps students to deconstruct a problem and then reconstruct it in a way that lets them understand the meaning of that problem. By being able to do this, students will further enhance their reasoning and critical thinking skills. Looking at this on a larger scale, self-directed learning is precisely how people solve problems in the real word. You have to ask yourself “what is this problem really asking for?” You have to be able to break things down to figure out what is relevant and what is not. This isn’t just a tool you should use in the classroom, but rather a life skill to be used all the time.

 

Borich also talks about mental modeling, which is a teaching method that will help students internalize, remember and then be able to apply the same general idea to other problems (332-333). This is usually done by doing a demonstration on a white board. The point here though is not to work through a problem just to get an answer but rather working through a problem and stopping to explain your thinking or reasoning at each step. As the teacher, you are going to break things down without using a lot of academic language. You can also repeat certain steps to emphasize their importance. Every step of the process should be shown and explain why you did what you did. This is something that a lot of math teachers already do, or should be doing. When I can understand each step and why each step needs to be done, I can start to fully understand what those types of problems are looking for. The only drawback to doing this is the time constraint. Going through the whole process takes time, and then having the students work through examples and ask questions takes more time. But I still believe this is a valuable tool for teaching new and difficult content.

 

When students have been exposed to mental modeling for good deal of time, they will start having an internal dialogue with themselves known as inner speech (p.342). In their minds, the students will begin to prompt and ask questions just like their teachers would. This helps guide the learners to remember the processes they already know and apply that knowledge to other problems. I found this part of the chapter very fascinating. As an only child, I already had a pretty active imagination. When I was doing homework and ran into a problem I couldn’t readily solve, I didn’t have anyone that could answer my questions. My parents weren’t exactly math people, so I had to stop and think about what my teacher had said during class that day. Often times I could go through the lesson in my head and something would click, and I could then finish the problem. Now I wonder if this is something all students can do, or does it work better for the math/science kids versus the English/history students? And at what age can students begin having this inner speech?

8/2 Self-Reflection

August 3, 2012 at 11:41 am | Posted in E1, O2 | Leave a comment
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We have recently been discussing our current Washington K-12 State Standards and comparing them to the upcoming Common Core State Standards, specifically in math. There are some serious changes coming our way, and every teacher in Washington will need to know these new standards inside and out. As a soon-to-be new teacher, I will be responsible for both the current and common core standards. The first paper I wrote for this entire program was evaluating the pros and cons for both the Washington K-12 State Standards and the Common Core State Standards for mathematics. The first thing I noticed was the common core had shifted a good deal of content around. I was looking for Algebra 1 standards under the Algebra category in the CCSS, and couldn’t find anything relating to Algebra 1. After a little detective work, I found the standards I needed but they were lumped into both 7th and 8th grade. This is going to be a big deal come 2014 when every teacher will have to track down specific standards which could be located in a variety of possible locations. That’s a lot of extra time and effort being spent, but hopefully it will only be for that first year. Also, in the CCSS you have domains that house clusters of standards relating to a similar topic. These domains are not numbered, making it even more difficult to find a specific standard. I wonder why they didn’t at least keep the numbering system used by the current state standards. The good news though is that the CCSS have trimmed down the total number of standards and the ones that stuck around have been reworded to go much more in depth on their topics. By going more in depth, the impact on student learning should be much more significant. Instead of just scratching the surface on many topics, students will be able to learn, retain and recall information on fewer, but more important topics. Of course who is to say which content stays and which goes? Or which content is broken down and divided into other areas? And how can we ensure that even if the CCSS are adopted by a state that they will strictly adhere to them? These are legitimate concerns with serious implications, ranging from the state level all the way down to the teachers and students. Hopefully those in charge of rolling out these new standards got it right, and we will be the generation of new teachers bringing our youth and our nation back to the top of the pack where we belong.

8/1 Self-Reflection

August 2, 2012 at 12:15 pm | Posted in E2, E3 | Leave a comment
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Today was about growing as professionals and learners, and finding ways to make that happen. Sharing some of my ideas with classmates and also listening to theirs opened my eyes to a wide variety of options. Since we have such a small cohort, I wonder if perhaps we may have missed out on other, perhaps even more viable, options? We also had a great presentation focused on what we believe and to use that belief as our anchor. Rosemary’s belief that every child can learn was very powerful. It made me realize that not every kid will be able to pass, but if you can help them along the path and instill in them that they are learners, then you have succeeded. In addition to our core beliefs, we also learned about professional growth plans and these plans need to mesh with our core beliefs or they will not be effective. I feel we can learn a lot from our colleagues as well as our administration. Like one of our class norms says, ask questions! Garner as much knowledge as you can and apply what you can. Schools are places where learning needs to happen, for the students as well as the teachers.

Chapter 9 Reading Reflection

August 2, 2012 at 10:37 am | Posted in H2 | 3 Comments
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Chapter 9 is all about questions and the many different types and situations in which to use them.  Borich introduces us to divergent and convergent questions right away (p.300-302). The convergent version of a question is one that usually has one, or very few correct answers. When I think convergent, I am thinking about the lower level of Bloom’s Taxonomy where remembering and recalling facts is important. On the other hand we have divergent questions which are much more open-ended. It really should not have any one right answer, but it can have wrong answers. Don’t let your students get away with, or opt out as Dan would say in our classroom management class, by giving the wrong answer to divergent questions. In addition, divergent questions are a great tool to use when pushing your students to think on some of the higher levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy.

Thinking about Bloom, as we moved a little deeper into the chapter, we find that the same general question can be rephrased slightly to meet each of the six different tiers within his taxonomy (p.304-310). I have personally marked this section of the book to review later. There are great verbs listed at every tier, from knowledge all the way up to evaluation. I might even scan these into my computer to print out a list or throw on my phone. At this point in our teaching careers, I believe these examples will be very useful as we shift from on campus to being in the schools.

Another big topic that stuck out for me was the use of probes. Probes are responses to student answers that are designed for a specific purpose. The three types of probes are eliciting, soliciting, and redirecting (p.310-312). When you want to get clarification from a student, you would then use an eliciting probe. Maybe you want more information, or maybe you just want the student to rephrase his/her response so it makes sense. There are also times when the student is correct but you want to push them to a higher level of thinking. For those times, you use a soliciting probe. This one seems especially powerful to me because you push your students out of their comfort zones by forcing them to think creatively. And finally, if things are getting a little off-track, you can use a redirecting probe. This basically means finding a way to refocus a student’s attention without having to use phrases that might make them feel like they failed. Being able to use all three different probes at the right times will certainly keep discussions going smoothly and help push kids to think critically about the topic at hand.

7/31 Self-Reflection

August 1, 2012 at 8:43 am | Posted in E3 | Leave a comment
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The readings on cyber bullying shocked me because it feels like we as a society are woefully unprepared to combat bullying in cyberspace. If at some point some new technology is made to stop cyber bullying, how much will it affect our privacy rights? Will “Big Brother” be that much closer to controlling every aspect of our lives? The presentation was amazingly insightful. Going into our internships, we will have a much better idea of what to look for and how the changing of a kid’s affect may be a clue to something that something is happening. Dr. Mauk also explained how administrators work very hard to investigate and fully understand the context of bully situations. It is clear that the teachers are not responsible for any of the investigation part, but I also wonder if it’s possible to get through to these bullies at the high school level. Can we help them change enough so they become productive members of society, or will some of these bullies fall through the cracks and become bums or eventually end up in jail?

 

Chapter 8 Reading Reflection

August 1, 2012 at 8:27 am | Posted in E1, O1 | 3 Comments
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As I began this chapter, I immediately noticed how much more time indirect instruction uses to make the same connections as direct instruction (p.257). I understand that indirect instruction (ID) allows the students to make their own connections and develops insights that can build great problem solving skills they can use for years to come. What worries me the most is that the sole use of ID may only allow teachers to cover half as much content as direct instruction (DI).

Later Borich explains that DI strategies are more suited for teaching things like facts and rules, and ID strategies work best for teaching concepts, inquiry and problem solving (p.262). This seems like a gross oversimplification to me. I think it’s perfectly reasonable to have either instructional method be used at any level of Bloom’s Taxonomy. It could be more difficult at the higher levels for DI and the lower levels for ID, but not impossible. The biggest concept here I think is recognizing that the most effective teachers are able to use a blend of both DI and ID to their advantage. This blend may shift one way or the other depending on the topics covered. The greatest benefit of using each instructional method is that it will certainly keep kids engaged and the more engaged they are, the more they will learn.

Nearing the end of the chapter, Borich talks about large group discussions (p.283-285). Over the last week and a half, I have seen first-hand just how effective group discussions can be. The free flow of questions and answers and debate works so well, we’ve been using it since the time of Socrates. When you have enough class time, large group discussions can really have a significant impact. But even in smaller classes with limited time, you can still use the idea of “think, pair, share” (p.285). We have been using this exact technique in multiple classes here so far. A question is posed, then each student is given time to think about their response, and then they share their ideas with a neighbor. Finally, each pair will share their answers with the rest of the class.

Overall, I’m starting to like some aspects of indirect instruction. Trying out a blend of ID and DI might be something I look into as I begin student teaching.

 

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