Sunday, November 2, 2014

Blog Post #11

What Can We Learn About Teaching and Learning from These Teachers?
Teach and Learn Reflection

      Brain Crosby, in his TEDx Talk, mentions several times about his students "thinking outside of the box".  This is something I struggled with throughout my school career.  Not many of my teachers encouraged me to think outside of the box, just to get good grades and stay in school.  As a result, I did not enjoy school too much.  I want that to be different for my students.  I want them to look forward to my class and be excited when they come in the door, ready to learn.  I will have to spend some time coming up with fun and creative activities so my students can think outside of the box more.  I think having the capabilities that technology gives will be a great way to spark interest and excitement in students.

      In Paul Anderson's video, Blended Learning Cycle, I learned that it is always a good thing to be able to stay on track with teaching.  My greatest fear is that I will come up with a lesson plan, and then take forever and a day to actually execute it with my students.  I am going to have to become a better time manager so I can teach in an accurate manner, in the most time efficient way possible.  Mr. Anderson gives a good acronym to help stay on track.  He uses the word :QUIVER.
Question
Ivestigation/Iquiry
Video
Elaboration
Review

      Mark Church has some good ideas about group learning and group work in his Making Thinking Visible video.  I like that he split his students up into small groups and let them discuss what they wanted their banners to say.  Everyone is going to have different theories and ideas, and combinations of those differences sometimes come up with the best responses. I am going to incorporate group learning into my classroom, definitely.  Also, displaying student's work makes them try harder on the assignment because they know others will be looking at it.  It will also show students that I approve of their work and they will get a sense of accomplishment to see their work displayed in the room or in the hallway.

Digital Citizenship and quote from the Spider Man movie      Sam Pane teaches his students about digital safety in his video, Super Digital Citizen.  I tend to take for granted that students are going to come to school knowing how to safely use the internet.  I realize now that is not so, and they will more than likely need some assistance in that matter.  What better way to learn than to make a comic about a Digital Citizen superhero?  No matter how old or how young a student is, superheroes are always a huge hit.  Then we are having fun as well as learning important subject in the classroom.  If I am going to require my students to use technology in our classroom, I need to teach them how to be safe while they use it before we do anything involving technology.

      Dean Shareski's video, Project Based Learning, is a great example of how different subjects can be easily blended together.  I would love to partner with different teachers and complete projects that involve everyone.  I think the students will get more learning and understanding out of the project and as teachers, we will gain some team working skills as we go along.  It will be so fun to combine English (my subject matter) with that of History, Math, Science, and any other subjects.

      After watching Roosevelt Elementary's PBL Learning I have picked up on a theme that I will now remember throughout my teaching career.  That theme is: Always make sure that the students are engaged.  Now that I know this and realize it, I am going to use it, Engaging students is going to make sure they enjoy what they are learning and will retain what they have learned.  If they are engaged and participating, I will know that I am doing my job correctly.  PBL makes it possible for students to become fully involved in the lesson and the teacher is not just simply standing in front of them and lecturing information for them to just spit back out for a test and then forget it.  PBL lets students apply what they have found out to real-life situations, showing them value in what they are learning.  I now see the extreme worth in PBL and look forward to basing my teaching off of it.  


Quote from Dr. Kevin Maxwell

2 comments:

  1. Hi Kathryn,
    Great Post! You can tell you watched all the videos and organized your blog post! Very great post! I really have nothing negative to say about it. Keep up the good work!

    ReplyDelete