1) Chapter 9 discusses using technology in the classroom in effective ways to improve student achievement. This is related to what we have previously learned in that technology is a tool in education to help kids understand and retain the information in long-term memory. As the cognition book mentioned students lean in different ways. Technology brings in a hands-on tool to help kids succeed.
2) What am I not clear on? I had no idea how much technology software is out there for use in the classroom. I will do my research this summer to try to use more of this in my classroom. The students will be more involved and more interested in their learning.
3) It is important to introduce new technology in the classroom because we live in a technology age where students will need to know how to use it in the future as they join the workforce. I am going to look into podcasts for students that miss assignments. In the weekly discussion it was mentioned that kids could make these. This might be a good idea in Algebra after a test to get another type of assessment for each student. I think that students would enjoy it and it would be more interesting for other students to watch.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Sunday, April 12, 2009
Week 14 Reflection
1) There were 4 learning environments discussed in "How People Learn" Chapter's 6 and 7. These were learner, knowledge, assessment, and community based. The learner based environment focuses on giving the student the responsibility to learn the information through predictions and using their previous knowledge. The knowledge based approach is similar to the learner based in that the learner is very active but the type of instruction is more structured. In the assessment approach the teacher receives feedback through either formative or summative types of assessments. The community based instruction makes the classroom feel more like a family in which students do not feel threatened in the classroom. This relates to what we have learned in the cognition text by applying all of the cognitive principles to classroom instruction in order to achieve higher student achievement.
2) I think that the reason why math is moving quicker in Japan is that we have so much info to cover that we have to skim the top of everything. We are not doing our students any good this way. We are doing this because of the guidelines set by the state tests. Why do we continue to do this? Wouldn't it benefit our students if we had more time to try the learner based instruction where they would learn the material in more depth?
3) In my math classroom, I think that I take on a community based approach. The students feel comfortable in class. They know that mistakes are okay because we learn from them. I don't really make my students raise their hands to answer or ask a question. They are welcome to ask a question at any time during the lesson. I receive constant feedback by asking questions constantly. This would be an example of formative assessment. I would love to have more time to give the students the chance to do more with learner based environments. This would help the students have a deeper level of mathematical understanding and they will retain the info over time in their long -term memory.
2) I think that the reason why math is moving quicker in Japan is that we have so much info to cover that we have to skim the top of everything. We are not doing our students any good this way. We are doing this because of the guidelines set by the state tests. Why do we continue to do this? Wouldn't it benefit our students if we had more time to try the learner based instruction where they would learn the material in more depth?
3) In my math classroom, I think that I take on a community based approach. The students feel comfortable in class. They know that mistakes are okay because we learn from them. I don't really make my students raise their hands to answer or ask a question. They are welcome to ask a question at any time during the lesson. I receive constant feedback by asking questions constantly. This would be an example of formative assessment. I would love to have more time to give the students the chance to do more with learner based environments. This would help the students have a deeper level of mathematical understanding and they will retain the info over time in their long -term memory.
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Chapter 10 Reflection
1. Chapter 10 focuses on language production including speaking and writing. This relates to just about every other concept in the book because there are many processes that need to be used in order to communicate. Production of language through writing requires planning, sentence generation, and revision. We use our short term and long term memory to write and speak. Our central executive is very active in this process. It is interesting to step back and think about all of the cognitive activities that are done in seconds as we speak.
2. The book mentions that there is not much research on writing even though it is a very complicated process. I wonder why the research is focused on the processes before writing, like comprehension, etc. and we do not research the end product in our writings.
3. I will be careful not to make the speech errors in my classroom like the sound, morpheme, and word errors. It is important to establish common ground with your students to ensure that the students are able to comprehend what we are covering. I feel it is important in math to remember my thoughts when I first learn the information and relate to my students. Sometimes math teachers do not realize the complexities because they have been doing the concepts for years. It helps to tell the students common errors when learning the material so that they are aware of them as they practice. I also thought that the benefits of bilinguals were interesting. The critical period hypothesis states that it is easier for young children to learn a second language as opposed to an adult. Maybe this is partly because as an adult, we have our attention divided to several tasks compared to a child. I think that it is possible for an adult to master a new language and I think it would be a benefit if they visited a country that speaks the native language.
2. The book mentions that there is not much research on writing even though it is a very complicated process. I wonder why the research is focused on the processes before writing, like comprehension, etc. and we do not research the end product in our writings.
3. I will be careful not to make the speech errors in my classroom like the sound, morpheme, and word errors. It is important to establish common ground with your students to ensure that the students are able to comprehend what we are covering. I feel it is important in math to remember my thoughts when I first learn the information and relate to my students. Sometimes math teachers do not realize the complexities because they have been doing the concepts for years. It helps to tell the students common errors when learning the material so that they are aware of them as they practice. I also thought that the benefits of bilinguals were interesting. The critical period hypothesis states that it is easier for young children to learn a second language as opposed to an adult. Maybe this is partly because as an adult, we have our attention divided to several tasks compared to a child. I think that it is possible for an adult to master a new language and I think it would be a benefit if they visited a country that speaks the native language.
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Chapter 9 Reflection
1) I think that language ties in with just about everything else that we have learned in this course. I thought that the info on negative language ties in with the Pollyanna principle from earlier chapters. In order to communicate and learn through our working and long-term memory we need to be able to understand language and reading to be successful learners. I though that the top-down and bottom-up processes were similar to the whole-word (top-down) versus phonics (bottom-up)approach to learning how to read.
2) I wonder why the ACT test has several negative questions when it is a timed test? The book makes a point that these questions/statements take longer to comprehend. Are there educators out there that just use the whole-word approach without going through the separate sounds and letters first? This seems like it would be a struggle for kindergarten students if both approaches were not used.
3) I will be more careful in how I phrase my questions to be sure that I am using positives, the active voice, not nesting, and watching my ambiguities. I do not think that it is bad for kids to be exposed to this either though. They should be exposed to these in order to be aware of them when they are writing and communicating. If we failed as teachers to expose them to these, the students probably would not be successful communicators later on in life. Of course, we cannot be consistently ambiguous and we should try our best to stray away from these because there is a decrease in comprehension. We all learn from our experiences and I think that I am a better teacher from seeing both effective and non-effective ways to communicate.
2) I wonder why the ACT test has several negative questions when it is a timed test? The book makes a point that these questions/statements take longer to comprehend. Are there educators out there that just use the whole-word approach without going through the separate sounds and letters first? This seems like it would be a struggle for kindergarten students if both approaches were not used.
3) I will be more careful in how I phrase my questions to be sure that I am using positives, the active voice, not nesting, and watching my ambiguities. I do not think that it is bad for kids to be exposed to this either though. They should be exposed to these in order to be aware of them when they are writing and communicating. If we failed as teachers to expose them to these, the students probably would not be successful communicators later on in life. Of course, we cannot be consistently ambiguous and we should try our best to stray away from these because there is a decrease in comprehension. We all learn from our experiences and I think that I am a better teacher from seeing both effective and non-effective ways to communicate.
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