I will refrain from linking the videos we watched in class regarding copyright law, suffice it to say that they were horrendous, painful to watch.
I understand that copyright is and important thing, and that people deserve to make money from the work they do, but I find it hard to take it seriously. I generally rest easy in the fact that good people, who do not have malicious intent to do not face punishment for copyright violation.
If the laws were less confusing, it would be easier to be mindful of them. For example, you can show your class a video of a program you taped from television, but only if it's less than a month old. Now come on, if it's a good video, and the class learns from it, why can't I show it again next year? The truth is, I will.
I have no intention of stealing anyone's work, or distributing materials that I know I should not, but I do intend to continue with the "teacher's policy" of beg, borrow, and steal (but cite). I think the TEACH Act does a decent job of placing protections for teacher's to use material if they are just trying to help kids learn. Overall, I'm not to concerned, but if I have doubts about the legality of my use, I will reference the TEACH Act.
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Assessment
Most people are familiar with the same old routine that takes place in too many math classrooms. You lecture on a section, students do worksheets on the section, students turn in homework from the problems at the end of the section, you repeat for all the sections in the chapter, at the end of the chapter you give the chapter test that came with the book, and deal out grades which are more or less a bell curve. This unitary instruction works well for some students, but for most it is miserably deficient- in fact it is the reason why so many people openly say "I hate math." The effective math classroom needs to incorporate a variety of differentiated learning activities, and a variety of assessments. High quality assessment occurs at all phases of learning- exploration, concept development, and concept application. It is also valid and fair. This means that the assessment provides a true picture of student mastery, and students are not punished for cultural or linguistic differences, or other qualities which have no impact on mastery.
Sunday, June 6, 2010
Student Video Projects
Students in this video are working in small groups to produce an educational video regarding environmental health. The teachers are collaborating across contents, and the technology facilitates authenticity for the students. Students have an opportunity to apply their newly acquired powers of persuasion to interesting extensions of health class. The opportunity to take charge of their learning and explore the world while creating something personal and meaningful is wonderful. I am very impressed by this lesson, especially the cross-content collaboration. I would like to see more of this in secondary education. I think students should be encouraged to turn in lab reports in English class, or write about the history of mathematics.
Friday, June 4, 2010
Learning Styles
In this video Daniel Willingham "debunks" the theory of learning styles. First of all, this video is incredibly annoying to watch. First, Daniel's narration is so quiet that I had to lean with my head next to my speakers with the volume all the way up just to understand, and his voice is so boring that I could hardly pay attention. Daniel should hire someone with a sense of inflection to read his narrated scripts. Secondly, seeing Daniel sitting in front of a stack of library books, with enormous bags under his eyes was severely distracting. That part should definitely be cut out, and the video should focus on "making meaning" of the content.
That said, the conclusion of the video is certainly correct: Good teaching is good teaching. Whether you believe in learning styles or not, as teachers and learners we intuitively know that people learn differently. We have all had the experience of struggling with a concept until suddenly, someone presents us with something that allows us to approach the material in a different way, and, EUREKA! we've got it! We also see this in our students, as in the example of the structure of the atom being analogous to the structure of the solar system. SO in the end, learning styles or lack there of is nothing but psycho-babble. Good teaching is good teaching, and we need to differentiate instruction such that students can approach content from various angles, and construct understanding from an authentic experience.
My portfolio has some examples of differentiated instruction, including think-tac-toe, and 20 points assignments which I have created, and will work well for diverse learners and mixed ability classrooms.
That said, the conclusion of the video is certainly correct: Good teaching is good teaching. Whether you believe in learning styles or not, as teachers and learners we intuitively know that people learn differently. We have all had the experience of struggling with a concept until suddenly, someone presents us with something that allows us to approach the material in a different way, and, EUREKA! we've got it! We also see this in our students, as in the example of the structure of the atom being analogous to the structure of the solar system. SO in the end, learning styles or lack there of is nothing but psycho-babble. Good teaching is good teaching, and we need to differentiate instruction such that students can approach content from various angles, and construct understanding from an authentic experience.
My portfolio has some examples of differentiated instruction, including think-tac-toe, and 20 points assignments which I have created, and will work well for diverse learners and mixed ability classrooms.
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Embracing Technology
This video is a message about the changing needs of college students. According to the video, students are highly involved in pursuits which incorporate technology. Since there are only 24 hours in a day, their increasing involvement with technology means that they must attempt to multi-task, and also decrease their involvement with other things. (Research indicates that it is impossible to multi-task. The human brain can attend to one item at a time. But people still try to do it!) Overall, students are spending more time with immediate, short and transient media, (facebook, email, etc.) and less time with traditional, expensive, time consuming, permanent media (textbooks, writing essays, etc.) The problem is that the instructional techniques of the university are stuck in the past. Personally, I wish I had kept track of how many hundreds of dollars I have wasted on textbooks which are of no use to me. There is very little information that is available in a textbook but not available on the web (for FREE!) The problem is that most professors teach the same way they learned. The video is telling us that in order to be prepared to work and live in the world of tomorrow, college students need an education that is relevant to the world of today.
This video contains a similar message about K-12 education. Here, students are depicted languishing in outdated classrooms, where teachers fail to capitalize on the engaging activities surrounding them. Technology such as blogging gives learners an opportunity to create something and share their thoughts, ideas and experiences with the world. In the United States, it is no longer enough to sit still and passively receive information. We are expected to network, interact, create and communicate. Students need to be engaged in activities which support the demands they will face. The support I am talking (blogging, digital storytelling, etc.) about is easily available at very little cost, but it is simply not being implemented because people fear change and teachers are people.
The common message of these two videos is that education institutions need to catch up with modern culture. Certainly, all sociological institutions are slow to change, and this is a good thing- it provides stability. But, because education is not embracing the interactive trends of our technological age, students are bored and time is wasted.
This video contains a similar message about K-12 education. Here, students are depicted languishing in outdated classrooms, where teachers fail to capitalize on the engaging activities surrounding them. Technology such as blogging gives learners an opportunity to create something and share their thoughts, ideas and experiences with the world. In the United States, it is no longer enough to sit still and passively receive information. We are expected to network, interact, create and communicate. Students need to be engaged in activities which support the demands they will face. The support I am talking (blogging, digital storytelling, etc.) about is easily available at very little cost, but it is simply not being implemented because people fear change and teachers are people.
The common message of these two videos is that education institutions need to catch up with modern culture. Certainly, all sociological institutions are slow to change, and this is a good thing- it provides stability. But, because education is not embracing the interactive trends of our technological age, students are bored and time is wasted.
Friday, May 21, 2010
Resource room activity
The fourth grade students in this video are quite a bit younger than the students I will be working with.
I like the opening activity in which the students generate words associated with the four seasons. This is usually a good "warm-up" strategy to engage prior knowledge. The teacher's incorporation of music was interesting: not something I would have thought of, and probably not something I would feel comfortable implementing, but the students seem to appreciate it and it is a good way to accomodate one of Gardiner's multiple intelligences.
The KWL is one of my favorite tools for organizing ideas. I use it often in my own lessons, and I was happy to see it used here.
It seemed that the students were doing a lot of paper and pencil coloring and plotting. I would suggest that the teacher try to recreate this using technology. She could have a digital image of the map of Missouri, which the students could divide into regions, color, and easily change/redo if necessary.
The weather portion of this lesson was either underdone or underrepresented in the video. The students should have been given access to the website and allowed to click around and explore, rather than just writing down what the teacher found. Also, I would like to know more about how they used Microsoft Excel to manipulate and represent their weather data.
My final comment is on the teacher's statement that the earth rocks back and forth as it revolves around the sun. I do not believe this to be accurate. I think the earth is tilted on its axis such that different parts of the earth are closer to the sun at different phases of the yearly revolution: this causes the seasons. There is some "wobbling" of the earth on its axis, (like a top). This motion is called "precession" it is the reason that the stars appear to be in different locations over the course of hundreds of years. But I think the teacher in this video was trying say that the "rocking" of the earth, back and forth on its axis is the cause of the seasons. Giving the students such a grand misconception of the motion of the earth is a great injustice and it really irritates me.
I like the opening activity in which the students generate words associated with the four seasons. This is usually a good "warm-up" strategy to engage prior knowledge. The teacher's incorporation of music was interesting: not something I would have thought of, and probably not something I would feel comfortable implementing, but the students seem to appreciate it and it is a good way to accomodate one of Gardiner's multiple intelligences.
The KWL is one of my favorite tools for organizing ideas. I use it often in my own lessons, and I was happy to see it used here.
It seemed that the students were doing a lot of paper and pencil coloring and plotting. I would suggest that the teacher try to recreate this using technology. She could have a digital image of the map of Missouri, which the students could divide into regions, color, and easily change/redo if necessary.
The weather portion of this lesson was either underdone or underrepresented in the video. The students should have been given access to the website and allowed to click around and explore, rather than just writing down what the teacher found. Also, I would like to know more about how they used Microsoft Excel to manipulate and represent their weather data.
My final comment is on the teacher's statement that the earth rocks back and forth as it revolves around the sun. I do not believe this to be accurate. I think the earth is tilted on its axis such that different parts of the earth are closer to the sun at different phases of the yearly revolution: this causes the seasons. There is some "wobbling" of the earth on its axis, (like a top). This motion is called "precession" it is the reason that the stars appear to be in different locations over the course of hundreds of years. But I think the teacher in this video was trying say that the "rocking" of the earth, back and forth on its axis is the cause of the seasons. Giving the students such a grand misconception of the motion of the earth is a great injustice and it really irritates me.
Application software
The business class depicted in this video is utilizing a simulation software called Capitalism Plus. The software allows students to manipulate the economic forces on a virtual product and see the results. For example, students are able to adjust the price of a given hypothetical product, shampoo for example, and the software outputs adjusted data for supply, demand, revenue, etc. In this way, the students are able to see the effects of market forces in a visual and interactive way. Capitalism Plus is a nice way for students to interact with the class content, but the greatest strength of this lesson is the teacher's integration of other technologies to increase the lesson's authenticity and make connections across contents.
As the students work in Capitalism Plus daily, they record data from their activities in Microsoft Excel. They must then create visual representations of the data using the graphing technologies embedded in Excel. The graphs are transferred to a simulated corporate web page, which each student creates and maintains using another Microsoft program. The web page must also include daily press releases and information for stockholders (also created by the students.) The daily work must incorporate three words from a vocabulary list, and students have an opportunity to practice effective writing and communication. The students are also involved in mathematics through their data collection and analysis.
I would suggest that the school take advantage of these cross curricular activities. A math teacher might team up with this business teacher to double dip some of the activities into a statistics unit, and an English teacher might capitalize on the students written products.
As the students work in Capitalism Plus daily, they record data from their activities in Microsoft Excel. They must then create visual representations of the data using the graphing technologies embedded in Excel. The graphs are transferred to a simulated corporate web page, which each student creates and maintains using another Microsoft program. The web page must also include daily press releases and information for stockholders (also created by the students.) The daily work must incorporate three words from a vocabulary list, and students have an opportunity to practice effective writing and communication. The students are also involved in mathematics through their data collection and analysis.
I would suggest that the school take advantage of these cross curricular activities. A math teacher might team up with this business teacher to double dip some of the activities into a statistics unit, and an English teacher might capitalize on the students written products.
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