EDUC 400 Journal - Week Four:* When reading the book chapter, what attitudes and skills of a responsive teacher resonated with you? * What do you feel are the important aspects to consider when writing learning objectives? * What has been enlightening to you so far in this course?

The attitudes and skills that resonated most with me were to accept responsibility for learner success and to build awareness of what works for each learner. As a tutor, I already feel extremely responsible for each student that I give help to; if he or she didn't improve or at least learn something from our time together, I feel that I didn't do my job. Also, I think we should all take time to get to know our students' learning styles and try to incorporate that into our tutoring to make them feel comfortable and noticed so that they can learn.
I think that an educator should take learning styles, abilities, CSOs, the literature, and time into consideration when making learning objectives.
I feel that the most enlightening activity during this class has been the procedure to make learning objectives and the many factors one should take into consideration.

Though looking through the many CSOs for each subject is quite daunting, especially for social studies classes, it does make the many things to teacher seem more doable. In addition, I think that learning objectives should be made to hold the highest expectations for the students rather than to make objectives that can easily be met by all students.

How important are the curriculum standards and learning objectives to lesson plans? Is the required textbook an influence on your lessons? Is it alright to teach topics that do not fit into the CSOs simply to engage the students? What else should I take into consideration when making learning objectives?

Lessons Learned

I have learned so many lasting lessons about educating and the students I have helped within my PDS. Very recently I learned how important it is to be with classroom time management in order to assure there is no lost time. I first saw this when I was coordinating my technology assignment, and had difficulty with load time and finding the website. Because I had no additional assignment or back-up plan for my students, they became distracted and less willing to learn.

I have also learned to be unbiased among the students when grading or disciplining. It’s very easy to assume a student who typically causes problems is the culprit for the actions we as teachers do not catch or see. After learning the term “halo-effect,” this problem is an important habit to avoid. Being unbiased is extremely important in order to give students equal opportunities for achievement.

Lastly, I have noticed that as the year goes on, fewer students see me as the young person within the class and more like a second teacher who will be just as attentive to behavior problems. Though I see why this is a good change, part of me feels disappointed that my status as their “friend” has disappeared. As much as I would like all the students to like me, I have realized that sometimes I must sacrifice this in order to maintain a hold on behavior problem in the classroom.

Action Research

How has learning about inquiry and creating a 'wondering' influenced the way in which you think about what you see at your PDS? Your responses may include your thoughts about teaching, students, student learning, your own learning, or a combination of these. Make sure you consider your thoughts in light of your understanding of inquiry as a way to study your own practice, your students learning, and your own interests or 'passions' as a teacher.

I think creating wonderings and starting inquiry has caused me to understand that there are different ways to teach, and many different approaches to every lesson. I now realize that part of teaching is being a researcher and scientist; I must try to access new information and experiment with different lessons, technologies, and methods. The biggest influence I've felt is the idea that there is not just one way to do something in a classroom. After studying the students at my PDS, I have been able to study my inquiry first-hand. I'd like to investigate what methods work best for retention of content in history or geography, and in my PDS I have seen different methods and tried out some of my own. I have seen how technology, lecture, and visual aids can assist content retention. Overall, I believe that for the grade level in which basic geography is taught, stimulating visuals and pictures that create images in the students' minds so they can associate a word with the image may be the most effective approach. I'm very interested in the cycle of information from a lesson to the long term memory of a student, so I think that my inquiry will definitely have an effect on how I teach. Ultimately, I care most about students leaving the classroom and retaining the information over a long period of time. Being a the PDS only once a week with the same classes definitely allows me to see what the each student retains and how to tutor them to maximize their content retention.

Instructional Technology Integration

Technology Use vs. Technology Integration

I think that though technology use and technology integration both utilize some sort of technology, they do so in very different ways. Technology use implies the standard use of technology for its own sake, not for any specific purpose. Technology integration involves incorporating the use of technology into a lesson to enhance it. Technology integration encourages further understanding of technology usage and can also enhance a student's understanding of a lesson in a more modern way.
In many of my geography classes we have utilized the GoogleEarth technology to better understand locations and coordinates, but in a much different way than simply looking at a map. This type of technology integration is beneficial for any age of geography student.

Action Research Wonderings

This section of my blog shares my wonderings from my classroom experience.