Recently, in my ED 307 class, we did a project called Partnering Pedagogies- An Investigation. This whole project dealt with different ways to help students learn. We had to create a multimedia PowerPoint presentation and then narrate the presentation and upload it using screen cast. I was assigned the topic of Action Learning. Action learning is a method that requires good critical thinking and problem solving skills. It requires students to look and try to find the answer for themselves before they ask for help finding the answer. The students go through a four step process. Those steps are plan, act, reflect, and learn. This process repeats over and over until they come up with a solution to the problem.
I really enjoyed doing this project because it required me to look deeper into this methodology. I know that this is something that I will for sure use in my classroom in the future as well as some of the other methodologies that I learned about in this class.
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This semester, we read the book "Teaching Digital Natives: Partnering For Real Learning" by Marc Prensky. I really liked the approach that he took with this book. He gave me many new strategies and tools to use in my future classroom that go along with the technology that we have available to us today. Students now a days also want some curriculum that relates to them and what they have gone through in their lifetime. I completely understand that. I love history class but sometimes it can be really hard to relate to or get through the reading because you get bored and there is nothing to hold your attention. I had a teacher in high school who would always show us movies to go along with the chapter that we were studying. I learned so much from that class because he used a way that was interesting instead of us just reading through the chapter and taking a test. One of my favorite movies that he ever showed us was Pearl Harbor. I remember that movie sucked me in and made me feel like I was really there and because of that, I remembered all of the tiny details that were necessary to pass the text. It is methods like this that Prensky talks about in his text.
I think it is important to remember that education is ever changing. We have more technology available to us today than we did yesterday and tomorrow we will have even more technology. It is up to us as teachers to take advantage of this technology and use it to the best of our teaching abilities. It is also important to constantly have an open mind. Sometimes, a child might know more about the technology than you do and that is okay. Have them help! Sometimes, students learn best from their peers. This is another method that Prensky talks about in his text. Children learn a lot from things like grand conversations and open discussions especially when they feel safe and comfortable in the environment. Overall, I really liked reading this book. Like I said earlier, it taught me a lot of methods and strategies that I will be able to use in my future classroom. If you are a teacher or planning on becoming a teacher at some point, then I highly suggest that you read this book! So I will be completely honest, I am still a little lost as to what constructivism is. From what I have read, and the research that I have done, constructivism is a theory that was primarily founded by John Dewey. The other three that collaborated with him to work on this theory were Bruner, Piaget, and Vygotsky. From what I understand, this theory says that learners or students construct knowledge rather than simply, passively taking in information.
One of the main points of this theory is that learning is an active process. This means that children need to be engaged in the classroom rather than just simply sitting there and absorbing the information. They need to be able to make real world connections in order for them to actually learn something. If children just sit there and absorb the information like a sponge, then they will never truly learn anything. I really like this theory even though it is a little complicated. I agree that learning is an active process. Sometimes I find myself sitting in class day dreaming because I am not engaged or the lesson is simply boring. All teachers need to be able to engage their students in the lesson and keep them interested so that they will be able to learn something. Something as simple as calling on students to answer questions or do things on the board or have them demonstrate something to the class can keep all students entertained, engaged, and not bored. " Too often, we give children answers to remember rather than problems to solve."- Roger Lewin I'll be honest. When I first read the words "Flipped Classroom", I had no clue what the lesson was going to be about. I have been working on the school work for this class for the last couple of hours and part of that work included watching a video by TED Talks from the guy who created Kahn Academy. I think it was really cool to hear the story about how Kahn got started and about how many people they are currently helping. I will link the video below if you would like to watch it. After reading the first part of this blog, you might also be wondering what exactly a flipped classroom is and how effective it is.
A flipped classroom is essentially a classroom where the students watch a video lecture from home, and then do the required homework in class with the teacher there to help. This method of teaching really gets away from the whole "one size fits all" lecture type class. It allows children to work at their own pace and take their time on concepts that they don't fully understand just from watching the lecture. If they need help on a certain topic, then the teacher can find a student that has already mastered that particular concept and have them tutor the student that is stuck. If that doesn't help, then the teacher can really get involved and help them understand. This allows peer to peer contact and communication. It allows students to build relationships with each other and in a since, it "humanizes" the classroom. It also allows the students to have more "teacher time" to ask questions and get answers instead of the teacher just constantly giving a lecture and then grading papers. I really like this method of teaching. I myself have done the "watch the lecture from home and do the homework in class" thing and it really helped me. I was able to work at my own pace in subjects that I had a harder time with. I wasn't allowed to start doing that until I got into college though. If you talk to me, you will know that math is not my strong suit. The struggle really started for me in fourth grade and I had to work extra hard to understand the concepts. I had to go to tutoring and I had to stay after school multiple times. I was finally able to get caught up but I was super embarrassed to be going to tutoring when the rest of my class was doing so well. The reason I wasn't grasping the concepts was because the teacher was moving too fast for me to keep up and I fell behind. I got off track again in seventh grade when the teacher started using football examples to teach math (I already didn't understand football and then he added math to it). I pretty much stayed behind for the rest of my grade school time. My first year in college, I made all A's (I had never made all A's in my life) because I was able to work at my own pace and work until I fully understood the concepts. I do plan on using this method some in my classroom just because I know how much it helped me personally however, I will not be using it all the time. I do think it would be a good thing to use for teaching math to my students seeing as though math is a tough subject. Science, I plan on using experiments and hands on learning as much as possible and Social Studies, I plan on taking virtual field trips and maybe even a few actual field trips. I haven't quite thought about how I am going to teach English yet but that is my next plan. If you have any questions about how to go about a flipped classroom or just want to know more, I highly encourage you to look up some stats on Google and some videos on YouTube. They will be able to teach you a whole lot! Watch the TED Talk from the creator of Kahn Academy here! "I believe that education is all about being excited about something. Seeing passion and enthusiasm helps push an educational message." - Steve Irwin This week in my ED 307 class, the topic was 21st century skills. When I think of the 21st century, I automatically think of technology like the IPad or IPhone and skills associated with something of that sort but it was actually the opposite of what I was expecting. It was discussed how now, in order to get a job, there are different types of skills required than just knowing "reading" or "math" or "science" or "english". As a matter of fact, it goes much deeper than that. Now you have to know how to think critically, solve problems, synthesize information, have good research skills, have a good imagination and creativity and much, much more. When you think about it, it can almost seem overwhelming. This is where we come in as teachers and educators. Children need to be taught these skills from the time they can talk so that they are prepared for life when they graduate. As a teacher, you should already have a majority of these skills (especially the creativity and imagination skills, they are especially handy in this field). I plan on using these skills in my classroom to create an environment that is fun and happy but is also very educational and allows me to assist children as they learn these skills. One of the ideas that came to mind when thinking of ways to incorporate this information into my classroom is having an art time within my class. When I was younger, I loved drawing and coloring but as I got older and on into middle school, they didn't allow us to use our creativity in those respects so I eventually lost that talent. This art time will allow my kids the time they need to be creative and it will also allow them to manifest their imagination. Another idea that came to mind was for them to have a "writing time" outside of what is required for the curriculum. Essentially, they would have a notebook that they treat as a journal and they would be allowed to add whatever they wanted to it day by day whether that be some type or art work or a story that they want to write. Sometimes I would give them a prompt to encourage their critical thinking skills. I'm thinking every other day would be good for giving them a critical thinking writing prompt. This would allow them to see how much they grow over the year in their writing skills and it would allow me to see what the children like to do most so that I can try to incorporate that into the curriculum. Overall, I think this was a good thing to think about. I hadn't thought very much about how much the skill requirements had changed since technology has become huge. Going forward, I plan to keep these skills in my mind while lesson planning and coming up with activities for different lessons. "Investing in education and providing 21st century skills for students are fundamental components to the nation's continued growth and prosperity." - Craig Barrett |
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April 2021
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