Do all students have a capacity to learn? Well, this is the loaded question of education isn't it? I believe that all students have the capacity to learn. I do not know to what degree all student's can learn, but I know that they certainly CAN learn.
What shapes this capacity?
Now that I have told you that I am certain that all students learn, the big huge question is "what shapes this capacity?" This is huge. Every thing shapes this capacity. Parental attitude, student attitude, teacher attitude, life experiences, and basic needs. I can remember taking a class, but honostly I cannot remember which one, that said no learning can take place until a student's basic needs are met. This is what I believe is one of the biggest factors of learning. When a student goes home, and has no food, possibly no parent available, maybe or maybe not electricity or clothing, then those needs must first be met and become a priority in that child's life above anything else. That is when we become such an important part of that child's life and such a huge determining factor in their capacity to learn. We have to know our students, and I mean really know our students, in order to have the ability to positively shape their capacity to learn. We have to do our best to understand the circumstances that each child comes from before we can possibly help them. Not only do we have to help them, but we may also have to work to give those who have parents that may have such huge burdens in life, that education takes a back seat to any of it, a positive feeling about school. We have to make sure there is a bridge of communication between home and school, and not only do the students trust us, but the parents do as well. I think it is our job to try and reach each student and make sure that they do reach their full potential, whatever that may be. I do not believe that each child has the same potential. This may be a politically incorrect statement, but I think it is a true statement. I do not believe it is in anyway an excuse to not try equally with each individual, however, the word cannot be soley made up of rocket scientist, or neuro surgeons. It takes all types. The important part is, that we give them the tools to be the best they can be and to reach their full potential. This is why for the next task I am very interested in Domain 2: The Classroom Environment.
How do these assumptions about learning shape our instruction?
Monday, September 28, 2009
Monday, September 21, 2009
Task 2
What is the purpose of curriculum and what role do we have as teachers in this purpose?
Wow, this is such a loaded question that I don't know exactly where to start. What are our roles, or what should they be? I believe the purpose of curriculum is to keep us on track for what our students need to know. But as Dr. Clarke responded in my previous blog, it all boils down to teaching to the test. That is where I feel that curriculum is actually leaving us. With our pacing guides and our curriculum guides, our program of the year, new paper work, teach this, teach that, lets see what this test says about how our kids will score on the test... It just goes on and on and I think as teachers we become kind of like a robot in our own classroom.
When I first started teaching, my father told me the best advice I think that I have ever heard in education. He said, "Learning is not memorizing, it is understanding how to find information when you need it." I have tried to live by this in my classroom, but with all the guidelines, it really makes it tough. I feel like I am just skimming the top of everything, and then ...time to move on to the next subject. I honestly feel that curriculum has it's place, but it gets lost in the process. It should be just that, a guide, but it becomes more like a bible. In 2nd grade, I feel my job is to teach students to read, comprehend, and, not just learn to read, but learn to enjoy reading. I also feel that I need to give them a really good understanding of numbers, and number sense. It all gets so garbled. Because of our maps and guides, you can walk down the hallways in our school, and see that kindergarden, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd grades are all teaching the same content. Now...If we really covered content the way it should be covered, we would not be reteaching everything from year to year. Things would be completely covered and understood before you move on to another subject. Then when you walk down the hall, you would see education becoming spiral. Using what we have previously learned, to move on to something else. That would give us time to teach children to use their brains. We have become this machine like industry instead of an institution of learning. I know that we have district walk through visits in our building and all the others in the county, and they come in and look for objectives, student work, etc. We train the students to be able to recite objectives because that is what the district wants. While I do my best to try and really reach each student, there are times that I feel like the guidelines are so strict, I could easily be replaced by a robot.
We had a PD this summer about going deeper into subjects, making students responsible for their learning, slowing down and really understanding and mastering the content that we are teaching them. I asked if that meant we could slow down and not worry so much about the pacing guide, and teach the students what they needed to learn and really make sure they had mastered the content. The response was that we still had to cover the pacing guide. HOW CAN YOU SLOW DOWN AND SPEED UP AT THE SAME TIME? I love teaching, don't get me wrong, but thinking about this can make you feel as if you are beating your head against a brick wall on a daily basis. I feel like everyone's intentions are good, but those who make the rules and come up with the "flavor of the month program" have sometimes been out of the classroom so long that nothing adds up or makes sense.
Wow, this is such a loaded question that I don't know exactly where to start. What are our roles, or what should they be? I believe the purpose of curriculum is to keep us on track for what our students need to know. But as Dr. Clarke responded in my previous blog, it all boils down to teaching to the test. That is where I feel that curriculum is actually leaving us. With our pacing guides and our curriculum guides, our program of the year, new paper work, teach this, teach that, lets see what this test says about how our kids will score on the test... It just goes on and on and I think as teachers we become kind of like a robot in our own classroom.
When I first started teaching, my father told me the best advice I think that I have ever heard in education. He said, "Learning is not memorizing, it is understanding how to find information when you need it." I have tried to live by this in my classroom, but with all the guidelines, it really makes it tough. I feel like I am just skimming the top of everything, and then ...time to move on to the next subject. I honestly feel that curriculum has it's place, but it gets lost in the process. It should be just that, a guide, but it becomes more like a bible. In 2nd grade, I feel my job is to teach students to read, comprehend, and, not just learn to read, but learn to enjoy reading. I also feel that I need to give them a really good understanding of numbers, and number sense. It all gets so garbled. Because of our maps and guides, you can walk down the hallways in our school, and see that kindergarden, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd grades are all teaching the same content. Now...If we really covered content the way it should be covered, we would not be reteaching everything from year to year. Things would be completely covered and understood before you move on to another subject. Then when you walk down the hall, you would see education becoming spiral. Using what we have previously learned, to move on to something else. That would give us time to teach children to use their brains. We have become this machine like industry instead of an institution of learning. I know that we have district walk through visits in our building and all the others in the county, and they come in and look for objectives, student work, etc. We train the students to be able to recite objectives because that is what the district wants. While I do my best to try and really reach each student, there are times that I feel like the guidelines are so strict, I could easily be replaced by a robot.
We had a PD this summer about going deeper into subjects, making students responsible for their learning, slowing down and really understanding and mastering the content that we are teaching them. I asked if that meant we could slow down and not worry so much about the pacing guide, and teach the students what they needed to learn and really make sure they had mastered the content. The response was that we still had to cover the pacing guide. HOW CAN YOU SLOW DOWN AND SPEED UP AT THE SAME TIME? I love teaching, don't get me wrong, but thinking about this can make you feel as if you are beating your head against a brick wall on a daily basis. I feel like everyone's intentions are good, but those who make the rules and come up with the "flavor of the month program" have sometimes been out of the classroom so long that nothing adds up or makes sense.
Monday, September 14, 2009
Curriculum Design-Task 1
I am not sure that any one of the curriculum ideas are a "stand alone" fix. I believe that all of the ideas would be best put to use buy using them all together and integrating them with each other as much as possible.
Wraga believes in having a common goal for all students. We are really working towards that goal this year in my school with our writing workshops. This summer we spent a lot of time in PD learning how kids respond to how they are assessed in writing. One teacher may grade the content, and another may grade the grammar. We needed to come together as a district and decide how we would assess student writing. If the assignment calls for them to tell as much as they know about phases of the moon, and they can convey that information perfectly, then we are striving as a district to not take off for punctuation and capitilization. The student's goal is to master the phases of the moon, and if they meet that goal, they begin to feel defeated when they could possibly fail the paper due to technical errors. We have started a writing workshop where we are trying to learn to work on this very thing; just grading them on what they are asked to do. We are implementing mini lessons to work on the common grammatical errors we see in their writing that won't lower their score on curriculum. I think this is going to be very successful.
Wiggins idea is to make students responsible for their learning and getting into the deeper questioning. Our district is working on this two fold. First we have started a program called ThoughtfulEd. This program is supposed to give students questions to discuss that lead to higher learning, instead of always using those depth of knowledge 1 and 2 questions that are so easy to get stuck using. We are also working on getting our students to self assess their work. This helps them see how they can improve, gives them the tools to do it, and takes the responsibility off the teacher, and puts it on the student where it should be. We are only beginning the self assessment, and I have already seen results with students as young as 7. They are beginning to really understand what they will be graded on, and how they will be graded. They are beginning to take responsibility for getting that "4" on the open response, and if they don't get it, they are beginning to understand how they can improve to get it next time. I believe that once the student takes an interest in their own education, 90 percent of the battle is won.
The converstaional, connected curriculum that Applebee talks about is one that I believe we are attempting in the ThoughtfulEd program I discussed earlier. Getting them to go deeper, and find the connections to real life. If they can find a meaning for what they are learning in life, they are much more likely to make a deep connection and a true understanding. I believe this one might be the most difficult to accomplish. Maybe not with the proper training, but I don't feel I know quite enough about how to implement this type of curriculum without more training, other than with the program I have already spoke about. I am also unsure how to keep them on topic.
I think anytime that we can use multiple ideas in different ways to bring learning to a deeper level and have students make that connection, we hit a home run. I do believe that there are pieces of all of these ideas in my classsroom, and I owe that to my district for always being on the lookout for things that will make our students the best that they can be.
Wraga believes in having a common goal for all students. We are really working towards that goal this year in my school with our writing workshops. This summer we spent a lot of time in PD learning how kids respond to how they are assessed in writing. One teacher may grade the content, and another may grade the grammar. We needed to come together as a district and decide how we would assess student writing. If the assignment calls for them to tell as much as they know about phases of the moon, and they can convey that information perfectly, then we are striving as a district to not take off for punctuation and capitilization. The student's goal is to master the phases of the moon, and if they meet that goal, they begin to feel defeated when they could possibly fail the paper due to technical errors. We have started a writing workshop where we are trying to learn to work on this very thing; just grading them on what they are asked to do. We are implementing mini lessons to work on the common grammatical errors we see in their writing that won't lower their score on curriculum. I think this is going to be very successful.
Wiggins idea is to make students responsible for their learning and getting into the deeper questioning. Our district is working on this two fold. First we have started a program called ThoughtfulEd. This program is supposed to give students questions to discuss that lead to higher learning, instead of always using those depth of knowledge 1 and 2 questions that are so easy to get stuck using. We are also working on getting our students to self assess their work. This helps them see how they can improve, gives them the tools to do it, and takes the responsibility off the teacher, and puts it on the student where it should be. We are only beginning the self assessment, and I have already seen results with students as young as 7. They are beginning to really understand what they will be graded on, and how they will be graded. They are beginning to take responsibility for getting that "4" on the open response, and if they don't get it, they are beginning to understand how they can improve to get it next time. I believe that once the student takes an interest in their own education, 90 percent of the battle is won.
The converstaional, connected curriculum that Applebee talks about is one that I believe we are attempting in the ThoughtfulEd program I discussed earlier. Getting them to go deeper, and find the connections to real life. If they can find a meaning for what they are learning in life, they are much more likely to make a deep connection and a true understanding. I believe this one might be the most difficult to accomplish. Maybe not with the proper training, but I don't feel I know quite enough about how to implement this type of curriculum without more training, other than with the program I have already spoke about. I am also unsure how to keep them on topic.
I think anytime that we can use multiple ideas in different ways to bring learning to a deeper level and have students make that connection, we hit a home run. I do believe that there are pieces of all of these ideas in my classsroom, and I owe that to my district for always being on the lookout for things that will make our students the best that they can be.
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