Month: April 2019

Great topic this week with teaching challenging subjects. My biggest takeaways are as follows:

• Know your school, environment and students – It will be imperative that I am aware of polices and procedures for everything involved with teaching but especially in the area of challenging subjects. I have seen many teachers be fired or at least petitions created to have the teacher fired over inappropriate lessons, activities, and speech when it come to topics that can easily offend someone. It will be important to learn the background of each of my students so I can be sensitive to their feelings and cultures.
• It’s always nice to know that your not the only one with hesitations about difficult topics. While I knew already that I wouldn’t be the only one who has reservations, it was get to see what reservations my peers have as well. Some are the same and some are different. I think discussing some of them together in our small groups helped many of us think of these topics in different ways which helps.
• Regardless of any best practices sheets or information I can read about to prepare for such difficult topics, it all comes down to speaking the truth!! The truth will set you free!!

One thing that wasn’t discussed as I look back on the agenda was fake news. I wonder how one should go about addressing fake news? My guess would be seek out the truth by finding multiple, reliable sources.

So tonight I have realized that what we have been doing with the strategies in class have a direct link to the literature circles. Obviously, I knew the activities we have been doing each week were tied into the reading of the book, but now I see how I would be able to use the literature circles as a start to different units. Reading the book in the literature circle builds on the background knowledge for each group. Where I would go different, is to then split the class up into different groups so that each group has one person from each of the books to complete activities going further so that one person could lead the group during that weeks lessons. For example, I could select 4 or 5 biographies for students to complete the literature circle with and focus the plans for each week around each book just like we have done in class. And with each week, I could figure out how to use each book/topic across content to keep the students engaged while they continue to learn about each person (and other content).  I feel like I should have picked up this sooner but I guess its better late than never.

The question about how learning the way we are in class versus how we learned in school seemed to be unanimous. I know there we answers given comparing the two but I think the biggest way to compare the two would be summed up easily with what Lynn said about self-direct teaching. Tonight is the first time I have heard that term used and I feel like it should be used more across the classes here at UR. I believe that one of the most important things I will do as a teacher is to be more of a guide that allows the students to learn as oppose to a person who gives the information to learn from. Making the learning engaging and giving the students some of (if not most of) ownership of their learning will be very beneficial in their success.

I was not a fan of the 4 reads activity. I felt like it was difficult for me to complete the tasks for some reason. I’m not sure if it had to do with the fact that we did it in groups and I was afraid that I was going to have something different from the group and was just too focused on that. Or maybe I was just thinking too hard but I will still be open to trying something like this. I think it is good to look at a document through different lenses in order to get all you can out of the document.

Once again, working on and finishing the lesson plan was helpful. It was a nice surprise to have few minutes to begin work on the bio lesson plan. I feel like I should be more comfortable when completing the bio lesson plan.

I feel that I was not as comfortable with the presentation as I have been in the past. Even though I always get a little nervous when presenting in front of my peers, the more you do it, the more comfortable you get with it and I feel like my last presentation went really well. It wasn’t because I waited to the last minute (working with a partner forces you to get it done sooner then later) but I think I should have read through it one more time and read it out loud to be a little more prepared. I will try to do this next time so I am a bit more comfortable.

I’m not sure if I want to work with a partner on the virtual filed trip or not. On one hand, you have someone to help with all the information and planning. On the other, you have to depend on them to help get the work done and compromise on what your going to do. I need to make a decision on this soon either way so I can get started on it. I think I am leaning on doing it myself but I might ask a few classmates what they are thinking and go from there.

The BBK activity is one of my favorites so far. I feel like being consistent in my teaching will be one of the keys to my students success and if I am able to use a strategy like this to always introduce new topics to my students, they will know the process and be able to become masters at it. However, I wonder if using the same strategy ALL the time would be beneficial or detrimental to students. If there are students that do not like the style of the BBK, would they be engaged and learn the material if that is all I use? Maybe it might be best to find three or four powerful ways to build that background knowledge so they could have a little variety but still be somewhat consistent in only using a few techniques.

I like that you guys changed the closing activity this week, however, I’m not so sure I could use that in lower elementary. I would be afraid that some of the boys might get a little carried away and someone might get hurt. Have either of you used this activity in elementary? How did it go?