Mentoring

At my PDS my mentor teacher has been very helpful and is always available. He has given me his personal cell phone number so I can get ahold of him whenever need be. I have benefited greatly from my mentor teacher because I can a chance not only to teach a lot but see him teach. I have learned a lot by watching my mentor teacher teach becasue he has a very good control of his classroom. I have a chance in my 2nd period class to talk to my teacher every day about what I have done well in the classroom and what areas I need to improve on. My teacher has also made me create stronger lesson plans by me submitting them to him a few days ahead of time. This gives him a chance to review my lesson and ask me questions about it. Sometimes offers advice on the lesson and makes changes to what he thinks will work best with his students.

Wiki

Creating the a wiki for our PDS was a great assignment, and I learned a lot. This was my first time creating a wiki so I had to learn everything. It was fairly easy to pick up and the tools on the site were easy to find. I realized after completing the wiki page that, wikis can be used in the classroom. For example I could have each student or groups of students create a website on a historical figure of their choosing. The site is easy enough to where a teacher would not have to spend a whole period explaining how it works. Another thing I liked about the site was how easy it was to add videos or pictures. My favorite part of my blog is the pictures and I wish we could have added a video of members in our group but we did not have enough time.

Wikis do not have to just be limited to in the classroom, they can be a great way to share information with other teachers. For example the principal could create a wiki page with all kinds of links and important school information. This would make it easier on the teachers because it would be one site they can easily access any of the school's info or what is going on in the school on a daily basis.

One part of our wiki that I enjoy is the town and school's history. This part is very important because most of this information I was unaware of before completing this assignment. Another part of our wiki I liked that I'm not sure a lot of other groups did was how we put links to every page at the bottom of every page. This makes it easier for the view to jump between pages.

Education 312 Post #3

Differentiated Instruction and Understanding by Design can be integrated in many ways for effective teaching. Differentiated instruction involves processing construction and developing new teaching materials and ideas. A teacher can use different methods to help all the students within the classroom learn effectively. Understanding by Design is a teacher teaching students making sure they understand the topic. An example of this is backward design. I think that when doing this each classroom should have high expectations for all the students and should lay out essential questions at the beginning of the lesson that need to be answered by the end.

Single planning lesson is a lesson plan that a teacher uses when a lesson differs from the unit they are discussing. For example when introducing a new topic after an exam a teacher can use a single planning lesson before the "unit" lesson to introduce the new topic. Unit and curriculum planning are lessons that are planned over a long time period. Each unit should have certain goals that the students should reach by the end of the lesson. This can be tested by assessments such as test or projects.

What are so different ways I can use differentiated instruction besides the ways mentioned above?

Which do you feel is more effective single planning lesson or Unit and curriculum planning lessons? and Why?

Education 312 Post #2

This Monday I had to give a 20 to 30 minute lecture on the War of 1812. Even though there was a lot of information about the war I had to find ways to get the class involved in the lecture. The first thing I did was I put written question into my lesson plan. These questions were meant to make the students argue with each other. For instance Who won the War of 1812? This question sparked a lot of discussion because it is sort of unclear who actually won the war. Most American's assume that the United States won but in reality we had many more killed and wounded than the British. Another way I got the students involved in the classroom was finding ways the War of 1812 realated to West Virginia. Even though it was not West Virginia the state at the time I still tried to relate as many things to this area as possible. This was also helpful because it made the students dicuss important areas in West Virginia. Also I tried to take the opposite side of the students views so I could debate with them. Even if I did not agree with the subject I was debating it is still important to do this.

In my lesson I tried to use direct instruction because it gave me a chance to get different students involved. doing this gives you chances to expand on your questions and ask more questions about the original question. Direct instruction works well in lessons because it gives each student a chance to debate events in History and give their personal viewpoint. All of these gives the students a better understanding of the material because they will remember better by debating then they would if they were just listening to a teacher lecture about the subject for a whole period.

What approaches do you think I could use to get the students more involved?

If this was a full lesson plan what could I add to extend the time of the lesson.

Education 312 Post #1

First after receiving the topic I will be teaching, I try to break up my lesson into three parts. I have learned breaking it into three parts gives the students a break and a change of pace so they can pay attention easier. I find it easiest to start with a power point to introduce a topic and they move on to others things that involve the students more. The more the students are involved the more they will pay attention. Over the past three weeks I have noticed that my teacher also likes to break up her lessons and use three to four outside sources. So far in my new classroom I have taught one lesson but I did not create the lesson. My teacher created the lesson plan and it was similar to something I would like to create. She had a few of the students read out aloud. I spoke with her after and she said that try to pick students to read that you know will read clearly and loud enough for all the students to hear.

In the two classes I was in last semester one was a normal class and the other was a special education class. In the special education class I had to try to involve the students more and break down questions so that each student understood and could give their opinion. On the power point slides I was able to go the same speed with each class. This could have been because the students didn't have to write anything down all they had to do was listen. Since I have only taught one lesson so far this semester I have gotten to know the students only a little bit but it is similar to last semester. The first class needs to be forced to do things more than the second class. The second class is interesting because it is the same subject as the first class but it is twice the size and it is a honors class. In the classroom I have used power point and DvD clips so far this semester.

Learner centered means that a student or group of students can learn something on their own. A teacher can teach these students a few times how to do something and they will pick up on it easily. Most of these students cannot teach other students how they learn it so quickly because they just know it and cannot explain it.