During the group forum discussions that we had in class, I think we all learned a lot about our specific group, but we all were able to also learn a little about all the other groups as well. I think this would have been a really cool project to have going on the entire semester, so we could have all been presenters on each minority group or everyone all read each article for the groups.
The group that I learned the most from was the religion group about the oppression of other religions by Christmas. I had never even considered that or really thought about it, but then Gretchen also mentioned that it is not only Christians that are oppressing people with Christmas, because our culture, Christians, agnostics, atheists, whoever, many people celebrate Christmas that are not Christians. Even people of a religion that is not Christianity oppress other people of other religions by celebrating Christmas so out loud as our culture does.
I would have liked to hear more about the practical ways to include all these different groups into our classroom. We talked about the research and the articles, and many questions did touch on this, but I would have liked to talk about practical ways, for example, to be aware of race in your classroom.
I know that my own research on gender will help me in my classroom to be able to emphasize that masculinity or femininity is not what makes a person "a man" or "a woman". It's also really important in the classroom to be the teacher that these students can come to and talk with when they are being bullied or feeling oppressed by being of a minority group.
Like I mentioned above, I think it would have been helpful to have this project over a longer period of time. Because of how short of a time we had, we were not able to cover all of the groups really thoroughly, and I would have liked a chance to read everyone's articles and ask my own questions.
Saturday, December 7, 2013
Saturday, November 30, 2013
Ch. 3 Questions
1. In your classroom, will you have different behavior management techniques for handling a moral transgression vs. a conventional transgression? (p. 90) [APPLICATION]
2. Name and define the four different types of aggression listed on p. 84 [RECALL]
2. Name and define the four different types of aggression listed on p. 84 [RECALL]
Wednesday, November 20, 2013
Ch. 2 Questions
Ormrod mentions three very specific things that dynamic assessment involves. Please name these three things (p. 48). (RECALL)
Ormrod talks about how students' knowledge of vocabulary and syntax affects their listening comprehension. Knowing this, what could you do in your future classroom to heighten your students' listening comprehension? (p. 52) (APPLYING)
Ormrod talks about how students' knowledge of vocabulary and syntax affects their listening comprehension. Knowing this, what could you do in your future classroom to heighten your students' listening comprehension? (p. 52) (APPLYING)
Monday, November 11, 2013
Ch. 5 Questions
Emotional and behavioral disorders have two types of behavioral symptoms. What are they? (recalling)
What are three things you can consciously do as a teacher to be more accommodating to your students with emotional and behavioral disorders? (applying)
What are three things you can consciously do as a teacher to be more accommodating to your students with emotional and behavioral disorders? (applying)
Sunday, October 27, 2013
Field Trip: Girl Rising
For the field trip, I chose to go to a showing of Girl Rising in the University Center hosted by the International House on October 23rd. The documentary shows the horrors that women all over the world go through in order to get an education and also things that can happen to women if they are not educated and ways they have to resort to living. The film was split up into individual stories of young women. I wanted to briefly discuss parts of the stories of three of the young women to give a glimpse into what the documentary was about.
A common theme throughout all the stories was persistence. These young girls persisted on and keep pushing towards a better future for themselves even as they had horrible things happen to them. The first girl they showed on the film was named Wadley. She is eight years old from Haiti. Before the earthquake, they showed her enjoying school. After the hurricane, the teacher of her class was charging the children's parents money to keep the school going. She tried to turn Wadley away, and Wadley told her that she was going to keep coming back everyday even though they had no money. It was inspiring to see that a child who had her home completely destroyed still wanted to be a part of school and a part of the learning community with her classmates. Her teacher shocked me though, because I did not expect that she would turn students away for lack of money after a natural disaster like that.
Another girl, Suma, from Nepal in the film was also really persistent in her education but also in wanting freedom for all young women. When she was very young, her parents sold her to a Master so that she would have a place to live and food to eat since they were very poor. She talked about the horrors of abuse that her Masters put her through, and she talked about how songs kept her going through the abuse. She would sing songs and make up songs about her everyday life as she worked.
A teacher was a lodger in Suma's third Master's home. He convinced Suma's Master to let Suma enroll in a night class with other kumlari, unpaid workers. The class was run by social workers, and the teacher stood up to the Master about the laws of domestic violence and labor laws. He also talked to the Master about human trafficking and injustice. The teacher was also persistent every time that the Master said he would not free Suma, the teacher came back. Eventually the Master let the teacher take Suma home to her family. Suma now goes with other social workers and teachers to the homes of Masters with kumlari and advocates persistently for those young women's freedom like the teacher did for her.
Suma's songs kept her going through the horrors of being a kumlari. Ruksana, a young girl in India, had a similar hope in art as a street girl. In one of her classes, she was kicked out for drawing instead of listening. On the way home her sister kept telling her how angry her father would be at her. The father's response was perfect I think. When she got home, he took her to an art store and bought her a sketchbook and pencils for her to draw in. He talked to her about how it was really important that she had an education and was able to break the chain of poverty living in the street. He said her sketch book was for art and to please do her school work in her school books. Throughout her story, her family wouldn't have money to put food on the table and eventually their slum was torn down and they had no where to live at all, but the father was set on how important it was that his daughters have an education.
To me personally, I thought it was really interesting the links of art and music almost as symbols of hope in these desperate places. Art is something that is very important to me personally, and I think this shows the great importance of the subject to people in general but especially children. In my future classroom, I want to make sure that I always have art materials around and encourage exploration with them but also just doodling. Even if it's a huge mess or not an actual "picture", the motions of making art can be therapeutic and really great with the fine motor strength required to make accurate letters.
A common theme throughout all the stories was persistence. These young girls persisted on and keep pushing towards a better future for themselves even as they had horrible things happen to them. The first girl they showed on the film was named Wadley. She is eight years old from Haiti. Before the earthquake, they showed her enjoying school. After the hurricane, the teacher of her class was charging the children's parents money to keep the school going. She tried to turn Wadley away, and Wadley told her that she was going to keep coming back everyday even though they had no money. It was inspiring to see that a child who had her home completely destroyed still wanted to be a part of school and a part of the learning community with her classmates. Her teacher shocked me though, because I did not expect that she would turn students away for lack of money after a natural disaster like that.
Another girl, Suma, from Nepal in the film was also really persistent in her education but also in wanting freedom for all young women. When she was very young, her parents sold her to a Master so that she would have a place to live and food to eat since they were very poor. She talked about the horrors of abuse that her Masters put her through, and she talked about how songs kept her going through the abuse. She would sing songs and make up songs about her everyday life as she worked.
A teacher was a lodger in Suma's third Master's home. He convinced Suma's Master to let Suma enroll in a night class with other kumlari, unpaid workers. The class was run by social workers, and the teacher stood up to the Master about the laws of domestic violence and labor laws. He also talked to the Master about human trafficking and injustice. The teacher was also persistent every time that the Master said he would not free Suma, the teacher came back. Eventually the Master let the teacher take Suma home to her family. Suma now goes with other social workers and teachers to the homes of Masters with kumlari and advocates persistently for those young women's freedom like the teacher did for her.
Suma's songs kept her going through the horrors of being a kumlari. Ruksana, a young girl in India, had a similar hope in art as a street girl. In one of her classes, she was kicked out for drawing instead of listening. On the way home her sister kept telling her how angry her father would be at her. The father's response was perfect I think. When she got home, he took her to an art store and bought her a sketchbook and pencils for her to draw in. He talked to her about how it was really important that she had an education and was able to break the chain of poverty living in the street. He said her sketch book was for art and to please do her school work in her school books. Throughout her story, her family wouldn't have money to put food on the table and eventually their slum was torn down and they had no where to live at all, but the father was set on how important it was that his daughters have an education.
To me personally, I thought it was really interesting the links of art and music almost as symbols of hope in these desperate places. Art is something that is very important to me personally, and I think this shows the great importance of the subject to people in general but especially children. In my future classroom, I want to make sure that I always have art materials around and encourage exploration with them but also just doodling. Even if it's a huge mess or not an actual "picture", the motions of making art can be therapeutic and really great with the fine motor strength required to make accurate letters.
Wednesday, October 23, 2013
Ch. 8 Questions
1. On p. 252, Ormrod talks about the importance of note taking to understanding classroom information for upper elementary and older students. Can you think of a way to have younger elementary school students process information in similar ways as taking notes without having them sit down at their desks and take notes? [applying, creating]
2. According to Ormrod, what are two different types of learning strategies? (Hint: they are both highlighted in a green color; p. 251-54) [remembering]
2. According to Ormrod, what are two different types of learning strategies? (Hint: they are both highlighted in a green color; p. 251-54) [remembering]
Sunday, October 13, 2013
Constructivist Concepts // Service Learning
I find the whole concept of service learning to be really interesting. Ormrod (2011) explains that service learning not only helps the students but the outside community as well. I also found on the San Diego Unified School District page a handout of ideas for service learning that included direct and indirect activities along with a section called advocacy, which Ormrod doesn't mention in the text.
I think an example of service learning that I could see using in my future classroom (early childhood) would be having the children create art to take to nursing homes or mail to soldiers overseas. I think this would help the children learn basic writing and drawing skills as well as open doors for conversation with children about different family compositions (like having a parent overseas or having a grandparent in a nursing home). We could also talk about different emotions and abstract concepts like empathy. Those are difficult to explain to young children, but I think with activities like this it could be more real.
I think the students would be so excited to get to show their work to others. Young children typically love to draw pictures to give to loved ones. It would also add an interesting motivation for them to do this drawing work knowing that they would be giving it away to other people. I would really love if the children could each be assigned a different person to make a card for, like a specific person at the nursing home and then be able to go and physically hand it to them themselves.
Some obstacles to this would be that it could be considered not "academic" enough by some principals. It would also be hard to get children physically to the nursing home to deliver the mail. Sending cards overseas to military personnel would be difficult to explain to the children concepts of war. It would also be impossible if our country wasn't in a war.
Personally I love the idea of service learning. I think it is so important to instill in even young children the importance of caring for others not only in our classroom but outside of it too. I can definitely see myself incorporating lots of projects like this for literacy lessons with young children. It provides a purpose to their work that writing an imaginary letter on a worksheet would not.
References
Ormrod, J. E. Educational psychology: Developing Learners. (7th ed.)
San Diego Unified School District (2010). Learn and Serve San Diego: A service learning handbook for elementary teachers. http://www.sandi.net/cms/lib/CA01001235/Centricity/Domain/62/Current%20CRD%20Web%20Docs/Elementary%20Handbook%20Revised%20July%2010.pdf
Tuesday, October 8, 2013
Social Cognitivism vs Behaviorism Objectives
Ormrod (2011) says behaviorism "focuses on how environmental stimuli bring about changes in people's behaviors" (p. 285). To me this means what I do as a teacher combined with other stimuli in the child's life is what forms and shapes the child's behaviors. Essentially the child would be reacting to a set of reinforcers and punishers to exhibit the behaviors that I wanted them to exhibit in order to show me that they learned what I wanted them to learn.
If I was planning a lesson with a group of preschoolers on how to write the first letter of their name, I would look for the child to be able to do that task as a successful mark of learning that objective. They would have to complete the objective. I could use verbal encouragement as a positive reinforcement to encourage them to keep working at the task. (As a side note, this is not something that I would do in my classroom. My objective would be for the children to attempt to write the first letter of their name. I recognize that children at this age are at a wide range of developmental levels, and I wouldn't want to punish some children by withholding encouragement or a positive reinforcer because they weren't as developed as other children with fine motor and writing skills.)
From a social cognitivist perspective, I would have the children work together at a table each with paper and crayons to work on writing their letters. This way they would have other models to look form to see how to hold the crayon and make the marks for letters. I would look for signs of interests and attempts at learning to write. As a social-cognitivist, I would also remember that "new learning doesn't always reveal itself immediately but may instead be reflected in the students' behaviors at a later time" (Ormrod, 2011, p. 325).
With the self-regulation piece of social cognitivism, I would want to continue to give the children in my class verbal cues about staying on task, but I would also be aware that the children are really young, and their attention spans are still quite short. That is something that I think some teachers and adults forget with young children. I would say it is developmentally inappropriate to have the children sitting at desks doing "seat work" for extended periods of time (more than 5 minutes). Their self-regulation can increase by working at hands-on tasks for extended periods of time or working at a puzzle day after day and increasing time worked on it daily.
If I was planning a lesson with a group of preschoolers on how to write the first letter of their name, I would look for the child to be able to do that task as a successful mark of learning that objective. They would have to complete the objective. I could use verbal encouragement as a positive reinforcement to encourage them to keep working at the task. (As a side note, this is not something that I would do in my classroom. My objective would be for the children to attempt to write the first letter of their name. I recognize that children at this age are at a wide range of developmental levels, and I wouldn't want to punish some children by withholding encouragement or a positive reinforcer because they weren't as developed as other children with fine motor and writing skills.)
From a social cognitivist perspective, I would have the children work together at a table each with paper and crayons to work on writing their letters. This way they would have other models to look form to see how to hold the crayon and make the marks for letters. I would look for signs of interests and attempts at learning to write. As a social-cognitivist, I would also remember that "new learning doesn't always reveal itself immediately but may instead be reflected in the students' behaviors at a later time" (Ormrod, 2011, p. 325).
With the self-regulation piece of social cognitivism, I would want to continue to give the children in my class verbal cues about staying on task, but I would also be aware that the children are really young, and their attention spans are still quite short. That is something that I think some teachers and adults forget with young children. I would say it is developmentally inappropriate to have the children sitting at desks doing "seat work" for extended periods of time (more than 5 minutes). Their self-regulation can increase by working at hands-on tasks for extended periods of time or working at a puzzle day after day and increasing time worked on it daily.
References:
Ormrod, J.E. (2011). Educational Psychology: Developing Learners. Boston, MA: Pearson.
Thursday, September 19, 2013
Environments for Learning
In our class discussion and teaching project about creating environments that are effective for learning, we talked about having engaging materials and activities. Something that my group discussed during the activity from the teaching project was the importance of giving the students a signifier of time to transition like five minute warnings. I know from my own experience with really young children that this is especially important for their own self-regulation. It helps them prepare mentally to change from one task to the next.
In the Ormrod text, the section on "Creating an Effective Psychological Climate" was really interesting to me, and it really describes how I want to set up my future classroom. It discusses having a classroom with a "general sense of community and belongingness" (p. 465). Regardless of the age of the student, I believe that it is important to show that student that you care about them as a person, and that you notice when they aren't in class and how they are doing during class. My best teachers that I ever had were really fantastic observers of what I had been doing, and then they cared enough to talk to me about it afterwards in a way that meant a lot that they had noticed.
The section on setting rules and limits was interesting too, and it talked about only setting a few rules at the beginning of the school year. Personally, this seems like a trust thing with the classroom as well by showing them that you don't have to set up tons of rules for them, because you trust them to do the right thing. It also talks about frequently reflecting on the rules and their appropriateness with the class and involving your students in the rule making process. I think that's an invaluable idea, because then the students want to follow rules they thought of themselves and actually care about. It also helps to build that sense of community and belongingness when the students themselves are helping construct the structures and limits of the classroom.
In the Curtis and Carter textbook Taylor and Samantha brought in, it also talks about bringing in some of the student's home items to school to make the space more their own -- like hanging their pictures on the wall that they drew or bringing in pictures of family members or a favorite stuffed animal. Even if this is not as feasible with older students, I think it is still important to at least bring ideas from home to the classroom and talk about out of school experiences, hobbies, and interests to actually know all your students.
Case Study: Early Childhood Sample
"It has been one month since the school year began and most of your 25 kindergarten students know class procedures, such as the schedule of learning activities, where they are supposed to be for each learning activity, where they are supposed to keep their personal items, and how they are expected to move about the room and the school building in order to ensure a productive learning environment. Then there is Willard. He must ask 20 or more times a day, “Teacher, when can we go outside to play?” In addition, he often does not stay where he should to work on a given learning activity. Instead, you find him wandering around the room and getting into other children’s personal things. Three times this past week you looked up just in time to see Willard walking out of the classroom without permission. Some of the other children in your classroom community have started making fun of Willard. Others are beginning to become less engaged in their learning. "
The first thing I would address with Willard would be the schedule questioning. I would make sure that I had the schedule posted WITH IMAGES at Willard's height on the wall somewhere close to his desk. Since other children are becoming less engaged with their learning, I may make flash cards with pictures of the schedule with numbers on each event to know what activities go where and put those on a key ring for each child to carry around and have at activities. This way if they are ever unsure, they can look at their own schedule. I would have the children help me take the picture for the schedule and put them together so the children would feel ownership of these schedules.
Since Willard is becoming disengaged at different learning activities, I would first check and see how engaging my activities actually are. They might just be boring, and so then Willard would rather go do something more worthwhile with his time. If I check my activity and it seems engaging enough, I would look for Willard's personal interests and pull those in for him into the activities.
When Willard wanders, it says he is wandering into children's personal items. I would talk with the children about keeping their personal items either in their desks or in their cubbies to keep them away from being distractions to the other children. We could have a share time too if the children have things they want to share with the other children and have the other children look at with them.
Willard walking out of the classroom is a safety issue. I would work first at preventative measures -- moving Willard's desk far away from the window might help to take longer to get to the door. This way I would have a longer period of time to get to him and redirect him before he leaves the room. This could also happen from a lack of engaging materials. I would work to make sure there were materials in the classroom that Willard wanted to work with, and I would ask him to see what materials he wanted to use.
In the Ormrod text, the section on "Creating an Effective Psychological Climate" was really interesting to me, and it really describes how I want to set up my future classroom. It discusses having a classroom with a "general sense of community and belongingness" (p. 465). Regardless of the age of the student, I believe that it is important to show that student that you care about them as a person, and that you notice when they aren't in class and how they are doing during class. My best teachers that I ever had were really fantastic observers of what I had been doing, and then they cared enough to talk to me about it afterwards in a way that meant a lot that they had noticed.
The section on setting rules and limits was interesting too, and it talked about only setting a few rules at the beginning of the school year. Personally, this seems like a trust thing with the classroom as well by showing them that you don't have to set up tons of rules for them, because you trust them to do the right thing. It also talks about frequently reflecting on the rules and their appropriateness with the class and involving your students in the rule making process. I think that's an invaluable idea, because then the students want to follow rules they thought of themselves and actually care about. It also helps to build that sense of community and belongingness when the students themselves are helping construct the structures and limits of the classroom.
In the Curtis and Carter textbook Taylor and Samantha brought in, it also talks about bringing in some of the student's home items to school to make the space more their own -- like hanging their pictures on the wall that they drew or bringing in pictures of family members or a favorite stuffed animal. Even if this is not as feasible with older students, I think it is still important to at least bring ideas from home to the classroom and talk about out of school experiences, hobbies, and interests to actually know all your students.
Case Study: Early Childhood Sample
"It has been one month since the school year began and most of your 25 kindergarten students know class procedures, such as the schedule of learning activities, where they are supposed to be for each learning activity, where they are supposed to keep their personal items, and how they are expected to move about the room and the school building in order to ensure a productive learning environment. Then there is Willard. He must ask 20 or more times a day, “Teacher, when can we go outside to play?” In addition, he often does not stay where he should to work on a given learning activity. Instead, you find him wandering around the room and getting into other children’s personal things. Three times this past week you looked up just in time to see Willard walking out of the classroom without permission. Some of the other children in your classroom community have started making fun of Willard. Others are beginning to become less engaged in their learning. "
The first thing I would address with Willard would be the schedule questioning. I would make sure that I had the schedule posted WITH IMAGES at Willard's height on the wall somewhere close to his desk. Since other children are becoming less engaged with their learning, I may make flash cards with pictures of the schedule with numbers on each event to know what activities go where and put those on a key ring for each child to carry around and have at activities. This way if they are ever unsure, they can look at their own schedule. I would have the children help me take the picture for the schedule and put them together so the children would feel ownership of these schedules.
Since Willard is becoming disengaged at different learning activities, I would first check and see how engaging my activities actually are. They might just be boring, and so then Willard would rather go do something more worthwhile with his time. If I check my activity and it seems engaging enough, I would look for Willard's personal interests and pull those in for him into the activities.
When Willard wanders, it says he is wandering into children's personal items. I would talk with the children about keeping their personal items either in their desks or in their cubbies to keep them away from being distractions to the other children. We could have a share time too if the children have things they want to share with the other children and have the other children look at with them.
Willard walking out of the classroom is a safety issue. I would work first at preventative measures -- moving Willard's desk far away from the window might help to take longer to get to the door. This way I would have a longer period of time to get to him and redirect him before he leaves the room. This could also happen from a lack of engaging materials. I would work to make sure there were materials in the classroom that Willard wanted to work with, and I would ask him to see what materials he wanted to use.
References
Ormrod, J.E. (2011). Educational psychology: Developing learners (7th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson Education.
Wednesday, September 11, 2013
Motivation: Social Cognitive Theory
The social cognitive theories of motivation are the most helpful for myself. Ormrod described that over time the learners "begin to set goals for themselves, and much of their motivation comes from within, rather than from external consequence" (Ormrod, 2011, p. 363), also known as intrinsic motivation. Intrinsic motivation has always been the most effective with me. When I realize that a lesson or a class is going to be helpful for my career and actually useful, I am much more inclined to put in a lot of hard work. I want to do well for myself and my own goals and to actually learn the material in those classes.
For my own students, I would want to provide materials that cater to their interests and needs. I think this is the best way to work to set up an environment where the students actually want to learn the materials for themselves and not because I am giving them a gold sticker every time they complete an assignment.
With young children this is an interesting concept of children setting goals for themselves. It is completely appropriate, and the children are in a developmental stage where they are craving more autonomy. This sets up a perfect ground to teach autonomy and have a young childhood classroom that is intrinsically motivated by their own goals.
At the beginning of a week, I could have each child pick an area of the classroom that they want to work in and describe something they would like to do and work with that week specifically as a goal. I would not want them to turn it into me like an assignment, but to keep that page that either they wrote what their goal would be or drew a picture if their letter forms aren't quite readable.
I want the children to build these self-efficacy beliefs and work towards their own realistic goals that they set for themselves and believe that they can achieve.
Ormrod, J.E. (2011). Educational psychology: Developing learners. (7th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson
Education, Inc.
Education, Inc.
Saturday, August 31, 2013
Forms of Assessment
Informal vs. Formal Assessment
Informal Assessment: During some science lessons that I did at the preschool on campus, the children would ask questions and make comments as they worked with the flying machines they were creating. The conversations they had about the materials they were using to make the flying machines and what would fly better/more efficiently showed me what they knew about flight and gravity and the way air would affect their creations. It was helpful to use this kind of assessment to gauge their learning without putting pressure on the children to answer my specific questions.
Formal Assessment: In the same lesson, we had a contest and threw our flying creations off of the roof to see whose would fly the longest through the air. The children knew that this was the culminating event of the project, and they all worked towards winning this contest as they built. We had a planned time and day that the contest would happen, and the children were all really excited about whose flying machine would be the best. By building a flying machine that would actually fly the best, the children would have had to have gained real knowledge from the experiments that we did with lots of materials to see which ones would glide through the air best. Then they applied that knowledge to their own work. I needed to see what the children knew at the end of the semester in a summative assessment, but I wanted to be able to gauge all the children's work. I also wanted them to be excited about their "final" test with their flying machines.
Traditional vs. Authentic Assessment
Traditional Assessment: With my young toddler class, we had a little quiz about what colors they all knew. I read the colors out and had the children each point out something that color that they could find. With the traditional assessment, it was easy for me to go through and check yes or no for each color the children did or did not know.
Authentic Assessment: To gauge the young toddlers' art work from over the span of the summer, I had them each work with me to create a portfolio. It had images of the children working, some images of scanned work, and some videos of the children working too. This was authentic assessment, because the children were able to practice their drawing and painting skills and then show me the completed work in their portfolios. This worked well to see their progress over the entire semester and use their work production to assess their learning of the art concepts we talked about (how to hold a paintbrush, how to apply paint, how to clean a paintbrush, etc).
Criterion-referenced vs. Norm-referenced Assessment:
Criterion-referenced Assessment: With a kindergarten class, I could have a reading test of specific sight words and test the children's knowledge of those words by having them read them off to me. I could gauge their mastery/non-mastery by how many words they were able to recognize and read. This would give me a solid base to start building towards seeing which children would need more instruction with sight words.
Norm-referenced Assessment: In a kindergarten class, I could have the children each bring in a reading chart from home with the name of the book and amount of time the child either read at home with another person or by themselves. Then I could have a chart in the classroom on my desk to be able to personally gauge how much time each child was spending at home reading and see who was reading the most and who was reading the least comparatively to the other children in the classroom. I could break the children into groups based on this assessment and make sure I am giving children who may not have books at home or someone to read with ample time to work on their reading skills. It would also show me who was the strongest reader in the class (or most interested) and who I would need to work with more diligently.
Paper-pencil vs. Performance Assessment:
Paper-pencil Assessment: In a kindergarten class, I could assess if the children know how to write their name by having them write their name down on their name tags for their desks. That would also give them ownership of their name tag knowing that they wrote it out themselves. This kind of assessment would be nice for this, because the majority of children like to write their own name.
Performance Assessment: For a social studies activity with older elementary children, I could have them follow a list of directions on a map around the school to test their knowledge of north, south, east, and west. This would show me whether they could use those words with directions and a compass to travel around the school. This would be a more interesting way to assess the children's knowledge of directions than a true false quiz.
Standardized Test vs. Teacher-developed Assessment:
Standardized Test: The TCAP test for children in Tennessee is a standardized test provided to gauge the children's knowledge of concepts they think that they should know. This is helpful to see what objectives the children are not meeting and how to provide more instruction in these areas.
Teacher-developed Assessment: I could give out a spelling test I made for my third graders to test if they knew the spelling words we had been talking about in our class that week. I could personalize the test more towards my classroom and what we had been specifically talking about with one another.
Informal Assessment: During some science lessons that I did at the preschool on campus, the children would ask questions and make comments as they worked with the flying machines they were creating. The conversations they had about the materials they were using to make the flying machines and what would fly better/more efficiently showed me what they knew about flight and gravity and the way air would affect their creations. It was helpful to use this kind of assessment to gauge their learning without putting pressure on the children to answer my specific questions.
Formal Assessment: In the same lesson, we had a contest and threw our flying creations off of the roof to see whose would fly the longest through the air. The children knew that this was the culminating event of the project, and they all worked towards winning this contest as they built. We had a planned time and day that the contest would happen, and the children were all really excited about whose flying machine would be the best. By building a flying machine that would actually fly the best, the children would have had to have gained real knowledge from the experiments that we did with lots of materials to see which ones would glide through the air best. Then they applied that knowledge to their own work. I needed to see what the children knew at the end of the semester in a summative assessment, but I wanted to be able to gauge all the children's work. I also wanted them to be excited about their "final" test with their flying machines.
Traditional vs. Authentic Assessment
Traditional Assessment: With my young toddler class, we had a little quiz about what colors they all knew. I read the colors out and had the children each point out something that color that they could find. With the traditional assessment, it was easy for me to go through and check yes or no for each color the children did or did not know.
Authentic Assessment: To gauge the young toddlers' art work from over the span of the summer, I had them each work with me to create a portfolio. It had images of the children working, some images of scanned work, and some videos of the children working too. This was authentic assessment, because the children were able to practice their drawing and painting skills and then show me the completed work in their portfolios. This worked well to see their progress over the entire semester and use their work production to assess their learning of the art concepts we talked about (how to hold a paintbrush, how to apply paint, how to clean a paintbrush, etc).
Criterion-referenced vs. Norm-referenced Assessment:
Criterion-referenced Assessment: With a kindergarten class, I could have a reading test of specific sight words and test the children's knowledge of those words by having them read them off to me. I could gauge their mastery/non-mastery by how many words they were able to recognize and read. This would give me a solid base to start building towards seeing which children would need more instruction with sight words.
Norm-referenced Assessment: In a kindergarten class, I could have the children each bring in a reading chart from home with the name of the book and amount of time the child either read at home with another person or by themselves. Then I could have a chart in the classroom on my desk to be able to personally gauge how much time each child was spending at home reading and see who was reading the most and who was reading the least comparatively to the other children in the classroom. I could break the children into groups based on this assessment and make sure I am giving children who may not have books at home or someone to read with ample time to work on their reading skills. It would also show me who was the strongest reader in the class (or most interested) and who I would need to work with more diligently.
Paper-pencil vs. Performance Assessment:
Paper-pencil Assessment: In a kindergarten class, I could assess if the children know how to write their name by having them write their name down on their name tags for their desks. That would also give them ownership of their name tag knowing that they wrote it out themselves. This kind of assessment would be nice for this, because the majority of children like to write their own name.
Performance Assessment: For a social studies activity with older elementary children, I could have them follow a list of directions on a map around the school to test their knowledge of north, south, east, and west. This would show me whether they could use those words with directions and a compass to travel around the school. This would be a more interesting way to assess the children's knowledge of directions than a true false quiz.
Standardized Test vs. Teacher-developed Assessment:
Standardized Test: The TCAP test for children in Tennessee is a standardized test provided to gauge the children's knowledge of concepts they think that they should know. This is helpful to see what objectives the children are not meeting and how to provide more instruction in these areas.
Teacher-developed Assessment: I could give out a spelling test I made for my third graders to test if they knew the spelling words we had been talking about in our class that week. I could personalize the test more towards my classroom and what we had been specifically talking about with one another.
Class activity reflection: grading art (assessment)
In class on Thursday, we did an activity where we brainstormed solutions for an art teacher's grading system. I used to be an art major, and I have been in art classes my entire life. I have seen assessment and grading done a variety of ways on a such a subjective group of work.
One thing that we did in high school was either write a justification for the work that we were doing, or we would get up and explain the work to our teacher and classmates at the end of the grading period. It did not matter how much work was produced, but if we were in class every day actually working, and then we could explain our work well at the end of the semester, we got an A. It took the pressure off of producing a plethora of mediocre work and opened the way to being able to really spend time on specific, detailed pieces of work.
In the college art classes that I have had, the first couple semesters, we would do presentations on artists for supplemental grades. The majority of our grades came from being able to justify and explain our work during class critiques at the middle and end of the semesters. The first few semesters we had very structured directions on how many square feet of paintings we had to have complete and what the topics/subjects were. For example a group of assignments for a body of work could be to experiment with color. That absolutely looked different for every single person, but it was still really intriguing to hear every person explain how they incorporated that assignment topic into every piece (or in some cases one ginormous piece) of work.
My last semester of painting studios used an exhibition approach to assessment. We did not have any assignments or regulations at all, but we had a show at the end of the semester. If your work was phenomenal, it could be bought or noticed by other professors and artists who attended. Those were a few external motivators. Internally it was motivating to myself to make sure that I had the best work that I could have to present, so I would create tons of work all semester, and then I would chip away at the pieces that I wanted to exhibit and the pieces that were better off left in the studio.
The exhibition of my work was the most motivating and least structured of all the assessment types I have had in art. I wanted to be the best I could be and be the most true to my work, so I would work really hard to make sure that my pieces reflected that. Also knowing that everyone was going to see my work and that if I slacked it would be painfully obvious was really motivating too.
One thing that we did in high school was either write a justification for the work that we were doing, or we would get up and explain the work to our teacher and classmates at the end of the grading period. It did not matter how much work was produced, but if we were in class every day actually working, and then we could explain our work well at the end of the semester, we got an A. It took the pressure off of producing a plethora of mediocre work and opened the way to being able to really spend time on specific, detailed pieces of work.
In the college art classes that I have had, the first couple semesters, we would do presentations on artists for supplemental grades. The majority of our grades came from being able to justify and explain our work during class critiques at the middle and end of the semesters. The first few semesters we had very structured directions on how many square feet of paintings we had to have complete and what the topics/subjects were. For example a group of assignments for a body of work could be to experiment with color. That absolutely looked different for every single person, but it was still really intriguing to hear every person explain how they incorporated that assignment topic into every piece (or in some cases one ginormous piece) of work.
My last semester of painting studios used an exhibition approach to assessment. We did not have any assignments or regulations at all, but we had a show at the end of the semester. If your work was phenomenal, it could be bought or noticed by other professors and artists who attended. Those were a few external motivators. Internally it was motivating to myself to make sure that I had the best work that I could have to present, so I would create tons of work all semester, and then I would chip away at the pieces that I wanted to exhibit and the pieces that were better off left in the studio.
The exhibition of my work was the most motivating and least structured of all the assessment types I have had in art. I wanted to be the best I could be and be the most true to my work, so I would work really hard to make sure that my pieces reflected that. Also knowing that everyone was going to see my work and that if I slacked it would be painfully obvious was really motivating too.
Sunday, August 25, 2013
Interests
After our first class, I am interested to hear about parent-teacher relationships and how to talk with parent's about conflicts and problems at school. During our introduction activity, many of us commented on how parent-teacher relations will be a great challenge during the first year of teaching.
We also listed many adjectives about what makes someone a professional in their field, and it was interesting the different adjectives people came up with. For me, it is interesting to be in a 400 level class where we all (for the most part) are preparing for teaching careers and working towards a common goal.
I want to understand better how to be an effective teacher. I am really interesting in the relationships side of teaching, and I am interested to talk about how different students learn and even how the student's parents learn and communicate with educators.
I think this class will help me in my future career to understand how to teach better to all different types of learners and students. I am hoping that this class will prepare me better to work with a wide range of different people: professionals, students, and parents.
We also listed many adjectives about what makes someone a professional in their field, and it was interesting the different adjectives people came up with. For me, it is interesting to be in a 400 level class where we all (for the most part) are preparing for teaching careers and working towards a common goal.
I want to understand better how to be an effective teacher. I am really interesting in the relationships side of teaching, and I am interested to talk about how different students learn and even how the student's parents learn and communicate with educators.
I think this class will help me in my future career to understand how to teach better to all different types of learners and students. I am hoping that this class will prepare me better to work with a wide range of different people: professionals, students, and parents.
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