Resource Blog #3: What about assessment?

I heard about Plickers from the cohort above me at UGA and it sounded extremely useful and interesting. The student teachers just one year above me said they were using this resource in their student teaching classrooms currently, so I decided to take a look into it. Plickers is an app you can use on any mobile device or computer. It is a form of formative assessment, or a way to gage the students understanding of the topic that has been presented. It gives students individual QR codes or task cards that are printed on paper that match with their name and depending on which way they hold it the teacher can scan their answers in. (Each side of the square, depending on which side is on top, produces a different answer to be recorded). A fun cool way for students to submit their answers while they do not have to use technology themselves, just the teacher. It would be very useful in a permanent classroom to laminate said QR codes and reuse them throughout the teachers timing. It is an easy way to engage student to where they all need to submit an answer, and the teacher can see behind the screen what students are missing. This is a resource I am excited to employ in my own classroom; I believe formative assessment is the best way to prepare for summative assessment and overall learning.

https://get.plickers.com

https://www.lauracandler.com/plickers-made-easy

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Synthesis Blog #3: How to Use a Textbook

Assigning a whole textbook is in the days of the past. We find ourselves finding new ways to present material to students rather than following the textbook way of doing things. There’s also the notion of being selective with the sources and texts presented to the students; it is always beneficial to present both sides of the argument. Furthermore, by providing different texts it exposes students to different styles of writing including grammar, sentence structure, and vocabulary that increases their reading comprehension. After saying all this I am in no way telling you to throw your state mandated textbooks out the window in defiance but to simply only use the parts of the textbook that are useful. Find the big ideas that the text is trying to convey, use what you need, and find some more.

When using a textbook I believe the strategy presented in Subjects Matter Activity 3: Guide-o-Rama Study Guides is extremely useful. This is a way to break up long readings for students; it also adds teacher commentary that would explain the importance of the section, focus on diagrams, and give students a sense of structure instead of just a giant text to read. This allows for teachers to break up the larger reading into sections and not assign everything. Yes, this requires quite a lot of preparation, however, over time the amount of prepared chapters will increase. It can be a learning process as you continue your years of teaching. It creates a personalized way of helping your students at home.

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Resource Blog #2: Interactive Social Studies

Interactive Sites for Education

https://bit.ly/1gqFxJB

For this resource blog, I focused on Social Studies and how students can have alternatives to reading the textbook. This online resource links to multiple different interactive sites; sites that are all organized by topic or time period. I believe interactive electronics will be the pinnacle of the classrooms that we will be teaching in. Most students will own, or the school will provide some form of electronics. If anything, there is the possibility of going to the local library and using the computers there. This site allows teachers access to 35 broad middle school topics; within each of those topics, multiple interactive online resources. When students are engaged, they are more likely to recall and remember the material being presented. For example, some interactive sources have students clicking on different parts of a map to explain the chronological order of a certain battle or war. The action of the student clicking is helping them feel as though they are choosing to read the presented material rather than “read pages 383-401 for homework tonight”, when in reality most students skim if read at all. I know going to the computer lab or library was always an exciting day in middle school. It is a simple yet effective way to get students out of the classroom yet still in a controlled “classroom like” setting. 

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Synthesis Blog #2 - Chapter 11: Help for Struggling Readers

Help for struggling readers is something ever current and aspiring teacher should understand and focus on. Reading is not to be left to the reading teachers; it transcribes into ever subject and aspect of our students lives. It is important to understand the significance of reading in the classroom. Reading, as discussed before, is not just the ability to read but the ability to understand and conceptualize what one is reading. Every subject relies on the skill to read in order to experiment, analyze, and understand the material being presented. The skills to help a struggling reader can exceed any skills on content area. Anyone can regurgitate information if they have been in a classroom themselves before. The true test of a successful teacher is the capacity to explain the subject matter in an engaging and thoughtful way and aid students in their academic struggles; by this I mean, helping students understand the material, which means helping them read.

            The main concepts addressed in Chapter 11: Help for Struggling Readers— in the textbook Subjects Matter—include: “creating supportive relationships, model thoughtful reading, promote self-monitoring, use materials students can successfully read, but also give them extensive support for more challenging texts, build engagement with text, and provide books and materials in various formats” (281). With supportive relationships in the classroom, students can feel more comfortable and confident approaching the teacher with questions and will be able to manage the failures they encounter more advantageously. Comfort is something that is necessary in my classroom. The classes I exceled in at a young age were the teachers I loved or the teachers I felt comfortable approaching with a problem. My grades and academic success plummeted in classrooms that I was afraid of the teacher. I never want to be the teacher that everyone is scared of, yet I will not be the teacher that is too easy. I want to challenge my students, however, I decided to be a middle school teacher because I want to help children in every aspect of their lives in this tumultuous time. I want to lead by example and allow children to have high aspirations in my classroom.

            Becoming a middle school teacher has a lot of pressure attached to it. Not only are you tasked with academically preparing your students, but you also have to cultivate skills that become the backbone of study habits and reading ability for the rest of their lives. Every student is different and requires a different approach. Therefore, showing an array of different ways or skills to complete a task is only beneficial in a large room of middle schoolers. With the academic side of the responsibilities of a teacher covered, there is also the emotional support and comfort that is expected of a middle school teacher. When a student feels comfortable in a classroom it shows the competency of the teacher and the strength of the student.

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