TL Standard 10

TL Standard 10

During the course EDU 6526 Instructional Strategies, I was able to explore several research-based instructional practices. Some of which I was familiar with, others I had not had the opportunity to explore or dive deep into with my students. We began the quarter by looking into our common practices and beliefs. We began to look at a general overview of several types of research based instructional practices such as; cooperative learning, feedback, advance organizers, questioning, self-reflection, reciprocal teaching, and non-linguistic representation. After reviewing several of these instructional practices and looking at the key components that make them successful, I realized I had a lot to learn and a lot to explore in my classroom. For the remainder of the quarter, I got to explore these research-based instructional practices in depth and try implementing a few into my own practice. I chose to do further research on cooperative learning, advance organizers, role play, and non-linguistic representations.

During my further research in role play I found an article on how dramatic play/role play can enhance student learning. One piece of information that I found very useful was they gave the reader the list of things they need to have thought of, prepared, or aware of during role play in order to be successful in enhancing student learning. Cecchini referred to it as, “setting the stage” to have the right skill set. Incorporating role playing and having children mimic behaviors, actions and verbal expressions of someone helps retention and comprehension of taught material. In this article it discusses the importance of paying attention to the use of materials, making sure you have the correct length of time for the activity, keeping an eye on their social skills/interactions with their peers and their communication levels. All of these pieces are important things to consider when having your students’ role play in your classroom. I wrote a lesson plan to test out these ideas with my students. Overall, I was pleasantly surprised by engagement levels and how much fun they had. I will definitely do another lesson like this! I loved this website, and will refer back to it when I plan another lesson with role play in the future!

I also spent time researching non-linguistic representations. I found a website that covers the book Enhancing Writing with Visualizing by Linda Zeigler, Jerry L Johns and Virginia R Beesley. This book is one I might order to read and keep in my professional library. It is a “how to” book to help teach students the strategy of visualization and the important role it plays in literacy. A quote from the webpage that I really enjoyed was “By integrating visualization into the writing process, students think as they create. And since an image looks the same in any language–this research-based strategy benefits every learner!” Learning how to tap into your visualization skills not only benefits the engagement levels, but the retention levels too. It can aid any lesson in any subject area. This book I found focuses on how it helps in literacy. In the book, each lesson is prefaced with information to help teachers choose lessons that match the needs of their students. The indicators are labeled with writing traits to help teachers comprehend how each lesson incorporates multiple elements of writing. I gave this a try in a writing lesson plan I wrote. Students had an opportunity to put their senses to the test. I loved to see how this research-based instructional practice was highly effective with my students. They all took the lesson very seriously and their ability to write with “wow words” seemed effortless.

I learned a lot about myself as a teacher and my students during this quarter when I explored, wrote lessons and taught several of these research-based instructional practices. However, I feel that one of my biggest takeaways during this course was my learning on giving feedback to students. In chapter 7 of Visible Learning for Teachers, John Hattie talks a lot about feedback and how “feedback aims to reduce the gap between where the student ‘is’ and where he or she is ‘meant to be’ (Hattie, 129).” As a teacher it is imperative for you to know where your students are and where they are supposed to be. He discussed how the more transparent you make it for students, the easier it is for them to help in getting themselves to that place. This really piggybacks to the importance of your students knowing the learning targets and objectives each day. I found that this chapter really connects the importance to why having your students be able to share the objective and why it is important for them to know the goal of the lesson to the power of feedback with your students. Hattie describes the best form of feedback is just above the level at which the student is working. With that requires a lot of work for a teacher to make intentional and meaningful comments that aren’t just “way to go” or “wow, good job”. Knowing your students currently level and the end result is critical. A quote that really stuck with me from the readings this week was when Hattie states, “Almost half of teachers’ feedback was praise, and that premature and gratuitous praise confused students and discouraged revisions. Most often, teachers use praise to mitigate critical comments, which indeed diluted the positive effect of such comments (Hattie, 136).” This was a new way of looking at feedback for me. I definitely feel that I am guilty of premature praise which in return in fact has discouraged revisions with my students. I am truly interested in working on my praise and the timing and intent of that praise so it doesn’t discourage my students for revisions within their work. One of my biggest takeaways from Hattie this week was “Errors invite opportunities” I love that statement. “What we now know and what we could know; they are signs of opportunities to learn (Hattie, 139).”

Another big take away was around note taking. In chapter 6 of Classroom Instruction that Works it states, “Evidence from the 2010 study also suggests that note-taking strategies are not intuitive; this means that students benefit from explicit instruction in note-taking strategies, particularly those that are guided and more structured (Dean, Hubbell, Pitler and Stone, 79).” Changing to Common Core this year has brought along several changes. One change that classroom teachers have taken on is structured and purposeful note-taking. This is a skill that is now being taught as early as kindergarten and also graded during our Performance Assessments throughout the year. I feel that it is important and very critical for students to be taught how to be effective note takers. I was very taken back when I first read that kindergarteners would be required to take notes from an informational text and then use the notes as a reference during an assessment. Reading that in September as a kindergarten teacher, I just about fell out of my chair. I felt that was asking way too much of my little five year olds, half of those kinders not even able to write words independently at that time of the year. However the teaching to note-taking in kinder is very intentional and guided. It is a process that is done together and allows students to see the framework of successful note-taking. They build from that in September to hopefully the beginning stages of independent note-taking by the end of the year. I felt it was really neat to watch (most of) my students this year develop such a complex skill at such a young age!

Over the course of the quarter, I participated in a final collaborative inquiry with a teammate that I collaborate with frequently. We focused our research on using transition words to help stories flow better, as well as adding a concluding sentence in narrative writing to conclude their story. Our inquiry question was: How can we implement advance organizers to support students in their narrative writing? You can look at the layout and framework of this action research project here. In the Collaborative Instructional Strategies Inquiry project you can see my analysis of this action research project and how effective it was in the presentation.

As I mentioned throughout this reflection, I look forward to continue using the research-based instructional strategies that I learned about. To further challenge myself, I plan to try using additional research-based instructional practices that I am not as familiar or comfortable with. Teaching such a young grade, some of the concepts that go into these lessons can be intimidating.  In the research throughout this quarter I did find several examples of how to scale lessons down which is encouraging and helpful to get my feet wet! I recently began working with professional learning coaches with my grade level team to try find new ways to add research-based instructional practices into a math workshop. I look forward to continuing this work with my teammates and the learning coaches as well as looking into additional professional development to implement into my classroom!

Citations:

Cecchini, M. E. (2008, January 1). Earlychildhood NEWS – Article Reading Center. Earlychildhood NEWS – Article Reading Center. Retrieved May 16, 2014, from http://www.earlychildhoodnews.com/earlychildhood/article_view.aspx?ArticleID=751

Dean, C, E.R. Hubbell, H Pitler, and B Stone. Classroom Instruction that Works. 2nd Edition. Alexandria, VA: ASCD, 2012. Print.

Hattie, John. Visible Learning for Teachers Maximizing Impact on Learning. Routledge: London and New York, 2012. Print.

Success for all foundation®: Cooperative Learning- Elementary. (2012, January 1). Success For All. Retrieved May 2, 2014, from http://www.successforall.org/Elementary/Powerful-Instruction/Our-Instructional-Design/Cooperative-Learning/

Using BrainPOP as an Advance Organizer. (2009, December 20). BrainPOP Educators Using BrainPOP as an Advance Organizer Comments. Retrieved May 2, 2014, from http://www.brainpop.com/educators/community/2009/12/20/using-brainpop-as-an-advance-organizer/

Zeigler, L. L., & Johns, J. L. (2007). Enhancing writing through visualization. Dubuque, Iowa: Kendall Hunt Pub. Co..

EDU6655: Meta Reflection

I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed all of the assigned online articles and readings from our required books Brain Matters, Jossey Bass and Brain Rules this quarter. There are so many important pieces that go into teaching and education. Before this class, I feel that I was always focused on the curriculum as well as supplementing that curriculum to give my students the best education I possibly could. Now, I feel that my original focal point is being shared with a new large piece. I am not only focused on those aspects of the teaching field regarding curriculum, but now, I am focusing more on best practices. These best practices are based on solid research regarding how students learn and retain information.

Both Brain Matters and Jossey Bass do a wonderful job explaining the brain. These two texts covered a lot of similar information such as; the structure and functions of the human brain, the development of the brain, sensory input, information storage and how the brain learns best. As an educator, I was able to take away and apply many pieces of these books into my classroom immediately. However, there were a few topics of discussion during this quarter that I feel really grabbed my attention that I would like to discuss. I really connected with and would like to talk about the “buy in” at the start of each lesson and its importance. I would also like to discuss using the arts in my teaching. Another large take away was, teaching using concrete experiences. I will also touch on the benefits of exercise in the classroom, student’s memory, and the importance of using visuals in the classroom.

In a webinar Dr. Willis, an educational researcher, mentioned it is important to make your lessons enjoyable, you need to have what she called, the “buy-in” method. Making your lessons relevant for your students allows them to immediately connect and engage. They should understand what she called the “here-me-now” not only in reading, but in every subject area. At any age, students should be able to answer: what will this information or skill offer me, here, at this time. In Brain Matters Wolfe explains, “Occipital Lobes are the primary brain centers for processing visual stimuli (Wolfe 2010).” The visual stimulus connects with stored cognitive associations which make what is being seen, meaningful. So what does this mean in my classroom? Making sure my learning targets are always posted and up to date for my students to see. It also means making learning meaningful to my students, and giving them concrete experiences (which I will discuss later).  I see the best learning and highest success in my students when I have provided a great buy in to my lesson and then continue with a highly interactive, hands on activities. Looking back into chapter 11, Wolfe states, “We learn some things by experiencing them concretely, others symbolically, and still others in abstract terms (Wolfe 166).” I was recently introduced to a program called BTiC: Bringing Theater into the Classroom. It is a program that teaches you ways to integrate drama into your entire curriculum. I was able to immediately implement my learning into my classroom. I played around using a type of acting called tableaus. I had my students use a tableau to demonstrate their understanding and comprehension of a story we had read that they were struggling with retelling. I was amazed at how well they did and the results showed they were able to retain and pull great content from our lesson using this exercise. Research proves that the arts allow students to explore, learn from peers and learn how to explore and express emotions. The arts provide students with skills which are not directly taught in content based classes, but which are required to have and use in content based classes.  For example: observation, spatial relationships, kinesthetic, symbolism, imagination, abstractions, cooperation (Sousa, 335-336). Using a buy in, music and theater in our classrooms more often could ultimately be the new “best teaching practice”.

Another big takeaway for me this quarter was the idea of getting my students out into the real world. That all not all of my assignments have to be pencil and paper based, like our curriculums seem to have them. “Young children learn best through concrete experience. It is important to provide hands-on learning to strengthen natural interactions in natural settings (Wolfe 6).” In chapter 11 of Brain Matters Wolfe mentions,“ Many of our strongest neural networks are formed by actual experience (Wolfe 169).” Looking and researching further, it is beneficial and more interesting to find actual problems in our own school or community for students to problem solve and work together to find possibly solutions. Teaching kindergarten and having my students be so young I find other ways to help give them concrete experiences at home too. I have my students out in natural settings to gain experiences. They help parents write grocery lists, they cut out words from food labels, bags, magazines to add to our classroom word wall. They go on nature walks with their parents to connect to science curriculum. I look forward to incorporating real world problem solving strategies into my classroom!

  A big interest of mine has always been the benefits for students and the research behind exercise within the classroom. In John Medina’s Brain Rules, he states that, “kids pay better attention to their subjects when they’ve been active. Kids are also less likely to be disruptive in terms of their classroom behavior when they’re active (Medina 18)”. Not only are they less disruptive but they “feel better about themselves, have higher self-esteem, less depression, less anxiety. All of those things can impair academic performance and attentiveness (Medina 14)”. So how can I take this into my classroom? Well, each morning in my class, we are now taking the time to do our Get Fit- Count to 100s song, stretching, doing breathing exercises, and having them do children’s yoga to help set my students up for a successful morning and day. It has been a great way to get the blood flowing and get more oxygen to their brain. I have really noticed a difference in their level of engagement after such activities. In the book Brain Matters, Wolfe talks about research that Harvard University did that shows that exercise plays a critical role in brain functioning (Wolfe 94). Having a lot of research backing up and supporting my choice of adding 20+ minutes of exercise each morning and again in small periods throughout my day lessens the stressful feeling that I am “wasting” teach time because I am, in actuality, helping their learning.

A large chunk of our time this quarter was researching and completing readings about our memory, long-term, short-term memory and the inner workings of each. During our Brain Rules presentations we learned that most memories we make are lost within minutes (Medina 147). Hearing that students are likely to lose a large percentage of the information taught each day is a scary and concerning thing for any teacher to hear. So what is the solution? How do we make sure our lessons and hours upon hours teaching each day are not wasted?  Our memory experts Wolfe and Medina suggest if teachers “want something to stick in students’ long-term memory, then teachers must build elaborative rehearsal strategies into their instruction.  Building elaborative rehearsal strategies allows students’ time to process the information.  This increases the strength of students’ learning because the strategies allow consolidation to take place (Wolfe, 157.) It was brought up in class discussion after a Brain Rules presentation that it is best for teachers to plan lessons where content is incorporated gradually and then repeated in intervals. At the beginning of each year, teachers spend time looking at their specialist schedules hoping and trying to work their days where they can have large chunks of teach time during ideal parts of the day. I feel that I have always had an inconsistent specialist time and I never really have more than a small block of time for teaching a lesson before recess or a specialist interrupts it. Well, research has shown that leaving a lesson and revisiting that material is actually doing your students a service. The best way to retain information in your memory is to rehearse and revisit as much as possible. I am now using my choppy daily schedule to my advantage to really reiterate my main teach points.

The last piece of information that I found extremely valuable, that I would like to discuss is the importance of visuals used in your daily lessons and in the classroom. We learned through class discussions and our readings that images help us learn and remember more than just written words. This immediately made me think back to my own classroom and what I could change in my lessons to fit this model that is more visual based. Medina says, “Vision trumps all other senses…We learn and remember best through pictures, not through written or spoken words.” (Medina, 223) In a sense, less is more. Teaching kindergarten my classroom is filled with pictures and word labels for my ELL students and non-readers. For my kiddo’s on IEP’s I have several picture schedules that allows consistency for them. I have always been aware at how beneficial images are for ELL students and students on IEP’s but I had never understood how important images were for increasing understanding for the whole class.  Wolfe discusses in chapter 12, “Not only are visuals powerful retention aids, but they also serve to increase understanding,” (Wolfe, 184). This will be a constant challenge for me in my teaching career. To look at my lessons each day and find ways to scale down the amount of text and increase the visuals.

I am excited to see what another quarter or even year of new learning will bring to my classroom. I am happy to say that I feel like I have been able to make many changes so far this year in my room to better the learning for my students. Although sometimes make a change or adding something new that I might not feel 100% comfortable with, like theater and drama, can be intimidating it is proving to be effective and really helping my student learning. What is most important in my eyes as an educator, is to remain open minded and open to suggestions that could best benefit your students. Always be willing to take risks, and better yourself as an educator, because we have to remember, it is all about the students!

Resources:

Bringing theater into the classroom. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.seattlerep.org/Programs/Education/BTIC/Default

Medina, J. (2008). Brain rules: 12 principles for surviving and thriving at work, home, and school (pp. 14-147). Seattle, WA: Pear Press.

Sousa, David A. (2008). The jossey-bass reader on the brain and learning. (1st ed., pp. 95-336). San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Willis, J. (n.d.). ASCD Webinars – Judy Willis, Brain-Based Learning Strategies. Membership, policy, and professional development for educators – ASCD. Retrieved October 6, 2013, from http://www.ascd.org/professional-development/webinars/judy-willis-brain-and-learning-webinars.aspx

Wolfe, P. (2010). Brain Matters. (2nd ed.,pp.16-223). Arlington, VA: ASCD

Wolfe, P. (2013). Early Brain Development. (pp.1-10) A position paper for the 9th Bridge Early Childhood Program in Las Vegas.

EDTC 6433: Final Reflection

I am happy to say that I am leaving this class feeling like I have learned a lot and also feeling like technology is not nearly as intimidating as I made it out to be. Walking into this class in the beginning of the quarter I have to admit that I was nervous, and intimidated. Yes, I feel that I am pretty tech savvy with the items that I use outside of my classroom, but when it came time to implement technology into my classroom, I didn’t know where to start. During the first class session we spoke about our final projects we would create and we touched on the types of work we would do in this tech class. We also took a NETS self-assessment to see what areas we could use improvement.  After leaving class the first day I have to a say that I was pretty skeptical. Reading over the NETS and taking that self-assessment truly felt like I was trying to (and not succeeding) read a different language. The self-assessment showed me that I truly had a lot of room for growth in all areas. I teach kindergarten, I have 22 five year olds who are just learning the letters of the alphabet and learning how to read and write. My original outlook was, what in the world could I possibly take from this class and make applicable in my room? “These projects and NETS don’t really apply to me”. I am proud to say, that I was so very wrong! Whether I am teaching 5 year olds or 75 year olds, teaching technology is possible and very doable at any age! My overall technology goal was to focus on NETS-S 2: Communication and Collaboration and NETS-T 1: Facilitate and Inspire Student Learning and Creativity. I would improve technology integration in my classroom by using Haiku as a space to allow my students to share their animal research projects in June. Students would use our classroom Haiku page to demonstrate their research and use of PebbleGo and a voice recording system to create their project. Although this project won’t be completed until May/June of 2014, I feel I was effective in setting my students up for success on this project. I have spent a lot of time teaching my students about the basics of using netbooks. I have worked hard teaching my students how to log on, how to navigate to their sites, how to adjust volume, use headphones and how to log off. I have also done a lot of preloading with my students on how to research using graphic organizers and using the basics of PebbleGo. I have learned so much about how to introduce somewhat complicated technology skills so early in the year with kindergarteners. My biggest learning and takeaway from this class is twofold. One is how many technology tools and resources can be modified and used with my kindergarteners in class. The second biggest takeaway is the capability of my kindergarteners using technology, especially so early in the year. With enough practice and careful teaching my students were able to meet extremely high expectations that I set!

During this class, I learned about several different programs that have been extremely useful and helpful in my classroom! A part of this course that I greatly enjoyed was the fact that majority of the programs we got to learn about and use in class are all able to be scaled down to use at different grade levels.  I also feel that I am leaving with wonderful resources and tools for my future years of teaching. Not only did I find new programs and technologies that I am able to use with my students, I learned about new technologies that will benefit me in my journey with SPU for my graduate degree! I already used one 2 of the programs I have learned about in my projects and presentations for finals this quarter! I look forward to seeing how I can continue to use these programs with my class this year and in the future as well!

Something I always need to remember is how important technology is and how it allows for creativity in my classroom. Student choice is so important. It allows for students to be more engaged and take ownership in their learning, and technology really aids student choice. Technology has really opened the door and alleviated stress for the kiddos in my room who struggle with fine motor and writing skills. It has allow for my students who rarely participate in conversation and give me a large sigh when it is time to get work done,  to be excited to pull out the netbooks or recording system to get started on their work! Technology is supporting students with many different avenues to access information and support learning! I will definitely be continuing the use of technology in my classroom!

EDU 6655 Is Theater the Answer?

While reading chapter 14 of Brain Matters, Wolfe does a wonderful job recapping the main takeaways from her book. While reading over the importance of using appropriate rehearsal strategies and providing many opportunities for students to revisit information over time on page 222, I was able to connect a phenomenal new resource I received during our staff LEAP time.

Our staff was lucky enough to have a training session from BTiC: Bringing Theater into the Classroom. It is a program that teaches you ways to integrate drama into your entire curriculum. They give activities, and ice breakers to help start your year off. With those activities, comes a set up for grouping our students that you are able to pull from for the rest of the year. Looking back into chapter 11, Wolfe states, “We learn some things by experiencing them concretely, others symbolically, and still others in abstract terms (Wolfe 166).” What I loved about BTiC is this program provides methods of learning that research has proved to be most effective. During this mini workshop, we learned a lot about tableaus and how effective they can be in all subject areas and used for many purposes. This immediately excited me and got me eager to apply my new learning into my classroom. I already had an idea of where and exactly how I wanted to test out using tableaus.

In my classroom during reading workshop, the curriculum is focusing hard on oral retelling of the highlighted story from the curriculum. We are provided with a hardcopy version of this story, the story is available online, and we are given blank picture cards for students to “fill in the blank” of the story. However, no matter how many times we listen to the story (me reading the book, played online or using the blank cards) my students are still having a difficult time with going back and recreating the story in the correct order. I went back into my classroom after the workshop and immediately introduced tableaus to my students. Rather than having my whole class attempt to retell the entire story together, I divided the story out into 4 sections and grouped my students into 4 groups. Each group was given a section of the story and they had to work together to create a tableau to show the most important piece of their section of the story. Each group then watched the others mini productions! We had a quick discussion about each tableau and why they chose the stances, and gestures they chose. After this activity, we sat back down and debriefed the whole lesson. The next day I came back and revisited this same story and asked them to retell the story. The outcome was phenomenal. Every single student was able to correctly retell the story in the correct order and they were actually able to pull even more information from the story after that activity than they were able to before.

All of the reading and research from Jossey, Wolfe and the fabulous online readings that we have been able to discover have really come to life in my classroom with how students learn best. I can’t wait to continue using tableaus and theater in my classroom!

Bringing theater into the classroom. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.seattlerep.org/Programs/Education/BTIC/Default

Wolfe, P. (2010). Brain Matters. (2nd ed., pp.221-223). Arlington, VA: ASCD.

Mnemonics Saved the Day

Growing up, I always had a difficult time studying for tests. There was always so much information that I needed to retain but I struggled keeping the information organized and straight in my mind. I always seemed to struggle until the day I started using mnemonics. In chapter 13 of Brain Matters Wolfe states, “many teachers view mnemonics as mere memorization or ‘memory tricks’ (Wolfe 208).” They say that mnemonics are unrespectable because they don’t enhance deep and meaningful understanding. As an educator, I could not disagree more. I was able to be successful in elementary school, middle school, high school and college because of the help from mnemonics. It is a great tool to  aid memory and the ability to recite information.

Wolf spends a great deal of time reciting many of the categories of mnemonics. Two categories that I was able to connect with the most is acrostic sentences, as well as acronyms. The two are very similar to one another. The difference is acrostic sentences are always sayings in a sentence form whereas acronyms are using just a single word.  Many of us have probably learned several of these as young children and still to this day are able to recite these silly sentences or words. Examples are how many days are in each month “30 days has September, April, June and November..” ,  learning the notes of the line on the treble clef by learning the sentence “Every good boy does fine” . A popular acronym that I still use to this day to help me remember how to properly use the words affect vs. effect is RAVEN.  “Remember affect (is a) verb, effect (is a) noun (Wolfe 210).”

“When two vowels go walking, the first one does the talking (Wolfe 211).” Using what seems to be just a silly sentence during reading workshop to help students remember a very important rule while reading, truly works. In chapter 15 of Jossey Bass Reader, it talks about the differences between literate and illiterate students. One intriguing difference was when they looked into reciting nonsense words. “The illiterate people tended to turn these into real words (Blakemore 240).” Teaching kindergarten, I still have several students who are not reading yet. Illiterate students, struggle retaining the information and research shows that they are actually using a different part of their brains when attempting to read words. They use the part of the brain responsible for problem solving.

After looking deeper into this new learning, I am curious to see how helpful it could be using mnemonics more frequently with my illiterate students. I look forward to learning more creative ways to distribute information for my illiterate students to recall it better/faster, as well as strengthen my literate student’s skills. Could this change, decrease or eliminate (in some areas) the problem with students using the wrong part of their brain while trying to read? Even if it couldn’t solve the problem, I am curious to see the growth with those illiterate students in using mnemonics. As teachers we can teach students about how their memories work and give them the tools they need in order to recall and pull from that stored information.

Wolfe, P. (2010). Brain Matters. (2nd ed., pp.200-217). Arlington, VA: ASCD.

Blakemore, S. J., Frith, U. (2007). The JOSSEY-BASS READER on the Brain and Learning (p. 101). San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

EDU 6655 What Would I Change?

There are many things that we as educators would change about our schools if we had the money and/or power to.  Ask a teacher to close their eyes and pretend that money and power were not an issue. For them to write down ideas of what a perfect school would look like and see what you get. Every teacher has their dream of what that would look like, and it would be pages upon pages of changes, some more feasible than others.  There is, however one major change that I would like to see implemented in schools all over the country. I would like to see more exercise built into our students’ school day.

“Research from Harvard University has shown that exercise plays a critical role in brain functioning (Wolfe-Early Brain Development 6).” Many researchers have concluded that exercise is an important part of a child’s day. In chapter 7 of Brain Matters, Wolfe discusses how school districts are decreasing the time spent in subjects like art, music and physical education to spend more time on core subjects such as math, reading and writing in hopes to raise students standardized test scores. However, after looking into research concerning the effects of exercise on brain function it suggests that this practice may be counterproductive to the results they are looking for (Wolfe 93). Wolfe goes on later in the chapter explaining a study that was done proved that the more physical tests students passed, the higher they scored on the achievement test. Exercise not only enhances learning, it affects emotional and physical well-being as well because when you exercise your body produces endorphins (Scheve).”

I was pleased to read in John Medina’s Brain Rules that “kids pay better attention to their subjects when they’ve been active. Kids are also less likely to be disruptive in terms of their classroom behavior when they’re active (Medina 2008)”. Not only are they less disruptive but they “feel better about themselves, have higher self-esteem, less depression, less anxiety. All of those things can impair academic performance and attentiveness (Medina 2008)”. Science and my readings have proved that exercise is a vital part of education and learning. Taking the time each day in my class to do our Get Fit- Count to 100s song, stretching, doing breathing exercises, and having them do children’s yoga are all benefiting the learning of my students. It has been a great way to get the blood flow and oxygen to their brain to help get them ready to learn. I have really noticed a difference in their level of engagement after such activities. In my perfect world, districts would stop eliminating our student’s time in important activities that help the success rate of our students. I would also have blocks of time set for exercise in the classrooms totally to about an hour of fun movements and exercises. There could even be a before school program where students could come and do Pilates, yoga, zumba, jogging or any other type of exercise to get their brains awake and ready to learn before the day begins! This would not only aid learning and engagement, but it would also help solve our national obesity issue that our country is undergoing.

Resources:

Medina, J. (2008). Exercise. Brain rules: 12 principles for surviving and thriving at work, home, and school (pp. 14-18). Seattle, WA: Pear Press.

Scheve, T. (n.d.). Is there a link between exercise and happiness?. Retrieved from http://science.howstuffworks.com/life/exercise-happiness2.htm

Wolfe, P. (2010). Brain Matters. (2nd ed., pp.93-97). Arlington, VA: ASCD.

Wolfe, P. (2013). Early Brain Development. A position paper for the 9th Bridge Early Childhood Program in Las Vegas.

EDU 6655 Real-Life Problem Solving

In chapter 11 of Brain Matters it states, “John Dewey contended that school should be less about preparation for life and more like life itself (1937) (Wolfe, 169).” This quote from Dewey really makes me look at how I teach my classroom in a different way. I have always felt that preparing students for life is the most important part about my job. In the past I have focused on helping my students learn about how to become a better friend, citizen and overall person using problem solving strategies. These lessons have been taught in different scenarios and I have even had my students act out and role play problems and solutions.

Wolfe states, “teachers can find actual problems in their own schools and communities for students to solve (Wolfe, 170)”. I really want to find a way to incorporate a smaller scale of this idea for my kinders. We are currently doing informative writing and later in the year my students will be learning how to use research data bases to find information to support their writing. Finding a way to get student into the action of solving a problem to allow for some real hands on experience would improve their learning and retention. Wolfe mentions, “Many of our strongest neural networks are formed by actual experience (Wolfe 169).”  We have spent a lot of time in classes discussing how quickly and how high the percentage of information that is taught, is lost after the students walk out the door. Giving students the hands on learning, where they are able to put their problem solving strategies to use over a week or two time frame, would support their ability to recall and therefore remember materials. Solving a real-life problem would fully support those skills. Dewey mentioned how most schools have students developing critical-thinking and problem-solving skills but they are almost always hypothetical case studies. They are not addressed in the classroom. They are typically taught by lecture and recitation of the information given during instruction. Wolfe mentions that by having students solve a real problem within their community or school, “students learn both content and critical thinking (Wolfe 170).”

A lot of discussion was swirling this week about how important visuals are in our teaching. Less is more. Lessons and information that are jam packed with words quickly become ineffective for our students. Wolfe supports this discussion in chapter 12, when she states, “Not only are visuals powerful retention aids, but they also serve to increase understanding,” (Wolfe, 184). It is important to really tie these two topics of discussion together. While solving those real-life problems in the classroom,  it is important to be showing students how to access databases and how to use visuals to support their learning and presenting. It is just as important for students to understand the importance of visuals as teachers. When we were students growing up giving presentations about different topics from kindergarten all the way through college, no one ever told me how less is more, how important visuals were for retaining and recalling information. Medina states, “the more visual the input becomes, the more likely it is to be recognized-and recalled (Medina, 233).” As students we were pushed to give as much information as possible and that typically resulted to PowerPoint slides in 8 pt font so we could fit everything on! As current educators, it is our responsibility to not only use this in our own practice, but also to teach our students about the importance of these topics too so they can apply it into their daily work.

Resources:

Medina, J. (2008). Brain Rules: 10 Vision (1^st ed., pp. 233). Seattle, WA: Pear Press.

Wolfe, P. (2010). Brain Matters. (2nd ed., pp.169-184). Arlington, VA: ASCD.

EDU6655 How People Learning Using Meta-Cognitive Strategies

Chapter 2 of How People Learn: Bridging Research and Practice connected directly into my classroom this week because the past 4 days of school has been goal setting conferences with parents and students. During these conferences I spent time discussing their achievement on beginning of the year assessments and then we looked at next steps in each subject area. Together, we then create a goal for the student to focus on for the next few months. We discuss the best possible practices to help them obtain their goal. The students in my classroom are expected to take control of their learning and monitor their progress until we meet back in January. Even though this process is something I have done for years, I have never known there was a name for what I was doing besides “goal setting”.  In chapter 2 it says, “a ‘metacognitive’ approach to instruction can help students learn to take control of their own learning by defining learning goals and monitoring their progress in achieving them (Donovan, Bransford, Pellegrino 13).”

After reading that information it really helped solidify that using meta-cognitive strategies in my classroom and then discussing them in my conferences will help students learning. The struggle I have with this is their age and ability level in the start of the year. Being in kindergarten, the hard part it is getting the students to understand and remember what those strategies are and what they look like, and then having them document and kept record of their learning. Chapter 2 reads, “because metacognition often takes the form of an internal conversation, it can easily be assumed that individuals will develop the internal dialogue on their own”…” Research has demonstrated that children can be taught these strategies, including the ability to predict outcomes, explain to oneself in order to improve understanding, note failures to comprehend, activate background knowledge, plan ahead, and apportion time and memory (Donovan, Bransford, Pellegrino 14).”  Like I mentioned before, my students need a lot of scaffolding. They are too young to be able to develop those skills without several lessons on what it looks like. Modeling this behavior for my kids and then having them practice these skills in a subject area that they have perfected really allows them to ask the necessary questions to understand how to approach this type of learning.  The beginning of the year is always a challenge because I still have many students who are unable to read and write. I have had to result to using pictures and check off sheets for my non-reader and writers. Research has shown that “meta-cognitive practices have been shown to increase the degree to which students transfer to a new setting and events”…..” Class discussions are used to support skills development, with a goal of independence and self-regulation (Donovan, Bransford, Pellegrino 15).”

I have ran my conferences this way for the past 4 years, but I never had research to back up my approach to confirm that it truly does help student learning! As many of the other readings and Dr. Williams screen-casts touched on, is how to go from being a novice to an expert. To help my students become more of an expert of their learning it will depend on, “the manner in which information is organized and utilized (Bransford, Brown, Cocking 101)”. As teachers, we all strive to help our students learn how to become an expert on managing their own learning. I feel these skills will help them accomplish that!

Resources:

Donovan, S. M., Bransford, J. D., & Pellegrino, J. W. (1999). How People Learn: Bridging Research and Practice (pp. 13-15). N.p.: National Academy of Science.

Bransford, J. D., Brown, A. L., & Cocking, R. R. (2007). The JOSSEY-BASS READER on the Brain and Learning (p. 101). San Francisco, CA: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

How People Learn ScreenCast. Dir. Dr. Tracy Williams . Thurs 17 Oct. 2013.

EDU6655 The Secrets of Early Brian Development

In our assignments for this week we watched an ASCD Webinar, Dr. Judy Willis focuses her discussion on how to increase reading motivation in students. She spends a great deal of time discussing best practices and wonderful activities to try in your classroom. My biggest takeaway from this webinar was, connecting what she mentioned and being able to apply it to every subject area that I teach. Being a kindergarten teacher it is also crucial to be knowledgable on early brain development to understand how to better prepare your students for success.

Dr. Willis mentioned in her Webinar that it is important to make your lessons enjoyable, you need to have what she called, the “buy-in” method. Making your lessons relevant for your students allows them to immediately connect and engage. They should understand what she called the “here-me-now” not only in reading, but in every subject area. At any age, students should be able to answer: what will this information or skill offer me, here, at this time. This information is nothing new for me and many other teachers in my school district. As educators in Lake Washington School District, we have always been advised to have learning objectives posted in our room for all subject areas for students to recall on and use each day. In Brain Matters Wolfe explains “Occipital Lobes are the primary brain centers for processing visual stimuli (Wolfe 2010).” The visual stimuli connects with stored cognitive associations which makes what is being seen, meaningful. So why is it so important for learning objectives to be posted and shared with students? Wolfe shares, “This is why preparing students by telling them the objective of an activity is usually desirable. It allows the brain to anticipate critical features or ideas, and it increases the likelihood that the brain will focus on essential information (Wolfe 2010).”

Like I mentioned above, early childhood teachers need to understand the developing brain and what type of interactions are helpful for children that will set them up for success. The quotes mentioned above from Brain Matters and Dr. Willis’s Webinar really connected to the second reading by Wolfe, Early Brain Development. This reading lists 10 “need to knows” about brain development. There were a few that I was able to immediately connect into my classroom. In #3 Wolfe states, the brain is largely sculpted by its environment. Provide many options from which children can choose their activities. Watch what interests them and engage them in talk about their discoveries (Wolfe 2013). In my school, my team and I spend a lot of time discussing how we can give our students more choice in what they do for multiple subject areas. Students have choice options for order of completion in assignments, to free time activities, some writing topics in writing workshop, as well as brainstorming our classroom rules.

Another piece that I connected with was #4, Language Development. Talk, talk, talk! In this part of the reading it mentions the importance of language development during the first 3 years. However, I feel that the importance of language development continues well into kindergarten. Research has shown students benefit from talking about what they know and what they have learned. “Research studies show that children raised in rich language environments have much larger vocabularies than those raised in language impoverished environments (Wolfe 2013).” I have pulled this into my classroom by sending home Conversation Starters each Friday. I created Conversation Starters to help parents know exactly what we learned in different subject areas to be able to continue educational language in their home. They are questions parents can ask their child at dinner, in the car etc to help supplement learning at home. Having meaningful conversations with their parents allows them to use newly learned vocabulary and hold the student responsible for their learning through discussion.

“Young children learn best through concrete experience. It is important to provide hands-on learning to strengthen natural interactions in natural settings (Wolfe 2013).” Get your students out in the real world! Assignments don’t have to be limited to paper and pencil. This is another method I was able to connect to my classroom. I have my students out in natural settings to gain experiences. They help parents write grocery lists, they cut out words from food labels, bags, magazines to add to our classroom word wall. They go on nature walks with their parents to connect to science curriculum. Like I mentioned in Dr. Willis’s webinar, she talks a lot about making learning relevant to your students. It can be difficult to make learning in all subject areas relevant to kindergarteners who have not had many natural experiences in the world. I have enjoyed the challenge of incorporating this into my classroom over the past 4 years to really give my students a “buy-in” for their learning and how they can apply it to the now of theirlife.

The last piece I want to discuss is #9 in the online reading, the importance of exercise. Wolfe states, research from Harvard University has shown that exercise plays a critical role in brain functioning (Wolfe 2013). Being 5, my students like to wiggle and it has required me to get very creative with methods to keep their attention. I was very pleased to read in John Medina’s Brain Rules that “kids pay better attention to their subjects when they’ve been active. Kids are also less likely to be disruptive in terms of their classroom behavior when they’re active (Medina 2008)”. Not only are they less disruptive but they “feel better about themselves, have higher self-esteem, less depression, less anxiety. All of those things can impair academic performance and attentiveness (Medina 2008)”. Science and my readings have proved that taking time in my day to do our Get Fit- Count to 100s song, stretching, doing breathing exercises, and having them do children’s yoga are all benefiting the learning of my students. It has been a great way to get the blood flow and oxygen to their brain to help get them ready to learn. I have really noticed a difference in their level of engagement after such activities.

I really enjoyed how I was able to connect each reading and videos that were assigned this week to one another as well as directly into my classroom.

Resources:
Wolfe, P. (2010). Brain Matters. (2nd ed.,pp.16-69). Arlington, VA: ASCD

Wolfe, P. (2013). Early Brain Development. A position paper for the 9th Bridge Early Childhood Program in Las Vegas.

Medina, J. (2008). Exercise. Brain rules: 12 principles for surviving and thriving at work, home, and school (pp. 14-18). Seattle, WA: Pear Press.

Willis, J. (n.d.). ASCD Webinars – Judy Willis, Brain-Based Learning Strategies. Membership, policy, and professional development for educators – ASCD. Retrieved October 6, 2013, from http://www.ascd.org/professional-development/webinars/judy-willis-brain-and-learning-webinars.aspx