Module+4


 * Example modules to read: Josh Freier and Abby Suelflow**


 * **Student ID** || **Mod 1** || **Mod 2** || ** Mod 4 ** ||
 * 1035180 || 17 || 18 || 19 ||
 * 1036766 || 18 || 18 || 19 ||
 * 1098247 || 18 || 0 (Late) || 0 (Late) ||
 * 1476011 || 0 (Late) || 17 || 0 (Late) ||
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 * 1667099 || 18 || 19 || 19 ||
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 * 1720929 || 18 || 18 || 19 ||
 * 1826882 || 18 || 18 || 20 ||
 * 1827487 || 17 || 17 || 19 ||
 * 1833131 || 18 (Late) || 18 || 19 ||
 * 1839018 || 19 || 18 || 18 ||
 * 1848436 || 18 || 0 (Late) || 19 ||
 * 1857564 || 18 || 18 || 18 ||
 * 1885769 || 19 || 19 || 20 ||
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Halli Holden Module 4 Reflection January 28, 2010 I have done a few projects through my Teacher Education program that involve putting a lesson or unit together for my content area. One thing that I have noticed in terms of standards is that it is not all that difficult to incorporate each standard into a unit. I think that a teacher could easily meet each standard without even thinking to deeply about it. I have only done unit or lesson projects for class assignments, I have never made a lesson to actually teach in class. I found the text to be really helpful when discussing the main points that go into making a lesson plan. I liked the definitions that the for some terms that are maybe a little gray in definition such as, aim and objective. What is the difference? Or better yet, what separates a goal from an objective? One idea that the textbook covered was overt and covert behavior outcomes. This was a little confusing to me. I guess when I thought deeply about this I wondered why a lesson wouldn’t display both types of behavior. I understand that covert behavior might not appear until later after the lesson has been completed but shouldn’t a lesson always have overt behavior outcomes? Good question - attempt to answer it yourself! Reflect. The answer is YES! But many people leave them off because they are difficult to measure -- and, if one wants to provide evidence that all students are meeting all of the goals and objectives of the lesson this becomes difficult so many choose not to address it. The “team” and “teacher-student collaboration” reminded me a little bit of a project that my class did when I was in first grade. We were discussing the marriage between Q and U. The idea that the teacher was trying to get across to us was that every other letter can be used singular but QU always go together, therefore, they are married. The class nominated someone to play the Q and the U and we threw together a wedding for our parents. During the “ceremony” we each gave a small speech discussing why QU are married. The day before the ceremony, we all teamed up and baked/decorated a wedding cake and learned the waltz so we could all dance after the ceremony. This project touched a little bit on both team and teacher-student collaboration. Interesting motivator... a little overboard? I'm sure no one forgot the idea! As a future English teacher, I found that the ABCDs of writing objectives was really helpful. This layout is a great way to discuss what is expected of students while writing. This idea is also useful in reverse, when assessing students. How do you feel about writing the D part? Does this seem like a behavioral objective to you? How would a constructivist view this? I think one of the more difficult aspects of teaching will be dealing with the developmental needs of youth. Out of the following developmental needs: intellectual, physical, emotional/psychological, and moral/ethical, I am most concerned with emotional/psychological and moral ethical. As I teacher I would think that you would want your student’s issues in their personal lives to stay out of their work in your classroom but sometimes there is just no way around it. I have never taught a lesson in a classroom this shocks me! This should not be the case! ut judging by the way my high school class was, it cannot be easy to teach lessons with moral and ethical issues presented.

Amy Wolff Module 4 January 28, 2010

This module covered a lot of different material, some I have encountered in past classes and some I am seeing in some of my other current classes. Some information that I learned about in my other classes include the teaching standards, objective, and also Bloom's Taxonomy. In my educational psychology class this semester we have been learning about behaviorism and constructivsm, and rehearsal just as this module did. However, none of those topics are what I found most interesting. What I really connected with was the discussion of good planning and and textbook dependency. The reason I felt a connection to these two topics is because I have had bad experiences with my own teachers who have failed to plan properly and succeeded all too well in being dependent on just one textbook. I believe I will do a very good job planning units and lessons for my classes because I am very organized. Of course there will always be times when life or technology will get in the way, making it difficult to follow through with the lesson as planned just like how this module is being added to the site late at night due to technological failure on my laptops part. Now even though there will be times like this there is no excuse for constant poorly planned lessons. Yes, I would agree. There is also no excuse for using the same poorly planned lesson year after year. Unfortunately I have seen disorganization and poor planning on the part of both high school and college instructors. I cannot say why my classmates and I were put through the torture of that, however, I can say that I will not put my own students through the same. With my organizational and creative skills I should be able to do a great job presenting new and exciting lessons. Another thing that I will make sure not to do is become dependent on only one textbook for classes. I have had to deal with one-sided textbooks that often had very little to do with my kind of lifestyle and background. This made it very difficult to enjoy the material or to take it seriously. I want to be able to find as many secondary sources for the class as I can in order to help them avoid the same unfortunate times. It only makes sense with as many different students as there will be in these classes that there needs to be a variety of tools for them to learn. After having the Support Lecture, how do you feel about Layered Curriculum? I know from having to do various research projects here at USD that I have the power to find these different items and that is exactly what I will do. Students can only learn in the right environment and that includes the proper planning and the proper sources.

Abby Suelflow Module 4 Reflection January 26, 2010

Upon completion of this module, I have thought a lot about the ways in which I will select the most appropriate content for my future classes. As mentioned in module 4, educators often get too wrapped up in the notion that in order for students to understand the material they must read the textbook from the front to the back cover. In my past experiences in both high school and college, I have witnessed first-hand these types of instructors. I have a very difficult time understanding the point of rushing through material when nearly the entire class is still trying to grasp the concepts from the first unit. What is the point of completing the last chapter in the textbook when students are sorting out the material from the first exam? Having been a student in these types of classes has enabled me to understand that it is far more important to teach content that students find meaningful and relevant, while at the same time, covering the content at a pace that enables students to gain a firm understanding of the material. Excellent reflection, now how will you accomplish this... In relation to the idea of selecting content that students find relevant, I feel that it is absolutely necessary to incorporate several different resources into the curriculum other than the textbook. Especially in my disciple (biology), new research is being conducted daily that result in additions or alterations to the current data. Therefore, I would like to incorporate scientific journal readings, popular scientific magazines, and current events into my lesson planning  in order for students to see how the scientific world is evolving. <- Yes! I am glad to see a broad subject matter goal for student development! Furthermore, this enables students to find materials that are at the appropriate reading level and are of interest to them. As a high school student, I remember discussing biological current events and it was evident what each student was interested in by the article that he/she shared with the rest of the class. These types of assignments will also help students be more prepared for college level courses in which they will be expected to understand how to conduct research using outside resources. Thinking back to module 1, what is the purpose of secondary education? Does this meet every students' needs? Isn't it important for everyone regardless of going to college? The last portion of this module dealt with preparing instructional objectives and moving student thinking and behaving from the lowest levels to the highest levels. In every education course that I have been enrolled in, the importance of incorporating higher order thinking skills has been emphasized. As I think back to different courses that I have taken, I have found that I have little recollection of the content when root memorization was all that was required. On the other hand, when we were asked to justify, evaluate, create, interpret, or illustrate an important concept, I can describe in detail the material covered in that course. Nice reflection! This isn’t coincidental; there is research that backs up the fact that students will be able to recall information much longer if they are required to move beyond simple recall of information. In my future classes, I want my students to have a strong foundation for biological concepts; however, I can’t achieve this goal by having students fill in the missing blank in a sentence that is verbatim from their notes. Instead I must instill higher order thinking skills in my students by incorporating projects that require them to use the concepts in order to design, invent, or create a project that shows they understand the material. Although it is a daunting task, I strongly believe if my students are able to acquire higher order thinking skills, they will be much more successful at the postsecondary level.

Jamie Wickham Module 4 1-26-10

This module was interesting to me because I feel like I see very little of what is told us about education actually implemented in today’s classrooms. As I was finishing up the module I made note of the quotation that “unlike behaviorists, constructivists do not limit the definition of learning to that which is observable behavior” (146) because I have spent my teacher education program reflecting on the Behaviorist education I believe I was given and the ways in which I intend on providing my students a different experience. I cannot remember a time in which my teachers seemed concerned with my learning as an individual. The unique perspective that I, or my classmates, could bring to the classroom seemed of little interest or influence save for the random anecdotal fact someone could provide because of a family vacation to a point of interest. The realm of covert behavior is indeed an important one because appreciating, discovering, and understanding is just as important as any action verb that can be written into an educational objective. Yes, now you just need to think about its measurement! Thus, a true assessment of the student (that extends beyond their standardized test scores) can indicate to a teacher what the student has truly learned from their class. Today in class we examined the difference between the area and the circumference of a circle, and though I knew the difference at some point in time during my education so that I could apply it on an exam (and I remember again teaching myself the formulas so I could use them on the GRE) I was at a complete loss when it came to identifying the specific formulas. However, after the illustration that was placed on the board relating the area of a circle to the area of a rectangle, I find myself sitting here now thinking “why wasn’t I taught that in high school ? I think I will actually remember it this time.” This has to do with the idea of rehearsal. Giving us a formula is one thing (rote memorization!!), but actually teaching us the formula by relating it so something we already know allows us to actually understand what we are practicing. It moves us beyond the phase in Bloom’s Taxonomy known as knowledge to the higher-order cognitive thinking skill known as application. If the instructional objective is for the student to be able to //calculate// the area of a circle rather than simply //recognize// the formula for the area of a circle than it is important that the teaching follows a style that focuses on teaching information that will eventually end up in long-term memory, and not simply forgotten after a standardized test. This is so well thought out! Great reflection! And I am not just saying that because the content is math and ideas that I have shared are dear to my heart. It is easy to read this information and latch onto the ideas that can make a great teacher, but as our time in class and the information in the text indicate, this will take a lot of time, planning, and effort. I consider myself to be an excellent planner…perhaps I even over-plan. But I am used to planning in a way that is beneficial to me. Certain tasks may seem like a waste of time to others, and in the classroom this is perhaps the greatest crime a teacher can commit. Being knowledgeable of the materials my students need to learn I will be better prepared to plan in a way that both challenges them and avoids any lengthy wasting of time. There are many components to take into consideration (see list on pg. 116) when planning for instruction, but a well thought-out plan is the quickest way to ensure the students are allowed the time to infuse their unique personalities into classroom activities.

Kellen Moser Module 4 January 26, 2010 You never really think about all of the planning that goes into making something as simple as a single lesson, until you have to do it. I know that I didn't realize all of the time and effort that went into planning a lesson until I did it for my Paraprofessional experience. After reading this module, I see all of the things that I should be thinking about while planning my lesson. I'm actually thinking that the information given will make it easier to plan a lesson a little more smoothly. While reading it I thought that it was only more things to consider, but I think that these are things that will actually help me down the road. It may be tough to think about all of these things at first, but I feel that after a while I will be automatically integrating these techniques into my lessons. It will just take a lot of practice and adjusting of my methods before I get things to run efficiently. This makes me wonder why I only did one lesson at my Paraprofessional experience and am only doing two in my Internship. I guess I don't know what the requirements are of the student teaching semester exactly, but hopefully it will allow me to plan an entire unit <- you will get the opportunity to plan an entire unit in student teaching! I am hoping this class makes that task a whole lot easier, because the more practice I get, the better I will be at it. It almost seems to me like textbooks are becomming completely outdated, especially with what we are learning in this class. Even though I don't have much knowledge about problem-based learning, it seems like you could teach a course with virtually no textbook. I think kids are ready to do away with the traditional textbooks and get hands-on with their learning, which is exactly what we are learning about in class. I think that I would like to have textbooks for my class, but maybe just use them as supplemental material. If the kid is struggling with something, I could direct them certain materials in the textbook to help him or her out. I agree that it will be important for me to not be reliant on a textbook, as the kids will most likely become bored with the material. It is interesting to read about textbooks that will be completely online or on discs on the computer. I think that even this change will be more favorable for kids. They are almost always willing to do things on the computer, even if it doesn't initially catch their attention. The section that I found really interesting was the section with dealing with controversy, because I don't have any idea how I will handle controversy. How am I going to react to a student that personally attacks me? What am I going to do if a student challenges me? How am I going to handle parents that don't like what I am doing as a teacher? What if they don't like the books that I send home for their kids to read? I think it is important for me and parents and administration to all have open minds within education, but that won't always be the case. I am going to have to be willing to compromise with parents and other faculty members on certain situations, and hopefully, they will be willing to do the same. I think it will be important to have an understanding up front with my boss. I will have to establish a sense of trust with him before I even am willing to take the job. I would want to know that I will have the freedom I need in my class. I hope that he/she will know that I can be trusted in the classroom. I also think it is important to develop character, as well as learning. What would be the point of molding the smartest minds in the world if they weren't generally good human beings to go along with it. Actually, in some aspects, developing character is more important than anything else. Not everyone is going to be brilliant. Not every child will go to college (most likely). We, as teachers, should be able to make that person a better human being ,<- careful with this language... I know what you are trying to say, but "make the person into a better human being" displays a slight patronization and control; would you agree? How does one help a student learn to self-regulate, develop their own character, and construct their own knowledge? though. If we are able to change that person into a better person, they will be able to handle life, regardless of what it throws at them. I would be more proud of my work when I'm done if I was able to maximize the number of good human beings that came through my class, rather than the number of good students.

Kelsey Sammons 1.26.10

This module began with addressing the importance of planning. I feel that I am an effective planner and organizer when it comes to my schedule and time management; however, I wonder if that will translate over into my planning a lesson. After reading this module, I realize that it is important to master the planning process as early as possible. Not only will this keep teachers on track, but it will also help us become a master of the materials and methods that we are teaching. I agree with the statement in the book that the heart of good planning is decision making. It is important to decide ahead of time which subject matter is appropriate and most valuable to teach. There is no reason to overload the students with excess material that may be irrelevant. If our students believe that the material is unimportant, they will not remain on task and the lesson will be a waste of everyone’s time. I appreciated the books statement that “A well developed plan will not guarantee the success of a lesson or unit or even the overall effectiveness of a course.” This alludes to the fact that even if a teacher plans his or her lesson down to the last word, there could be many factors that would contribute to the plan going awry. The students may not be interested in the lesson, they may have questions about certain parts of the material that seems less important to the teacher, or maybe there is fire drill that interrupts the lesson. Many things could go wrong the execution o f the lesson, and it is better to be prepared for that than to let it overwhelm and distract the rest of your lesson. Good reflection! Even some of the best lessons in my mind did not go over that well. But, this is a great time for reflection as well. Another important part of this module is the use of textbooks in the classroom. The first thing that struck me was the differences in different schools and their access to textbooks. Some schools have 2 copies of a textbook for each student, which allows students to have a book at home to study from, and a book to use during school. I believe that this is extremely effective, because it eliminates many excuses that students may have to not do their homework. It also allows them better opportunities to learn the material. On the other hand, some schools have no books. This is a tragedy. Even though I do not believe that all learning comes from a textbook, I do believe that a textbook is essential in the reinforcement of subject material. Students deserve the opportunity to learn to their full potential, and they deserve the right to use all means to achieve that knowledge. Agreed! I don't think we, or the text, ever discussed not haveing "a" text. But, is completely online an option? One part of the module that I was extremely interested in was how to deal with controversy. Because I am an English/Speech Communication Education major, I will have to deal with many types of controversy surrounding the books that my students are allowed to read and the topics my students select to discuss in their speeches. Controversy is another facet of education that I was sheltered from by attending a private Catholic school. Controversial subjects were not discussed, and if a controversial subject did come up, it was not dealt with in an “all-inclusive” manner. There was one belief, one answer and it was the Church’s answer. There was little room from discussion or differing opinions. This may hinde r my ability to be unbiased during discussion in my classroom. I hope that in learning different methods on how to deal with controversy, I will be able to help my students come to their own conclusions, and form their own opinions on controversial subjects. I believe that the book stated it perfectly in saying that “We must understand the difference between teaching truth, value and morals and teaching about truth values and morals.” I think this was a great selection on your part... what does it mean to you? Reflect.

Scott Morrison 1/27/09 Module 4

When I first decided to become a teacher my thoughts centered immediately on helping students. I envisioned myself in a classroom leading a discussion while my students diligently pondered their responses. It seemed like it would be that simple. There was not going to be that much planning involved. Obviously, I was a little off considering the preparation that is truly necessary for providing students the best possible learning environment. Reading through Module 4 allowed me an opportunity to view how valuable preparation is to the teaching profession. An individual teacher must outline everything that takes place in their classroom. This planning involves a wide range of tasks including, but not limited to, unit plans, lesson plans, goals, objectives and assessments. One planning responsibility that caught me off guard was selecting text books. As a student I remember text books being present, but I never considered that teachers went through such an exhaustive search to pick out the best fit. I figured that most information included a text book was thought to be universally true. The introduction to such concepts as stereotyping, invisibility, and unreality have helped to change my mind. Surveying the preface of each prospective text book will help in determining to what degree several of these issues are addressed. Our book recommends selecting a textbook that makes references to diversity, has diversity among the authors, and contains lesson adaptations and accommodations for students with special needs. When I begin teaching I hope to use these guidelines to provide a sound textbook for my students. I hope that, as an English teacher, I will have the opportunity to use novels, shorts stories, and other genres before having to use a textbook, but using a textbook is will be unavoidable. One thing that I will have to keep in mind when teaching novels and other forms of literature is censorship. Asking students to read a novel which contains controversial ideas or images can create problems with parents. Being mindful of certain books which may be inappropriate could prevent tremendous amount of stress. Another important aspect of preparation is addressed through collaborative planning. Teachers can drastically enhance their instruction by planning in accordance to fellow teachers and even their students. Using fellow teachers seems to be an excellent method to integrate a school’s curriculum. Using interdisciplinary theme-based units is a strong idea for producing a sense of relevance in students’ lives. As an English teacher, I am going to want to contact History teachers who are teaching the same group of students to get an idea of what they are teaching. Coordinating literature to the period of history students are currently studying will help to portray the idea that English has had and can have an impact on history. One of the most difficult aspects of preparation can be seen through the establishment of instructional objectives. The relationship between overt and covert behaviors is one which a teacher must understand. Because covert behaviors cannot be seen, a teacher has to rely heavily on overt behaviors to demonstrate them. When writing objectives a teacher must use overt language in hopes of inspiring overt behavior that closely mimics its covert behavior counterpart. Given that many literary concepts are covert, it will be necessary for me to harness overt language when writing objectives. Great reflection! Because a teacher must continually teach to the cognitive, affective, and psychomotor domains of their students, they must establish objectives that cover each one. This seems to be a particularly difficult task considering different types of categories involved with each domain. Our book is helpful in providing the necessary language for the specific stages in each domain. This seems to be a great starting point for a teacher who is unfamiliar with writing their own objectives. I am interested in seeing if I can indeed fit their language into the objectives that I write. Our book mentions that teachers should attempt to teach to the affective domain first and foremost, meaning that they should put a priority on writing objectives geared towards feelings, attitudes and values. This is what the text says; how do you feel about it? If you agree, state why. Although preparation could be considered an unsung portion of teaching, it is a necessary venture. This module has helped me to understand the role that planning plays in an effective learning environment. Making an extra effort to plan efficiently seems as if it will go a long ways in directing learning outcomes. I now realize that I need to make effective use of my time (including summers) and resources to make sure everything goes according to plan. <- And to ensure that you are doing your BEST at assisting students in learning and making sense of the material.

Alisha Limoges Module 4 27 January 2010

I have never taken the time to actually think about how much work teachers put in to make a lesson plan. Not only do they make a lesson plan five days a week, but they decide the content that they plan to cover and anticipate how long it will take to cover that specific information. This module covered the importance of a textbook, and how every content area really depends on that book to serve as a road map of where that class will go. I have always thought that English textbooks where dull and did not motivate students to read. However, I can now see that the textbooks I had in the past were helpful in explaining different literary terms and concepts to look for. This module also emphasizes the importance of picking material that is going to capture the attention of your students and make the information interesting and very relevant. In picking books and novels for my students to read, it is important to keep every type of student in mind, which is why a variety of literature is vital to the success of every student. We also need to make sure that the material is going to hit standards. This module also pointed out “team” and “teacher-student collaboration”. Not only would it be helpful to team up with teachers in your content area from other grades, but also to team up with teachers from other content areas how might you get this accomplished? What if administration does nothing to support this? How can you make it work? who teach your students before and after your class. If a history and English teacher team up to discuss certain wars or events in time, the students will be able to make more connections between the content areas and they will be able to get the same information in a few different ways. Also, teaming up with the students is also imperative to gain their interest. Surveying what your students like and dislike will allow you to focus on certain types of teaching, or in English, will allow you to narrow what type of literature to cover and assess. Lastly, this module also talked about how to overcome controversy. One thing that I really appreciated about this section what that the chapter says every student involved in a controversy has a right to input their information, ideas, and opinions. Obviously, if the controversy is that Mike is picking on Sally, it is not appropriate to let Mike say mean things about Sally. However, if the controversy is over a certain issue that a book may raise, then it is important that every student feels that their opinion is going to respected and is welcomed. I’m sure that we all have been in a situation where we had different views from our teachers and because of those differences, we were not allowed to voice our opinion. It is important to keep in mind that you may have different opinions and views from your students, but that does not give you the right to judge or belittle that student for voicing their thoughts and concerns.

Kevin McKinstry Module 4 January 27th 2010

Module 4 is very interesting in the fact that it explains in explicit detail how to write a lesson plan and what the difference is between a lesson plan, a unit plan, and a course. I found this incredibly helpful because I sometimes can not tell the difference between these. I like the idea of writing individual lessons for a larger unit which with many other units can be put into a course. This shows me that all of the parts are important not just the idea that a lesson plan is the law. Working with a unit means that a person needs to be flexible because some things may not be accomplished on time. Working at being flexible is one of the most important parts of being a teacher. A teacher can have the best planned out lesson plans and unit but if a class finishes early or takes longer than expected a teacher has to learn to improvise on the spot. Otherwise a class could fall into utter chaos.I like the idea of using a uniform way of writing lessons. If a person uses many different formats then they could easily miss something of utter importance, such as how they are going to accomplish certain goals that they have set for themselves. If those goals are not met then the teacher is not doing their job correctly. I like how the module four talks about textbooks being A tool not THE tool. Recently I actually read a book called lies my teacher told me, and it shows that some textbooks are just wrong in what they print. I haven't read itThis book I think correlates excellently with module four in that using an out of date textbook is cheating the students out of their right to a great education. Textbooks are a great tool to use do not get me wrong but I think that they need to be used as module four puts it with other resources as well. This is especially true with my discipline. History is full of so many accounts that it is not possible for all of them to be included in a textbook. Not only that but some points are just not talked about in certain textbooks. Yes, in your discipline this is something that you need to truly pay attention to. The only thing is that textbooks are safe and teaching out of them is easy. Using outside sources is not only hard but it can be dangerous to some teachers as well. Reading about how a teacher should play it safe the first couple of years kind of scared me a little. I do not want to tone down my teaching, but I realize that teaching when teaching high school there are many people who “have their hands in the soup” for lack of a better phrase. Which means that there are so many people that could be offended that everyone’s opinions have to be taken into account. Which by itself is nearly impossible, but on top of that teaching outside of the book means more outside research on the teachers part. Yes! I do believe that good teachers spend a lot of time thinking and preparing. Working on weekends, nights, and yes even breaks. This shows me that the great teachers do not really stop working ever. They are always looking for something that will enhance their students experiences in the classroom. What is sad though is many teachers do not view teaching with this type of dedication and as a result many students suffer. Teachers have to think like students sometimes, would we sit through a long boring lecture or would we want to get in there and get our hands dirty. In the words of the magic school bus to learn properly one has to take chances make mistakes and get messy. In my opinion this is the best way to learn and should be used for all of the disciplines.

Josh Freier Module 4 1/27/10

While reading Module 4, particularly the sections on hierarchies, I remember my high school math teacher. He said that his main goals were for his students to be able to think critically and logically, and be able to solve problems. He was much less interested in them learning important formulas or terms. And to me, he seemed a strange exception to the rule . Most classes, we were focused on learning facts, remembering names and dates and terms . But in reality, I doubt a student that is going on into a career in computer science is going to need to know who Louis XIV was or what //Hamlet// was about. When I took my ACTs in my junior year, I was able to recall all more algebra and trig than when we had to take those university tests in our sophomore year . And, in the end, I don’t really remember about tangents and cosines—and I don’t really need to— but I was never able to break a problem down and solve it more effectively than after I went through my math teacher’s class . That is awesome. I like how you have been thinking about your past experiences and connecting them to what you are reading. For my own content, I see the upper level objectives in Bloom’s Taxonomy as much more important, and unfortunately neglected . I see little importance in having my students memorize dates; they can look them up. But they should be able to look at events in history and understand why they happened and what effect they had on the world today. In middle school and high school, I believe getting students to think critically about problems is a much better preparation for the real world than trying to get them to become “experts” in a certain content area that they might not even remember later in life. Although of course lower-level thinking needs to be remembered when planning objectives, it’s been my experience that too much has been focus on these lower levels, and not enough on the higher-level, more abstract processes that are use to anyone going on into any content area . In that train of thought, this module also lists three different domains of learning objectives: cognitive, affective, and psychomotor. Looking to my past English classes for an example, I think far too much time is spent on learning facts about the books than actually interacting with them. In my experience, we were taught Shakespeare so that we might be “appreciate” good literature, but to me, it had the opposite effect, and I was the one out of the class that would read just about anything. What is the point in cramming the “classics” down students’ throats in an effort to get them excited about reading, when it deters them from it? Frankly, I see literature classes as being <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">primarily in the Affective domain, where students react to what they read, form their own opinions about the text by analyzing it and discussing what it meant to them, and in that way learn more about themselves <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">. And when making objectives within a literature context, I believe lower-level “knowledge” based objectives to much less important than analyzing and evaluating a text. I don’t see the point of having students know what a metaphor or simile is, if it results in them not wanting to read ever again. I particularly liked the quote, “ <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">learning that is most meaningful to students is not so neatly or easily predicted or isolated <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">.” <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">To me this means that the objectives I state cannot be viewed as autonomous boxes to be checked off a list, but rather parts that help guide me in implanting the best way for my students to fully grow, in a variety of different ways <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">. <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">Great job of providing a quote and how you are coming to understand it based on your experiences and connections to what you are reading.

Brandon Krull Module 4 Jan 27, 2009 Planning is very important for becoming an effective teacher. Planning prepares a teacher for creating an optimal learning environment. Planning allows time for teachers to reflect on different possible scenarios. Since classrooms are so diverse, planning allows teachers to address individual differences and create a equal opportunity learning environment. Planning will help teachers develop a better understanding of the material and thus develop an approach that will be most effective. Planning will help teachers better manage their time throughout the semester and not have to sacrifice time in other areas. Planning will also help deal with any controversies that may arise during class. If a subject might spark a debate, we need to know the possible reactions of students and have a plan to deal with them. Content choice must derived from different sources. A variety of sources will help ensure a clear understanding of the material and help eliminate any biases that a single source may create. It will allow a teacher to use more resources in class other than a text book. This can address different levels of reading comprehension in students and help insure that everybody is obtaining the information in a way that they deem most effective. I was surprised to read that 80% of textbooks were beyond a high school reading level. Text books can get thick, especially in history. We need to be creative in our sources to avoid burning the students out. When choosing the content, you should consult the school curriculum and state and national standards. This will help ensure a more uniform education. Consulting articles based on new techniques or up to date information will help keep a teacher current and devise new strategies I truly believe that this will help you better think about good teaching! that might be different from what they might traditionally use. In module 4 they introduce team planning. This can be very effective because it will use more than one point of view. T eachers can use one another for resources, ideas and techniques that they might not figure out on their own. Team planning also will lighten the work load if split amongst the team members. It also makes sure that students in the same subject but different teachers will have the same opportunity as their peers. Team planning will also help create objectives that will help shape future choices. It will help create realistic expectations of what students should be able to do. By setting an objective, we can have assessments that measure the degree the objectives were met. Setting objectives maybe simple, but yet this can be a complex task but they can have a huge effect on a teacher’s self-evaluation.

Rob Cunningham Modulo 4 January 27, 2010

Textbooks are one of the most common forms of information for students. In the eyes of many students a textbook is the key to information in a course. One of the most important events for a teacher then is to select a textbook, and the supporting materials to go with that textbook. As was mentioned in our textbook there are many different aspects to selecting a textbook for a course. There are things like invisibility, stereotyping, imbalance, selectivity, unreality, fragmentation and isolation, linguistic bias, and cosmetic bias that must be analyzed before selecting a textbook for a class. I feel, however, that due to my field of study that these will not be as big a factor as it would be other subjects. I can see how literature and history textbooks might represent individuals or groups of people in biased manners, both positively and negatively, but in a math textbook there is not a lot of information that can be distorted. I agree with your statements, but the approach taken by a textbook can vary greatly! Some may be more discovery, or mastery, or problem-based. Granted these topics should be considered, but I feel that the presentation of the material would be a more important factor for my class. I was actually given the opportunity to help in the selection of a math textbook in the Rapid City school district. Over a winter break my math teacher had me come in to look at two possible books that would be used the following year to teach the Pre-Calculus and Calculus classes. I was able to look through the texts and was given an opportunity to express my opinions to a group of teachers. They ended up using the book that I preferred and the teachers ended up loving the presentation of the book. However, my sister took the courses with that textbook and did not favor this new textbook. She said that the students did not like how the information was presented. I had to reevaluate myself because it is my belief that the textbook should be helpful for the students and they should find the textbooks enjoyable. Then I came to the realization that it might be an ok situation because then it puts the emphasis on the actual teaching and presentation of the information. Then I had another thought that then the problem lies with the teacher, rather the presentation in class needs to be adapted for better retention. Either way I believe that a textbook should be a way for students to obtain information but should be a secondary source to the teacher and to the other sources that the teacher brings to the educational table. Now a further matter of interest in this section surrounds the hierarchy cognitive domain. To begin with, there are the six levels, knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. Obviously the highest level is evaluation where students can criticize material, form their own opinions and other higher levels of thinking, but I do not feel that this is attainable for every student in a classroom. I feel that if I can get students to reach the level of application that, for most students, is a high feat. In my years of tutoring athletes I have found that simple application or word problems is highly difficult for probably 80% of the students that I help. I think that if a teacher, like myself, can get a student to reach the application stage in mathematics that the student would be considered a “success” in attaining their higher category. Now I must ask myself if that is sufficient for me? Should I accept only getting my students to that stage or will I only be satisfied with higher categories. This is great reflection! But you should also tackle the How? I wish I knew the answer. At the moment I feel as if I can teach anyone and try to get them to these higher levels of comprehension, but in all practicality I believe that it is a very difficult thing to achieve. It is simply through trial and error, and adapting to my students will I ever have a chance at pushing them over the top. Yet, if I can get one student to push themselves further into the mathematical world of comprehension and get them to that higher stage well then I believe I will be satisfied in getting the most out of at least one student. Hopefully that gratification will give me the drive to get more of my students over the proverbial hump into their learning.

Cody Miller Module 4 1-27-2010

After reading module four, I thought about how I am going to plan for my classes in the future. During my high school years, I witnessed many different types of planning methods. Some teachers believed that the only way to learn was lecture after lecture. Others believed in activities such as acting out Romeo and Juliet or titration labs. Whether an activity or a lecture was planned, it should be well thought out and ensure student learning. Good planning will make class more fun and help you be a great teacher. I think too many teachers rely too heavily on the class textbook. My high school history teacher would literally read to us from the textbook. She would use little outside sources. This made her one of the worst teachers I have ever had. I want students to learn the material not race through the book as fast as possible. I plan to balance outside resources with the textbook when planning. Using outside resources is especially important in the science classroom. Science is constantly changing, and new articles are being published. It is important to introduce these new topics in class. The module moves on to discussing controversy. Being a Earth science teacher, many controversial topics will arise. The book says when teaching a controversial topic: students should learn about all sides of an issue, it should be well thought out ahead of time, at some point all persons directly involved in an issue have a right to input, and allow students to disagree with your opinion without fear reprisal or academic penalty. My greatest fear is getting in a hot topic such as creation vs evolution especially if it happens spontaneously. I know that I am not ready to lead a discussion about this with a high school classroom. Maybe this indicates it is a topic worthy of uncovering, for yourself, through planning a unit. One controversial topic that I think should be addressed in schools is sex and contraceptives. Telling students not to have sex until marriage is not working, because more are having sex and more are getting pregnant. I think teaching students about safe sex and contraceptive methods is the way to go on this issue. My high school anatomy teacher taught a lesson about sex and contraceptives that really put things into perspective for me. Although I feel strongly about this issue I will not dare to act on it before I have taught for at least 5-7 years, unless requested to discuss it by my superiors. The module ends by discussing blooms taxonomy. Knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation are the processes in truly understanding a material. Each step students gradually grasp the material more and more. Students cannot reach the highest milestones in blooms taxonomy by taking multiple choice tests. Students must be given a variety of assignments to reach these higher milestones. It is difficult, but multiple choice tests can assess higher levels of thinking - but you are correct in saying that we need multiple data points to triangulate understanding. I think PBL schools do a wonderful job in helping students reach the evaluation stage of blooms taxonomy. PBL schools have students learn by completing their project, not memorizing facts. It should be common sense; taxpayers and administrators should understand that teaching through projects will help students reach a higher stage of learning and be more effective.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Rita Buschbacher 1-27-10 Module 4 Module four is about teaching toward multiple objectives, understandings, and appreciations. This is actually one of the titles of a section in the text. <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">More important than how you teach, is how you plan to deliver the message that you are trying to communicate and how to assess and react to student’s behavior or thoughts about the message <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">. One portion I enjoyed was the components of a structural plan for developing a lesson which include a statement of philosophy, a need for how to assess the students, aims, goals, objectives, a sequence, how to integrate this knowledge into previous knowledge, sequentially planned learning activities, and a list of any resources needed. The most important part of this plan is the goals, aims, objectives, and the sequential order of how you will deliver the knowledge. Once you set up the order of how you want to present a lesson, you can then write the goals and objectives you want the students to be able to do by the end of the lesson. The text mentions that sometimes it is easier for some to write the sequence before goals, and I am one of those people that it would be easier for. Once you have the direction of the lesson, you can see what you may need to change or add to achieve goals and objectives. With this planning all of the rest of the components needed for an instructional plan will fall into place. This planning will tie in with any lesson you may give that has controversy. The text comments that you need to be fully planned and prepared for controversial lessons because of the damage that can be done to a student if the wrong comment is made. The module says that the major goal should be to show students how to deal with controversy and to mediate wise decisions on the basis of carefully thought out information. There is nothing wrong with having controversy because people come in contact with it every day in life, but students must learn how to deal with it in order to grow. <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Teachers job is to educate students in their content area, however the way you treat a student or help them discover or learn something much larger will also benefit that students. Whether they learn about others views on an idea or they learn how to communicate their own ideas, this is knowledge that they will need and always use in life. Considering that I am a Math Education major, I am most interested in the psychomotor domain for the learning objectives which, “ranges from the simple manipulation of materials to the communication of ideas, and finally to the highest level of creative performance.” <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Even so, remember that we need to think about objectives in the other two domains. This is possible in mathematics, and often times left out. What does this mean? <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"> Math has a lot to do with manipulation of numbers and formulas and although teaching middle school or high school you may not see the highest level of creative performance, you will help those students to build their knowledge in that direction. This will be important when I am writing my objectives for my lessons. I want students to master the basic knowledge in order to have a solid foundation to build on when they reach upper level math courses. <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">This module was one that I will reference to quite often when writing objectives because of the details descriptions on how to write well-rounded <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">ones.

Adam Ericsson Module 4 January 27, 2010

Before I started my reflection for module 4, I went through and carefully read all the reflections already posted by my classmates (probably something that I should’ve been doing and will definitely be doing for the remaining reflections). <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">I wished everyone felt this way! <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Honestly, I was afraid that I might be the only one feeling a little overwhelmed thinking about planning an entire years worth of content. Luckily, after reading those reflections of <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">fellow classmates that had the same fears and unrealistic ideas of just walking into a classroom with some content knowledge and charisma and wowing a class of high school sophomores <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">, I feel confident that I’ll be able to apply what I’m learning to the classroom. By realizing and utilizing the resources we are being exposed to, for example our content areas professional journals, I’ll be able to form complete and coherent unit and lesson plans. <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">This is good to hear, many do not keep up with journal reading - something that I think helps one improve at a steady rate. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">I was happy to see that our textbook pointed out a common error that my content area (History) deals with all that time. In many instances, especially in lower grade level textbooks, errors surrounding indigenous populations are numerous. Simple put, they are not counted as human beings. As our text states, many textbooks make the culturally insensitive mistake of naming the first white man as the “discoverer” of certain places that had been frequented by the indigenous population for centuries. I’ve seen teachers that do not account for this and I had a hard time keeping by mouth shut in my role as Substitute Education Assistant. However, there were instances where the <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">teacher used these mistakes as critical-thinking exercises <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;"> that are especially relevant for the state of South Dakota due to our Native population. Obviously, it’s our responsibility to know the text we use in the classroom. My own view of textbooks in my content area is that they are great for timelines and maps, but lacking due to the bland nature of the prose. I feel it’s <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">my job as a History teacher to make the information, or “story” as I like to call it, come alive <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">.

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">Emily Schaefer January 27, 2010 Module 4

<span style="font-family: Tahoma,Geneva,sans-serif;">As I think back on my Spanish classes in high school, I can remember <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: Tahoma,Geneva,sans-serif;">participating in a variety of assignments <span style="font-family: Tahoma,Geneva,sans-serif;">out of the book and also from supplementary worksheets and readings the teacher had found from other resources. Additionally, we sang Spanish songs like “La Cucaracha,” made piñatas, had tough grammar lessons, and learned about Latin culture though music, food, and dance. Now, <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: Tahoma,Geneva,sans-serif;">as I am thinking about what kinds of activities I would like to have in my classroom when I am teacher, I realize the amount of preparation that my high school teacher had to do to give us such a varied curriculum <span style="font-family: Tahoma,Geneva,sans-serif;">. Preparation and planning is something that I know that I will personally have to work with a lot before stepping into the classroom. As it stands now, I have more of a general idea of how to plan units and lessons. I am eager to gain hands-on experience writing goals and objectives, working with the textbook to plan our lessons, planning formative and summative assessments, etc. One thing that I mentioned that my high school teacher did was to provide supplemental material to our books. I liked how the text covered how <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: Tahoma,Geneva,sans-serif;">we as teachers should approach textbooks as a resource, but not as the final destination <span style="font-family: Tahoma,Geneva,sans-serif;">. I am excited to gather different resources, texts, and teaching exercises and combine them to make a more balanced learning environment. It was also interesting to think about the disappearance of textbooks—it might not be far off that we will just be using software instead of physical textbooks! This module was also useful in that it provided guidelines for objectives. It was interesting to learn about the cognitive, affective, and psychomotor domains and how we can use them to make detailed objectives that dip into each domain of learning. This is <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: Tahoma,Geneva,sans-serif;">another way we can be more effective teachers by appealing to different kinds of learners <span style="font-family: Tahoma,Geneva,sans-serif;">—just like my high school teacher did by having us dance Latino dances, watch Latino movies, and learn Spanish vocabulary with flashcards. <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: Tahoma,Geneva,sans-serif;">You might want to go one step beyond your connections to what your teacher did for you that you are now reflecting upon, toward thinking about how you are going to start applying the new things that you are learning. You are doing a great job of reflecting upon your experiences though; keep up the good work!

Carrie Brooks SEED 400 Module 4 Reflection 28 January 2010 I tend to avoid making “blanket statements,” but I feel confident in saying that //every// first-time teacher enters the classroom with some nervous feelings. It is difficult to know how the students are going to react to you, how the administration will respect your instruction, and how your co-workers will cooperate with you. Module 4 of our book helps to calm some of the nerves that I would have potentially experienced. It describes the processes of planning for instruction, choosing and utilizing textbooks, and creating goals, aims, and objectives. When planning for instruction, the book suggests keeping two goals in mind: select strategies that keep the students mentally and physically engaged, and not wasting time. Awesome! I like this too! These two goals seem to go hand-in-hand. If the students are engaged, they are typically learning new information and skills, which is not a waste of their time. In order to achieve these two goals, teachers must perform adequate preparation. Yes, it will be easy for me to hand out pre-made worksheets about “Vocabulario de la clase,” but the students will gain a deeper meaning of the information if I prepare an interactive activity for them. As long as the meaningful and interactive activities can fit within the goals of the entire course, they are the most effective method of teaching. But teachers cannot plan day-by-day. It is important to keep in mind the scope of the entire course and the information that the students will learn in the courses surrounding. Such coherence requires communication with other teachers within your discipline. The book mentions that there are eight components of planning. Some of them seem to be common sense, such as creating appropriate assessment strategies and creating goals, but I find it interesting that the “statement of philosophy” appears as the first on the list. Why? Reflect on why you might not have even put it on your list or at the top. One’s teaching philosophy will dictate his/her approach to the other requirements. For example, I realize that a major component of my philosophy is that the students need to communicate in real-life situations in order to learn Spanish, and such an idea will likely be strewn throughout my planning. My philosophies and beliefs inevitably will appear in my instruction. My philosophy will also appear in many other facets of my instruction, such as the textbook that I choose. Module Four suggests that teachers should avoid books that stereotype, distort reality, and are imbalanced. The book also says that the text should not be the end-all be-all of the course. In fact, I look back at my High School Spanish course, and we did not even use textbooks! I appreciate that we did not use textbooks because it forced us to do other activities beyond the text. We learned through interaction. I now teach a Spanish 101 class here at USD, and we fly through the chapters so quickly that it would be nearly impossible to rely on interaction for instruction, rather than on the text. I hope that I can follow a curriculum in the future that allows for learning through interaction. It is the most realistic and hands-on approach for the students. Module Four also introduces the process of writing aims, goals, and objectives. I like that the book clarifies how “goals drive instructional method, and objectives drive student performance.” Then, further delving into objectives, I benefited from reading about the ABCDs of writing objectives and about the classifications of objectives. I now understand that I will need to touch on the cognitive domain, the affective domain, the psychomotor domain, and character education. “Bloom’s taxonomy” is a phrase that I have heard over and over, but as a master’s plus cert. student, I never have had the opportunity to learn the details. Page 140 provides an explanation of the taxonomy, and I can now see how it is important for students to reach a level of knowledge before they reach a level of comprehension, and reach comprehension before moving onto the application, and so forth. So rather than saying to my class “Do you understand that?,” and being done with the lesson, I need to challenge my class to apply the new material in order to solidify their comprehension. Yes, this is key.. how does one motivate/challenge them to move themselves up the heirarchy? Module Four led me through many issues that were a bit unclear to me. I feel more comfortable with the idea of planning for a day, unit, and semester. I also have more guidelines for choosing and utilizing the proper texts, and I feel more comfortable in the process of developing and integrating aims, goals, and objectives.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">Amber Hegge Module 4 January 28, 2010 Module 4 focuses on the preparation phase of teaching. To me this is the most unknown aspect of teaching. Since <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">, I have been a student for nearly the last 15 years, I feel like I am somewhat familiar with different aspects of the classroom environment, and different approaches teachers make while teaching. However, the behind the scenes action, I am not so familiar with <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">. <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">Yes, many believe they can teach (well) just because they have been subjected to it for so many years; but it is a complex endeavor <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">. According to the book, “thoughtful planning is likely to make your classes livelier, more interesting, more accurate, and more relevant, and thus make your teaching more successful”. This statement exemplifies just exactly how important planning is to instruction. <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">Planning seems to be the key between being a good, and great teacher <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">. This chapter helped ease some of my concerns with planning. It is obvious however that early on in one’s teaching career planning will be much more difficult than in later years when the teacher is familiar with the content. I think that planning will be one of the most crucial aspects when determining success in that first year. In many different situations throughout my education, I have witnessed an unprepared teacher. <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">If the teacher is come off as unprepared, as a student it makes me feel like it is hard to take what they are saying seriously, and to even pay attention <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">. Part of planning described by the book, is thinking through specifically <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">what you intend your students to learn <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">. From there you can let your students know expectations in this learning, and asses whether or not they meet these expectations. In regards to the math field, it seems like this is the most effective way to go about educating students. I think that deviating from this path occasionally is good for student learning too however. Stepping outside of this pattern of teaching material and assessing how well the students learned the material can help students stay interested in my opinion. In high school I recall I my geometry class, the teacher would mainly utilize traditional learning, but perhaps <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">once a week we would do some sort of project to apply the material <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">. For example when studying the volume of cones, she brought in small waffle cones with ice cream. We first figured out the volumes of the various cones, and also the volume of total ice cream if we were to put a scoop on top of the cone. The activity only took half a class period, but it is one of the few geometry classes that I actually recall <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">(Did you remember the event, or the mathematics, or that it made sense?) <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">from my sophomore year of high school. I feel that when planning, incorporating different forms of instruction from the norm would be extremely beneficial. <span style="background-color: #ffff00; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">I plan to utilize the things I learned throughout this chapter when I become a teacher <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">. <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt;">Hopefully during your unit as well!

Jeff Sebern SEED400 Reflection for Module 4

Planning a course with the units and lessons that go with it takes a tremendous amount of reflection on the goals and objectives for student learning. This module helps us take a look at course material and what these materials are meant to achieve, as well as how this course material fits into the overall planning of a course. On a smaller level is the unit, this is the level which we will be focusing on in SEED 400 and is therefore of most importance to us for this class. Planning a unit takes a considerable amount of effort. Determining what is important for students to know and how this information should be presented is one of the factors that goes into selecting texts for a particular unit. Textbooks and other sources should not be biased, prejudiced, ignorant of ugly truths, but should instead be multicultural and holistic. It is also important that other texts and forms of media be used to supplement learning. Presenting current information that applies to something meaningful in a student’s life will make the material stick much better than something that does not have personal relevance. This ability to be personal with your teaching becomes apparent throughout the process of planning a unit. Keeping sometimes monotonous class periods entertaining is possible when relevant, new, and exciting material is presented in a way that the class can become involved and take control of their own learning. I like this idea! Planning the unit must also follow a logical plan that has clear goals and objectives, a plan to meet those goals and objectives, and finally to assess those goals and objectives in a way that accurately verifies student learning. In the classroom in the future I would hope to apply these same strategies. While I have learned from previous readings that differing instructional strategies is important, this module shows the necessity to change things up from traditional education in a way to make courses more effective at meeting learning objectives. These objectives can be met by applying strategies that keep the student interested. This module also sheds light on the fact that teachers must facilitate healthy critical thinking. It seems that critical thinking and problem solving are being sought after by the "buisness/real-world" The world needs people who analyze the world around them in a critical fashion, and can use these critical thinking skills to come up with solutions to some of the world’s problems. A final idea that should be brought into the classroom is the idea that all the planning in the world cannot ensure that a lesson, unit, or course will follow the original plan. Sometimes straying from the original instructional plan is necessary for students to be able to apply their newfound knowledge in various ways. If science students would like to discuss some aspect of the digestion of food in the body that provides relevance to them, then it can be assumed this distraction from the original plan is actually a positive thing. This kind of critical thinking is exactly what teachers should promote in their classrooms.

Tyler Maxwell Modulo 4 January 28, 2010

Modulo 4 is basically covering the importance of lesson planning. It refers to lesson plans as a map guiding you along the way to your goal but not ensuring that you will get there. Every school I’ve been in has set aside class periods for teachers to plan their lessons for the next day, or later that day. Lesson planning will not guarantee success in teaching, but not having a lesson plan will set you up for failure. Teachers from my high school would always say that we could come in to their class over their plan period to discuss any questions we had. When we would go in to their room they would always have their desks full of material for their classes as they were trying to set up their lessons for their upcoming classes. Every day when they were in class, they would also be looking over notes they had taken to guide them in their teaching. When I did my paraprofessional, my field based supervisor would let me look at his lesson plans almost every day. He wanted me to understand how he did his so I could try to formulate a good lesson plan when it was my turn to start teaching his classes. He always had a basic outline of what he wanted to teach and would list a few example problems from each area he wanted to cover to help the students grasp the information. When it came my time to teach his class, He gave me one period or so to set up a lesson plan for the class I was going to teach. When I was done he looked over it and gave me a few pointers on how to make it more affective and easy to go about teaching. He always said it was better to have more information on your lesson plan than you thought you could cover because that way you were ensured to make it the full period without running out of material to go over. He said the less you had to improvise at the end the better. In conclusion, modulo 4 was discussing the importance of lesson planning. To have good effective lesson plans is a guide to being a better teacher. My field based supervisor helped me to create some lesson plans so I could get some practice writing them. Our book says that lesson planning is a critical skill for a teacher, but a well-developed plan will not guarantee success of a lesson. However, lack of a good lesson plan will most likely result in poor teaching. Yes, but what does it help with, and what typically fails if you do not have one. Reflect a bit more on this!

Andy Cahalan Module 4 Some of the different topics that jumped out at me while reading module 4 were Preparing for and Dealing with Controversy, and Collaborative Planning. I think that both of these topics will be highly important for my content area. I think that Preparing for and Dealing with Controversial Topics could play a role in how I teach Government. I am a History major, but a Political Science minor and am extremely interested in teaching government. There are many topics in government that are controversial. Take the bill of rights for example. The first Amendment protects the freedoms of speech, religion, press, peaceful assembly, and petitioning of the government. The freedom of religion is a very touchy subject for many people, however it is also part of one of the most influential documents governing the United States. Knowing that a discussion about first amendment rights may create controversy is important to anticipate because if I expect it I can try and lesson any arguments that may ensue. However, I also believe that a healthy debate is necessary in understanding other people’s ideas and view points. Also, I think it is very important to make your opinion of a matter as invisible as you can. The book mentions that there isn’t a problem sharing your beliefs if you let the students form their own opinion first. However, the teachers that have influenced my beliefs the most have not made known their opinions. So this is different from what the text mentioned. What will you do and why? Reflect! This allows the student to think on their own and to not be influenced by you, their teacher. I think collaborative planning can be very helpful to the social studies because teachers within a school can communicate with each other about what they are covering. This can . If all of the history professors are on the same page, there can be less jumping around and less confusion on the students part.