Final Synthesis Blog

Throughout the course of the semester, we have researched, learned, and practiced many different teaching strategies that will help diversify our teaching when we are in our own classrooms. Different teaching strategies help to switch up the way our classroom works. Many of these strategies are to help our students understand the information we give them easier and to allow them to work with us to learn in an easier and more efficient way. Not only have we learned about different ways to teaching students, but also different ways we can make learning easier for them. The extensive research and information we read about over this semester that explains how students learn and how many students are not comprehending the information they are learning because of some problem is astounding. In my blog post, “Help for Struggling Readers”, I read and discussed Chapter 11 of subjects matter, which looks into struggling readers and how we as teachers can get students more interested and help them be more successful in their reading motivation. Although that chapter included many different approaches to help struggling readers in the classroom, I found one approach to be more interesting to me than the others. The approach that I thought was interesting was proposed by Lisa MacArtney in her classroom. She had the students fill out a profile that helped her define the various types of intelligence found in her students. The four types were, “students who are strong on social relationships, those who are well organized, those who are analytical, and those with high energy,” (Daniels and Zemelman, p. 282). By filling these profiles out, MacArtney is able to analyze the different types of students in her class, and then group them based on their strengths. By doing this, she is automatically helping her students succeed in group work as well as boost their confidence in their own skill. 

Not only did this semester equip me with some necessary tools for teaching a middle school classroom, but it also pushed me to improve my skill of researching as well. Through resource blogs, I am now able to properly search for helpful math/teaching websites that I can use at will in my classroom. And through this research, I found some very helpful websites that can help me in my teaching as well as provide entertaining learning for my students. One article I came across in my search that I thought was interesting and helpful was titled, “We should Teach Math Like it’s a Language”. This article pushed my idea about math and the relationship it can have with a student. In the article, the author Jeannine Diddle Uzzi compares learning math to learning Latin. She talked about the idea that math builds on itself, and goes on to explain why this is one of the reasons why students have such a hard time with math. The negative stigma with math can also be traced back to our education system. One problem that fosters more negative ideas about math is that “instead of encouraging them to start anew in order to reinforce their skills, we test them, label that review ‘remedial,’ and withhold college credit from them,” (Uzzi, 2018). Uzzi goes on in the article about the importance of higher education math classes. This article was very helpful for me, though, because it pushed the limits of my idea on math and how it should be taught. 

Our job is a very tedious one. It requires many different elements of teaching that all take time and practice to use effectively. But without the right tools, you will not be able to get the job done. This class over the course of the semester has given me the proper tools to do my job as a teacher effectively as well as given me the opportunity to research tool myself that I can apply to my classroom. There are no two teachers with the exact same teaching strategies, and that is something I really look forward to as I become a teacher myself. The information I have received from researching and practicing will allow me to have my own twist on my classroom and help me to adjust to the different types of students that I will have over the course of (hopefully) many years. 

Word count: 717

Strategy Lesson Reflection

Our strategy lesson we taught for the class was the strategy “Tweet to Text”. The strategy includes giving the students some sort of topic or problem on a tweet-based document, and the students only have a certain amount of characters to give an explanation or answer. You could also have your students do a real life tweet on their phones if your classroom allows technological devices. I thought our lesson went pretty well. We gave our students order of operations equations and told them to solve them using order of operations. Some grows that we received were to be more organized and explain the assignment better. I think we could have done a better job with explaining the directions, however it was difficult for us to explain the task with four people teaching the lesson, and I also think it was difficult for the students since they were in groups of three or four. I think doing an assignment like this would be easier when you are the only teacher and you have created a level of respect with your students and they understand your way of explaining lessons. I thought this was an interesting strategy lesson and I would like to implement it into my own classroom one day, especially since students are becoming more and more technologically savvy through the generations. 

Word count: 224

Podcast - I am Malala

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1eCkM4GiDdbwxUC_XnX0muRP6Dlk_zebT/view?usp=sharing

Carter Gibbons, Alena Locurcio, Katie Story , Calli-Ann Cardin, Heather Perry 

I am Malala

Corbett Math

Many middle school math websites today try and make everything about them look fancy and nice so that people will use their resources, even though sometimes those resources might not be the best thing for the students that are trying to learn. I decided to go with Corbett maths as my final resource, because it is a pretty basic website besides the fact that it has a variety of different abilities and opportunities for students to grow and learn better. Its wide variety of information is available for kindergartners, all the way up to seniors in high school. Another positive about Corbett maths is that it is free for everyone to use, teachers and students alike. This Corbett maths provides math videos, math practice questions, and worksheets with answers for students to practice on their own and for teachers to be able to use in class to better prepare their students. Another one of my favorite things about Corbett maths is that it has a drop down bar titled 5-a-day, which has 5 questions for students to practice with every single day of the month. Taking one look at the website, one might think that it might not be a very good source. But investigating a little deeper might reveal a hidden gem for teachers to give to their students. 

Word count: 222

https://corbettmathsprimary.com

Synthesis blog 5

The idea of using a book club in a math class seems extremely odd to me and also to other students if I had to guess. Although this seems like a very peculiar idea, incorporating book clubs into math curriculums can expand the students’ minds on how math works in the real world and how they can handle real life situations. Another fine example of why it is a good idea to incorporate book clubs into the math curriculum is that we can better show students how easy it is to organize cross content subjects with math, just like how easy it is to do that for English language arts classes. Incorporating a book club into a math class could also be a great way to get students that may not enjoy math as much more involved in the math setting, giving they are probably more comfortable reading than solving problems. Diversifying your classroom is a great way to keep your students interested and engaged. Although, it might be difficult to introduce something very alien into the classroom, so it is our job as teachers to make sure we provide well explained instructions to the students. Book clubs are a great way to incorporate different ideas into the math class and engage students who may not be interested in math. 

Word count: 220 

Math TV

For my resource blog for October 6th, I came across a website called mathtv.com. This website was described as the “Netflix of online learning”. Math TV is home to 10 thousand free math videos covering topics such as algebra, geometry, trigonometry, and calculus. However, their “Basic Math” topic will be most relevant for middle school students. They have 34 amazing math tutors that make their videos. The reason the website uses so many tutors is because they use all of the varied approaches to the same math topics and problems help students see how to solve problems differently. The website can also be used on all mobile devices so students can watch them on the go or teachers can incorporate them into daily mathematics instruction. I think it is self-descriptive as to why this resource can be so valuable. One of the many things that I enjoyed about this website is their variety of videos and tutors. I think a lot of the times we get caught up teaching one way to do things (often our own way) and we do not allow our students to think of different ways to solve a problem, even though it might be easier for them that way. Overall, I think this website will provide a useful tool for teachers that allows them to show different ideas on different problem-solving techniques. 

https://mathtv.com

Word count: 235

Historical Fiction in English and Social Studies Classrooms: Is It a Natural Marriage?

In the article titled “Historical Fiction in English and Social Studies Classrooms: Is It a Natural Marriage?”, we see a study group of ELA and Social Studies teachers that share the lessons they learned from reading historical fiction and nonfiction together. Through this, they are able to explore different approaches for a text from both disciplines, and how seeing through the different approaches can more fully contextualize the work, as well as cultivate historical empathy. For me, this was a difficult read. I had a hard time focusing in on the information the author was giving us and picking out certain topics that seemed important. I did pick up on a few things, such as contextualizing. Contextualizing is described by the author as, “the act of placing an event in its proper context—within the web of personalities, circumstances,” (Hinton, Suh, Colòn-Brown, O’Hearn, 23). When I was in high school, one of my social studies teachers gave us a historical novel. She told us the object of the novel was for us was to gain a better sense of knowing and understanding of the context of the time period discussed in the novel and the chronology of that context. This allowed us as students to gain a true understanding of the characters, time period, and events that happened in the novel. 

 Word count: 222

Freckle Education

For this week’s resource blog post, I decided to go with another website I found. The organization that runs the website is called Freckle Education, formerly known as Front Row. It targets kids kindergarten through ninth grade, and is free for teachers separate from some fees for different upgrades you can buy. I think this website is a good resource for students because it allows kids to practice math at their own level and pace. It has more than 30,000 math questions and starts with a diagnostic that starts the students off at just the right level. This allows the students to get the appropriate level of instruction and lessons that fosters the right amount of growth that is good for the students. Front Row also features lessons, assessments, and reports to help teachers come up with different material and research different strategies for teaching. The website also has a dropdown bar titled “resources” that has case studies, research, webinars, and blogs to help teachers share ideas and learn new ones from different teachers. I think this website is a great resource because it gives the students the right amount and level they need to really engage with learning. At the same time, teachers are able to check on a students work and see what areas they might be struggling with, as well as provide very useful information, giving teachers an advantage when it comes to teaching and adapting to students. 

https://www.freckle.com

Word count: 241 

CH. 6 How to Use a Textbook

Chapter 6 of Subjects Matter titled, “How to Use a Textbook” offers much insight into how a textbook should be used in a classroom and the importance of variety of instruction when teaching your classroom. It brought up many points I found particularly interesting and some different ideas to figure out what’s really important in the textbook. A lot of the time, teachers think it is a good idea to go through the whole book thinking that it will help the students in the long run. Many of us already know from experience that skimming your eyes over the text just to say that you did it does not help the students remember the information. Instead, the chapter talks about being selective when picking out topics to teach your students, and it also gives you questions to ask yourself when going through the information such as does the idea, topic, or process represent a big idea with enduring value beyond the classroom? Questions like these allow us to really delve on the concepts we are teaching and determine if they are REALLY important to the students’ learning. Going along with the textbook, this chapter also provides a few activities that help you as a teacher divide the textbook up or provide alternative activities rather than just assigning reading. One activity that stuck out to me was the idea of finding out what’s on the big tests our students have to take. I believe this one stuck out to me because I always felt that my teachers already knew what was on the test, but when it came down to it, they were off by a good bit. It never occurred to me that finding out what was on the big test and basing my teachings and lessons around that would help my students better. 

Word count: 304

Prodigy Game

For this week’s resource blog post, I decided to research helpful math websites that teach students new and fun ways to learn math. I came across a website called “Prodigy”, a roll-play game that teaches students math lessons along the way. From what I read and observed on the website, it seems like a very helpful source for elementary and middle school math teachers. Some interesting things I read on the website included it has curriculums and skills for students to learn from first to eighth grade, motivates students to learn outside of the classroom as well as in the classroom, and offers incentives in-game that help keep the students interested and engaged in learning. Not only does it help the students, but the teachers as well. At the bottom of the page is a link to teacher articles that help make lesson more engaging and effective. These articles include tips and tricks to help keep your student engaged, but also they have more websites and games that teachers can use to change things up in the classroom. The amount of potential sources and articles this website has as well as the potential for learning provided for the students is astounding. This website is a special tool available to both students and teachers, which is very hard to find. Overall, this website is very useful and a great source of learning and engaging with students and connecting modern technology with traditional learning. 

https://www.prodigygame.com

Word Count: 244

Help for Struggling Readers

The biggest struggle for teachers is students that do not want to read or give up because certain lessons are too difficult. Although it is our job to make sure that the students learn the material, it makes if far more stressful and difficult when the students do not even care about learning. So how are we as teachers supposed to motivate students to want to learn? There has been extensive research on this topic, and it has produced amazing results in the classroom. Different strategies such as “building engagement with the text” and modeling thoughtful reading have created new opportunities for students to become more interested in the reading. Chapter 11 also discusses different types of approaches from teachers that have been extremely successful. One example that I found to be more interesting to me was one proposed by Lisa MacArtney in her classroom. She had the students fill out a profile that helped her define the various types of intelligence found in her students. The four types were, “students who are strong on social relationships, those who are well organized, those who are analytical, and those with high energy,” (Daniels and Zemelman, p. 282). She then had them form a “human graph” in the hallway to see where the students fell in each type. Often she would have them work in groups, and it was evident that they encouraged each other and were more patient. It also showed how there different strengths worked together well. I thought this example was particularly interesting because I have never thought of trying to distinguish the types of learning my students might be the strongest at, and I feel like this example as well as the rest of this particular chapter will be extremely helpful with struggling readers in my classroom. 

Word count: 299 

We Should Teach Math Like it's a Language

For my resource blog, I found an article titled "We Should Teach Math Like it's a Language”, written by Jeannine Diddle Uzzi. This article stood out to me because of its title. Math as a language? That just does not seem write. But as I kept reading the article, I realized that it makes complete sense. Jeannine compares learning math to learning Latin. At first I was skeptical, but the idea that math builds on itself might seem obvious but in hindsight, this is one of the reasons why students have such a hard time with math. One problem that is evident in our higher education system for the United States is that “instead of encouraging them to start anew in order to reinforce their skills, we test them, label that review ‘remedial,’ and withhold college credit from them,” (Uzzi, 2018). This turns many students away and gives them the idea they are not good enough to take a higher level math. This process of throwing students in “remedial” courses and discouraging them from taking other higher-level math classes is a main reason why we are seeing less and less students follow the path of math-lead careers, including math teaching of any level. 

Word count: 205 

https://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2018/05/30/we-should-teach-math-like-its-a.html

Synthesis Blog #1

Chapter 2 of Subjects Matter talks about the difficulties we face when exploring a child's understanding of reading comprehension. The short excerpt that I read opened my eyes to the different ideas of reading comprehension and how we are so quick to judge a child for not understanding the text. Growing up in the Common Core Standards of schooling and curriculum, I understand what it means when the author explains why it is difficult for kids to really comprehend the texts they are reading. We were taught the important part of learning something was getting the question right instead of actually understanding what the text meant and retaining the information we were given. Now that we are able to learn from our mistakes, we are able to actually see the importance of understanding and comprehending instead of memorizing and dumbing the information when we are done with it. This provides teachers with a very helpful ability to give students tools for success they will use for the rest of their lives. This excerpt continues explaining multiple strategies we as teachers can use to help kids better understand the texts they are reading, including "Thinking Strategies of Effective Readers" and the "Columbus Key". Throughout my 20 years on this planet I have never heard of those two tips for reading, but now that I understand what they are I wish I would have heard of them sooner. These strategies have the ability to give our future students a tool that can help them decipher anything you put in front of them. I believe this is the future of teaching and the advancement of teaching in our society has given us the ability to change our students' future and the future of our world. 


Word count: 292

The Jungle Book

Today I read The Jungle Book by Jennifer Adams for my Professor's daughter named Arya. The Jungle Book explores the different characters found in the movie and gives a small description about each of the animals. Hopefully Arya enjoys the book as much as I enjoyed the movie when I watched it!






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