11-15-10 blog Chapter 4.
Blake Stanger
EDCI 320 & 321
Dr. Nick Lux
I was well aware of the uses of word processing software, but I wasn’t cognizant of the fact that it is the most widely used and influential software used in teaching. I understood the ideas about teaching styles and the benefits of word processing software, but the chapter served to crystalize my ideas and put them into a easy to understand sources. I also learned that student decline in handwriting is not proven to be linked to keyboarding, but its my experience that this is true.
I use spreadsheets all the time in my accounting classes ( I’m studying for an accounting minor) but I had no idea that they were used in teaching. Now that I had that idea dropped on me I spent a half hour looking at my spreadsheet program trying to think of ways that I could use it in the class room. I liked how the book put it “it is a system for organizing numbers, just like a word processor is a system for organizing words.”
Data bases are the combination of word processors and spreadsheets. I think my favorite use of databases is the comparison of information in the database. This combination of learning and comparing leads to higher order thinking. Databases have a negative quality though in my opinion. There is no replacement for primary source material. Thought more time consuming it is great for students to understand the process of research and how to acquire knowledge. If there is no database, and students don’t know how to find primary sources, where will they go for understanding and information?
I have advocated the use of word processing since I was in the seventh grade. I have always been a much better typist than a hand writer. I will do everything I can to make sure students have the time, tools and proficiency to use a word processor. A student comfortable with a word processor is much better armed for many professions in life.
Having spread sheet software at my disposal will be so much more convenient for making sign up sheets, grade books, attendance logs, parent teacher conference sheets, pot luck sign ups and a million other things. I will use spreadsheet extensively for the logistical side of my class.
What is the percentage of mac to windows computers in most schools?
Best-
Blake
Monday, November 15, 2010
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Blog for Classroom Assessment: Minute by Minute, Day by Day 11-4-10 Blake Stanger
Blog for Classroom Assessment: Minute by Minute, Day by Day
11-4-10 Blake Stanger
This article was a great change of speed from the text. I enjoyed reading an article that came from an educational journal; it made me feel like a real teacher in the field. The first thing I gathered from the article was a feeling of changing methods in the teaching field. I felt like a focus of the article was the more effective use of assessment in the classroom. One of the major changes was to use assessments to evaluate student progress through out a lesson or unit. In this way teachers can make sure that learners are progressing well during the lesson and not be blindsided by poor student lesson comprehension. This use of assessment better serves learners and teachers.
Another subject of the article was using assessment effectively as feedback. One of the big problems with assessment today is the fact that it shows where learners progress after it is possible to help them move forward. Progress is impossible after an assessment, there is no more time to teach; but, with a feedback method that was discussed in the text learning can continue. Teachers can give feedback that encourages students to work back through the problems and ideas that students didn’t understand.
I really liked the example that was used in the article about using “traffic lights” as a formative assessment. This type of quick immediate feedback would be so useful and extremely easy to accomplish in a classroom. It would also take away the “stupid question” stigma that some students feel when they need a more detailed explanation or to cover material again in order to understand it.
I wasn’t to implement some method of quick formative assessment like the traffic lights in my classroom. I might have something more suited to a literature class, or more customized to make it mine. Something along the line of a little figure the students can place on their desks and if they are understanding then the figure can face me, but if they aren’t then the figure will have its back to me. I would have to make sure that this assessment also had a more detailed component so I was certain that students were understanding to the level I need them to; furthermore, that I knew what the students who weren’t understanding needed to cover.
I want to use the interpretive listening method discussed in the article in my class. Rather than just focusing on the right answer in the student’s discussion I will try to listen for the students thought process and learning ideas. In this way I will connect with students and understand better how to teach them.
How fast will the assessment structure in today’s schools change?
Best-
Blake
11-4-10 Blake Stanger
This article was a great change of speed from the text. I enjoyed reading an article that came from an educational journal; it made me feel like a real teacher in the field. The first thing I gathered from the article was a feeling of changing methods in the teaching field. I felt like a focus of the article was the more effective use of assessment in the classroom. One of the major changes was to use assessments to evaluate student progress through out a lesson or unit. In this way teachers can make sure that learners are progressing well during the lesson and not be blindsided by poor student lesson comprehension. This use of assessment better serves learners and teachers.
Another subject of the article was using assessment effectively as feedback. One of the big problems with assessment today is the fact that it shows where learners progress after it is possible to help them move forward. Progress is impossible after an assessment, there is no more time to teach; but, with a feedback method that was discussed in the text learning can continue. Teachers can give feedback that encourages students to work back through the problems and ideas that students didn’t understand.
I really liked the example that was used in the article about using “traffic lights” as a formative assessment. This type of quick immediate feedback would be so useful and extremely easy to accomplish in a classroom. It would also take away the “stupid question” stigma that some students feel when they need a more detailed explanation or to cover material again in order to understand it.
I wasn’t to implement some method of quick formative assessment like the traffic lights in my classroom. I might have something more suited to a literature class, or more customized to make it mine. Something along the line of a little figure the students can place on their desks and if they are understanding then the figure can face me, but if they aren’t then the figure will have its back to me. I would have to make sure that this assessment also had a more detailed component so I was certain that students were understanding to the level I need them to; furthermore, that I knew what the students who weren’t understanding needed to cover.
I want to use the interpretive listening method discussed in the article in my class. Rather than just focusing on the right answer in the student’s discussion I will try to listen for the students thought process and learning ideas. In this way I will connect with students and understand better how to teach them.
How fast will the assessment structure in today’s schools change?
Best-
Blake
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