Great Discussion Going On Re: Unit 1

Even at this late date, there is still a valid and worthwhile discussion going on in the Unit 1 discussion forum.

In Brian's original posting, he describes the difficulty in teaching Mathematics in a constructivist method. Too sum up what I feel he is saying, Math doesn't lend easily to constructivism, and other theories certainly have a place in this setting. However, the learning achieved by students in a constructivist classroom are well worth the effort put in by the instructor.

The discussion goes on to encompass many themes following the teaching of mathematics, the eagerness of learners, various learning and teaching styles, and the learning required of the teacher.

Here are my thoughts:

My student teaching was spent with someone whom I considered an icon. However, I soon discovered that the "binder" of notes (aka class bible) hadn't changed for many years (from my new perspective, I got to read the date on the top of the page!). This tarnished my opinion slightly, as there had been a lot of changes in the "health" side of phys. ed. in recent years. I agree, its lovely to have a set of notes to work from..or at least an outline..and if it works, that's great, but we have to remember to take a few moments now and again to reflect upon what our outcomes are and why we teach things the way we do...who is it best for? The teacher or the students?

That being said, I really feel for those teachers who are pushed into teaching different subjects each year, many of which they have no background in. I have a friend right now who has openly said.."course A is going to suffer this year as I only have x amount of time to work and I want to concentrate on these 3 subjects, and that's all I can do."

Common assessment is a really big deal here right now. At a meeting last Friday a Supervisor asked us what we should be doing to help teachers get this off the ground. My suggestion was time. We spend a pile of money each time we bring a group of teachers together to bombard them with information, but we never take some of that time to set the wheels in motion. We just send them back to their schools to try and find time to begin again. The beginning is the hardest. Lets have them make those first steps in this supportive environment, where we can give immediate feedback, then send them back to class with something they can use!

Concept Mapping-In our Group

I am in a group of 4 (Barb, Steve, Michel and myself).

I was a late entry into the group, and the others had already begun the work of deciding upon a topic. Global Warming was the winner..and a good pick too as the topic is current and thus, there is a lot of great material on the web dealing with this topic.

Our group went through a bit of an evolution trying to put together this concept map. First, a map was drawn up that, to me (not very knowledgeable about global warming) looked too vast. We discussed the fact that all need not be in the final project, but even so, we went back to the drawing board. The second version ended up confining us too much. We had a much more difficult time trying to find resources that matched the new model. That being said, we did find a lot of resources. I submitted links to a few lessons, but moreover samples of work worth emulating. I think some of us became overwhelmed by the multitude of "stuff" without any clear focus. I tried to compose a type of scenario or real-world problem to anchor our model in. The idea in total didn't fly, but the main ideas of Causes, Effects and Education lingered. Michel drafted a new model (bless his heart-he's good!) and the main themes I was looking for were melded together to get our final result.

I'm not going to pretend it wasn't difficult. It's funny how even as an adult, I can still take things personally. And even though I know that the typed word can take on any tone, I still apply to it what I feel or hear in my head. It's hardly right. In the end, I called Barbara, which helped me a lot. I tried to make the map more linear, so that I could better follow it from my perspective as a learner, but I came to realize that it sort of defeated the purpose of the map in the first place. I am happy with the end result. There are more lessons to be learned in a distance ed class than just those of the curricular content, to be sure. I certainly dont' want "does not play well with others" on my report card!! Give and take...back to work!!

Comments On Web Site Assingment

Hello Again!!

There were some great postings in the forum of may useful resources. I have begun the process of saving them in a Del.icio.us site file. You can access my links here:

http://del.icio.us/D10TechMentor

The Results of my Teaching Perspectives Profile....

Cheryl Russell here are your TPI scores:----------------------08-OCT-07----------------------Transmission total: (Tr) 29.00 B=9; I=9; A=11
Apprenticeship total: (Ap) 36.00 B=12; I=12; A=12
Developmental total: (Dv) 33.00 B=12; I=11; A=10
Nurturance total: (Nu) 39.00 B=13; I=14; A=12
Social Reform total: (SR) 26.00 B=10; I=7; A=9
Beliefs total: (B) 56.00Intention total: (I) 53.00
Action total: (A) 54.00----------------------
Mean: (M) 32.60
Standard Deviation: (SD) 4.67HiT: (HiT) 37.00LoT: (LoT) 28.00----------------------Overall Total: (T) 163.00-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------For future reference your TPI ID number is: 071008061540-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Review/Print your graphical results on-line here: http://www.one45.com/teachingperspectives/tpi_html/T071008061540_Russell_Cheryl.htm

Concept Mapping-Unit 2 Begins...

Concept Mapping;

I'd had the chance to try out concept mapping software before, and the practice of using concept maps has been in my "bag of tricks" for quite some time. I find it to be very helpful for various reasons:

• it helps learners to "see" the various ideas in one place



• it helps show that there is value in all ideas, we display all contributions.



• helps my students to process and learn the information



• aids in organization of ideas



• helps to identify "what's missing" from an assignment, piece of writing or activity.
  

My students were better able to retrieve information that I had taught them using a concept map. I'd often see little scribbles to the right of the page with the map re-constructed.

Our group had our own personal experience creating our concept map. I'll post that idea in the next entry.

In a previous course, I'd read the "Cognitive Flexibility" Theory by Spiro et al. (http://tip.psychology.org/spiro.html) and got out of it, among other things, the importance of presenting the same idea in various different formats, as well as the importance of creating ties to various ideas, instead of keeping everything in its own little box!