4-Information Literacy/Learning Theories PowerPoint
This PowerPoint was very interesting to me because it really put differentiation into perpesctive for me. I understand differentiation, but this put it in a manner that made everything that much clearer. There were two awesome analogies used within this PowerPoint to describe differentiation. The first one discussed the millions of species in our world today and how this can look messy. The other discussed the replicating of cells. Cells replicating can look extremely messy with no central authority while acting to their environment. At first, learning was looked at as very, very structured and mainly used organizational charts and outlines. Along with these outlines came tons of information. However, as we know this is not cognitively appropriate for our students. We need to teach our students by making learning a building process and allowing the students to learn new information by constructing it from the information or background knowledge they already have. We need to apply the earlier analogies to our classroom by making the classroom more student cantered with constructivist learning and discovery. Georgia has now begun to take part in the Common Core which puts a lot of focus on differentiated learning and allowing the kids to take charge.
Planning Strategic Reading Lesson
The pupose of this PowerPoint is to discuss strategic reading. I have actually never heard of strategic reading before, but it is led by the teacher who chooses various text for the students to dive in to. Eventually the work the teacher has chosen will lead to student-directed work through activities such as literacture circles. I did get to experience literacy circles during my student teacher, but it was also an experimental year for my host teacher so I do not know if I got the full experience. However, the ability-grouped students would all be reading one book and every few days they would have different tasks they would need to complete and then discuss with their group-mates. They really enjoyed it and I feel like it allowed them to grow independently. Since the teacher chooses the books, the students will get to read various genres and learn different strategies for reading those genres.
Literacy Practice: Promoting Content Area Reading
Content Area Reading most closely means text books. I completely undertstand that my students would have a hard time reading the text books because there can be difficult content-specific vocabulary and knowing the fact that I continue to have a hard time reading some text books. However, this does not mean that they should not be used, it just means that the students need assistance reading through these types of books. The PowerPoint discusses the concept of scaffolding which means that the teachers supports the students throughout the entirety of the lesson by modeling different reading strategies. We are there to assist the students while they read. As teachers, we need to be sure that we can read and understand the text books before we give them to our students to read, so that we can thoroughly and accurately assist the students and make sure that this text is actually something the students will understand even with assistance. Before reading the text, it is also our responsibility to determine the readability to ensure that the text features and clear and understandable. If after reading the text, the teachers realizes that it is too hard for the students then we can modify the content and put it in context that is understandable for the students at their current levels. As far as vocabulary is cnocerned in the text books we use, I believe that they do a good job of not introducing too many new words at one time. Each lesson usually has five or less new words throughout its length. Usually I introduce the vocabulary first before the student begin to read because that way the students have at least a little background knowledge. I do not recall teaching text features last year in my student teaching, but this year it was a standard that we needed to teach and after having finished the lessons I realized how much they helped the students understand the structure of the text. After the students have completed their reading, we need to do something that will allow for the students to put what they have learned in their own words in order for the information to mentally make sense to them.
Goals for Differentiated Instruction Video
Differentiated instruction was something that was of upmost importance in my undergrad, so I am glad to see that this is something that is being discussed a lot because I feel like I learn more and more each time. Differentiated instruction is a new way of thinking about the teaching and learning process. None of our students are exactly the same, so we should not treat them that way. In order to effectively meet our students needs, we need to focus on their specific learning styles and needs. We also need to get the students involved in their own learning by setting goals. Within each of our lessons, we need to make sure that each student is being challenged and has found an interest in the current topic. In my undergrad, our lesson plans consisted of an entire area dedicated to differentiated instruction. In each lesson I had to discuss how the lesson was differentiated: content, process or product. If the students are engaged and interested in the topic they are more likely to pay attention and retain the information because they have connected the knew information to something they already knew.
The Story of Differentiation Video
Carol Tomlinson began by discribing her first years of teaching at a school that had a very diverse population. She stated that she had students who were four years below reading level and students who were four years above reading level and that she had no students in the middle. Tomlinson realized quickly that it was pointless to teach to the middle because the students would lose interest due to lack of understanding or boredum. She began implementing classroom rotations where the students were in what she called "flexibility grouping" which means that the leveled groups are interchangeable. She did not want to keep the "low" students together because they would not get as much out of that group as they would if they were pushed academically by their peers. After moving on to the college level, she realized that other teachers were experiencing what she went through, so she started teaching them about the big picture instead of focusing on how to teach the "lower" students. She want to show them that we can allow the students to work twoards the same goal with varying academic levels.
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