Due to the guest speaker being unwell, Kerrie's lecture today was her presenting a guest speaker talk. As with any good guest lecture, it lacked structure but contained lots of interesting insights.
The points I found interesting and/or useful included:
1. Be explicit with students. Don't assume that students know what you are thinking and understand what is expected of them.
2. Think about classroom organization. Single desk arrangements are good for some situations. U-shape is most flexible. You need to teach students skills for working in groups - don't assume that they know how to work in groups (see point 1!). Putting difficult students in far back corners can reduce eye contact problems.
3. Develop class rules and do it collaboratively. Have consequences for breaking rules. Have realistic consequences.
4. Take time to build relationships before starting on content. My mentor teach said something related - take time to motivate content before starting on content.
5. Routines are great. We all need structure and routine. We need boundaries that we can work within.
6. Don't wrestle with the pig! Look at your weekly schedule. What are your productive lessons? What are your unproductive ones? Adjust material to suit lesson times. For example, Friday afternoon lessons aren't going to be productive, so don't fight the class trying to make it productive. Instead, find an activity that suits Friday afternoons.
7. Don't try to teach content all the time and every lesson. For starters, it takes too much preparation time. Schedule activities that are low preparation but engaging for kids. Good for kids and good for teacher.
Showing posts with label STS 1. Show all posts
Showing posts with label STS 1. Show all posts
Thursday, April 14, 2011
Monday, March 21, 2011
STS 1 - Module F - Teaching and Assessment
The lecture discussed two topics: teaching and assessment.
The first topic of teaching looked at the National Professional Standards for Teachers. I am amazed how regulated the teaching profession is. In an Educational Foundations lecture, Phil talked about how standards can be informative and set a benchmark, but they can also be prescriptive and limiting.
The seven standards are listed below, along with their domains:
Professional Knowledge
1. Know students and how they learn
2. Know the content and how to teach it
Professional Practice
3. Plan for and implement effective teaching and learning
4. Create and maintain supportive and safe learning environments
5. Assess, provide feedback and report on student learning
Professional Engagement
6. Engage in professional learning
7. Engage professionally with colleagues, parents/carers and the community
The second topic was that of assessment. Various principles were described. It appeared to me that the challenge will be trying to remember a range of the principles, not just a few, when designing assessment tasks.
The first topic of teaching looked at the National Professional Standards for Teachers. I am amazed how regulated the teaching profession is. In an Educational Foundations lecture, Phil talked about how standards can be informative and set a benchmark, but they can also be prescriptive and limiting.
The seven standards are listed below, along with their domains:
Professional Knowledge
1. Know students and how they learn
2. Know the content and how to teach it
Professional Practice
3. Plan for and implement effective teaching and learning
4. Create and maintain supportive and safe learning environments
5. Assess, provide feedback and report on student learning
Professional Engagement
6. Engage in professional learning
7. Engage professionally with colleagues, parents/carers and the community
The second topic was that of assessment. Various principles were described. It appeared to me that the challenge will be trying to remember a range of the principles, not just a few, when designing assessment tasks.
Monday, March 14, 2011
STS 1 - Module E National Curriculum and Skills for Learning
This week's lecture looked at two topics: the National Curriculum and skills needed for learning.
The National Curriculum is the result of a government effort to produce a national curriculum for Australia. See the web site for details.
We had discussed the curriculum for Mathematics in our tutorial and our tutor had encouraged us to download and read the maths curriculum. The curriculum covers years 7 to 10. It is well-structured but probably slower in pace than I would have expected.
The second topic of the lecture was the teaching of skills. The broad questions were "what skills do we need to teach", "how will you teach them" and "how will you sequence the learning".
Three phases of learning of skills were presented
It is important to provide tools to students so that they can reflect back on their learning of a skill, so that they can assess their level of competence and do more learning if required, and also transfer the learning of this skill to the learning of other new skills.
The National Curriculum is the result of a government effort to produce a national curriculum for Australia. See the web site for details.
We had discussed the curriculum for Mathematics in our tutorial and our tutor had encouraged us to download and read the maths curriculum. The curriculum covers years 7 to 10. It is well-structured but probably slower in pace than I would have expected.
The second topic of the lecture was the teaching of skills. The broad questions were "what skills do we need to teach", "how will you teach them" and "how will you sequence the learning".
Three phases of learning of skills were presented
- information is learned
- skill is used
- skill becomes part of normal behaviour
It is important to provide tools to students so that they can reflect back on their learning of a skill, so that they can assess their level of competence and do more learning if required, and also transfer the learning of this skill to the learning of other new skills.
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
STS 1 - Module D - Pedagogy
I watched the on-line lecture on Pedagogy, subtitled "Why is it all so complicated?".
I find the various theories interesting but I also find that the theories tend to be extreme. By this, I mean that the constructivist approach is described as where "knowledge is created rather than received". But it appears (to me) that some knowledge is received and that other knowledge is created.
Authentic pedagogy has appeal. The notion that students should just experience and hence learn, ignores the knowledge that has been accumulated by humanity. So the idea of disciplined inquiry makes sense. The idea that some knowledge is more authoritative than other knowledge does mean that there will be values-based arguments about what is more authoritative, but to me that is the role of a society, to argue and develop a set of relative weightings.
Both the Productive Pedagogy of Queensland and the Quality Teaching of NSW and ACT seem to be well-developed, thorough and sensible platforms for teaching. They are a good argument that education should be a federal responsibility in Australia - why have each state developing very similar approaches, when an Australian-wide approach would work?
I liked the guiding questions from the Queensland approach: what do I want the students to learn, why does that learning matter, what will the students do and how well do I expect them to do it?
The link to an article showing how to develop the design of a unit in the framework of Quality Teaching demonstrated that it is important to not just design the lessons but also think about how the unit outcomes match up with the elements of the model. For example, what higher-order thinking should the unit include?
I find the various theories interesting but I also find that the theories tend to be extreme. By this, I mean that the constructivist approach is described as where "knowledge is created rather than received". But it appears (to me) that some knowledge is received and that other knowledge is created.
Authentic pedagogy has appeal. The notion that students should just experience and hence learn, ignores the knowledge that has been accumulated by humanity. So the idea of disciplined inquiry makes sense. The idea that some knowledge is more authoritative than other knowledge does mean that there will be values-based arguments about what is more authoritative, but to me that is the role of a society, to argue and develop a set of relative weightings.
Both the Productive Pedagogy of Queensland and the Quality Teaching of NSW and ACT seem to be well-developed, thorough and sensible platforms for teaching. They are a good argument that education should be a federal responsibility in Australia - why have each state developing very similar approaches, when an Australian-wide approach would work?
I liked the guiding questions from the Queensland approach: what do I want the students to learn, why does that learning matter, what will the students do and how well do I expect them to do it?
The link to an article showing how to develop the design of a unit in the framework of Quality Teaching demonstrated that it is important to not just design the lessons but also think about how the unit outcomes match up with the elements of the model. For example, what higher-order thinking should the unit include?
Monday, February 28, 2011
STS 1 - Module C Connecting Pedagogy and Curriculum
The readings and lecture made me think about the provocation "Should we teach students or subjects".
The Australian Curriculum in Mathematics has a clear focus on content. For example, one objective for year 7 is "Calculate volumes of rectangular prisms".
When thinking about unit planning or lesson planning, it is necessary to consider the pedagogy that supports the content-based objective. As students learn in different ways, the curriculum planning must cover content but must also look at ways to make the content engaging and accessible to as many of the students as possible. I think this is especially true in mathematics.
My take on the provocation is that, in mathematics, we should teach the subject to students.
I am interested in how much direction or structure that a school provides in the way of curriculum planning for a new teacher. Coming in to teach year 7 maths, will I be given the Australian curriculum and a blank sheet of paper, or will I be given unit plans and asked to developed lesson plans within unit plans? This topic was discussed in our tutorial and our tutor Rebecca stated that it will vary from school to school.
I found the broader discussion of pedagogy and culture in Yates heavy going.
The Australian Curriculum in Mathematics has a clear focus on content. For example, one objective for year 7 is "Calculate volumes of rectangular prisms".
When thinking about unit planning or lesson planning, it is necessary to consider the pedagogy that supports the content-based objective. As students learn in different ways, the curriculum planning must cover content but must also look at ways to make the content engaging and accessible to as many of the students as possible. I think this is especially true in mathematics.
My take on the provocation is that, in mathematics, we should teach the subject to students.
I am interested in how much direction or structure that a school provides in the way of curriculum planning for a new teacher. Coming in to teach year 7 maths, will I be given the Australian curriculum and a blank sheet of paper, or will I be given unit plans and asked to developed lesson plans within unit plans? This topic was discussed in our tutorial and our tutor Rebecca stated that it will vary from school to school.
I found the broader discussion of pedagogy and culture in Yates heavy going.
Thursday, February 17, 2011
STS 1 - Module B Curriculum
Module A explored 'What is curriculum?'.
Wikipedia provides the following definition of curriculum: "a curriculum is the set of courses, course work, and content offered at a school or university". This is consistent with my initial notion of a curriculum.
This definition is extended by Schmidt et al to include the "sequences of learning opportunities in formal schooling". It is noted that the sequences of learning opportunities are not visible; the tangible artefacts consist of entities such as documents, textbooks and lessons plans.
The article by Egan considers some of the broader issues in curriculum studies. It is argued that curriculum studies is not simply studying the content of curricula, but must consider all educational aspects. Although curriculum is the what, it is necessary to understand the how as well. He believes that western cultures are struggling with the design of content due to a loss of nerve.
I am planning to teach mathematics. It appears to me that mathematics does not suffer the problems of many other disciplines that struggle to understand their core content or meaning. For example, there is no post-modernist angst among mathematicians. I would suggest this is a reason why Mathematics was arguably the least controversial curriculum developed as part of the Australian National Curriculum. This is not to say that there are differences of opinion about what material and in what order the content should be in the curriculum, but these differences are not as political and emotional as discussions of history content when considering issues of western colonization (for example).
The discussion of curriculum has made me consider the provocation "Am I ready to teach". I realise that I have to have a detailed knowledge of the National Curriculum in mathematics before I teach. From the tutorial, it was clearly shown why teaching material for a year 7 class must be designed so that it does not rely on or use, concepts that may confuse or intimidate students.
Wikipedia provides the following definition of curriculum: "a curriculum is the set of courses, course work, and content offered at a school or university". This is consistent with my initial notion of a curriculum.
This definition is extended by Schmidt et al to include the "sequences of learning opportunities in formal schooling". It is noted that the sequences of learning opportunities are not visible; the tangible artefacts consist of entities such as documents, textbooks and lessons plans.
The article by Egan considers some of the broader issues in curriculum studies. It is argued that curriculum studies is not simply studying the content of curricula, but must consider all educational aspects. Although curriculum is the what, it is necessary to understand the how as well. He believes that western cultures are struggling with the design of content due to a loss of nerve.
I am planning to teach mathematics. It appears to me that mathematics does not suffer the problems of many other disciplines that struggle to understand their core content or meaning. For example, there is no post-modernist angst among mathematicians. I would suggest this is a reason why Mathematics was arguably the least controversial curriculum developed as part of the Australian National Curriculum. This is not to say that there are differences of opinion about what material and in what order the content should be in the curriculum, but these differences are not as political and emotional as discussions of history content when considering issues of western colonization (for example).
The discussion of curriculum has made me consider the provocation "Am I ready to teach". I realise that I have to have a detailed knowledge of the National Curriculum in mathematics before I teach. From the tutorial, it was clearly shown why teaching material for a year 7 class must be designed so that it does not rely on or use, concepts that may confuse or intimidate students.
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