Category: Topics

Technology in your classes – Nour Alkhalidy

Truly Integrating Technology — Nour Alkhalidy

I am a computer teacher who works at a school in a poor village where technology is kind of a big deal.  Some of my students don’t have access to the Internet in their houses. Many do not even have a PC at home. At school, some teachers don’t know how to use computers. Others only utilize them in some way. It is rare to find teachers who are really integrating computers and technology into their classrooms. I am one of the few who is trying to do this. I have been working at this for eight years.

Being a teacher who is trying to integrate technology in such a context has been a little bit challenging for me.  Still, although I have had some discouraging moments, my mission has been and is to create a rich environment for my students by introducing new technologies into my classroom – technologies that actively engage and motivate learners while helping me successfully deliver content.

Before planning to integrate a new technology I always consider two issues:  my students’ weak basic computer skills and the school’s limited Internet access.  Given these parameters, I always look for simple tools that can be used offline. As I design my lesson, I think about how a simple tool can be used to enhance clear curriculum goal and try to incorporate a strategy (often a cooperative strategy) related to such a goal. Then I design activities, making sure each separate group within my class has a task or problem to solve. I also think through how much time a task will take, what roles each student in each group will have, what instructions to give, and what the final output will be.

Personally, If the technology tool I have chosen fulfills subject content goals, improves computer, thinking, and collaboration skills,  engages and motivates students, and more importantly convinces me that I cannot proceed without it, then for me I have successfully integrated technology in my classroom.

I usually prepare my lessons using Powerpoint — the old tool that will never die — to explain tasks and instructions.  Sometimes I use it as a learning tool to design a virtual tour or micro-lesson.

I also use Microsoft’s FrontPage to design webquests,  online scavenger hunts or 5Eonline research modules. Multi-media tools, mindmaps and word cloud applications are also at the top of my technology list to promote visual literacy.

For project work, I tell students they can bring their parents’ cell phones to class in order to capture pictures, record their voices and do interviews. We also use cell phones along with Microsoft Photo Story or Movie Maker  to create videos that showcase work, summarize ideas,  display knowledge on a subject,  or share thoughts about the project we’re doing. They also use cell phones to gain internet access that allows them to extend their learning by finding additional information they then add to a FrontPage website made by them.

I’ve been involved in some global projectson Twitter like Michal Ann C’s (@Cerniglia) Sharing Perceptions Project in which my 9th grade students in Jordan shared their  thoughts about the U.S. with Michael-Ann’s 6th grade students.  In Jordan, my students and I used Tagxedo and Wordle to present brainstorming ideas, and Vokito express our thanks for being involved in the project.

Sometimes, I have 10-15 minutes  at the end of a class for a group game. Playing games enhances students’ attitudes and motivates them. For example, a simple game like FreeCellor Tetrisoffers some opportunities for group collaboration and improving thinking skills, while a Rapid Typing Game improves  basic computer skill and kills classroom boredom.

I may not have iPads, iPods or laptops in my classroom and my students aren’t adequately digitally savvy learners equipped with the needed skills, but I certainly believe that any technology can be powerful — even the simplest one if it is being used in the right way. It’s not about what tool to integrate but how to exploit its effectiveness and add real value to the learning process.

As a computer teacher, my role is to mainly help my students benefit from technology’s opportunities, improve their computer and information literacies skills (along with other 21st century skills), and finally to reduce the big gap between what the world is like in my poor village with the life my students will have in college and beyond. If I can do those things, then I consider all the challenges I face worth every effort.

 

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Working with difficult students – Vladimira Chalyova

Meeting Everyone’s Needs   — Vladimira Chalyova

I believe in second chances. In fact, I believe in giving second chances for as long as they’re needed. That’s basically my attitude towards difficult students, though I cannot really relate to putting the word difficult next to the word student. For me, such students are either lacking something or have more to give than the teacher is asking them to give.

I am convinced that such students would thrive if they were given enough opportunities to express themselves.  Unfortunately, it’s unlikely they’ll come right out and explain what they need. They might not even realize what they need. That’s why it’s so important to be a careful observer and an active listener.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs is a good frame of reference.

 

There’s probably not much you can do to help with the basic physiological needs at the bottom of the pyramid, but you can work to understand where students are coming from and how that might be contributing to classroom behavior.  With such understanding you’ll know that students who are falling asleep aren’t bored. They’re lacking a basic need: sleep, and there’s a reason for that. Talk with them privately learn about their situation and thus avoid misunderstandings. With higher level needs such a love, esteem, and self-actualization you’ll probably find something lacking in every challenging student you encounter. Think about:

  • The way you teach: your beliefs versus their needs and expectations.
  • The atmosphere in the group: is it supportive, safe and friendly?
  • Your own personality: are you always fair, open and understanding?
  • The bigger picture: do students know why they are doing what they’re doing?
  • Space: is there space and time for students to put their personalities into their work.

If I’m able to eliminate issues related to basic needs, I can focus on belonging, esteem and self-actualization by asking myself questions like those in this illustration:

These ideas from John Medina’s book Brain Rules is also a framework:

  1. We can fully concentrate for only 10 minutes. Then it is time to wake up the brain with a break that is somehow related to the topic.
  2. Our brain loves balance so provide a combination of rules and improvisation. Make it clear how things work but give time and space to practice it in various situations.  Don’t let students wander around hopelessly in exercises or feel stupid because they can’t get a rule from context because their brain works differently.
  3. The more senses you involve while learning, the stronger the memory path that is created and I presume the more students will remember. Definitely, learning will be more enjoyable.

By paying attention to brain rules like these  — especially with teens and young adults — we make learning actively purposeful and therefore increase the level of class satisfaction.

Psychologist Ed Diener writes thatpeople evaluate their own lives more highly when others in society also have their needs fulfilled. Thus life satisfaction is not just an individual affair, but depends substantially also on the quality of life of one’s fellow citizens.”

Replace the words lives/life, society and citizen with learning, the class and classmate.

The spirit of a class is as important as the information we pass to our students. If everyone in class is learning happily and needs are being met, challenging students are less likely to be difficult.

~  Vladimira Chalyova

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How important is lesson planning? – Ann Loseva

The Real Work Of A Lesson Plan

— Ann Loseva

Let’s agree on being sensible teachers entering classrooms with a notebook or a sheet of paper with some appropriate notes scribbled on them. The question is not to plan or not to plan. That’s out of the question. The questions that I would pose are how detailed should these notes be? What part do they play in the lesson? Should every step of the plan be followed? Should you allow yourself to be guided by the plan or should you allow your lesson to flow according to the plan? That is, should you allow yourself some room for improvisation? I do.

Still, what I know about lesson planning comes from the methodology classes that we had at teacher training university where I studied. Let’s face it – the knowledge is rather basic. We were given the big picture of what a well-structured lesson should look like. Hence, I publicly admit that I have never written a lesson plan in such a detailed way as to note timing of every section, let alone write up my exact words for introducing these sections. Frankly speaking, I’m rather scared of going on a CELTA course for this very reason.  Dissecting a lesson will not appeal to me and I might as well fail, and of course failure is something a teacher fears so much. I have a feeling that this skill of writing in-depth lesson plans could be very helpful, so, to my regret, I’m held back from further development due to my unwillingness to welcome change.

Having worked in the profession for almost eight years, I have shaped an image of what a perfectly suited lesson plan is for me. This perfectly suited lesson plan reminds me of a to-do list. There are points mentioning activities I plan to do, along with explanations of how to conduct this or that activity, as well as NB(nota bene) points I want to remind myself not to forget or want to remind students to pay attention to — and that’s it. The one core principle that is an absolute must for me to stick to is meaningful connections. Logic, consistency and clear-cut structure are crucial. In an ideal lesson plan, tasks are interrelated and help meet lesson objectives. It’s also important that a lesson aims at practising several skills rather than just one, thus providing multifaceted language experience and loading. Yet the lesson itself could be a flow of activities, pre-planned or spontaneously arising in my mind. In the class itself, students’ reactions play a great role as well.  A teacher needs to be sensitive to this emotional aspect of a class and easily adjust.

Maybe it’s not planning that I would speak of as being important, but rather an ability to structure a lesson in such a way that at the end of it, students have a clear and complete idea of what the lesson has just been about.  Additionally, students should be able to see how the teacher has managed to interweave this particular lesson into the pattern of lessons that make up a course.

A lesson plan can be long or short, detailed or sketchy, but it should do its work.    ~ Ann Loseva

 

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Learning to See – John

The Obvious Can Be Difficult To See    — John F. Fanselow

. . . the obvious can be very difficult for people to see.
(Bateson, 1972, p. 429)

Why? According to Bateson, it is because “. . . people are self-corrective systems. They are self-corrective against disturbance, and if the obvious is not of a kind that they can easily assimilate without internal disturbance, their self-corrective mechanisms work to sidetrack it.”

I illustrate the theme with his sorting activity. Write down which stamps below contain these categories:

Sources of heat
Women
Water
Non-English  

#1
#2
#3
#4

I have asked hundreds of people to sort the 4 stamps using their own categories. Hardly any used four categories I asked you to use.  Even with Non-English as a label, few wrote Olympiad, XIII or Los Angeles in stamp 1 or Graf Zeppelin in stamp 3 or Pocahontas in 4. The torches in 1 and the engines in 3 were rarely seen. It usually takes quite a bit of time to notice the clouds and the globe showing the oceans in 1 and 3.

We are used to looking at denominations, country and maybe the date on stamps. Knowing that the first stamp has torches is not particularly important information. Obviously Lincoln is the focus of the second stamp and not the two women engraved on the sides as decoration.

What I just asked you to do with the stamps is central to the understanding of our teaching.

1.  By using labels to highlight features that are not obvious, you had to analyze. Of course in looking at your teaching you should use labels you are familiar with initially.  Ones I often hear include these:

off task on task

teacher talk student talk

clear explanation

unclear explanation

But as you look at samples of your teaching, with students and colleagues if possible, you will all create new labels: necks straight, students using erasers every time I say “Mistakes are OK”, using their first language to clarify what I am doing or to chat. The more original and the less use of jargon from methods books the better.

2.  I asked you to look at a small amount of data in different ways. If  you transcribe a recording that fills one A4 sheet of paper, it will be enough data to see something new about what you and your students are doing. The point is to look at a small amount of data from multiple perspectives rather than to look at a lot of data from one perspective.

3. Some make judgments like “Ugly design, boring color” in the process of sorting stamps. Judgments are very, very common when teachers first hear what they say and their students do. “Wow, I talk too much; some students wrote too slowly.”  I used to encourage teachers not to judge but advocate writing judgments down. Then, look for examples in the recording and transcription that support the judgments and do not support their judgments. And then write ways that what you initially think is negative—like students writing slowly—might be positive. As teachers consider how talking a lot might be helpful some have asked their students to transcribe their talk. They realize that much of what they say is natural but that in fact students do not understand them. As they transcribe and practice teachers’ language, they improve their listening and master many of the patterns.

I am not suggesting that you should not vary the amount of talk but rather to see how what we initially think is positive or negative can in fact be the opposite.

4. I urge you to spend fifteen minutes twice a week. This adds up to a lot of time in a term but one purpose of the analysis is to plan a change in your teaching so transcribing and analyzing becomes planning time.

634 Words
Grade Level 8.3
Flesch Reading Ease 65%

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Learning to See – Chiew

Seeing Beyond The Classroom Walls — Chiew Pang

When I was asked to contribute to this topic,

one of the first things I did was to put feelers out to my PLN (Personal Learning Network).

I asked them, “What do you see each time you walk into your classroom?”

Photo taken by Chiew Pang, used under a CC Attribution, Noncommercial, No Derivative licence 

 

 

I’d like to share their comments with you.

Michael Griffin @michaelegriffin: I see an empty room that will soon be filled with humans and possibilities.

Jo McN @cunningcanis: I see community spirit.

Yitzha Sarwono @yitzha_sarwono: I see smiles and laughter painted on each wall.

Anne Hendler @AnneHendler: I see the potential to turn the room into anything we want today.

Christopher Wilson @MrChrisJWilson: I see a space that wants to be filled. Anything could fill it: my voice, their voice, handouts, pictures…

Abby Popowich @abbypopowich: … an opportunity to help somebody!

@JohnPfordresher: …vast but reluctant potential

Generally, they were all very positive comments except, perhaps, for John, who qualified “potential” with “reluctant”.

Now, what do you see? Do you see your students as a reluctant potential, too? What do you really see when you walk into your classroom? Do you have a preconceived idea before you walk in? Or do you try to empty your mind, or alternatively, fill it with unrealistic over-optimistic thoughts of how you want the classroom to be? Or, perhaps, you have nothing in your mind but the plan you had prepared and a determined effort to see it through. Or, maybe even, you have hardly anything prepared, and you walk in with nothing but your experience, and have the intention only to play it by ear.

Well, do you know what you see? I’m willing to bet that the majority of us see different things at different times; after all, we are humans and we are affected by many factors, often beyond our control. That is OK. What is important, however, is that we try to be positive. We try to see the goodness, rather than the opposite, in our students. They are humans, too. They, regardless of their age, have their stories to tell; they have their experiences to bring into the class; they have their ups and downs, just like you and me.

It is more usual than not that there is always one, or a few, “bad eggs” ready to cause turmoil, ready to push you to your limits. But, do you know them? I mean know them? Do you ever talk to them, find out what their story is, what their life is really like when they leave the classroom door?

Next time you walk into your classroom, before you say anything, make eye contact with each and every one of your students. Look at them. What do you see? Do you see a life behind those eyes? Reach out to them and let yourself be reached.

What is also, maybe even more, important is this: what do you see at the end of the class? Do you try to see yourself? Do you try to see you as the students did during whatever time it was that you were in the classroom? Do you ask yourself:

What did I like about this lesson?

What didn’t I?

What did the students learn, if anything?

What would I change if I were to have this lesson again?

Learn to see not only that is visible but that which is not. Don’t be like the people Ralph Waldo Emerson saw: “People only see what they are prepared to see.”

Prepare yourself to see beyond the classroom walls.

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