In terms of literacy, technology has definitely added at least one more to the list—computer literate. I feel that technology has definitely changed the world today. Not only is the world different than it was 20 years ago, it’s crazy because we have actually lived through the change. I don’t think that young students today even understand the difference in terms of the access they have to the plethora of information available on the web, to typing papers, to communicating via sites like myspace, blogger, and even the idea of hybrid classes. This is normal to them. I don’t think they even think about the times when this wasn’t in existence. But for us, I do feel we are of a lucky generation. We understand and appreciate a lot of effort, we know what the long way is, and the hard way, and we appreciate this technology for what it is and what it has done to simplify our lives. (but maybe at the same time complicate it) Sometimes I wish I could get my butt of the computer and do something else!
I think that technology has the ability to assist in learning. There are programs to help children learn, and just using the computer in general provides reading, and the challenge of typing (writing). Exploring new programs and sites teaches people how to do new things and to figure things out. There are clearly advantages to technology and of course there are some disadvantages, but I feel those affect the newer generations who only know life with technology the most. Anything you want…it’s at your fingertips. I have a question, I stumble across something during the day I am unsure of…what do I do? I jot it down, and when I get home, I go online yahoo.com and there is my answer. Enough said…ANYTHING I want to know..it’s there.
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Monday, July 16, 2007
NCLB (hurts my subject) :-(
Hmm..I'm not really sure how I feel about No Child Left Behind. I do realize that teachers are now teaching to the test, like is mentioned in the Wikipedia article. In doing so they are teaching just enough to get students to do well on standardized tests. They are not teaching new innovative lessons, that have more to do with what we do when we get out of school, and in the end enable us to do well on these tests. I feel that is so much more beneficial to a student. Learning life skills, and real life situations, that they will encounter one day seems more realistic than simple math out of a book or reading out of a book. Yes you need to know the basics but we should also be taught to think outside the box.
There is actually something I don't like about NCLB. It messes with My Job as a PE teacher. In order to add more time to the core subjects in order to get scores higher on standardized tests, schools are cutting out time in the arts and PE. I am currently writing a research paper on something similar and am coming across so much literature on this. Cutting into time for PE is not smart in my opinion. The benefits that Physical Activity and Physical Education have on a child is amazing. It helps prevent so many diseases and things like obesity which are becoming more and more prevalent today. These diseases that people are dying from due to sedentary behaviors don't show as much in the early ages, but are caused by inactivity in the early ages and come on later in life. For so many kids not that late though. Therefore, we need to keep our kids informed, educated, and MOVING. This is all hard to do when our time with the students is being cut. Most studies show that students actually do better on standardized tests when they are active and fit. And the small increase in time with core subjects, after the added time is divided between them, does not help much in rasing scores.
Anyway...I think it is good to tighten the gap between different racial groups, but if we retain a kid for not passing the test, we are still leaving them behind, aren't we? Also the fact that each state can make their own tests doesn't prove much. If one state can make their test really easy and one makes it harder, what does that show us when they get the results and the state with the easy test does amazing and the harder test does average. NOTHING. Unless there is a country wide exam and all states need to teach the same curriculum, how can you really measure and compare?
There is actually something I don't like about NCLB. It messes with My Job as a PE teacher. In order to add more time to the core subjects in order to get scores higher on standardized tests, schools are cutting out time in the arts and PE. I am currently writing a research paper on something similar and am coming across so much literature on this. Cutting into time for PE is not smart in my opinion. The benefits that Physical Activity and Physical Education have on a child is amazing. It helps prevent so many diseases and things like obesity which are becoming more and more prevalent today. These diseases that people are dying from due to sedentary behaviors don't show as much in the early ages, but are caused by inactivity in the early ages and come on later in life. For so many kids not that late though. Therefore, we need to keep our kids informed, educated, and MOVING. This is all hard to do when our time with the students is being cut. Most studies show that students actually do better on standardized tests when they are active and fit. And the small increase in time with core subjects, after the added time is divided between them, does not help much in rasing scores.
Anyway...I think it is good to tighten the gap between different racial groups, but if we retain a kid for not passing the test, we are still leaving them behind, aren't we? Also the fact that each state can make their own tests doesn't prove much. If one state can make their test really easy and one makes it harder, what does that show us when they get the results and the state with the easy test does amazing and the harder test does average. NOTHING. Unless there is a country wide exam and all states need to teach the same curriculum, how can you really measure and compare?
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Assessment..
First of all I have no experience with assessing students reading, or writing for that matter. I am not a teacher yet so I don't have any experience even assessing students in general. Plus, since I am going to teach Physical Education, we don't really talk much about assessing literacy or any kind of written work. But after reading the articles it makes me think back to when I was in school.
From the first article Literacy Assessment techniques, I really like the responses to literature. It really shows what the student's took from what they read, and how it made them think while they were reading. As opposed to summarizing what you read. Anyone can do that. If you can put together what you read with your own experiences or thoughts then we know you really understand the material.
I think interest inventories are a good idea. I think if my teachers created instruction and lesson plans based on my interests I would have definitely paid attention more as a student. And I always think back and regret that I didn't pay attention as much in Reading class. I wish I could just sit down and fly through books like my friends do, and I wish I understood some of the things that go along with reading more difficult books. I feel it all stems from me having a lack of interest back then and now I can't change that. If only there were topics of interest maybe I would have learned to like it more.
What really stood out to me from the second article..I agree that assessment should be a collaborative effort and that it should be done reflectively. I feel that teachers, students and parents all learn from each other and should help the student reflect on his or her own work and assess it that way. I think this really helps it sink in, it is more conversational and two-way, since you can discuss why you did something or why you don’t understand something. This is actually all demonstrated in the article about Mrs. Rodriguez' class. I think she did a good job involving the students in the assessment progress and I think they will surely benefit more in the 5th grade having had a teacher like this.
From the first article Literacy Assessment techniques, I really like the responses to literature. It really shows what the student's took from what they read, and how it made them think while they were reading. As opposed to summarizing what you read. Anyone can do that. If you can put together what you read with your own experiences or thoughts then we know you really understand the material.
I think interest inventories are a good idea. I think if my teachers created instruction and lesson plans based on my interests I would have definitely paid attention more as a student. And I always think back and regret that I didn't pay attention as much in Reading class. I wish I could just sit down and fly through books like my friends do, and I wish I understood some of the things that go along with reading more difficult books. I feel it all stems from me having a lack of interest back then and now I can't change that. If only there were topics of interest maybe I would have learned to like it more.
What really stood out to me from the second article..I agree that assessment should be a collaborative effort and that it should be done reflectively. I feel that teachers, students and parents all learn from each other and should help the student reflect on his or her own work and assess it that way. I think this really helps it sink in, it is more conversational and two-way, since you can discuss why you did something or why you don’t understand something. This is actually all demonstrated in the article about Mrs. Rodriguez' class. I think she did a good job involving the students in the assessment progress and I think they will surely benefit more in the 5th grade having had a teacher like this.
Thursday, July 5, 2007
TIP Chapters 5, 6, 7
In chapter 5, I am familiar with Piaget’s theories and stages of cognitive development. I feel that most of what we are taught in our classes here stem from that. We hear about developmentally appropriate documents when we are working on lesson plans all the time. It is important to create lessons that are on target with the stages in which students are at in order for them to be effective. Basically we know that if we took a lesson book for a first grade class and used it to teach an 11th grade class it wouldn’t serve much purpose in helping students learn and advance, and vice versa.
I don’t know that I agree with the maturation theory. As I was reading it I almost got mad, like why would anyone not let a child learn to read? Words are all around as, and as children we see that our parents need to read words to tell us information, like menus, signs, books…so why would we withhold this information from our curious children. They develop curiosity, they want to learn. When you read a book to a young child, they look at words and listen to what you say and try to match it up. I think that if you kept this from a child until they were six and a half years old you might even slow down that development. Students should have foundations laid before they enter the formal learning process we call school. Basically I agree with the Theory of Literacy Development by Holdaway.
I feel the emergent literacy theory describes how most children learn to read, through exposure as a child, at home, out in the world, and in school. Children aren’t necessarily at the level that their school grade says they should be at. Some will be more advanced, some will be right on target, and some will struggle and be behind. That is why we have advanced level classes for the gifted, mainstream classes, and supplemental support classes when needed. I think the environment that a child grows up in plays the largest role on how they develop and how much they care for and desire to learn more. I think that the Family Literacy Theory goes along with this as well. I believe we need to encourage reading, and praise a child when he or she accomplishes something in the stages of learning to read. When a child feels a sense of accomplishment, a child wants to continue to show you that he/she can do it. This creates a love of reading and learning.
As I read about the Sociolinguistic Theory in Chapter 6, it reinforces something I was thinking myself while reading chapter 5. As I read chapter 5 and they talked about families and their influence on a children ability to read and learn to read, I was thinking to myself that children from more affluent home and more academic homes will have more exposure and more chances to learn to read better. They might also see their parents in these situations more, creating more of a will to learn. Where in poorer homes, and less privileged homes, children will not come across this opportunity as much. They also will not be exposed to as many words and ideas. This is sad because I feel that a good majority of people end up similar to their parents, instead of going above and beyond and moving up in life. I guess that proves that the more you see your parents and peers love reading and use reading, the more you will want to, and same with learning. But how is a child supposed to think something is important if they are not exposed to it, and brought up to think it is. And that carries out through the rest of the child’s life as a student. They might not be encouraged to do school work at home, or might not get the help or support they need, and the cycle just continues. And people wonder why in more cases than not, people who come from affluent places and rich academic lives stay like that, and people who don’t end up in the same situation that their parents were in. This also makes me think of silencing teachers from the last readings. How they used that system of scripted and not individualized learning to teach in a poorer, lower class school. They didn’t care because it wasn’t a school full of “smart, affluent children” it seemed. Basically this chapter proves why people are classified in classes such as upper, middle, lower, white collar, blue collar, poor, rich…and how they ‘usually’ (not always) seem to stay very close in classification when they grow up.
Children learn from their families, from their cultures, from the communities around them. They learn through the social interactions that they encounter. Everything we are exposed to as a child is what shapes us as learners, creates our knowledge base, and guides us to our next step in learning. We are products of the society in which we are exposed to. I agree with Vygotsky’s ideas about exposure to our sign systems and how manipulation of such information can affect who we become as people and learners.
I guess writing as I read is funny, because as I read something, and write about what it makes me think of, I feel like the next thing I end up reading confirms what I just thought about. The Critical Literacy Theory basically talks about how people end up staying in the same classifications they grew up in, because they are not offered equal chances and equal education as the members of other classes are. My whole idea of how the poor get less than the affluent kids. It seems what you are born into is what you are destined to be unless you can excel and break free and really take advantage of any opportunity you have to go above and beyond and learn more on your own.
I find the substrata factor interesting. I would like to see a class of young students and analyze them to see these skills and see if they relate to their reading abilities. As for Rauding, I don’t know, maybe this is a majority thing, but I am a slow reader, I have to reread sentences sometimes to make them sink in too, but I think I have a fairly high vocabulary, and a good knack for putting an unfamiliar word into context and figuring out what it means too. I know I have had this problem forever and it has always been a struggle for me, but I think it is something I have learned to deal with.
I think that all of the information and cognitive processing models are interesting and in another sense similar. I feel that the pattern that the brain uses to get, decipher, store, retrieve, and filter information is complex and that maybe everyone’s brain works a little differently. I think these are all good theories and I think they all make significant contributions to what we understand about reading.
I don’t know that I agree with the maturation theory. As I was reading it I almost got mad, like why would anyone not let a child learn to read? Words are all around as, and as children we see that our parents need to read words to tell us information, like menus, signs, books…so why would we withhold this information from our curious children. They develop curiosity, they want to learn. When you read a book to a young child, they look at words and listen to what you say and try to match it up. I think that if you kept this from a child until they were six and a half years old you might even slow down that development. Students should have foundations laid before they enter the formal learning process we call school. Basically I agree with the Theory of Literacy Development by Holdaway.
I feel the emergent literacy theory describes how most children learn to read, through exposure as a child, at home, out in the world, and in school. Children aren’t necessarily at the level that their school grade says they should be at. Some will be more advanced, some will be right on target, and some will struggle and be behind. That is why we have advanced level classes for the gifted, mainstream classes, and supplemental support classes when needed. I think the environment that a child grows up in plays the largest role on how they develop and how much they care for and desire to learn more. I think that the Family Literacy Theory goes along with this as well. I believe we need to encourage reading, and praise a child when he or she accomplishes something in the stages of learning to read. When a child feels a sense of accomplishment, a child wants to continue to show you that he/she can do it. This creates a love of reading and learning.
As I read about the Sociolinguistic Theory in Chapter 6, it reinforces something I was thinking myself while reading chapter 5. As I read chapter 5 and they talked about families and their influence on a children ability to read and learn to read, I was thinking to myself that children from more affluent home and more academic homes will have more exposure and more chances to learn to read better. They might also see their parents in these situations more, creating more of a will to learn. Where in poorer homes, and less privileged homes, children will not come across this opportunity as much. They also will not be exposed to as many words and ideas. This is sad because I feel that a good majority of people end up similar to their parents, instead of going above and beyond and moving up in life. I guess that proves that the more you see your parents and peers love reading and use reading, the more you will want to, and same with learning. But how is a child supposed to think something is important if they are not exposed to it, and brought up to think it is. And that carries out through the rest of the child’s life as a student. They might not be encouraged to do school work at home, or might not get the help or support they need, and the cycle just continues. And people wonder why in more cases than not, people who come from affluent places and rich academic lives stay like that, and people who don’t end up in the same situation that their parents were in. This also makes me think of silencing teachers from the last readings. How they used that system of scripted and not individualized learning to teach in a poorer, lower class school. They didn’t care because it wasn’t a school full of “smart, affluent children” it seemed. Basically this chapter proves why people are classified in classes such as upper, middle, lower, white collar, blue collar, poor, rich…and how they ‘usually’ (not always) seem to stay very close in classification when they grow up.
Children learn from their families, from their cultures, from the communities around them. They learn through the social interactions that they encounter. Everything we are exposed to as a child is what shapes us as learners, creates our knowledge base, and guides us to our next step in learning. We are products of the society in which we are exposed to. I agree with Vygotsky’s ideas about exposure to our sign systems and how manipulation of such information can affect who we become as people and learners.
I guess writing as I read is funny, because as I read something, and write about what it makes me think of, I feel like the next thing I end up reading confirms what I just thought about. The Critical Literacy Theory basically talks about how people end up staying in the same classifications they grew up in, because they are not offered equal chances and equal education as the members of other classes are. My whole idea of how the poor get less than the affluent kids. It seems what you are born into is what you are destined to be unless you can excel and break free and really take advantage of any opportunity you have to go above and beyond and learn more on your own.
I find the substrata factor interesting. I would like to see a class of young students and analyze them to see these skills and see if they relate to their reading abilities. As for Rauding, I don’t know, maybe this is a majority thing, but I am a slow reader, I have to reread sentences sometimes to make them sink in too, but I think I have a fairly high vocabulary, and a good knack for putting an unfamiliar word into context and figuring out what it means too. I know I have had this problem forever and it has always been a struggle for me, but I think it is something I have learned to deal with.
I think that all of the information and cognitive processing models are interesting and in another sense similar. I feel that the pattern that the brain uses to get, decipher, store, retrieve, and filter information is complex and that maybe everyone’s brain works a little differently. I think these are all good theories and I think they all make significant contributions to what we understand about reading.
Saturday, June 30, 2007
Language Acquisition
Children learn language from their interactions with other learners as well as becoming a functioning member in society. They learn through their surroundings, communities, television, books, toys, games, and people.
I think the nativist theories are interesting. Are they implying that some of our parents brain and memory is being passed on to us, or that everyone just has a foundation already layed out in their brain and we just need to make the child aware of it and feed it in order to watch it grow? I don’t know, makes me think. I mean, most children do develop at similar stages and all parents cannot be giving the same nurturing. Unfortunately, all parents do not give their children the necessary attention. Which could be why some develop slower, but it seems that certain skills might be innate.
I think it’s weird though, if we have this innate sense for language, is it the same for everyone of different cultures? Is it just pulled out of us using our native language. Does a Chinese speaking baby differ from the English speaking baby when they are born, and before being introduced to words? Is there a difference in the two brains or is one just trained to use whatever it is born with in the language of it’s parents? What about the adopted baby, say a Chinese baby, and adopted by an American family, raised to speak English. Does that mess with this innate grammar system at all?
I think the article on learning 2nd languages is very helpful and describes the adult learning process of learning a 2nd language very well. I know that I understand Spanish a lot better than I can put it into words. I find it especially hard forming grammatically correct sentences. But I can usually get my point across.
I like the idea of learning one language, say French, and then learning Dutch through a FrenchßàDutch book. Although, I think it would be way too confusing for me. I think the fact that students are learning languages in the early grades now, is a pretty good idea. I think children have an easier time of picking up new information and learning new things.
I think the nativist theories are interesting. Are they implying that some of our parents brain and memory is being passed on to us, or that everyone just has a foundation already layed out in their brain and we just need to make the child aware of it and feed it in order to watch it grow? I don’t know, makes me think. I mean, most children do develop at similar stages and all parents cannot be giving the same nurturing. Unfortunately, all parents do not give their children the necessary attention. Which could be why some develop slower, but it seems that certain skills might be innate.
I think it’s weird though, if we have this innate sense for language, is it the same for everyone of different cultures? Is it just pulled out of us using our native language. Does a Chinese speaking baby differ from the English speaking baby when they are born, and before being introduced to words? Is there a difference in the two brains or is one just trained to use whatever it is born with in the language of it’s parents? What about the adopted baby, say a Chinese baby, and adopted by an American family, raised to speak English. Does that mess with this innate grammar system at all?
I think the article on learning 2nd languages is very helpful and describes the adult learning process of learning a 2nd language very well. I know that I understand Spanish a lot better than I can put it into words. I find it especially hard forming grammatically correct sentences. But I can usually get my point across.
I like the idea of learning one language, say French, and then learning Dutch through a FrenchßàDutch book. Although, I think it would be way too confusing for me. I think the fact that students are learning languages in the early grades now, is a pretty good idea. I think children have an easier time of picking up new information and learning new things.
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Essential Questions Blog
From the first article I feel like they are just showing how important books are in a child’s life. Whether they are mostly illustrations, or illustrations and words, it seems that getting children involved with books and learning at a young age is important. I had no idea so many events were out there like this for the younger crowd.
After reading the second article on literacy from wikipedia, I realize the importance of literacy. Literacy is needed for society to function. Most of the points in the article are things we all know, but just don’t truly think about all of the time. They are simply understood, but rarely talked about. In America there aren’t that many cases of illiteracy, at least probably where most of us come from, so we often forget that it exists. Most people who are illiterate probably don’t have jobs, or good ones at that, therefore probably don’t have a lot of money. This would be why they aren’t in our presence as often. After reading this article I see how there are still countries where the literacy rates are so low. Also, its crazy to think about how the whites not allowing the slaves to learn to read was truly holding one of the greatest abilities from them. They were denying them so much. Being literate is like have a power, it is our key to the world.
I feel like we never think about how much our parents and teachers really taught us at a young age. Not just to read and recognize letters and simple words, but to use phonics to sounds out more difficult words. And more importantly to understand all that we are reading.
It’s amazing that the literacy rates have increased in the past decades, yet from 1992-2003, the literacy rates of college grads have decreased. The sad part—I believe it. There are so many more easy ways out these days. Students don’t have to read through something to get by.
In reference to the 3rd article, I agree with Elizabeth that teachers needed to teach more as opposed to reading scripts that were designed for the average learner. Not the challenged, not the advanced. I don’t think that giving each student 45 minutes of personal time and 12-15 hours of individual time will do them much good. They will be much better learning as a whole, and in the end, learning from each other as they move along. I also don’t like how it is the poorer school that is being put through this curriculum and how they seem like they just don’t care since they aren’t the white, English speaking, wealthy kids who are going places in life.
After reading the second article on literacy from wikipedia, I realize the importance of literacy. Literacy is needed for society to function. Most of the points in the article are things we all know, but just don’t truly think about all of the time. They are simply understood, but rarely talked about. In America there aren’t that many cases of illiteracy, at least probably where most of us come from, so we often forget that it exists. Most people who are illiterate probably don’t have jobs, or good ones at that, therefore probably don’t have a lot of money. This would be why they aren’t in our presence as often. After reading this article I see how there are still countries where the literacy rates are so low. Also, its crazy to think about how the whites not allowing the slaves to learn to read was truly holding one of the greatest abilities from them. They were denying them so much. Being literate is like have a power, it is our key to the world.
I feel like we never think about how much our parents and teachers really taught us at a young age. Not just to read and recognize letters and simple words, but to use phonics to sounds out more difficult words. And more importantly to understand all that we are reading.
It’s amazing that the literacy rates have increased in the past decades, yet from 1992-2003, the literacy rates of college grads have decreased. The sad part—I believe it. There are so many more easy ways out these days. Students don’t have to read through something to get by.
In reference to the 3rd article, I agree with Elizabeth that teachers needed to teach more as opposed to reading scripts that were designed for the average learner. Not the challenged, not the advanced. I don’t think that giving each student 45 minutes of personal time and 12-15 hours of individual time will do them much good. They will be much better learning as a whole, and in the end, learning from each other as they move along. I also don’t like how it is the poorer school that is being put through this curriculum and how they seem like they just don’t care since they aren’t the white, English speaking, wealthy kids who are going places in life.
Monday, June 25, 2007
About Me
Hi my name is Michelle Noto. I am in the MAT program getting my teaching certification in Physical Education. I have one more year left and begin my student teaching this coming year in Montclair.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)