Motivation

Today in class we watched a TED talk video where Dan Pink talked about motivation. It was called “Dan Pink on The Surprising Science of Motivation”. Here is the video:





He stated motivation comes from autonomy, mastery and purpose. When a person is intrinsic motivated rather than extrinsic motivated then they are more likely to do well, as a student I think a lot of my motivation is extrinsic, as I want high grades to get into university, but it is intrinsic, as I want to become an elementary teacher and feel very passionate about it. I have always been an average student. Last year in college I worked hard to get my C’s, but last semester I did very well. I even surprised myself when I achieved the principals list. I worked very hard that semester, as I was very worried about getting into university next year, but I was very stressed the whole semester, and therefore, not very happy. My performance was high, but I did not enjoy what I was doing. I was going through the motions to get the grades. I hope one day I reach mastery in my learning, as I will hopefully look forward to do the work and enjoy it. I think I will feel this way when I become an elementary teacher, because I feel very passionate about working with children. I think the big thing about motivation is being happy. If you are not happy about what you are doing then you are not going to do well and want to do it, as you will have to force yourself to do the task at hand. I hope when I become a teacher I help my students feel motivated in what they are supposed to learn. I think teachers help student’s motivation, as student’s can tell if a teacher wants to be there or not. For instance, I have a teacher this semester that you can tell that he does not care about the class I am in. He tells us what else he has to do and that he is very busy. I feel that my class is on the back burner for him and I feel that is not fair to me and the other students; because the teacher is not very motivated in teaching me, I am more very motivated in the course and learning from him. This course has a lot of assignments and I have trouble doing them, because the teacher does not care, so why should I? There are classes that I can tell that the teacher is passionate in what they are teaching; therefore, I feel more motivated in learning the course material. Since, they are passionate about the material they make the class more engaging and interesting. I hope to do this when I become a teacher.       

Cooperative Learning

I think group work has pros and cons. Working with a group you get different ideas that you would not have otherwise, but it is hard to meet together and different personalities may have conflicts. I think at a college level group work it harder, because teachers do not usually give class time and you have to meet outside of class, but everyone has different schedules and responsibilities. Therefore, it can be very difficult to meet outside of class. In high school group work was easier, because the teacher usually gave class time and the people in your class were usually friends, so it was easier to get together and meet for a project. In college you usually do not know the people you are with until you do the project. In group projects there is usually someone that does not put as much effort into the project compared to the other group members, so group projects can be stressful and unfair in that way. Cooperative learning is also hard, because everyone has different work ethics and different expectations on their grades, so people do not put the same amount of effort into the project, but they get the same grade.

I think I would evaluate cooperative learning in my classroom by getting the students to do a group evaluation and a self-evaluation, because a group evaluation would give me an idea on who did what. A self-evaluation would also give me an idea on what the student thought they did. I would give them questions to answer as a guide line for them, so the evaluation process would be easier. Then get them to give a mark out of 10 for example. This would help me as a teacher on what mark I should give each student.

School is becoming more project based learning, as it is more interactive. I think it is a good thing, as it gets the students to problem solve and think outside the box, but it is harder for teachers to mark. I did many group projects throughout my schooling. Some were good experiences and some were not. I remember in grade seven, I did a group project. We were put into groups randomly and I just happened to get into a group with all boys that were friends. I ended up doing a lot of the work and there was some conflict between me and the boys. Sometimes it is good for the students to make up their own groups depending on their age, as disagreements can occur, but then there is always the chance someone will feel left out if they did not get into a group. Sometimes it is also good for students to try to work with people they do not usually work with. Some teachers give an option to do the project alone, as some students like to do the work themselves, as they can work on it on their own time and not worry about meeting with people. There are many careers that you have to work with people and problem solve, so learning that skill in school is a very useful thing.

A successful cooperative learning would be a project that everyone works together nicely, as everyone works hard to try to do well. Everyone is social, as they talk through ideas. There is an individual assessment as well as a group assessment. The teacher gets the students to think about what they learnt and what happened during the project.

SQ4R

SQ4R is a reading comprehension strategy. SQ4R are the different steps:

S is for survey, as you scan over the text you are going to read.

Q is for question, as if you question what you are surveying then you are more active in your learning.

R is for read.

R is for recite, you say the content out loud, as you may be able to understand it better.

R is for relate, relating the material to what you already know which makes it easier to understand.

R is for review, repeat the survey process again.

I think this process it better than just reading the information, as when I read my textbooks I do not comprehend what I am reading. I am just reading and have no idea what the textbook was talking about. By pre reading, reading, and post reading it makes the information “stick” better. You will be able to understand the information. Here is a link to a website that outlays the SQ4R method out nicely: SQ4R is a reading comprehension strategy. SQ4R are the different steps:

I think teaching this strategy to children would be great. Some children read a textbook, but have no idea what they are reading, so doing this in your classroom may be useful for some students, but other students may find it very tedious and not useful for them, as they understand the information when they just read it. I think this is a great method to use through and I will try to use it with the rest of my schooling.

William Ury: The Walk from “No” to “Yes”

Today we watched a video in class called “The Walk from “No” to “Yes”” where William Ury did a TED talk about conflict. Here is the video:

I felt that Ury’s message is a very simple concept, but may be hard to do in a conflict situation. If a person is mad at you it may be hard to sit back and think about the situation and what to say. Ury stated that the “secret to peace is the third side and the third side is us”. I think what he meant by this is that a third person can be there to not pick a side, but help resolve the situation and help the two people come to a resolution. Ury also stated that when you are in a conflict you should “go to the balcony”. I think this means that when you are in a conflict you should take a minute and breathe and think about what you are going to say so you do not regret anything. I think I will be able to use this with my students, my colleagues, family, my school, and my community, as when I am in a conflict I could go to the “balcony”, so I do not say anything I regret and think about the situation and cool down. In a classroom situation I think the teacher is there to be the third side sometimes, as they are in a neutral position and trying to get the students to resolve the conflict. I remember in elementary school my school try to teach students how to be the “third person”, as we had conflict mangers. Conflict mangers were grade 5 students that were “working” during recess and if students had a conflict they would go to the conflict mangers to resolve the problem. The goal was to get students to resolve their own problem instead of asking the teachers. Something you need an outside perspective to help you resolve the problem. My only concern with this is that the third person should not pick sides they should just be the mediator on the situation, but sometimes people pick “who was right” and that does not help the situation.

Study Strategies

The other day in class we were talking about memorizing and study strategies. We were asked: how do you study? What is your process? Does it differ depending on the subject? How do you feel about the results?

I usually read over my notes and try to quiz myself afterwards. It sometimes changes depending on the class and how the class in structured and what the tests are like. I feel like I can improve my studying techniques, as I feel like I do not have the best studying strategies. I found it helpful when my classmates stated what they do to study they said they:

·         Use flashcards

·         Read over their notes then highlight important points

·         Rewrite notes

·         Map concepts

·         Associate and connect concepts to something they already now  

I found these ideas helpful and maybe I will try these ideas in the future for my tests and finals coming up.

Memory

We watched a video in class the other day where Andi Bell was able to memorize 5 decks of cards. It was pretty amazing here is the video:

Here is the video where he explains how he did it:

Andi was able to do this, because he related the cards to a picture and visualize the card being in that place. This is called the Location method or the Loci method.

I found another person, Ron White who was able to do the same thing. He is a two time national memory champion winning the USA Memory Championship in 2009 and 2010. Here is a video of him memorizing different things and he explains how to do it:

Here is also his website: http://www.brainathlete.com/meet-ron-white-memory-expert/ where you can learn more about Ron White and how he does what he does.  

I think memorizing things like that is very interesting. It is a simple technique that everyone can do and I think it can work with simple things to memorize, but learning subject content like astronomy, psychology, sociology, ect. is much hard. Rehearsing the information, deep processing, elaborating, constructing images, and organizing information are all ways for people to encode information. I think all these ways help people learn the information. Rehearsal is just memorizing the information and continually repeating the information over and over again. Therefore, you are not really learning and understanding the information you are just repeating it. Deep processing you are thinking about the information and going more in depth into the information, so you understand the information more. Elaboration is extending the information like giving examples to understand the information more in depth and relate to something you already know. Constructing images is a form of elaboration, as you picture the information and relate it to something you know. Organization helps you retrieve the information as you know where to go to get the information.

Curriculum Integration

Curriculum Integration shows students that everything in our world is connected. Therefore, students understand the information better. Curriculum integration allows students to have more opportunity to relate the curriculum to their own lives. Curriculum integration gives an answer to students that ask “why”, “why are we learning this”, “why are we doing this I won’t need to know this when I am done school”. It answers these questions, as students realize that they need to know what they are learning, because they will need to know it when they are not in school anymore. Curriculum integration creates a further enrichment of the subject content that would not have been presented in the normal curriculum, so students can understand the curriculum more in depth. It increases interest and positive learning environment, thus increasing student’s grades, participation, attendance, self-direction and interest in school. Curriculum integration also helps students with their self-development and provides intrinsic motivation, so they have a reason for learning the information. These are the positive accepts of curriculum integration, but the cons of curriculum integration are that it could take a long time to implement properly. The teacher would have to create an entirely new curriculum. Teachers may not have a lot of time to plan. Units are intensive, as you go more in depth into the material. Teacher’s collaboration may be difficult, as it is a lot more team teaching, which may be hard to meet with other teachers.

Here is a video were two teachers integrated their math and science curriculums:

Students understood the information better, because they realized why something was a certain way. The teachers worked together to explain both curriculums. The students understood the concepts better as they saw why they were learning something and they would be able to use that information in the real world and in their future jobs. I think curriculum integration is great, but it may be hard for new teachers to do this. I think this is something that can be a goal for the teacher to build up to and think about doing in their classroom. I think curriculum integration is good, but it should not be forced, as if it is forced then the subject content may not match and not make sense to the students. I think I would try to use curriculum integration in my classroom when I become a teacher, as it can make learning more interactive for the students and provide a reason for learning.   

Student Centered Learning

We watched a video in class from TED talk where John Hunter was talking about the World Peace Game he created for his grade 4 class. Here is the video:

I think the World Peace Game is a great game for students, as they learn many things and it is more interactive, which they will learn more and understand it better. The World Peace Game includes not only social studies, but all the subjects. Therefore, it is curriculum integration, which I think is good, as it shows students that everything is connected in our world and the world is not spilt into subjects. Building world peace is beyond the curricular outcomes of the K-12 classroom, but I do not think it matters. I think it is great that a teacher is going above and beyond the curriculum. There are curriculum based outcomes in the game, but adding the world peace and war accept makes it interesting and entertaining for the students and it is also educational. I think this game is a great idea, but you can tell that John Hunter has been teaching for a number of years. I think this would be difficult for a new teacher, but this is something a teacher could aspire to do later in their career. When learning is student centered I think it is more memorable for the student. When the student has to learn themselves then they put more effort into their learning. Therefore, they will remember the information more and remember what they did. I think projects are a great way for students to discover outcomes on their own. The teacher is there for guidance, but students are discovering themselves. I remember when I was in grade 5 we had a grade 5 Science Fair. We decided what we wanted to learn about and did it ourselves. We had guidance from our teacher, but we did the work ourselves. I still remember what I did and how it worked. My science fair project was showing how a lemon could conduct electricity. If my teacher showed me how to do that instead of doing it myself then I probably would not remember the project at all. I remember it more, because I did most of it myself and I was proud of myself for doing it.     

Operant Conditioning vs. Functional Analysis

I like the functional analysis approach, because it considers other criteria then just the behaviour. Everyone has bad days and the functional analysis approach considers that. It puts into consideration why people are acting a certain way. The functional analysis approach exams the student’s inappropriate behaviours as well as, their antecedents and consequences to determine why that person is acting that way. There are many reasons why people act the way they do and I think functional analysis approach considers these factors, unlike the operant conditioning approach. The operant conditioning approach just considers the behaviour and then you just deal with that behaviour accordingly. Therefore, I think the functional analysis approach is better, as you hopefully will be able to fix the behaviour altogether for the student, by teaching desirable behaviours, constantly reinforcing good behaviour, creating a predicable schedule, providing frequent opportunities for choice and providing accommodations to support academic success. I think all these strategies are what a teacher should do to help their students succeed in their schooling.  

I think teachers need to continually look at their class and think is there anything I need to change or do to make this better. The teacher could ask themselves this there something that I am doing to make the situation worse? I think these can be hard questions to ask, but I think it is beneficial for everyone. Teachers need to continually recess their classroom and how it is working, because all classes are different. What might have worked one year might not work the next year with a different set of students. The teacher’s classroom management technique might be extinction, as the teacher over used it, so the teacher has to think of different classroom management technique for their classroom.     

Functional Approach

In class today we discussed functional analysis approach. We had a discussion question which was: a student in your class, Cody, refuses to do his desk work. What are three possible purposes or functions for this behaviour and suggest alternative behaviours he can learn or adopt to meet each purpose or function?

The three purposes or functions for Cody’s behaviour we discussed were:

1.      Doesn’t like sitting in a desk

2.      He has different learning styles

3.      Doesn’t respect the teacher or doesn’t response to teacher

Alternative behaviours he can learn or adopt to meet each purpose or function is:

1.      Sitting at a bigger table so Cody does not feel so confined to his desk and hopefully able to do his desk work.

2.      Getting someone to read the directions and help him with his desk work.

3.      Discuss with Cody what you can do as a teacher to help him learn and help him realize that you want him to succeed. Ask yourself is there something you are doing that is making the situation worse?

Operant Conditioning

The four types of operant conditioning are:

1.      Positive Reinforcement- An example of positive reinforcement is a student puts their books away and is sitting nicely waiting for the next activity. Then the teacher praises the student and the student continues to do that.

2.      Negative Reinforcement- An example of negative reinforcement is if a teacher takes away a final example if the student has perfect attendance.    

3.      Positive Punishment- An example of positive punishment is when a student disrupts the class then the teacher gives the student detention.  

4.      Negative Punishment- An example of negative punishment is when a student does not do their homework then the teacher takes away their recess, so the student can finish their homework.

I think when I become a teacher I may use all these tactics. I may not use negative reinforcement very often, because it is not very common, but the other ones are more common and easy to use. I think positive reinforcement would be the best one to use, because it is positive and rewarding. Therefore, the student will response better and it will be a more positive learning environment. Unfortunately when a teacher is stressed and frustrated with their students either positive or negative punishment will come into play faster than positive reinforcement. Positive or negative punishment is still good, because it still works and help the students do what you need them to do. It is just not a very positive environment.   

Classroom Management

When I was in grade 3 I remember my teacher would give us a check mark on this board when we did something good and she also took check marks away when we did something bad. At the end of the week we got a jelly bean for each check mark. The other types of classroom management I remember my teachers using is positive reinforcement, or negative punishment, as if we did something good the teacher would praise us, but if we did something wrong we would have to sit in the hall, or put our head down on the desk or something like that. I think getting a treat is good sometimes, but should not be used all the time, as children need to realize that every time you do something you are supposed to do you do not get a reward like candy. Although getting something is sometimes nice to motivate students and get them to look forward to something. I think doing something as a class would make the class work together and be more cohesive. For example putting marbles in a jar when the whole class is good and when the jar in full the class gets to have a pizza party. Having a group reward may be a positive thing in your classroom as the whole class is looking forward to something and will work together to get it. Therefore, I may use this classroom management technique in my classroom, depending on the grade I am teaching as I think elementary students would response better to this than high school students.       

Learning Disabilities

In class we watched a video called “How Difficult can this be? (The FAT City Workshop)”.  FAT stands for Frustration, Anxiety, and Tension. Richard Lavoie had a group of adults and made them have a “learning disability” for one day. He used different tactics to help teachers, parents, social workers and other students understand how a learning disabled child learns and feels in a classroom. I think Richard Lavoie’s tactics were very powerful and helpful to help people understand why some students act the way they do. I think many students may feel stupid and have low self-esteem, because of their learning disability. I liked when Lavoie stated “in order to be fair you have to treat children differently”. Every child is different; therefore, you should not treat how they learn the same. To provide the child with the best education you may have to help each child differently. You are still treating them as equals, but you are just catering their learning, so they can learn best. When I was in grade 2 I was tested for a learning disability, but nothing came out of it, but it seemed I always had to work harder, and take longer on assignments and testes (I still do). I remember getting high anxiety in school. For example I would hate if the class was reading out loud as I hated reading out loud in class to everyone. Therefore, if the class was reading out loud I would read a paragraph ahead, while the class was reading the paragraph before just in case my name was called to read the next section. I would try to read it before so I could sound out the words beforehand so the class wouldn’t make fun of me, but they I did not know what the whole reading was about, because I was trying to read ahead so I was ready to read in front of the class. I remember I would make little mistakes while reading out loud in class and then the class or teacher would have to correct me and I felt very embarrassed. I feel as a teacher I would be able to understand these children more, as I been through this. School did not come easily to me as it does for some people; therefore, I will be able to relate to those children and understand what they are going through.