Monday, May 9, 2011
Student Teaching
Last week my cooperating teacher invited me to attend the class field trip. I was very excited that she called me. We went to Ponderosa for lunch. The students were very excited that I was there because they did not know that I was coming with them. For lunch each adult was assigned two students. We helped the students through the buffet line. The students had to ask for what they wanted and they had to talk to any staff member that spoke to them. The kids had a lot of fun. My teacher also explained to the students that we tip our waitresses and why we tip them. After lunch we went to an elementary school that was hosting a play by a local sign group about Charlotte's Web. The play was a lot of fun and the students really enjoyed it. I was so glad that I was able to go with them and experience a field trip with them.
Friday, May 6, 2011
Assessment Plan
The content area I want to focus on is reading. Reading is such an important skill for all children. It also carries over into all aspects of the child’s life so it is important to know how the child is functioning in their reading abilities.
The first assessment I would give the student is a running record. A running record is a great way to see what skills the student has and at what level skills are. One way to do this assessment is to use the Basic Reading Inventory assessment tool. Another way is to have two copies of a passage the student is suppose to read and mark on the teacher copy when the child makes an error in their reading. This will allow the teacher to see what types of errors that the child makes while reading. Also while reading the passage the teacher can keep track of how many words per minute the student is reading to determine the students reading rate.
The next assessment I would do would be to ask the student comprehension questions. Being able to comprehend and understand what you read is very important for everyone. However, often children who are deaf or hard of hearing have a hard time with comprehension. Therefore it is important that we as teachers target this skill and continue to build on this skill. Questions that I would ask the students would be who is this story about, what was the problem, how did he/she try to fix the problem, were they successful, what else did they try to fix the problem, etc. Based on the students responses additional questions may need to be asked to make sure the students understood what they read.
There are many different formal assessments that can be used for assessing reading skills. The assessment that I would use would be Accelerated Reader. My school during student teaching used this program. For this program all books are assigned a reading level. The students take a test to determine what their reading level should be. Then the students read a book on that level and take a test on the book. The test consists of 5 to 10 questions about the book. Each book then has a number of points that it is worth. Depending on how many comprehension questions the students get correct determines how many points they earn for reading that book. The students also have a specific reading points goal that they have to ear during each quarter. In my classroom my teacher then gave those students that met their AR goal a little party. This assessment program is great because it tells the teacher how the students are doing reading and comprehending on their own. If they are struggling then the teacher knows to work more one on one with that student to see where they are struggling. The kids from my student teaching placement also responded well to this program because they were motivated to read and they wanted to do well on their tests to earn their points.
The first assessment I would give the student is a running record. A running record is a great way to see what skills the student has and at what level skills are. One way to do this assessment is to use the Basic Reading Inventory assessment tool. Another way is to have two copies of a passage the student is suppose to read and mark on the teacher copy when the child makes an error in their reading. This will allow the teacher to see what types of errors that the child makes while reading. Also while reading the passage the teacher can keep track of how many words per minute the student is reading to determine the students reading rate.
The next assessment I would do would be to ask the student comprehension questions. Being able to comprehend and understand what you read is very important for everyone. However, often children who are deaf or hard of hearing have a hard time with comprehension. Therefore it is important that we as teachers target this skill and continue to build on this skill. Questions that I would ask the students would be who is this story about, what was the problem, how did he/she try to fix the problem, were they successful, what else did they try to fix the problem, etc. Based on the students responses additional questions may need to be asked to make sure the students understood what they read.
There are many different formal assessments that can be used for assessing reading skills. The assessment that I would use would be Accelerated Reader. My school during student teaching used this program. For this program all books are assigned a reading level. The students take a test to determine what their reading level should be. Then the students read a book on that level and take a test on the book. The test consists of 5 to 10 questions about the book. Each book then has a number of points that it is worth. Depending on how many comprehension questions the students get correct determines how many points they earn for reading that book. The students also have a specific reading points goal that they have to ear during each quarter. In my classroom my teacher then gave those students that met their AR goal a little party. This assessment program is great because it tells the teacher how the students are doing reading and comprehending on their own. If they are struggling then the teacher knows to work more one on one with that student to see where they are struggling. The kids from my student teaching placement also responded well to this program because they were motivated to read and they wanted to do well on their tests to earn their points.
Thursday, May 5, 2011
Student Teaching
I really enjoyed my student teaching experience. I learned a lot about time management! Everyday was a challenge to fit every lesson in for every student. I really had to learn to focus on what was really important and to make sure that task was completed. Everyday was crazy and most days I didn't even have a second to think, but I loved every minute of it. There was never any time to doubt myself or wonder if this was the right thing or how I could make the lesson better. I just had to do my lesson and move on. This helped me to really build the confidence in myself that I needed to help me to really see that I can really be a teacher and be a great teacher!
Science Strategies
Hands On
A hands-on approach is so important when it comes to teaching science, especially deaf and hard of hearing children. This approach allows children to explore and discover new things by trial and error instead of just reading about it in a text book. This approach really helps students to expand their thinking and really grow in there learning.
http://www.ehow.com/way_5879133_effective-strategies-teaching-elementary-science.html
Group Work
Working together in groups when learning a new concept is another important strategy. If children work in groups to figure out a new concept there are different brains and ideas being tossed around about how the concept works. The students can also brainstorm and work together to problem solve different scenarios.
NASA
The NASA website offers a wide variety of information. There is information on earth, the planets, missions and much more. The information is divided into information for teachers and students. There are interactive games and activities for students to plan and learn. There are also experiments that students can try in class or at home. Another cool feature of this website is that students can ask a scientist if they have a question about something. This website has so many different things to offer both teachers and students to help make learning about science fun!
http://science.nasa.gov/about-us/science-strategy/
Science Teachers
This website is great for teachers! There are a variety of lesson ideas on various science related topics. There are also worksheets already made up on various topics and on different levels. Another great feature about this website is that they are links to other websites about specific topics. These additional resources are great for when you are teaching about a topic and need to know more information to better inform your students.
Additional Resources
This websites all offer additional strategies and helpful tips for teaching science to students. Each of these websites can offer fun activities for students and help teachers with finding additional help.
http://www.sciencenetlinks.com/
http://www.nsta.org/
http://www.ehow.com/teaching-science/
A hands-on approach is so important when it comes to teaching science, especially deaf and hard of hearing children. This approach allows children to explore and discover new things by trial and error instead of just reading about it in a text book. This approach really helps students to expand their thinking and really grow in there learning.
http://www.ehow.com/way_5879133_effective-strategies-teaching-elementary-science.html
Group Work
Working together in groups when learning a new concept is another important strategy. If children work in groups to figure out a new concept there are different brains and ideas being tossed around about how the concept works. The students can also brainstorm and work together to problem solve different scenarios.
NASA
The NASA website offers a wide variety of information. There is information on earth, the planets, missions and much more. The information is divided into information for teachers and students. There are interactive games and activities for students to plan and learn. There are also experiments that students can try in class or at home. Another cool feature of this website is that students can ask a scientist if they have a question about something. This website has so many different things to offer both teachers and students to help make learning about science fun!
http://science.nasa.gov/about-us/science-strategy/
Science Teachers
This website is great for teachers! There are a variety of lesson ideas on various science related topics. There are also worksheets already made up on various topics and on different levels. Another great feature about this website is that they are links to other websites about specific topics. These additional resources are great for when you are teaching about a topic and need to know more information to better inform your students.
Additional Resources
This websites all offer additional strategies and helpful tips for teaching science to students. Each of these websites can offer fun activities for students and help teachers with finding additional help.
http://www.sciencenetlinks.com/
http://www.nsta.org/
http://www.ehow.com/teaching-science/
Thursday, April 28, 2011
Math Strategies
Math Strategies
Number Charts
Number charts are amazing to use!!! I used this website http://www.homeschoolmath.net/ to create a lot of my own number charts. I was working with my students are counting numbers up to 1000 and some of the students had a hard time with the counting. I created a number chart for each of the hundreds and we taped them all in a line in the room. We then studied these charts over and over again to help them with their counting. Then when the students had to complete paterns of numbers such as filling in the 250,____, 252 or ____,400,401 the students could go the charts and follow the chart to help them. I believe that hundreds charts can be used in so many different ways for students.
Blocks
During my math lessons I used all different kinds of blocks in my lessons. When working with place value we used hundreds, tens, and ones blocks. These blocks were great for showing the place value representation for the students. The blocks were also great for when the student add to look at a number such as 100 and add one to the number or ten to the number. They could not understand this concept by just the numbers alone, but the visual of the blocks helped a lot. I used these blocks in many different lessons and there are something that I definitely want to have in the future! When doing geometry I used different shape blocks. Again this visualization helped the students to understand the different geometric shapes and concepts. There are so many different types of blocks available for lessons to help students with the visualization that they need in understanding difficult math concepts.
Games
My students loved to play different games. For math lessons I would spend time on a particular topic we would talk about it, do some worksheet, and then for a review/ something fun the students would play a game. I found several different website that had different math games that student could play. In my classroom we have a promethean board, which is like a smart board, sp the students could play the games on there as a group or individually. Here are some websites that I used,
• http://www.free-training-tutorial.com/place-value-games.html#3digits
• http://www.funbrain.com/cgi-bin/tens.cgi?A1=c&A2=0&A3=0&A4=0&A5=5705.00000000&A6=2&A7=2&A8=[0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0]
• http://www.bgfl.org/bgfl/custom/resources_ftp/client_ftp/ks2/maths/bead/free/free.htm
• http://www.primarygames.com/math/timeclock/start.htm
http://www.teachervision.fen.com/math/teaching-methods/48952.html
This website was very interesting. There were a lot of different and helpful strategies to sue with our students. Some of them need to be adapted depending on the student and their level, but still useable. There are also fun lesson ideas for different topics. I really liked this website because there is a lot if information and because all the information is broken down into specific topics. This made it easy to go to the website and fins something depending on the topic I was working on at the time.
Number Charts
Number charts are amazing to use!!! I used this website http://www.homeschoolmath.net/ to create a lot of my own number charts. I was working with my students are counting numbers up to 1000 and some of the students had a hard time with the counting. I created a number chart for each of the hundreds and we taped them all in a line in the room. We then studied these charts over and over again to help them with their counting. Then when the students had to complete paterns of numbers such as filling in the 250,____, 252 or ____,400,401 the students could go the charts and follow the chart to help them. I believe that hundreds charts can be used in so many different ways for students.
Blocks
During my math lessons I used all different kinds of blocks in my lessons. When working with place value we used hundreds, tens, and ones blocks. These blocks were great for showing the place value representation for the students. The blocks were also great for when the student add to look at a number such as 100 and add one to the number or ten to the number. They could not understand this concept by just the numbers alone, but the visual of the blocks helped a lot. I used these blocks in many different lessons and there are something that I definitely want to have in the future! When doing geometry I used different shape blocks. Again this visualization helped the students to understand the different geometric shapes and concepts. There are so many different types of blocks available for lessons to help students with the visualization that they need in understanding difficult math concepts.
Games
My students loved to play different games. For math lessons I would spend time on a particular topic we would talk about it, do some worksheet, and then for a review/ something fun the students would play a game. I found several different website that had different math games that student could play. In my classroom we have a promethean board, which is like a smart board, sp the students could play the games on there as a group or individually. Here are some websites that I used,
• http://www.free-training-tutorial.com/place-value-games.html#3digits
• http://www.funbrain.com/cgi-bin/tens.cgi?A1=c&A2=0&A3=0&A4=0&A5=5705.00000000&A6=2&A7=2&A8=[0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0][0]
• http://www.bgfl.org/bgfl/custom/resources_ftp/client_ftp/ks2/maths/bead/free/free.htm
• http://www.primarygames.com/math/timeclock/start.htm
http://www.teachervision.fen.com/math/teaching-methods/48952.html
This website was very interesting. There were a lot of different and helpful strategies to sue with our students. Some of them need to be adapted depending on the student and their level, but still useable. There are also fun lesson ideas for different topics. I really liked this website because there is a lot if information and because all the information is broken down into specific topics. This made it easy to go to the website and fins something depending on the topic I was working on at the time.
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Reading Strategies
Graphic Organizers
Graphic organizers are a great tool to use with students when they are reading. Using a graphic organizer allows students to look at what they are reading and how it all connects together. Doing a group graphic organizer together allows the students and the teacher to discuss the story and discuss the as a group the best way to state the main idea, the problem, etc.
Picture Story Telling
I like to look at the pictures in a story and have the students tell me what they think the story is going to be able. This allows the students to use their imagination as well as picture clues. Another thing I like about this activity is when students read the story it is fun to see if they get any of their ideas right. It makes it so much fun when what they thought happened id really what happened.
Fluency
Students need to have good fluency in order to comprehend what they are reading. I have notice especially in my student teaching placement that the students that have poorer fluency seem to struggle with comprehension more than some of the other students. I think this is because the students are struggling so much to just read the words on the page that they don’t really understand anything that they are saying. Therefore, we need to help our students with their fluency skills. I know this does not seem completely change comprehension, but I believe that it can help in a small way for students to understand more what they read.
Vocabulary
Vocabulary plays such a big role in student’s ability to understand what they are reading. If students are reading words, but don’t know what they mean they won’t be able to understand what the story is about. I have found that having students look up vocabulary words in their reading selection is a great way for them to learn the words. In my student teaching placement the students look up their vocabulary words for their story selection. The students and I then read the definition together and discuss what we think it means. The students then write a definition for each word based on the discussion that we had about the word. Discussing and writing the words helps the students to really think about the vocabulary term and what it means,
Graphic organizers are a great tool to use with students when they are reading. Using a graphic organizer allows students to look at what they are reading and how it all connects together. Doing a group graphic organizer together allows the students and the teacher to discuss the story and discuss the as a group the best way to state the main idea, the problem, etc.
Picture Story Telling
I like to look at the pictures in a story and have the students tell me what they think the story is going to be able. This allows the students to use their imagination as well as picture clues. Another thing I like about this activity is when students read the story it is fun to see if they get any of their ideas right. It makes it so much fun when what they thought happened id really what happened.
Fluency
Students need to have good fluency in order to comprehend what they are reading. I have notice especially in my student teaching placement that the students that have poorer fluency seem to struggle with comprehension more than some of the other students. I think this is because the students are struggling so much to just read the words on the page that they don’t really understand anything that they are saying. Therefore, we need to help our students with their fluency skills. I know this does not seem completely change comprehension, but I believe that it can help in a small way for students to understand more what they read.
Vocabulary
Vocabulary plays such a big role in student’s ability to understand what they are reading. If students are reading words, but don’t know what they mean they won’t be able to understand what the story is about. I have found that having students look up vocabulary words in their reading selection is a great way for them to learn the words. In my student teaching placement the students look up their vocabulary words for their story selection. The students and I then read the definition together and discuss what we think it means. The students then write a definition for each word based on the discussion that we had about the word. Discussing and writing the words helps the students to really think about the vocabulary term and what it means,
Weeks 6 and 7
The last 3 weeks have been crazy. We got a new student, which means there are 14 students now. It has been crazy how adding just one new student to the mix can turn the room upside down and change everyone’s behavior. It has also been interesting because the child’s IEP does not seem to really fit the child. Therefore the child has been shuffled around to different groups to see where they will fit the best. The student has also needed extra help because they will use to different rules and situations. On another note I have been running the room on my own and making sure the students are getting all the lessons they need in the day. It has been a lot of fun taking on more responsibility and getting to work with the students more and just getting to be there with them every day. I am very excited to be where I am because I have learned so much. I am looking forward to the next few weeks at the school!
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