Blog #3: chapter 3-4
Literary Luminator
1. "Students often refer to good teachers as those who "make the stuff interesting." It's not that the teacher relates the material to students' interests- rather, the teacher has a way of interacting with students that they find engaging." (pp. 64) I enjoyed this passage because I found it to be very true. Teaching our students the necessary content is fabulous, however, many times we lose students due to disinterest in the material. If we know our students well, we can hook them and get them interested not by changing our content but just by being the amazing professionals we are! It is very much easier said than done because not all students learn the same and they all have very diverse personalities. So while your engaging some students you might be turning other students off to the content.
2. "The emotional bond between student and teacher- for better or worse- accounts for whether students learn. ....They are able to connect with students and they organize the material in a way that makes in interesting and easy to learn." (pp. 65) Okay, so a little redundant from the first passage but I think one of the most important things a teacher can do is connect with the students. Kids spend most of their day in school and around us teachers, shouldn't we make them feel safe and get to know them? Teachers have so much influence over their students and most don't even realize it. If a student doesn't feel like the teacher knows them as an individual why would they want to learn? I feel that connecting to the student and giving the individual what they need is just as important as teaching content.
3. "If someone understands an abstract principle, we expect they will show transfer. When knowledge transfers, that means they have successfully applied old knowledge to a new problem." (pp. 97) I chose this passage because in our faculty meetings at school I am in the "transfer" group and am collecting research to show how transfer is applied in the classroom. There are a couple different types of transfer. For instance, students can transfer skills like writing a rough draft...editing that draft..and then producing a final draft from ELA to Foreign Language. Students can also transfer content: In my Italian class we are watching a video about being Jewish in Italy and Italy's involvement during WWII. My student's can transfer previous knowledge from when they did a WWII unit in Social Studies. By transferring this knowledge or these skills, they are applying previous knowledge to a new content or new task which shows understanding.
-Alex
Alex I really found it interesting that two of your quotes were about how the teacher and student relationship were a huge factor if learning is to take place. Both with the idea of engaging the students and just having a good working relationship. However the book didn't talk about how to create those relationships with ALL of your students its not all the easy.
ReplyDeleteNatalie Gregorski
Making the "stuff" interesting for the students and relating the information to the students interest seemed like the same to me at first. Then he explained that students may go off topic when you bring up something that interests them and find it hard to pull their attention back to the necessary instruction. By making the lesson interesting, it will gather the students attention and keep them on topic.
ReplyDelete-Melissa Lochner
Alex, I find it interesting that you picked these quotes about how teacher and student relationships. Especially since we spent so much time talking about relationships on Monday night. Teacher and student relationships are the building blocks of a students learning. It is so important to foster those relationships.
ReplyDelete