As we have all heard many times, change is hard, basically that is what this chapter is talking about. Teachers that I have known are particularly hard to change, they like things the way they are and always have been. Think about the teacher who has been in the same grade perhaps even the same room for 20 years or more!! If this person is one of the exceptional teachers in the building then you can assume that they have figured out what works best for them and their students and that is way things are taught, forget about all the new techniques and strategies. Now assume that someone in authority has decided to bring about systemic change to the school district. I'm sure you can see the resistance coming from the veteran teacher.
It was interesting reading about the amount of preparation and planning needed to institute a major change in a school system. I am in a very small district and could not imagine that that much planning would go into a change that was planned for my district. It sounded like a lot of talk and not a lot of substance, but then I started to relate it to the change that we did implement this school year. Our high school decided to go to trimesters this year. The reasons for this change were many but the most important one was that trimesters would allow our failing students the opportunity to pass and continue their education in compliance with the new state requirements. So last school year when it was time to start scheduling the students into classes a decision had to be made as to weather the classes would be semesters or trimesters. The decision from the top was trimesters. Kids were scheduled, teachers were given their assignments and the school year started in Sept. This was a much different approach than what is described in our text. Missing from our approach was the setting up of the framework, the discussions with stakeholders ( parents, teachers, staff ) as to how this would work and was it the best education for our kids. Also the teachers were given no time to learn and prepare for a new school day. The result is that we are now seeing cracks in the system and fixing the cracks will be band aid variety at best. Teachers are grappling the re aligning their curriculum to the new time frame, trying to figure out how all that teaching will fit into the new set of minutes per class. What needs to be cut out, what can be looked at more in depth. Looking back, which is always with 20/20 vision we probably should have talked about this change for another whole school year, and implemented it starting in Sept. 2009. My guess is the transition would have been much smoother.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Sunday, October 26, 2008
What to do with a map?
We just finished studying the American Revolution. We talked about the troops and where they travelled, also how people got from place to place, as there were no cars, trains, planes, etc. As you can see I put a map of the Northern colonies on my blog. The students can now use the distance finding tools to measure how far the troops actually walked or rode horses to get to Quebec. Also Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain boys attacked Fort Ticonderoga and dragged the cannons they acquired over to Boston and the Battle of Bunker Hill. Using Google maps and measuring the distance these troops travelled will be a real eye opener for the kids. I can also use this when we are studying the Oregon Trail.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Class so far
It's a good thing this question was not asked five weeks ago!! The anxiety level was way up there back then. But after getting into the routine it's like anything else you get used to the expectations and learn to roll with the punches. While it was not a comfortable feeling I can see the validity of just jumping in with both feet and doing it. Now that I look back I can understand the reasoning. If you think about it the same amount of anxiety takes place in any new class you take, the only differance is in a classroom you can turn to the person sitting next to you and say " Are you getting any of this?" Misery loves company after all!! After reading some of the other blogs, I realized we were all in the same boat, we just couldn't see the frustration on each others faces. So with the benefit of hind sight I can see the method behind the madness, and I can't really think of a better way to start. I assume you are aware of the ansgt it generates with the students, I also assume that has leveled out as time goes on.
Chap. 18
As I was thinking about industry using technology to make life better or more productive, I thought about our fellow student Steve who teaches flying. Flying students are able to use simulators to hone their skills and practice manuevers without actually going up in the air. A very good use of technology in my opinion. This led me to another idea, how about putting teen age student drivers into simulators. First of all it shouldn't be that hard as we have tons of race car driving games already available. Then with some adaptations to the game kids could be exposed to all kinds of driving conditions. Consider the powerful impact the simulator could have by emulating a drunk driver, how the kids would view the road, varinging the perceptions, blurring the obstacles, making objects seem double, fuzzy signal lights. The more I think about it I'm actually wondering why this has not been invented yet. Then the program could make various weather conditions, the sky's the limit, [grin ]. So the road could be icy, snowy, wet, slick with leafs, in our area we have fish flies also known as June bugs that make the roads slippery. If you lived near a desert sand storms, or water over the roads if you are close to rivers, lakes etc. Rules of the road is another area that could be explored. Fire engines, ambulances, and police vehicles could all enter the picture. Accidents could occur in front of the driver, practice passing large trucks, stopping at railroad crossings, the list goes on and on. I believe you get the idea, while I am not currently a driver ed. instructor I was once a long time ago. I actually got into an accident with a student driving, a simulated accident would have been much cheaper, and a lot easier on my heart.
Businesses use technology to keep their employees current on developments in their field. This is especially useful if the business is an international one. The employee can sit at his/her desk learn about the culture and laws of the foreign country and apply them to the business they are running. One example is the car companies, even doing business in a country as close as Canada requires a knowledge of their laws, taxes, money exchange rates and how that will affect the hourly rates of employees wages. Of course, large companies must show a profit so all of these factors must be taken into account before any product is sold. Imagine a new employee trying to run a transaction with a foreign worker even though they work for the same company. If the new employee had no knowledge of how the foreign employee did business it would be a mess. Hence, the use of the computer to have a set of instructions, rules and regulations, and tests to help all workers in all countries stay on the same page. The employees are not thrilled with having to take the courses, so the business ties their promotions to the number of courses the employee has completed. Their has to be a hook somewhere, and the pay check is always the easiest to use.
Businesses use technology to keep their employees current on developments in their field. This is especially useful if the business is an international one. The employee can sit at his/her desk learn about the culture and laws of the foreign country and apply them to the business they are running. One example is the car companies, even doing business in a country as close as Canada requires a knowledge of their laws, taxes, money exchange rates and how that will affect the hourly rates of employees wages. Of course, large companies must show a profit so all of these factors must be taken into account before any product is sold. Imagine a new employee trying to run a transaction with a foreign worker even though they work for the same company. If the new employee had no knowledge of how the foreign employee did business it would be a mess. Hence, the use of the computer to have a set of instructions, rules and regulations, and tests to help all workers in all countries stay on the same page. The employees are not thrilled with having to take the courses, so the business ties their promotions to the number of courses the employee has completed. Their has to be a hook somewhere, and the pay check is always the easiest to use.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Chap. 14
I found that the diagram on pg. 141 pretty much sums up the whole chapter for me, and applies to what we as teachers do every day. So let's take a look at what we do.
Paper work is the backbone of the teaching industry, all the way from lesson plans to student worksheets. We are organized and we do know where it is we want to go, our administrators want to have curriculum maps for the entire school year, there is no question we are organized. We have goals provided for us by the State of Michigan, the federal government, and our local school districts. Teachers definitely have the organization part down pat.
We also know what the performance is we want the kids to achieve. Sometimes I tell my 8th graders let's just give you all A's on your report card and then we can worry about you learning something!! They like the idea of getting the A's, it's the let's learn something that's the hard part. Performance takes many shapes and forms. Currrently we are taking the MEAP test, talk about knowing the desired performance, we've been preparing for the MEAP for weeks now. Everyone knows the performance that is expected on this test. Once again, just because the kids know the expectations does not mean they are going to perform to that level. This leads to the idea that some students will purposely do poorly on the MEAP, just because they know the expectations are so high from all the adults around them, others can't meet the expectations no matter how hard they try. Remember the part in the chapter where the military screened the personnel so they could get the recruits that would have a better chance of completing the task and only teaching those men the activity. The ones that didn't make the grade were assigned to other activities. That is not allowed in todays educational world, high schools are now only training kids to go to college. We all know that not all kids belong in college, we still need electrictions, plumbers, bus drivers, and construction workers. Our educational system has no room for training these students, this is one difference from the chapter and the diagram. According to the chapter training workers to do the best job possible and finding the occupation that will help the company grow and survive is a valued goal. That is not always true in education.
Paper work is the backbone of the teaching industry, all the way from lesson plans to student worksheets. We are organized and we do know where it is we want to go, our administrators want to have curriculum maps for the entire school year, there is no question we are organized. We have goals provided for us by the State of Michigan, the federal government, and our local school districts. Teachers definitely have the organization part down pat.
We also know what the performance is we want the kids to achieve. Sometimes I tell my 8th graders let's just give you all A's on your report card and then we can worry about you learning something!! They like the idea of getting the A's, it's the let's learn something that's the hard part. Performance takes many shapes and forms. Currrently we are taking the MEAP test, talk about knowing the desired performance, we've been preparing for the MEAP for weeks now. Everyone knows the performance that is expected on this test. Once again, just because the kids know the expectations does not mean they are going to perform to that level. This leads to the idea that some students will purposely do poorly on the MEAP, just because they know the expectations are so high from all the adults around them, others can't meet the expectations no matter how hard they try. Remember the part in the chapter where the military screened the personnel so they could get the recruits that would have a better chance of completing the task and only teaching those men the activity. The ones that didn't make the grade were assigned to other activities. That is not allowed in todays educational world, high schools are now only training kids to go to college. We all know that not all kids belong in college, we still need electrictions, plumbers, bus drivers, and construction workers. Our educational system has no room for training these students, this is one difference from the chapter and the diagram. According to the chapter training workers to do the best job possible and finding the occupation that will help the company grow and survive is a valued goal. That is not always true in education.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Chap. 3
Will the internet have a major impact on grade school students?
I think the internet will be a part of elementary school curriculum for a long time to come. The work world runs on computers, everything from working at McDonalds to being president of a major company, to owning your own business. All of these undertakings have computers attached to them, payroll, writing memos, e-mail, sending documents as attachments, ringing up a sale, setting up meetings the list goes on and on. People have to learn how to accomplish these tasks.. that falls on the schools. The little kids have leap frog, play stations, and Sesame Street. As they get older the "toys" get more expensive but the learning to manipulate them still lies with the schools. So keyboarding, typing memos, excel spreadsheets, database applications, cad programs will all need to be taught. It is very unlikely that a K -12 learner is going to sit down, by him/her self, at a computer and learn excel. It may not be a human being standing in front of a class that does the teaching though, it may be a computer tutorial program. Either way the learning will go on in an educational setting. Even though learning about computer games will take place outside of school, the education of business type programs will be taught in school. The progression will start with the little kids learning to navigate programs and servers, saving, opening, adding file names etc. and will progress to the upper grades where they will learn the current programs for business use. I suspect the need for classes like the one we are currently taking will also remain a necessity... the teachers after all have to stay one step ahead of the students. The more they learn in the early grades the farther advanced they will be in the higher grades. Teachers will not be able to rest on their laurels.. they will have to keep their skills current also. Hence the need for ongoing professional development.
While there are some excellent computer programs available for student learning I don't foresee the end of having human teachers standing in front of kids. The personal connection that teachers have with students is irreplaceable. So the computer becomes another learning tool instead of a replacement teacher.
As students get older the internet can become a source of income, or give people the ability to work at home. Teleconferencing, email, placing orders over the web all allow some individuals the ability to work from home. This is a huge change from the old days when everyone had to leave the house and go to work. As we are experiencing high gas prices imagine how nice it would be to leave the car in the garage and work from the living room couch.
Training and testing is also convenient on the internet. One example is the Federal Aviation Administration testing. The FAA can administer its flying tests to anyone in the country over the internet. This is a huge time and money saver. Students who need to take an exam simply sit in front of a computer take the test, it is scored immediately and the results sent to the FAA all without a human test overseer. The student knows immediately if he/she passed, and the FAA has the information needed to issue the appropriate license. This is one area where our tax dollars seem to be operating efficiently.
It will be interesting to see where the technology leads us in the future.
I think the internet will be a part of elementary school curriculum for a long time to come. The work world runs on computers, everything from working at McDonalds to being president of a major company, to owning your own business. All of these undertakings have computers attached to them, payroll, writing memos, e-mail, sending documents as attachments, ringing up a sale, setting up meetings the list goes on and on. People have to learn how to accomplish these tasks.. that falls on the schools. The little kids have leap frog, play stations, and Sesame Street. As they get older the "toys" get more expensive but the learning to manipulate them still lies with the schools. So keyboarding, typing memos, excel spreadsheets, database applications, cad programs will all need to be taught. It is very unlikely that a K -12 learner is going to sit down, by him/her self, at a computer and learn excel. It may not be a human being standing in front of a class that does the teaching though, it may be a computer tutorial program. Either way the learning will go on in an educational setting. Even though learning about computer games will take place outside of school, the education of business type programs will be taught in school. The progression will start with the little kids learning to navigate programs and servers, saving, opening, adding file names etc. and will progress to the upper grades where they will learn the current programs for business use. I suspect the need for classes like the one we are currently taking will also remain a necessity... the teachers after all have to stay one step ahead of the students. The more they learn in the early grades the farther advanced they will be in the higher grades. Teachers will not be able to rest on their laurels.. they will have to keep their skills current also. Hence the need for ongoing professional development.
While there are some excellent computer programs available for student learning I don't foresee the end of having human teachers standing in front of kids. The personal connection that teachers have with students is irreplaceable. So the computer becomes another learning tool instead of a replacement teacher.
As students get older the internet can become a source of income, or give people the ability to work at home. Teleconferencing, email, placing orders over the web all allow some individuals the ability to work from home. This is a huge change from the old days when everyone had to leave the house and go to work. As we are experiencing high gas prices imagine how nice it would be to leave the car in the garage and work from the living room couch.
Training and testing is also convenient on the internet. One example is the Federal Aviation Administration testing. The FAA can administer its flying tests to anyone in the country over the internet. This is a huge time and money saver. Students who need to take an exam simply sit in front of a computer take the test, it is scored immediately and the results sent to the FAA all without a human test overseer. The student knows immediately if he/she passed, and the FAA has the information needed to issue the appropriate license. This is one area where our tax dollars seem to be operating efficiently.
It will be interesting to see where the technology leads us in the future.
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
Chapter 2
What is Instructional Design?
We have this wonderful model for instructional design, I am going to try to fit it into today's educational scheme.
Analysis, hmmmmm some educator who long ago taught school, probably for a short time and has since become a government employee, decides that the State of Michigan should see how all of the children in Michigan are progressing. How well are the children in Michigan learning, are they all learning at the same rate, and the same things. The answer must have been no, because the solution was to give the kids a test, hence MEAP. Once the process was started it grew and grew, like all good government departments. So instead of having just one test we are now testing many subjects, at many grade levels.
Design, part of design is to write objectives in measurable terms, we have GLCS and HSCS now for all grade levels. They are not written in measurable terms, that is for the teachers to figure out. Just make sure you are teaching what the state wants. But wait there's more, some data gurus have come up with the MEAP blueprint. This piece of data examines the test questions and tells teachers what percentage of the test questions are asked in which catagories of the test. For example, more narrative questions are asked than informational on the ELA portion of the MEAP, this helps the teachers in instruction and what to focus on the most.
Development, the MEAP has been an ongoing testing project, it is constantly being refined. When the economy is going strong the developers of the test put in some paragraph writing questions. These require extensive resources to score as many man hours are needed for reading all that writing. When the economy is not doing so well, like now, then the questions are multiple choice these are much more objective and a machine can score them which is very economical. The MEAP makers are always trying out different ways of conducting the test. One year the questions are all the same, this comes under attack because some students don't have the same background knowledge as others. So the developers put in a variety of questions, this comes under attack because some of the questions are harder than others. So we know that the test is constantly being refined.
Implementation, we have a testing window so all students are taking the test at the same time. Students that are slower readers or writers are given more time and extra help. This has also been refined so that the students are now all taking the same portion of the test on the same day.
Evaluation, there are two kinds of evaluation, formative and summative.
Formative first, teachers are constantly going over MEAP data to revise their instruction. When the results come out meetings are held to go over the progress that was made on the MEAP. In other words "how did our kids do", if the answer is they didn't do so good then instruction will be revised so they perform better the next time. This helps keep all school districts on the same tract teaching the same curriculum across the state. If the answer is we did great then the teachers will be told to keep doing what is working, you must be doing something right because the kids are doing well on the test.
Summative, results of the various school districts are published in the newspapers, for all the world to see. Parents can see which school districts are doing well on the test and get their students into those districts. The reverse of this is the districts that aren't doing so well are labeled as failures in a public forum. School districts doing well publicize their results in hopes of attracting more students, more students means more funding for that district.
It appears that the MEAP test fits into the instructional design model presented in chapter 2 of our book.
We have this wonderful model for instructional design, I am going to try to fit it into today's educational scheme.
Analysis, hmmmmm some educator who long ago taught school, probably for a short time and has since become a government employee, decides that the State of Michigan should see how all of the children in Michigan are progressing. How well are the children in Michigan learning, are they all learning at the same rate, and the same things. The answer must have been no, because the solution was to give the kids a test, hence MEAP. Once the process was started it grew and grew, like all good government departments. So instead of having just one test we are now testing many subjects, at many grade levels.
Design, part of design is to write objectives in measurable terms, we have GLCS and HSCS now for all grade levels. They are not written in measurable terms, that is for the teachers to figure out. Just make sure you are teaching what the state wants. But wait there's more, some data gurus have come up with the MEAP blueprint. This piece of data examines the test questions and tells teachers what percentage of the test questions are asked in which catagories of the test. For example, more narrative questions are asked than informational on the ELA portion of the MEAP, this helps the teachers in instruction and what to focus on the most.
Development, the MEAP has been an ongoing testing project, it is constantly being refined. When the economy is going strong the developers of the test put in some paragraph writing questions. These require extensive resources to score as many man hours are needed for reading all that writing. When the economy is not doing so well, like now, then the questions are multiple choice these are much more objective and a machine can score them which is very economical. The MEAP makers are always trying out different ways of conducting the test. One year the questions are all the same, this comes under attack because some students don't have the same background knowledge as others. So the developers put in a variety of questions, this comes under attack because some of the questions are harder than others. So we know that the test is constantly being refined.
Implementation, we have a testing window so all students are taking the test at the same time. Students that are slower readers or writers are given more time and extra help. This has also been refined so that the students are now all taking the same portion of the test on the same day.
Evaluation, there are two kinds of evaluation, formative and summative.
Formative first, teachers are constantly going over MEAP data to revise their instruction. When the results come out meetings are held to go over the progress that was made on the MEAP. In other words "how did our kids do", if the answer is they didn't do so good then instruction will be revised so they perform better the next time. This helps keep all school districts on the same tract teaching the same curriculum across the state. If the answer is we did great then the teachers will be told to keep doing what is working, you must be doing something right because the kids are doing well on the test.
Summative, results of the various school districts are published in the newspapers, for all the world to see. Parents can see which school districts are doing well on the test and get their students into those districts. The reverse of this is the districts that aren't doing so well are labeled as failures in a public forum. School districts doing well publicize their results in hopes of attracting more students, more students means more funding for that district.
It appears that the MEAP test fits into the instructional design model presented in chapter 2 of our book.
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