Barb and Lois Presentation

Before go to Barb and Lois’s presentation, I spent some time watching the suggested videos.  They were so interested that I spend some more time watching others videos that were able in YouTube.  Autism is a “phenomenon” that has always causes me curiosity and a lot of question, like many other people, I guess.  I went to the presentation thinking I would like to ask questions to Barb and Lois, about what if her hobby, how is she feeling living by herself, etc.  But when Lois set time for questions I was speechless.  After reflecting about my reaction, I think what most affected me was her answer about why the relationship with her brother is broken.  I never expect to have clearer respond to a question like that.  Most of the time we are unclear on answering questions like that one, but she wasn’t.  She does not care about diplomacy, she was clear and honest.  It was like getting the honest answer of a question from a 3 year old kid with the maturity of an adult.  It was definitely amazing!  I have no idea how many time I wish we were that honest.  Another comment that was touching was when they give us the idea that conversation is not needed to have a good communication.  I love it, because I totally agree.  I think not only people with autism can be annoying by other because of their talking or noise, many times we also are annoying by the same talk/noise, but many of us do not realize that.  Be with me does not mean we have to talk… just walk next to me.  Finally, my phrase that stays with me was when Barb said something like… I have had a lot of time in silence and that allow her to think.  Certainly, we have to be more silence.,,  Beside, the message that Barb and Lois leave to us on being open, receptive, generous, compressive, and just being the person we are with our student is perhaps the best suggestion a teacher could have.  After Barb’s experience with her teachers and receiving her message, we have to think twice the actions and comments we make to our students, because it can affect them more than we expect.  Barb and Lois’ talk was a very unique and interesting presentation.

Very interesting talk... Check the link below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-xgdqNtcDI

Chapter 9 & 10

a)      I would define successful mastery of my lesson objectives from a behavioral view of learning when the students’ behavior or students’ learning aptitude exhibit changes or modifications to think or drive conclusion about a subject.  These chances are cause by some kind of environmental modification that I make as a teacher, or by stimuli that I identify as causing a positive effect on my students.  As behaviorism learning principle is based on association of stimuli-response experiences, I expect the changes observed on students to last long-term.

From the social cognitive view of learning I would define successful mastery of my lesson objective when I can arouse students’ learning from other by observation.  I can be made through my own modeling or other students’ modeling.  Students’ have to express a high level of persistent and compromise on achieve their individual goals.

b)      Considering my CSEL intervention case of study (High School Case of Study) definitely there are tools from the behaviorist view that either encouraging productive behaviors or discouraging undesirable behaviors.  In my case there is a group of students that id constantly out of task and disturbing those engaged in learning.  To improve such situation behavior tools, such as environmental changes or use of different stimuli could cause a positive effect on the students’ behavior plus a interest on learning.  Changes in environment could be as simple as changing assigned seat or as complex as modification of the entire classroom furniture and decoration.  And using stimulating task, authentic, creative, engaging task that could cause curiosity on the students increase their interest in participation.  Conversely, if those students engaged on learning demonstrate a self-efficacy and self-regulation attitude, out of task students can observe their peers behavior and how much they can achieve, causing a positive effect and pressure on them that direct those student to a better behavior or interest on learning by their own peers model (social cognitive effect).

Chapter 6

Based on my experience as Math teacher, I have observed how much my students struggle on processing new information in a way that helps them to storage it in long-term memory; for that reason the main skill I would like my students to be able to do is reasoning. The ability of reasoning by themselves, form concepts, and come out with conclusions will help them in the solving problem process. During the process of reasoning they have to retrieve background knowledge and connect/associate it to the novel concepts in order to come out with their own concept and conclusions. It is my job, as teacher, to guide my students in this meaningful learning process, since I consider it the key in future problem solving situations. I would help activating background knowledge and elaboration through questions and authentic activities relevant to the students to create a sense of surprise to them, at the same time, improve maintaining their attention. Additionally, I would present different organization techniques that will help them in making connections. Moreover, I would like them to use rehearsal, since that will help students to move their knowledge from declarative knowledge to procedural knowledge, which will stay in the long-term memory.

CSEL intervention case study:

 In the High School Case Study I strongly believe that if we, as teacher, make the new information meaningful, logical, organized, and visually attractive and interesting to students, several behavioral issue can be corrected or avoid, because in many cases frustration or lack of interest is the cause of such behaviors; therefore they can encourage productive behavior in the students. However, when I think in these ideas, in theory it sound idyllic, but in practice, we –teachers- need a lot of experience to reach to the point where we know our students so well that we are able to plan our classes using relevant and meaningful activities for our students, authentic task, and significant assessment so that we capture their attention and make them feel part of the learning process.

 

Chapter 13

First, I would like to start creating my ideal learning environment by redesigning my classroom in a warm, safe, organized, and pleasant room.  I consider very important the physical environment where classes are given.  I strongly believe that if classes are developed in a warm place (a place that invites to stay) then student will tempt to be more comfortable and engaged in the learning process.  At the same time, it would be a place that facilitates the interaction between students and teacher.  Second, I would establish, together with students, the expectations and standards for everyone behavior since the beginning if school year.  It would involve discussion and explanation about why some behaviors are acceptable and others are not, giving them the opportunity to be part of the “setting rule” process, at the same time, setting precedent of how open I can be with them expressing their own opinions.  I would make sure to letting them know that they can count with me, that I will be there for them no matters what issue worries them, and without judgment.  I consider also very important the constant reinforce of caring and respect of the other throughout the school year, and as I said in class, if a teacher-student relationship start bad, I would try to enrich it by knowing more about that student and showing my respect as a person for him/her.  Overall, know my students the best that I can, because it will help me to understand some of their reactions and behaviors and be a better supporter for them.  I would involve students in management behavior by teaching them to ask the disruptive student to respect their time of learning.  Third, planning…. Oh! planning… I think it is the most important part of keeping my students engaged and enjoying learning.  Idealistic I would like to have activities that they enjoy doing it daily, but requires an enormous amount of time and experience that I currently need… but I will keep trying.  I personally think that setting a good routine plus using creative and enjoyable activities (using differentiate instruction when required) help student be on task for prolonged period of time and avoid misbehavior.  Fourth, create a two way parent–teacher communication.  It would help me to know better students background, at the same time, I can have parent supports in their kids’ education.  Finally, be constant with students and make them feel everyone is equal to your eyes; it would avoid inappropriate feeling in between students.

High School Case of Study:

It seems that my senior students’ class is out of control and establishing new rules and classroom procedures is a priority for me in order to get the class back on task.  My first approach to manage the situation would be to observe and collect data about possible events that could drive students’ misbehavior.  Then, I would start a conversation with the whole class remaining them what were our expectations at the beginning of the school year, and what is happening now.  I would point out some of my observations and encourage them to express their opinions and ideas. I would also express my concern on the consequence of misbehavior and lower grades upon graduation and I would offer my help for everyone, making sure they know I care about their success.  After making clear some important points, I would propose to establish, together with the student, new rules and procedures for the rest of the school year, giving them the “responsibility of making the rules” (even when I am supervising them) and making them feel that know it is up to them to graduate, because in a very short time they will be by their own and nobody will be behind them.  After that, I would call each parent letting them know about our situation and the actions that we, as a class, are taking to remediate behavior, so they are informed on their kids’ risk and progress.  It would be a second front of help for me to redirect the class management and implant my intervention plan.  Finally, I would research the possibility of implement the Restorative Discipline tool in my school, since it seems very effective in communities like the one I am currently working, to help students control themselves improving their behaviors and achievements.

Chapter 11

My short experience as teacher has being in a low socioeconomic school which hardly influence me to think that sociocultural theories of motivation are the most helpful and instructive for me.  It is not hard to see in my students the influence that parent, peers, and community have on them.  Their engagement about certain topic and their personal behavior many times comes from the environment surrounding them.  Since early stage, they learn that having certain behavior lead into grabbing their parents' attention.  They internalize such behavior as adequate and lately become part of their personality.  So that, even in situations when they do not have the need to behave in such way to have others' attention, they still do.  My students are easily out of task.  Their level of motivation is very low, and when present it is more extrinsic motivation than intrinsic motivation.  They tend to be self-handicap, reducing the amount of effort to succeed, procrastinating task, cheating, and even sometimes using alcohol and drugs.

Moreover, stereotypes coming from race and socioeconomic status make them to have a sense of learned helplessness and low self-determination.  Many time I have observed my students asking to a new student “where did you go for school last year?” when this new students shows mastery in a subject.  Then, their following comment generally is… “Ah, that’s why… In that school they are white and they have money”.  Which lead me to conclude, they think they cannot mastery the subject because of their socioeconomic situation and race.

Therefore, I think that if we, as teacher, take in consideration their cultural and socioeconomic background and embed the subject in meaningful, real-world task, the students will be more engage in the learning process.  For instance, if we use daily personal problems as discussion topics, real problem situation or own real data to be analyzed, etc., it can become more interested for students, enhancing their participation on the task or activities in classroom.  If we use us as example of how academic achieve have help us to have a better life, can open their eyes in the opportunities they have.

One interesting example that I could have happen last year when I open myself to them, letting them know a little bit more about me, and my family; where I come from, how I was rise, and how I use my high school grades to have a better opportunity in my life.  It was very interesting for me the changing on the perception that some (few, but at least some) student had about my class, it was not only about me, but also about the Geometry class that I was teaching.  They, in some way felt closer to me because they knew I wasn’t that “weird”, they found things in common.  At the same time I plan the seed on them making them think that they need to learn certain subject, even when they think right now it is not that important, because in the future they may need it perhaps only as prerequisite to do what they want to do, and perhaps because it is the base of their future profession.

Chapter 15

Knowing in advance that I am meeting with Ingrid’s grandmother to discuss about her scores, I will make sure to get information from all teachers’ subject and compare their comments about Ingrid’s strength and weakness with the standardized achievement test results. It will help me to have a better criterion when discussing the scores with Ingrid’s grandmother, particularly in the “struggle” subjects.

I will start the meeting introducing myself following by talk a little bit about general aspect of Ingrid’s personality in class.  Then, I would explain what a standardized achievement test is, telling Ingrid’s grandmother that it is a test that compare Ingrid’s score with the average performance of students at her same grade level.  I would also explain that the purpose of this kind of tests is to help students to improve academically by letting them know how much they have learned in each subject area and for us, as teachers, has the valuable information that could help us to improve our instructional strategies, plus know better the strength and weakness of our students.  After this introduction, I will make sure that Ingrid’s grandmother understands what percentile and stanine means, by telling her that percentile is the percentage of students at Ingrid’s same grade level that score less than or equal to her; and stanine is based on a statistic which an average student scores is 5 with a standard deviation of 2.

I will then go over the each score beginning with Ingrid’s strength subjects ending with her weakness.  I would mention that Ingrid’s has accomplished above average students’ achievements in reading comprehension, science, and social studies; she has accomplished average students’ achievement in math concepts, and that I can notice that she is struggle with spelling and math computation, since her scores reflect achievement below average students’.  Hence, based on standardized achievement test results, we have to concentrate our efforts and work in the spelling and math computation areas, to bring her to the level she needs to be.

Honestly, I will avoid going into the national percentile bands chart, since this information is not as relevant as the percentile and stanine scores, and it can be confusing for Ingrid’s grandmother.

Finally, (1) I would suggest Ingrid’s grandmother to encourage Ingrid to have a word-book at home, so every day she can work a couple of words (definition, how to spell it, and use in a sentence) to help her level with her peers in the spelling area.  (2) I would also highly recommend that any math or spelling homework should be checked by her grandmother, so it can be corrected for any error when needed. (3) If they have access to internet, I would suggest several sites where she could practice either spelling or math computation abilities having the feeling that she is playing more than working in her weakness.  But, if internet is not available, suggest some math workbooks with fun activities that help Ingrid improve her math computational skills.