Accommodating Student Variability (week 6)

*Chapter Summary*

In this chapter we studied different ways of accommodating student variability. We covered the “Individuals with Disabilities Education Act” (IDEA) and its impact on students with mental retardation, learning disabilities, social and emotional disturbances and students who are gifted and talented.


IDEA includes that all individuals, regardless of their disabilities, have access to a free and appropriate education, the receive placement evaluation before being placed into a special education environment, every child that is considered to have a disability will have an individualized education program that describes the program in place to meet the student’s special needs, and that the student be allowed to work in an environment that is the least restrictive environment that their disability allows for. The practice of mainstreaming involves having as many disabled students in a regular classroom with other non-disabled students as possible, providing them with access to the same education while being able to meet their unique needs, regardless of the disability. Mainstreaming is the goal of IDEA.


The chapter goes into detail about teaching student with mental retardation and how to recognize characteristics and ways to encourage self esteem, offer learning tasks that can be completed in short periods of time to obtain their attention, use small steps to obtain immediate feedback, teach memory improving techniques and use simple grading and recording techniques to show the students that they are making progress by completing things regularly and on time.

The book also goes into teaching students with learning disabilities. It offers tips in identifying students with LD and the issues presented when they attempt to contemplate basic psychological processes. The text offers numerous suggestions in teaching students with LD including emphasis on differences between similar letters and numbers, working in a clear work space to avoid distractions, memory improvement techniques, forming plans based on the student’s ability and learning patterns, and giving brief assignments. It also suggests that building self esteem of students with learning disabilities by allowing them to tutor other classmates in areas in which they excel, using cooperative learning techniques, using a variety of methods to present the material to the class, which allows the students to understand in a more visually detailed way, and allowing the students to demonstrate what they have learned in giving oral presentations and hands on activities.


In the section of the chapter that tells about instructing students with emotional disturbances, we are given possible characteristics of students with ED. The book then offers suggestions for instructing these students more successfully, like designing your classroom to encourage social interaction and cooperation and to reduce the probability of disruptive behavior, prompting and reinforcing appropriate social interactions, training the other students in the class to initiate social interaction, and when necessary, punishing inappropriate behavior.


Discussing gifted and talented programs in school is when my personal experience comes into play. When I was in elementary and junior high school, I was in the gifted and talented education program (GATE). Once a week, my mom would have to drive me across town to another school and I would spend half the day there, then be bussed back to my school in the afternoon. I learned to speak some German, French and even got to dissect a shark and a starfish. I loved the things that I learned, but I hated that I was taken to a strange school, missed my class work at my school and the other kids and I that were in GATE were singled out once we got back to class by the other students for being “too smart” or “lucky.”


I think that GATE is an amazing opportunity for students, but I think that it is disruptive to the normal classroom environment for that student as well as the others. My solution to this is making GATE into a before or after school program. Because only a select few are in these programs, I think that transportation could be provided by the school system if the parents are unable to bring the children. By having this be an extra curricular activity that does not take away from normal class time, I think the GATE students will benefit more from the experience.
The book suggests having the gifted and talented students act as tutors, encourage them to do supplementary reading and writing and encourage individualized study projects or learning contracts.


In this blog posting, when I am referring to “the book” or the chapter, or even the text, I am writing about the following book. Because I have used so much of the information provided in the book for this particular post, I have decided to cite my source. It is a wonderful book, full of educational research and data.


Jack Snowman, Rick McCown, Robert Biehler. (2009). Psychology Applied to Teaching. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Copmany.


*How Do I Benefit?*

By keeping this blog, I am able to have a reference point to look back on and see different suggestions for teaching in my classroom, and techniques that are beneficial for students with learning disabilities, mental retardation and social and emotional disturbances.

*Following the Blog*

As mentioned previously, I am following the blog called “Elbows Knees and Dreams” which is written by an early childhood teacher. Interestingly enough, in the past week she has written about struggling with a student that has some sort of emotional and social disorder. His name is David and she has written previously that he hits and kicks other kids. He struggles expressing himself at times, but then at other times he is an angel. She and the school psychologist along with the principal have decided that after David punched another teacher in the face, it is time for him to be taken out of her classroom. He has been moved to another classroom, but no details yet whether the decision was the right one for David. We’ll see…

*This week in the discussion boards*

I have learned that a lot of my classmates feel the same way about ability grouping. I think this could benefit all of our students knowing that they all have an equal opportunity to a quality education. It offers peace of mine to me as an aspiring teacher.

*Question of the Week*

When looking at ability-grouped classrooms, how do you feel about this issue? Is this a technique that you would use in your "classroom"? Would it be beneficial - why or why not? Are there any parts of ability grouping that could be modified to work in your "classroom"? How?

Ability grouping within the classroom is not something that
I agree with. I think that by segregating the students based on their ability as
determined by their standardized test scores is a bad practice for several
reasons.
#1 – It basically mandates that the teachers that
use this in their classroom have differentiating expectations for their students
based on their perceived abilities.
#2 – The students are
shown that segregation based on abilities is appropriate. This could potentially
discourage those that are struggling in giving them the impression that they
will never be able to succeed to the level of their classmates. For those
students that are not struggling, it gives them the impression that they are in
a sense better than the others.
#3 – It offers little or no
room for mainstreaming education. To me, mainstreaming means teaching all
students the same material at the same time. If a student struggles, it is not
an opportunity to separate them from the remainder of the class, but a cry for
help from the student to you, the teacher.

Ability grouping will not be
used in my classroom. I’m not sure if this is considered “ability grouping” or
not, but the only time I will pair students based on their “ability” is for peer
tutoring. If one student does well in math, and another is struggling, I will
give them the option of working together to understand the concepts presented.
In this case, it allows for all students to have the opportunity to benefit
another student, regardless of their perceived overall ability, disabilities or
socio-economic status.

Diversity: Ready or Not? Here I come...

In this chapter, we learned about socioeconomic diversity, and the way it affects the classroom. While I have to say that I was not very surprised to read about the statistics of minorities to be lower than that off the average white American, I can say that the situation still perplexes me. I understand that different people have different access to education, but I would think that those that have equal access, should have equal grade completion and similar scores on tests and other components of education.

Our question for this week was: How will you become an effective multicultural teacher? What teaching methods will you use to guarantee you are effective with your students? I would be an effective multicultural teacher by incorporating the different cultures from around the world in my classroom. I would incorporate the different ethnic music, traditions and important facts from various cultures throughout the year. To guarantee this was effective, I would have different cultural leaders from our area come in and discuss their heritage. At the end of the "chapter" or particular culture study, I would then test my students to see what they have learned and encourage them to do their own research. Because I plan to teacher Kindergarten, I think it will be a challenge for some students, but I think that it is important that they gain a sense of understanding and respect for other cultures.

I think what I found to be the most shocking in this chapter was the affect that teacher expectancies have on the students. I do not pretend to be blind to the differences in socioeconomic status, or the cultural and ethnic diversities in the world today. I can say that as a teacher, I will do everything in my power to create equal expectations for all that are in my class. As a child, I had what most people would consider to be a rough childhood. Of course, at that age, I felt like that was pretty normal. Looking back, I think that I used my school time to get away from everything that was going on at home. I loved school- so much so that I have decided to become a teacher. I feel like my teachers probably knew what was going on for me at home, and maybe they didn't expect as much out of me. Either way, I proved to them- and to myself- that nothing could stand in my way. I was always at the top of my class.

For this reason and others I do not think that expectations should vary from student to student. I think that rather than expecting less from students, teachers should create their lessons and learning environment in a way that can benefit all students, so long as they choose to be an active participant in class.

I have to say that I was most shocked this week to learn that a lot of my classmates want to change assignments or alter the expectations on assignments for students that, as our prompt suggested, lived in a shelter. I think that this surprised me because we just read the chapter that explains the impact of altering expectations for individual students based on their race, gender or socioeconomic status. I wrote that I would make allowances for all of the supplies and information needed for this assignment in my classroom, and make sure that all of my students were provided an equal opportunity. I am curious to see how our instructor responds to those that want to change the assignment for those students. We'll see!

https://mail.otc.edu/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://elbowskneesdreams.teacherlingo.com/default.aspx

The blog I have chosen to follow is called "Elbows Knees and Dreams" and it is written by a woman that is teaching preschool. I have only read a few entries, but this is a perfect real -life blog. She writes about lessons, books and arguments within her class. She has little boys that punch their classmates for no reasons, struggles with students that have a very limited English vocabulary, and somehow still manages to impress her senior teachers with her lesson plans and the reading time in her classroom. It is very humerus- and only makes me that much more excited to have my on classroom someday!

I think that by keeping my own blog, and following ones like this one, I will have a better opportunity to reflect on my own thought processes and gain insight into the "real" classrooms. I am becoming more and more eager to have my own classroom. I know it will be a lot of work and I will probably make those mom's on the Suave hair commercials look like heaven. (I am referring to those that look like they have been hit by a ton of bricks- you know, the hair commercials that say "Is motherhood messing with your hair?")

There will be days that I would rather pull my own hair out then face a
classroom with screamers and biters... but there will also be days that I
actually reach students. I will have the opportunity to impact so many little
lives. I can not wait! In keeping this blog and reading others, I have learned
various methods of successful "teaching." I think that this blog has helped me
to come up with ideas that are impertinent to the educational and cultural values of
the students in my class. It has also helped me to be more open minded in ways
to approach a lesson.

In this chapter we have learned about the learning styles of students and about the accuracy of intelligence and aptitude tests. I was surprised to see that all of the research that has proven that these test are not entirely accurate, and in fact only measure a students scholarly aptitude and learning styles correctly some of the time, that these test are still being used in schools.

When I was in school I hated to take the aptitude tests. I was an excellent student, but I'm not a great test taker. One test that I really enjoyed was the ones to take at the end of the year that supposedly predicted what field you would work in or be best in. I find it funny to think about about the results. They were always so wide-spread. I do remember that most of them said I had the best scores in the English category and most predicted that I would be best as a writer. Interestingly enough, I plan to become a Children's book writer after I obtain my teaching degree. This blog will help me to look back and remember my feelings on teaching techniques, and testing specifically as I gradually come into my own practices as a teacher.

In the discussion boards, I liked one student's post to 4.1 in particular. She elaborated on differentiated instruction. Providing a variety of instruction to help the students in class distinguish what the learning style they identify best with is a great practice that I think should be incorporated into every classroom.

Again this week we are working with partners. I have been very happy with my partner two weeks running and enjoy benefiting from their feedback on the assignment as well. I think that our DB post for teaching science to fifth graders has been the best assignment so far. I love to think about making lesson plans and developing teaching techniques to help to provide differentiated instruction to my students.

My classroom will be a safe environment, full of learning opportunities for my students. I plan to have different "labs" set up around the room. The students will rotate through the labs as we study each topic. As I plan to teach kindergarten, I hope to have labs that tap into the creativeness of the students. Hands on learning will be big in my classroom too.

I hope to have the kids cubbys in the back of the classroom. I will have the students at tables in the middle of the classroom and the different lab tables in the corners of the classroom. As I have previously stated, I hope to have a computer lab next to my desk so that I am able to help the students with any questions they may have.

Learning about the different learning styles and theories on students have helped to prepare me to teach. As excited as I am to being my career, one thing that I feel like I need to learn more about is the typical curriculum for each grade. I also hope to learn to speak Spanish, as I plan to teach in Northwest Arkansas and there is a large Hispanic population there.

Chapter Three - Age Groups

In this chapter, we have covered some of the different characteristics of different age groups. I was very impressed with the amount of detail put into each development stage for each age group. I was also surprised to see some of the different characteristics of the older age groups, like the depression statistics among females in the high school age group. I was also surprised that the text says that the girls in middle school that mature later, are more likely to be popular and "care-free."

My experiences in life thus far have indicated to me that girls that develop earlier are generally more popular, or at least they were when I was in school. Most of the other characteristics listed in the book coincide with my perceptions of development thus far.

Working in groups this week in the discussion board, I have been able to learn a lot about my partner. She and I are both taking 6 online classes this semester, and were both dreading this project until we realized how efficient the other was. I think this is actually my favorite assignment so far this semester. I find it interesting to hear about the ways others read and interpret the information we learn weekly. This assignment has allowed me to do that on a more personal basis.

Through this week's discussion boards, I was also able to find some very interesting websites to aid in bringing technology into the classroom. Another recommendation I found to be interesting, was the sit that our instructor posted, which had details that involved using a wii remote for educational purposes. A lot of my classmates put some great effort into their replies about technology, and I think that those have given the rest of us some great ideas for our own classroom.

Keeping this blog will allow me to focus on the material that I learned each particular week, and to look back and see what I learned and what perceptions that I originally had that have changed as a result of this course.

I plan to teach kindergarten. The age-level characteristics that I have learned in this chapter will enable me to better create my lesson plans for how the students of that age learn. I learned that students of that age do not have fully developed eyes, and that is the reason for the large print in books, and bright primary colors. I found the text helpful in offering suggestions of effective teaching styles for students of that age.

I think that as result of this class, and this chapter, as well as the handbook assignment in particular. This handbook and the information I have learned in this assignment will serve as a helpful reference tool for me when I enter into the teaching field. Because of the research I have done as part of this chapter, I have learned effective teaching techniques, helpful hints for teaching this age group.

Discussion Board

In our discussion board, one student wrote that she will force her students to write papers as a punishment in her English class. The following is the question I posed to her...

It sounds like you have a good idea of what you want to do in your classroom. I do have one question for you though. Aren't you afraid that forcing the students to write a paper for punishment will alter their feelings towards "writing" in the future? My younger brother for instance, was always in trouble for talking in class. His teacher made him write 200 sentences a night if he was in trouble. Did that stop him from talking? Nope. He would have a jolly time at school yapping away and then spend the evening hiding his sentences from mom so he wouldn't get in trouble there.

Today? Well today he HATES to write anything. He is in
pre-Med and has to do a lot of research. He still can not stand to write a paper. In college it is acceptable to type of course, but as far as taking notes or writing a rough draft- forget it!

I on the other hand, never had to write sentences. I also never had to write a paper as punishment. For each of my classes, even online classes, I write notes by hand. (Granted, I learn
better that way.) I love to write and once I get my teaching
degree, I hope to become a children's book author.

Now, maybe we are just completely different, but I can't help but to think back to him having to write all of those sentences in school. Could that be the reason he hates to write today?

She still has not replied to me, but I want to keep this as a reflection for myself - so that I know where I once stood on writing papers. Maybe she has information to tell me that could change my outlook?

Chapter Two - Who do you relate to?

I feel that keeping this blog will help me to reflect back on what I have learned and different ways to incorporate it into my classrooms. It is much like a journal, in that it is a place where I can include my personal experiences with something new that I have learned, and together, develop a new practice.

In this chapter, we learned about different theorists such as Vygotsky, Piaget, and Erikson.

Erikson developed Eight stages of Psychosocial Development. This covers the human lifespan from birth until old age. In each stage, he depicts different characteristics of that particular age group.

Piaget developed his own stages of cognitive development. They consist of the following: Sensorimotor (birth -2 years), Preoperational (2yr - 7yr), Concrete Operational (7yr - 11yr), and Formal Operational (11yr - older). These after different levels of organization and adaptation skills, as learned by age.

While they all have theories in which I can relate to, I found myself leaning more towards Vygotsky. Because I plan to teach early childhood to 4th grade, I plan to incorporate Vygotsky's theories into my classroom.

Vygotsky did not really set up stages, or specification of what and how one should learned based upon their age. Instead, he developed techniques for teaching pre-school aged children, and school aged. For those from birth - pre-K aged children, Vygotsky said they learned through spontaneous concepts. They learn these basic "rules" through interaction and mimicking their playmates, parents and teachers.

One quotes from Vygotsky, which I absolutely love is "Through others we become ourselves." I love that line because it is simply stated, and straight to the point.

I was surprised to see how many students in our class also found themselves identifying to Vygotsky. I liked to read their posts and see how they incorporate what they have learned in this chapter to what they have experienced in life. One student wrote that he sees his 3 year old daughter mimicking his 6 year old daughter everyday! It makes sense. We have all seen children doing this, but until now, I know that I personally have never really stopped to think about it.

I wrote in the DB this week about the country song by Rodney Atkins "Watching You". In the song the little boy, his son, says "I've been watching you, Dad. Ain't that cool? I'm your buckaroo. I want to be like you. Eat all my food, and grow as tall as you are." In these 5 sentences, the "spontaneous concepts" as dubbed by Vygotsky are played out. The little boy watches his dad, and because he loves his dad, and wants to be like him, he repeats everything that he sees Dad do.


Later in the song it says "Then my four-year old said a four letter word. It started with an S and I was concerned." This is another example of our children learning to do what they see us do. While I don't have any children yet, my nephew has done this a time or two. He hears his mommy say this four-letter word under her breath when she spills her coffee on her pants on the way to work, or gets stuck at a red light when she is already running late. To him, this is acceptable. I mean, Mommy says it, right? :)

Vygotsky says that school- aged children learn scientific concepts. These are the psychological tools needed to learn. By learning these techniques, they will be able to apply them to their studies, and life itself. He also dubbed the practice of helping students to learn answers to difficult questions by telling them how to research them, or asking leading questions as scaffolding. In my classroom, scaffolding will be one of the top ways of educating my students. I've had teachers that just answer the question for you, and others that lead your to the answer by showing how to find it. I can promise you that the latter of the two are what has stuck with me throughout life. I even use techniques I learned in junior high to help me today with my college work.

Technology can be applied to Vygotskys theories in two ways. The students can use the computer as a tool in helping them to research the answers to their questions. And by using the computer to link themselves to other learners working towards the same goals. Although at such early grade levels the children will be limited to computer knowledge, I can make that a part of my basic instruction. I will pair the children up and they can have "computer time." In these sessions, the children will learn via the computer programs I have installed for them. I will have the computer area next to my desk so that I can help them if need be. Although my nephew is only 2 1/2, he already uses computer learning disks. If you put their favorite cartoon character on a disk, he will watch it for hours at a time. He doesn't even realize he is learning! Almost immediately, he begins to mimic the computer. This is just one more way to learn those "spontaneous concepts."


The computer in itself is a tool to help you in learning. In collaborating with others that are encouraged to use the same learning techniques as you are, the students are more successful. It's just like having an online study group for instance. This semester, I am taking 18 hours of online courses. Obviously, online classes work better with my schedule, so why wouldn't an online study group? At some point, I plan to ask other classmates of mine to join a study group, whether it is a discussion board or school related chatroom. Being involved with other students trying to reach the same goals as I am not only motivates me to stay involved, but also helps me to succeed.