13.2

There are several responses to a student exhibiting disruptive behavior during a lesson. The first method I would use in this situation is providing a stern look towards the student to communicate that "yes, I am aware you are not paying attention." Ideally this would alert the student that he/she is disrupting the class and they will stop. It also prevents me from coming to a stop in the lesson and disrupting the flow of class. If the student continues the disruptive behavior following the stern look I would engage them with the lesson currently being taught. Asking them a question such as what they thought may have caused this certain event or how they would feel if they were living it. This forces them into attention and puts focus on the lesson. It also creates the opportunity for a discussion amongst the class and doesn't entirely interrupt the flow of class. Now this particular method may not be appropriate for all lessons depending on what is currently being taught. Other methods are moving the student to a seat away from the neighbor they were engaged with, potentially to one not near any other students. I see this is a last ditch effort because it stops class and draws attention to the misbehavior. Still, another method would be to ignore the behavior and speak with the student at the end of class. This action however is not beneficial to the class as a whole that has been disrupted the entire lesson. It runs the risk of no one gaining an understanding for the day, putting them behind.

13.1

The five areas I would focus on to create a learning environment that is conducive to learning are classroom arrangement, the creation of an effective psychological climate, the establishment and maintenance of productive teacher-student relationships, having clear limits established and taking developmental differences into account. To me these are the areas that would get the most attention.

Arranging the classroom so that students are primarily focused on what is being taught at the front of the room will have the optimal effect on learning. Also I feel that the classroom needs to not just be a room with four blank walls. In high school the classes that I felt I focused most in were the ones that had relevant material hanging up. I always enjoyed seeing copies of the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence in my social studies classes. However any class I had where nothing was hung up was incredibly boring from the onset and it was easy to lose interest in what the teacher was saying.

Creating an effective psychological climate is important because I feel students would learn better in an environment that is welcoming and nonthreatening. Creating activities that involve the students as opposed to lecturing all class is ideal. It is important to maintain order and control of the class, but doing so in a tyrannical manner only creates anxiety. This very much ties into having clear limits. In the first few classes establish with the students what routine you want the class to have and explain that a consistent flow class to class will benefit both the students and the teacher in instruction and comprehension. The chapter does an excellent job emphasizing that it is beneficial to an environment conducive to learning if the students have some control in this process.

Maintaining productive teacher-student relationships and taking developmental differences into account, in my opinion, also tie in well together. It is important to be involved in the success of your students and show an interest in their lives (while not muddling the line of friend and authority figure). Once good relationships are formed it becomes easier to get an understanding for one another, thus making it easier to learn when someone needs help or is struggling because of anxiety over school or their social life.

Semester Reflections

Well the semester has finally come to a close. Reading through my previous posts I can say I enjoy what I am taking from this class. Especially after looking through my initial blog post on my expectations for the class. I went in to this class wanting to be better acquainted with technology and the different tools available to be used in the classroom. Prior to the class I had never created a website or used any of the Web 2.0 tools we worked with in class (excluding a very primitive form of Google Docs). This blog right here is the first time I have done anything with any sort of blog.

At the conclusion of this class I feel very confident in my ability to use a variety of web based tools to further enhance learning in the classroom. IBA's, IWB's, wikis, movies and so on will be great ways to keep learning fun and interesting for students. Without this class I would have zero preparation for the challenges the future classroom faces with the growing role of technology.

Teachers who have little experience with technology will face numerous challenges as the years pass. So many things have become easier or replaced thanks to technology. Now, after a semester in TPTE 486, I feel confident that as technology's role in classrooms continues to grow I will be fully prepared to adapt and work with it. I have a feeling that I will often be remembering the lessons learned in this class during my time as a teacher.

Wait, I made a website?

By far the thing we worked on the most throughout the semester was the website. Each one of us created our classroom websites as if we were preparing to spend a year teaching. It was a pretty cool task that incorporated everything we did throughout the semester. The sites themselves have information about ourselves the authors, resources taken from our awesome subject area wikis, our technology projects and some of the artifacts we created using Web 2.0 tools. The websites are almost complete and will be a cool little remnant of the class to use in the future when showing off technology skills while job hunting. It was definitely something that you couldn't completely slack on because it needed constant updates throughout the semester. You've bothered to keep up with this blog for this long, so why not give this whole website thing a look as well? Check it out!

Making Movies

The digital story project was a lot of fun. We chose a topic relevant to our subject matter and using pictures, either our own or those we got off the internet (free of copyright), we created a digital story with iMovie. The iMovie software was really simple to use, especially if you followed the directions from our packet. Once all the pictures were put into the sequence we waited all that was left was adding captions, a title, credits and a soundtrack. Again all of this was pretty easy if you followed the directions and there were plenty of websites provided to get royalty free music.

The topic I chose was our 32nd President, Franklin D. Roosevelt. I'm a big FDR fan and his presidency covers a time really interesting to me so I was excited to do this project. I think that it all turned out well and that I have a solid short movie (about two and a half minutes long) talking about FDR's 12 years in office from the Great Depression through Pearl Harbor and World War II.

I liked this project a lot. It wasn't too hard to do, it was fun, and has plenty of uses in the classroom. Making several of these videos for class presentations or to have as an introduction to topics would not be difficult to accomplish and I think would be fun for the students. Below is the video I made.

Getting Digital with Diagrams

Most of the hands on activity this week in class revolved around the Inspiration software which is used to create digital diagrams and outlines. This software allows you to create a web diagram linking different subtopics and themes to a major topic. The software comes full of pictures that can be used to enhance your digital diagram, as well as a way to add notes to each "bubble" that provides further information on the topic. In the software you can also hyperlink phrases or themes to take the user to a website with further information on the subject. Of course when this is done it is important to make sure the website is reliable. Here is a screenshot of the digital diagram I created on World War II:

This was probably one of my favorite programs that we have used this year. It was simple and easy to use and with a little tinkering, could be spaced to look really good. Each "bubble" only contains a couple words maximum, but the note feature alleviates this. This tool is super useful in my opinion. In a classroom with an interactive whiteboard the digital diagram can be displayed and notes and links within the web can be accessed as the subject is approached. In instances where students have computers with them they can use the diagram as supplement to instruction following along and using the extra information given while studying. Even without the software the screenshot of the image is a successful basic study tool, linking topics and subtopics together. I see a lot of uses that can come out of the Inspiration software. 

Interactive Flip Charts

The majority of class this week was spent working on our flip charts for the Interactive White Board assignment. I find the project extremely useful because many classrooms today have Smartboards or Promethean boards. There is definitely a learning curve trying to figure out how to work the software and get the flip chart to do exactly what you want. I've found that as I have gone along and gotten better with the different aspects of the program I've had to tweak the outline of my flip chart. One thing I don't like is that while ActivInspire can be used on my home laptop, it doesn't seem to cooperate as well as it does in the classroom. This is more likely a problem with my laptop itself as opposed to the software, but it is nonetheless frustrating. Thankfully there have been plenty of hours where the lab is open and can be used. This is probably one of the more fun assignments that we've done in the class and I'm excited to learn more about Promethean and ActivInspire as time goes on to perfect use in the classroom.