Education is like learning a new instrument.

In an early post or discussion I talked about how Students and Teachers are like instruments.  To learn an instrument you either teach yourself or you  learn from a teacher.  In education you can teach yourself new things or you can learn through a teacher.  When you pick up a new instrument you start with the basics.  You start with how to put it together and where to place your fingers to make music, then you begin learning easy music and over the years move on to harder music as you learn and get better.  On the first day of class you look at the objectives and the teacher tells you about the class and what you shall be leaning, you begin with easy math, or an easy book to read and then over the years your work becomes a little harder as you grow as a student.  As a teacher your work for yourself grows a little harder to because you need to be prepared to teach these students something new that may be harder for them. As a teacher you need to be prepared to teach the new material to the way the students need it to be taught.  

You could compare the four different saxophones to the different tiers of school.  There'e elementary school, 

Middle school, High school and then college. The four saxophones are soprano sax, alto sax, tenor sax, and baritone saxophone. A teacher whether a music teacher or art teacher or even math teacher it is all the same to get through the year. You need to know the material you want to teach and you need to learn about your students and the best way they learn.  Being a music teacher you realize it is a very visual learning experience.

When i think about music the best theory that fits in is the cognitivism theory.  This theory is all about leaning through play or doing.  You have to play an instrument and learn how to play if you want to get better.  You have to take home the music and your instrument and practice and maybe even teach yourself.  In school you need to take your homework home and help yourself.  Children learn new material as the go along through the year and take home the homework.  In third grade i believe you start off with the recorder and then move on to picking out you very first instrument in the fourth grade.  Some students stay with the instrument for a very long time and some decide to learn more as they go through their school years.  Just like music a student starts off school with all the subjects but realizes through the years which ones they like the best. 

If you really think about it the recorder could be kindergarten because that's where they open your mind up to music and kindergarten opens up your mind to how school will be like.  You need foundation to begin school and you need a foundation for students to want to look into music.

I really loved the blogs and being able to read everyone's and learn what they researched.  I learned that it may be hard to get the attention of administrators and parents when you need their help.  You need to encourage parents to be a part of their child school career or they could possibly be the big problem of why their child may not do well if they do not support or help their child at home.  I especially learned a lot about each theory there is out there and different ways to teach students.  This class was great and there is truly many ways to teach students and many different theory's you can base your teaching from!!

Has equality for woman and girls gotten better??

Since the olden day's equality for men and woman have definitely grown and gotten better but girls seem like they are still less equal then boys.  My grandmother wasn't allowed to go to school when she was supposed to be in elementary school because she had to stay home and take care of house chores. The society throughout the world has grown as a whole but I read that still today there are girls that are not able to go to school.

"The word gender describes the socially-constructed roles and responsibilities that societies consider appropriate for men and women."  This is so true because when someone talks about a woman we tend to put women and our responsibilities of being a stay at home mom, maid service to the house, and a cook. My fiancé likes to joke to me about how I should stay home and take care of our son and finish my degree, because as a man he would rather not have me work.  I love that I can go to work and attend school. 
My parents pushed me and my sister in school and they may have not always had the money for extra curricular actives they would try really hard to give us what they could.  Girls today are missing out from different school activities or even just school all together because families are worrying about their son's first. According to a peace corps website if a girl was to go to school there is a big chance she will hold off marriage and starting a family.

In school I knew of a girl who had to drop out of high school to help her family.  Her father became very ill and her mother had to pick up two jobs.  Her brother was in the running for a football scholarship so instead of him dropping out she drop out to stay at home and help her mom around the house while she was at work and took of her younger sibling.  She wasn't in the running for a scholarship for college but due to her brother in the running he could have go to school for free, she gave up her education so one of them could still go to college. 
Girls today have a better chance of going to school in the Unites States but in different countries it is harder for the girls to go to school.  The rural poor areas are where girls aren't always allowed to go to school which in the future causes more problems for them.  For a long time it was the governments fault that girls weren't allowed to go to school but now in most places it is due to the parents not allowing their daughters to go to school.  Some parents believe in just homeschooling but in some countries they need their daughters to stay home and take care of the house hold and some just don't want their daughters to be taught by men.  At least these days girls are allowed to get a better education.


http://wws.peacecorps.gov/wws/stories/stories.cfm?psid=2162

Who began the thought behind Kindergarten??

Fredrich Froebel created the concept of Kindergarten.  I chose to do Froebel because lately there has been a lot of kindergarten talk in my family due to my nephew moving on to kindergarten and my son will go in a couple of years.  We were looking at different schools and thought I should research Frobel to find out his philosophy and what his concept was when he began talking about kindergarten. 

Froebel's building blocks also known as his third and fourth gifts.

Froebel was born April 21,1782 and passed away June 21, 1852. He was born in Germany and studied under Pestalozzi. Froebel discovered that brain development for children is most important between the age of birth and three years old.  Froebel did not fully develop the multiple intelligence theory but he was the philosopher that first realized children all learn different. Some of the examples he saw were some learn best by sorting blocks, talking with peers, or through different sensory experiences.  Froebel first called kindergarten "Play and Activity Institute" in 1837 and then changed the name to kindergarten in 1840.  The value of kindergarten is to bring out children's power of observations, judgment, and invention.  Froebel's invention of kindergarten really opened many doors for children.  They could begin school early and learn through play.  By going to a school for their age it could get them ready to switch over from kindergarten to elementary school.
Froebel says that when children play it is not just idle behavior it is the child learning and discovering how things work.  I like how Froebel thought of children planning as a learning process too because children do learn while they play they learn how to use new things.  I bought my son a tool bench this Christmas and while he played with it he learned by himself how to use each tool.

    

                                                                                                         One cool thing I found was that there is a paper star named after Froebel.  It is a three dimensional star, and it resembles what Frobel was trying to encourage for children to learn in kindergarten.. He wanted to encourage students to learn how to fold paper in kindergarten as a means to lean more about mathematics. The picture to the right is a picture of a building set Froebel came up with. the building blocks were his third and fourth gifts.  All together Froebel came up with four gifts for children that were designed to be educational and be able to be used in child's individual free play. Gift set one was a set of six individual, yarn balls. The point of gift set one is to work with form, colors, and movement. Gift set  two was to help with presentation, life (orange, bottle, wheel), knowledge and beauty.  This set contained cubes, cylinders, and spheres.  Gift three and four are different block sets, set three is the divided cube, and set four is rectangular prims and are pictured above.  Gift set five are triangular prisms.  Gift set six are another set of building blocks.  Gift set seven is a set of tablets, Gift set eight are sticks and rings, Gift set nine are small objects that vary in color, and lastly gift set 10 are framework sets. These sets are all for children to learn more by themselves. They get more mature as the children grow older in school.



I really like Froebel's  work and the gifts he made. He came up with a great kindergarten system.  I feel that student's do learn while playing just like Froebel realized.  The gift sets he made are great.  Each one has something different to it to teach the student's.



http://www.froebelgifts.com/method.htm
http://www.slowfamilyonline.com/tag/frederick-froebel/
http://www.froebelweb.org/
http://www.froebelgifts.com/gift10.htm

Should kids learn by doing ??

I myself have always really been into "learning by doing" I feel even I learn better when I do something myself.

I liked how this website explained what cognitivism was because they didn't just say that it is where students learn by doing.  They said "Cognitivism means through interaction and self congnition development to acquire knowledge and concern what the learner knows and how to use the efficiency way to process information." http://simonlin.info/learningtheory/cognitivism.htm 
Jean Piaget, Lev Vygotsky, and Jerome Bruner's were three cognitivists.  Each one had a different way theory on congnitivism.  Jean Piaget had a theory that went through stages: age 0-2 sensor motor, age 2-7 preoperational, and age 7-11 formal operational.  Lev Vygotsky came up with the zone of proximal development. The zone of proximal development demonstrates the need for the guidance and assistance of adults or more- skilled children. Jerome Bruner's came up with the theory of instruction which had four steps: 1) curiosity and uncertainty 2) structure of knowledge, 3) sequencing and 4) motivation.  With all these theories children learn through real life experiences with some help from teachers and parents to help them along.

Ways to incorporate cognitivism into the classroom is to make sure the students are engaged in the learning, ask the students questions, have fill in the blank notes, or quick quiz questions when taking notes. Allowing students to use computers to learn and use educational games will help keep them engaged and still learning.  One website I found was talking about how now a days students need to use technology more because that is what we use everyday.  It talked about allowing students to use Microsoft word to take notes because it could be faster then hand written notes.  I like this idea because it also helps with typing skills but my worry is how will every student be able to get the technology. http://www.slideshare.net/smith_leanne/cognitivism-theory

Cognitivism is the theory that describes how information is processed to turn into learning.  We have more than one memory and it's the way we use them that help us figure out how we learn.  While searching through the web I came across an article that talked about the memory banks and how the information you take in can move through the banks.   There's sensory memory, working memory, and the long term memory. We use these memories everyday.  Everyone has to find out the best way for them to remember information, but if they do something they love it helps them.  For example if you love music or just love to sing, you can come up with a song to remember information for a test.  Over the year many people have realized if what they are doing is something they don't like or think is boring they are not going to listen and engage themselves in the activity.  This is why in class we need to make sure that all students are engaged.  Many students become bored in class and can't learn  or take in the information, cognitively the students are bored.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&frm=1&source=web&cd=2&sqi=2&ved=0CDQQFjAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Fabanksto.myweb.uga.edu%2Fportfolio%2Fbankston_learning.pdf&ei=HaXAUY2PFOTq0AHR5oGwCw&usg=AFQjCNH52quxZxN8ls7fEX47fA4v-nwCnw&sig2=8RVbkwUthw-7yBkLY1k1TA

Is Inclusion working for everyone?

An Inclusive education is where all the students in a school are part of the school community and not broken up into the "normal" mainstream kids and the students with special needs.  This means that students with disabilities need to be into general education classrooms.  By allowing students to be in the same classroom it gives them the feeling of belonging with everyone.  Allowing the students to join general education classroom ensures that the students get a fair education and learn what exactly what other students are learning with help from their aides. Allowing students to join regular classrooms is great, but not everyone thinks so. Inclusion classrooms are mostly for students with IEP's but also include students who need even more help than just an IEP.
There are some issues to having students with disabilities joining general education classrooms.  One reason is some students need extra help from their aides or have a hard time sitting or a while and tend to disrupt class.  I remember a math class in high school where we had a special needs student that would make noises during class and would disrupt class. It didn't bug everyone but it did bug someone people and by the end of the year became an issue when we had to take finals.  The aide the boy had took all his notes and when he couldn't handle sitting anymore she would take him for a walk. 
Students with special needs sometimes need an aide and not every school can get an aide for every child to follow them to their classes.  They also don't get the same support in a regular classroom they could receive in a contained classroom with other students that had disabilities.  In a small classroom the students would be able to receive extra support like reviews, repetition, and instruction at a slower pace. In all classrooms there's some type of competition going on but when a student who already struggles in class competition is even bigger.   Asking questions becomes harder for these students because they are afraid to be jugged.
Is co-teaching for every teacher?  Teachers that have been teaching for many years alone may not be happy with having a second teacher in the room and changing what they do.  New teachers may be able to co-teach better because they haven't had the many years of teaching alone.
I feel that all student should have a fair chance in a regular classroom and that all schools should have inclusion classrooms but at the same time they should have a classroom for special needs students to be able to retreat to.  They should allow for maybe the last class of the day to be where these students go back to this room and talk about their day and are able to ask questions and get help.
Inclusion classrooms may be working and may not be working at the same time.  There isn't an actual answer.  Some students like it and some don't.  There are many things to look to just like the zero tolerance policy we talked about this week, inclusion classrooms may need to be worked on to make it all even better!


http://www.schoolpsychologistfiles.com/2008/11/the-benefits-of-an-inclusion-classroom.html
http://www.slideshare.net/DeeARoss/cons-of-inclusion-education

Do we really need the MCAS, do we really need it to Graduate!?!?

There are pros and cons to MCAS.  Many people say that MCAS is bad and many say it is a good thing, I am in the middle of that group.   Growing up I was stuck with the taking the MCAS and as a student I hated it, but I now believe that it can be a good thing. The MCAS was made to look at schools progress. The school boards can see what schools are doing poor and which ones are doing well. These tests can show which schools need better teachers, more classes for the MCAS, or just new ways of teaching to their students. When I was in school it was like every year they decided to add a new test in, they called my class "the guinea pigs" we had to take the science MCAS to see if it was worth it for them to implement as a test. In 10th grade you need to take the MCAS and pass it to graduate from high school if you don't you have chances to retake it, but it brings down the students who don't pass. 

I found a website that has reviews on the MCAS from teachers who have to teach to the MCAS. They put in their pros and cons and other teachers vote on points they agree with.  Some teachers said it went with the standards they teach and others disagreed with that.   One big con I kept seeing was it does not access higher order thinking, and also that it doesn't help the teachers track where their students are, because learning is gained over time.  One quote from a teacher caught my attention "Further, the test given at the end of 8th grade assesses students on content from 6th, 7th and 8th grades, leaving one teacher responsible for preparing students on 3 years' worth of material, and placing a huge pressure on students to bring a lot of content knowledge to one test."  That is very true it tends to become a lot of information for students to keep in and remember.http://www.assessment-advisor.org/view/111/massachusetts-comprehensive-assessment-system
I remember in school I had teachers that would teach all year to the MCAS and have an MCAS question of the day every single day, and others waited till a couple weeks before to teach us stuff on the MCAS.  They also tried to explain to use the set up of the test and a lot of kids would groan because they didn't like multiple choice and were really bad at them.  I am horrible at essays normally because I never know how to put my thoughts in order and end up writing a story so when it came to the English MCAS I got very anxious before I took it. The MCAS makes kids very nervous and takes up a lot of time. I understand why we have standardized tests but it makes me wonder is there an easier way to do them.
Lastly there is now a graduation problem for students due to the fact that they have to pass the 10th grade MCAS to graduate. I was researching things about the MCAS and found out that 3,000 students were denied diplomas due to the MCAS in 2010.  http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2010/06/08/3000_denied_diplomas_because_of_mcas/
Knowing so many students couldn't graduate is horrible just due to one test when religious schools and private schools don't even have to take the MCAS.  MCAS doesn't even matter to the college or universities they don't look for your MCAS scores they just want to see your SAT's. So why is it students have to be put through so much stress when colleges don't look for the scores?

 

I think we need tests to see where all the schools are at but I think we could tone down the MCAS. 

Why do we decide to become teachers?

"Once children learn how to learn, nothing is going to narrow their mind. The essence of teaching is to make learning contagious, to have one idea spark another." -- Marva Collins
(http://ripplemaker.hubpages.com/hub/50_Inspirational_Quotes_for_Teachers)

Why do we decide to become teachers?

When I first decided I wanted to become a teacher my friends thought I was crazy, but my family thought it was great.  Ever since I was younger I always loved helping people and helping my cousins with homework.  Being a teacher is an important job you set the stepping stones for students to be successful through school and the real world.  Many people may have different reasons to become a teacher.  Some of mine are:
1) Children are young sponges.  I love working with children and helping them learn new things. When they understand something new and you reward them or even just clap with a big smile they get a big smile too and feel so good.
2) I had some teachers that didn't help me at all or didn't do their job at all. I want to turn that around and be the teacher students know will help them and is happy to be there everyday. 
3) Students should be allowed to reach their full potential and open their minds up to different learning techniques.  Growing up I feel I was only taught one way to learn, all about taking notes and just sitting there listening to the teacher.
4) Helping people everyday at my job is a joyful feeling but helping children learn everyday and feel better about themselves in math and science is even better.  Some students really struggle in math and science and sometimes that may be because they needed more help then they could get from their teacher.

Just the many words of wisdom and reasons
to become a great teacher.

5) We need teachers that want to be at school and make the environment safe and fun.  The student should come into the class and feel safe to ask any questions they have but they should also feel good about the subject.  The class shouldn't be boring, just because we may have to teach to a test that the children will be given at the end of the year doesn't mean that learning math has to be so boring.

I found a website that listed reasons to become a teacher:
You can move around, you can move up, you can live your own life, you can challenge yourself, you can give back to the community, you can find your fit, you can have your choice, and you can change someone's life. (http://www.destinationteaching.org/career/why.phtml)
My favorite is the last reason, to change someone's life. Helping a child is great but changing their lives is even better.  You can help them but you can change their life by helping them in the subject they are struggling.  yes becoming a teacher means you have your summers off which is always nice you can get another job over the summer or even just take care of your family.

Another site I found had around the same reasons except for two reasons I really loved.  When you become a teacher you become a lifelong learner and you laugh every day.  Every year you will learn something new no matter if it is on a section of math or science you teach or something you learned from your students.  You lend out your knowledge to students and then you learn as you teach.  Along with learning from your students you will laugh everyday with them too.  I want to make leaning fun and exciting so laughing everyday will be something I look forward to doing.(http://www.unc.edu/uncbest/teacher.html)
One of the biggest reason anyone decides to become a teacher is to make a difference in a students life.  Some students have a great home life but some don't have parents there to help them with school. As teachers we are there to help them learn and to stay longer to help them if they need it. We are there to listen and we are there to encourage them to learn.  Changing someone's outlook on school is rewarding.