Learning to blend something new

Pedagogy Wheel. October 2017. https://designingoutcomes.com/assets/PadWheelV4/PadWheel_Poster_V4.pdf

This week we combined our knowledge of classroom led instruction with the innovation of technology to together create a blended style learning classroom. This week was an example of blended learning as we learned more about its importance, what research has said about it and different programs and applications that we can use in our future classrooms. As 21^st century teachers we must be prepared to have an open mind to a new way of teaching that may not have happened in our classroom as we were students, but is very prevalent in today’s classrooms.

As I continue to explore more about blended learning and what it is I feel the most important step for me is to have patience and to be open minded to something new. Resiliency is something I struggle with when it comes to new methods and ways of learning, being able to take a step back from my old way of learning and trying something new. It can be scary to take on new technology and invest so much time and effort into something new, but I can’t forget that with anything there are pro’s and con’s and sometimes taking the chance on change and something new with turn out for the better. Technology won’t always work the way we envision it to but that’s the chance you take for something new. We have to start with this growth mindset to instill in our future students to provide them with the tools that will best suit them and their learning needs to become successful.

Having a blended-learning style environment will also take many hours even days of prep time in order to make count. I think it is very important to collaborate with fellow teachers to exchange lessons, ways of teaching a new method and strategies that work for the different learners in the classroom and the different apps that work. Teaching is a team effort with your students, with fellow teachers and with the education world, so we need to remember to work together.

This week’s articles and online resources continued to educate us on the power technology has in the classroom and in particular the math class. There is no doubt that when kids are interested in what they are learning they will become more willing to try and learn something new, even in mathematics. Incorporating different gizmo’s, math games and online tools that will get students thinking about math is one way to foster engagement. In Lynda Colgan’s article she talks about the power of mathematics play and when we have students engaged in learning activities formally or informal and are designed for children to play they are doing math. They aren’t thinking about the mathematics principles but rather are engaged, exploring new things, interacting and most importantly playing with math. I believe blended learning takes the pressure off of learning math and transfers the attention to the student’s understanding of math the way that best fosters their learning.

As a future educator, I believe it is my responsibility to make mathematics meaningful and create a positive atmosphere for learning math; one that is fun, engaging, innovative, engaging and full of play.  

Filled with Richness

This week in mathematics was filled with rich tasks and how to provide differentiated instruction and strategies in a mathematics classroom via online webinar. Through each week we are learning as educators how to make mathematics a meaning subject and how we instill the belief that all students can be successful in mathematics if we continue to lead with a growth mindset.

via GIPHY

Each and everyone of us and our future students learn differently and we are reminded about then when we start classes with different Minds on activities. This week’s game ‘Which one Doesn’t Belong?’ provides open discussion on a problem and provides students the opportunity for reasoning which in turn helps them to understand better. I reflect back to the table conversation we had in class and between the 6 of us 5 of us had different answers and our reason why we think it doesn’t belong. It was great provides students autonomy and a conversation starter.

The articles from this week’s readings helped us understand background into what mathematical rich tasks are, their importance and how we can get started as educators on creating rich problem solving tasks. I believe it is extremely important to start the school year with knowing your students and getting to know them more and more as the year goes on it will certainly help to target a variety of learners. 

“Rich tasks have a range of characteristics that together offer different opportunities to meet the different needs of learners at different times.” 

-Jennifer Piggott

 

The key take away points that stand out as my ‘ah ha’ moments are:

• ·         Accessibility to ALL learners: We must learn what and how the best way to teach our students are and unsure we are providing them with the opportunities to make mistakes and learn from our mistakes, to be more confident in mathematics and all subject areas.

• ·         Real-life Tasks: Make Math MEANINGFUL! Give the students a reason to want to learn and make it applicable to their lives. When we connect what we are learning and different problem solving questions to experiences in their lives we providing students rich tasks that connects them to the problem, provide reasoning and talk math to one another.

• ·         Multiple Approaches & Representations: In other words Differentiated learning, provide autonomy for students and let them learn the task the way they know best.

• ·         Collaboration and Discussion: have students work with each, it allows them to connect and understand a concept and strengthens their chances at being successful in mathematics.

• ·         Engagement, Curiosity & Creativity: Not all students love math, I for one was not one who did. But when I decided to take on more of an open mindset and learn math in a more meaningful way I was able to enjoy it more. When students can become creative in their learning it strengthens their curiosity levels to learn.  

• ·         Opportunities for Extension:Students learn at different paces and bring forth different knowledge and understandings of different topics. It is important for us as teachers to provide the opportunity to further develop a problem or task to accommodate for all our students.

As future educators it is important for us to learn different strategies to help teach our diverse students who learn in different ways, at different speeds and with different instruction. This week’s webinar was led by Lizzy and myself on differentiated instruction and strategies that can be implemented in the classroom. I felt that in thirty minutes we really couldn’t even touch half of the ways we as teachers can differentiate learning for our students, however we provided our colleagues with some ‘go to strategies’ that our professors have shared with us in our time in Teacher’s College. The most important thing about DI is to know your students and understand their strengths and weakness and how we can challenge them to become better students. I really enjoyed the group of ladies we shared our webinar with, we had great conversation and shared how we saw DI in our placements and how we can really implement them into our classrooms. 

Alex Buckner. October (2017). UDL/Differentiated Instruction