Chapter 5 QTC

Chapter 5 (p. 137-149)

You have now read several views about intelligence. What do you think about intelligence?

Is it one trait or many? more heavily influenced by nature or nurture? a fixed capacity or a

modifiable ability? Articulate your views in a paragraph of 6-8 sentences.

I definitely think that intelligence can be more than one thing. As we discussed in class, there many aspects that could identify with intelligence. For example, the activity we did for the TP on Tuesday that had the Multiple Intelligence test. There are many different types. Some people are inclined logically, musically, interpersonally, etc. I think a person's intelligence is influenced by both nature and nurture. I feel like it leans more towards nature. To me, certain things come naturally to people. Like for myself, being social and interacting with others comes natural to me, and I think best interpersonally. Of course things come naturally but those things are learned more and more and you grow in those areas and that is how nurture is also apart of intelligence. I think that with the ability to grow in skilled areas, and in not so skilled areas, it makes intelligence a modifiable ability.

Chapter 4 Article Response

The article I read was called, "Working With Muslim Youths". I found this article to be very interesting. This article taught me many things about the Islamic faith and culture. The article focuses mainly on the conflicts that arise when Muslims are in public school settings. These people have such a hard time in public schools. This article really opened my eyes up to these conflicts and issues I had never really thought of before. Some of the conflicts they talked about were how secular western society is very open to "disrespecting religious values". This can obviously cause a problems for those of the Islamic faith. This is something that really interested me. Another thing the article talked about was how professional providers who may not know about the religion may engender negative outcomes. This worries me. I think that these children deserve the same chance at a schooling as other kids. The last thing that the article touches on is freely exercising their faith. The article notes that the free exercise clause in the Constitution protects students’ rights to freely express their faith. Then it goes on to say that school officials have the constitutional freedom to excuse students from classes for prayer and fasting. But do our schools do this today? That is what I struggle with the most. I think it is important to allow children of not only the Islamic faith, but even of other faiths to be allowed to exercise their religion freely in school. Just a thought.

Chapter 3 QTC

(3.1) Personal and social development can have a major influence on both individual student

learning and the learning environment as a whole. Identify a case from the CSEL guidelines*

that you would like to address in your paper. Then, examine the possible developmental

factors that could be influencing your target student(s) or classroom in the case study. Consider

all dimensions of personal and social development, including cognitive, language, social,

emotional, and moral development.

Elementary Case
You engage your third grade students in cooperative learning activities at least twice a day, changing heterogeneous group members once every four weeks. You have agreed upon routine procedures that your classroom community uses within their small groups, including the roles and responsibilities of group members. Lately you have noticed that one small group always seems to have difficulty grasping material and completing their project in an acceptable manner.  You observe this group carefully and find that Lisa seems to be the catalyst for their problems.  She gets angry with others if she does not get the job she wants and refuses to do her part in contributing to the group’s learning.  She constantly interrupts others in her group.  She does not pay attention when her group prepares for class presentations.

One of the first things I notice is that Lisa is definitely struggling in her social development.She isn't getting along with her peers and this obviously means there is a social problem going on. One thing I can think of would be that she may be acting out in a group to receive attention. She may not be getting attention at home and so she acts out. This ties into emotional problems as well as social. She may also not feel comfortable in a group setting with others and is used to getting her way. I think she may be used to being the one in charge and can't quite handle letting others take the control. I think there are a few ways that I can implement a plan to help her cooperate with her peers better. I think that I would take her aside and talk through what is maybe going on outside of the classroom to try to help the situation get better. If that doesn't work then I will try to work her into a smaller group and take it one step at a time. 

(3.2) Check out tables 3.1 (p. 75), 3.2 (p. 83) and 3.3 (p. 91) with particular attention to the age

ranges you are interested in teaching. Identify your personal favorite ways that an educator can

promote a child’s sense of self, perspective taking, and moral reasoning skills.

The ages I think I will be most likely teaching would be K-2. For Table 3.1 it says that children at this age have "Self-concept largely limited to concrete, easily observable characteristics." It is important to challenge these students to grow their already limited self-concept. It says to encourage students to extend their abilities by tackling challenging tasks they think they can accomplish. This is very important in allowing them to grow and not have such a limited self-concept. I would challenge my students to tackle things that I know are within their reach but may be a little challenging. For example, if I have a student that is always reading a certain series, I may challenge them to step outside the box and encourage them to challenge themselves to read something a bit harder. For Table 3.2 it says, ask questions about thoughts, feelings, and motives during storybook readings;encourage them to share and compare diverse perspectives and inferences. I think that this is vital for children at this age to do. Asking questions allows them to build their comprehension of the material presented and also about their own lives, and the other students. It also allows for the students to understand the different perspectives of their peers. For Table 3.3 is says, Make standards for behavior very clear. This is an integral part of my classroom. If I want respect then there must be rules. I will make sure that my children understand these rules up front. Having rules will help develop the children's moral reasoning skills. They need to know that rules are to be followed and will make the classroom a productive learning environment. Once they begin to understand this, their moral reasoning skills will grow.

Chapter 2 Questions to Consider

Chapter 2

(2.1) One of the most cited theories of human development is that of Swiss biologist Jean

Piaget. After reading about Piaget’s basic assumptions (p. 27-32) look with particular attention

at the stage of child development you would like to teach. The other most cited theory of

human development belongs to Russian developmentalist Lev Vygotsky. Vygotsky’s theory of

cognitive development leads us to expect greater diversity among our same-aged students than

Piaget. Given these two influential theorists’ ideas on cognitive development, how might you

accommodate students who are not yet working at the level of their peers?

According to Piaget my students would most likely be performing at the Concrete operational stage of development. Some basic assumptions of the concrete operational stage are... For the students who are not functioning on this level, it is safe to say that they would either be in the preoperational stage or the formal operational stage. In order to accommodate all of these stages, its important to implement a multi-leveled lesson plan.  This type of plan allows for children who are functioning on different cognitive levels to be able to learn from the lesson.  For example, in a spelling lesson I would give the students a series of letters to make words.  There will be students who can only spell short words but there will also be those students who can make longer words. This type of lesson in geared towards the different stages of cognitive development.  This type of lesson also accounts for Vygotsky's assumption of instructor aided learning. 

(2) Theories in educational psychology promote the idea that language plays a critical role in

cognitive development. Examine Table 2.2 (p. 51), paying particular attention to the age range

that you are interested in teaching. Consider how you might incorporate or adapt the strategies

presented for use with your own students. 

I will be teaching mostly k-2.  I think that having read-alouds are good for building their vocabulary.  Whenever we do read-alouds we would read books that are age-appropriate.  These books use words that they know but also have new words.  I can use these new words to expand on their vocabulary.  Read-alouds also allow the children to work on their attention skills.  This is important for them because it helps them to process what is being read to them and aids in retention of new vocabulary. 

Chapter 10 Questions to Consider

Chapter 10 

Which of the learning activities/skills can you think of that lend themselves to learning through modeling?

I think that any learning activity or skill can have modeling incorporated into it. For my specific case of working with elementary students, there are some specific examples of modeling that can be used. When we are going over our list of new vocabulary words for the week, modeling is necessary. I can put on the board the correct spelling of the word and have the children write it down. I'm modeling the correct way to spell it for them. After everyone has finished writing down the correct spelling of the words, we can practice writing the words over and over. Another example of when modeling is necessary is through reading. It talks about this is the book. If a child is at home and the parent is not modeling reading for them, then when they get to my class they will have a harder time understanding the different aspects of reading. So modeling can even come from the home. If parents are actively modeling reading at home and reading with their children every night, then they will come to class and understand when I do the same modeling for them. I can model reading in my classroom as well. For those students who don't get it at home, I can be the modeling through reading aloud in class everyday maybe.

How might self-efficacy and self-regulation contribute to the intervention plans you use in your case study?

They can plan a huge role. My child who is being disruptive in her group has to have some self-efficacy and some self-regulation to want to succeed otherwise we are wasting our time with trying to teach her. She needs to have that self-regulation and self-efficacy built into her. It is my responsibility to help her throughout the semester to build upon those things. In this situation I need to understand what level of self-efficacy and self-regulation she is at so I can appropriately handle the situation. I need to build up in her some confidence. I think maybe one way to build this would be by maybe putting her in a group where she is most confident. Maybe starting her out in a smaller group could help improve her self-efficacy and again just a strong encouragement from me that she is smart. I think once she feels comfortable and smart she will start to want to succeed and that will build upon her self-regulation. 

Friday Night's Field Trip

Wow Friday night's field trip was a lot of fun. I learned so many awesome things. It was so neat to learn about Barb and her autism. What stood out to me was just the crazy fact that she could speak so eloquently. Her writing ability is outstanding. I guess because she is mute we would just assume that she wouldn't have that much writing capability. I learned that we should never judge a book by it's cover. We just assume that just because they are a mute that they can't speak. We should never assume that. She is a wonderful and smart person just like the rest of us.

Ch. 9 Questions to Consider

How would you define successful mastery of your lesson objectives from a behavioral view of learning?

 For elementary students it is important to learn new words. So I would use a lesson plan on teaching children a new set of vocabulary words each week. A behavioral view of learning is important for learning new vocabulary. Once we begin doing new vocabulary each week they will really start to get in a routine with learning the new words. Their conditioned response (289) would be present every time I put up on the screen a new set of words. They know that they need to write these words down because they will be having new vocabulary for the week. So every week when the new words go up on the board they know exactly what to do because they have been conditioned in it (288). 





Consider your CSEL intervention case study.  Are there tools from a behaviorist view for either encouraging productive behaviors or discouraging undesirable behaviors that you could apply to the case? What are they?

I have the Elementary case study. So for this I would need to talk with the group that is having issues. Specifically I would need to talk with Lisa. I think what would work best for her situation is to present a removal punishment (297). She would most likely be upset if I took 3 minutes off of her recess time. I would need to get across to her that if she does not cooperate in her group that I will take time off of her recess time. Another way to handle this situation could be to use presentation punishment (297). I could tell Lisa that if she can't work on the project in her group, then she will have to do the project alone. I am providing her with a choice. She can either work together with the others or she can do it alone. Hopefully in this situation working alone would act as a stimulus she would find unpleasant. 

Chapter 8

Consider a lesson plan you might use. Which metacognitive skills/abilities are involved as students gain facility/knowledge in this domain?

The lesson plan could be to have my 2nd or 3rd grade class do a reading assignment where we read a book and picked out new words they weren't familiar with and had them talk about the main idea of the story and the main characters. The main metacognitive skill needed for this type of lesson plan is transfer (261). First, the children need to be able to use transfer to use their prior knowledge of how to read to be able to read the story. They would use transfer to read the story and then pick out the words they aren't familiar with. Also they have to use transfer to be able to remember what the main idea of a story means and what main characters are. Hopefully they would be able to use positive transfer to allow them to understand the material. I also think at this younger age that convergent thinking is the main type of thinking, although I would hope for my class we could strive to do more divergent thinking and become more creative. For this lesson plan I could have the children come up with their own stories similar to the story we have just read to try and enhance their creativity and help them to start think more divergent.

Think of an activity or lesson component that explicitly teaches one or more metacognitive and one or more problem solving skills.

For my elementary class, I could have them do an obstacle course. One child directs and gives the instructions and the other is blindfolded and goes through the course. This will teach children how to work with others and how to pay attention and follow directions. They would have needed to understand how to follow directions and how to work well with others before to achieve this. That is using problem solving skills and their transfer.The other metacognitive skill needed could be convergent thinking. The child who is helping the other child get through the course would have to think of the best way to get them to the end. This would mean they would have to think about the many different ways to get to the finish line and pick the best one to get the other student to the end. This is using their convergent thinking to have many options and end on picking the best one needed to achieve the goal.

Chapter 7 Questions to Consider

Describe a constructivist lesson you would teach.

 So if you think about some activities that would help students with what Ormrod identifies as constructivist: theory formation, concept generation, addressing misconceptions, etc.  And then she mentions a few strategies: authentic activities, problem/project-based learning, observation/experimentation, etc.  pp228-236.

 I think the Scaffolding theory would work very well for my elementary class. (232). It even talks about in the book how young kids are always asking the why and how questions. I know from personal experience that when I was young I didn't do well with math and I didn't understand why I had to do it. I think it is really important to instill the why into the children I am teaching because it might motivate them to work harder and want to do the tasks. I could implement this into a lesson in several ways. I think that specifically for a reading lesson I could pick a book that is about maybe cooking something. Then I could do a real world problem with the kids and show them how to make the certain dish that the book is talking about. For example a book about making cookies, I could bring in the ingredients and show the kids how to make the cookies.

Which of these learning activities/skills lend themselves to student’s individual or group construction?  How might you structure learning activities that lead students to discover these skills/these principles?

Still focusing on the scaffolding, I could put the kids into groups and then have them mix up the different ingredients for the cookies. For individual learning, I could give the kids another type of food and have them come back to school the next day with ingredients that go into that food. By doing these types of activities with the students, I think it will help the students discover the importance of these principles  If they are doing something that is fun yet they are learning, then they will be motivated to use them.

Chapter 6 Questions to Consider

What are the essential skills and/or learning outcomes you want your students to know and be able to do that relate to cognitive learning? 

I think that with elementary students and furthermore deaf students, their skills will not be quite as developed as those of say middle or high school. That being said though I do think there are certain essential skills that my kids should have. I think that learning things out in the real world and being able to relate them to the tasks in the classroom are important.(182) I think this especially of deaf students because they come from a different background sometimes. It does depend on the situation at home, but either way, whatever they bring from their background and environment can help with their learning. I also think that storage is very important for kids in my class, especially at the critical age they are.(183) When you are young you are learning so much and it is critical to learn at that age because you can retain so much. I think that if my kids can be storing the information in class, then when they go on  and get older they will be able to use it again, which brings me to another skill I think is essential. I think that retrieval of information already taught is very important.(184) If the student can learn something, retain it, and then refer back to it then I really think that captures the essence of them learning the material fully. They can also relate back to it later on in school which is great too.

How might your knowledge of the memory processes guide your instructional decisions?

I really think that now after reading and listening to the teacher project, that I will incorporate things into my classroom that kids are interested in. I think that is a great way to engage students and keep them interested. I hope that in my classroom that I can appeal to everyone's interests so that my children will all want to participate. Also another important thing about memory processing is that students store some information and use it later, retrieval  and I think that is something I need to incorporate in my class if I am working with students. They need to be taught material in a way that they will remember and be able to retrieve later so I hope that I can teach my students effectively. 

Chapter 15 Questions to Consider

Chapter 15
Turn to p. 559 in Ormrod’s text.  Now, imagine that you are meeting with Ingrid’s grandmother today to explain her scores on the recent standardized achievement test pictured at the bottom of p. 559.  What will you tell her about Ingrid’s performance? her strengths? her weaknesses?
If grandmother asks you what she could be doing at home to help strengthen Ingrid’s skills, what will you suggest?



I would personally probably start off by showing her the actual test and explaining what each thing meant. I would tell her that she scored well above average in Reading Comprehension and Science. She scored almost above average in Social Studies. I would tell her that she scored below average in spelling and math computation, and that she scored average in math concepts. Then we would obviously point out that her major strengths are reading comprehension and science, also she did really well in social studies. She definitely needs to work on her spelling and her math computations. I think that she could set aside time to help Ingrid with her spelling skills. Maybe once or twice a week they could sit down and just practice those spelling skills. You could even make it a fun activity by reading one of her favorite stories and picking out words in the story to spell. For her math computation skills I would suggest going back to the test and looking at the problems and then probably assigning her to a tutor if her grandmother isn't really skilled in the area of math. I had the privilege of having a dad that was a math major so when I was having a difficult time in that subject I had someone to help me. So back to Ingrid, I would probably get her a tutor for math. For spelling, I really think that the grandmother can help with that at home.

Ch 14 all over again :)

I'm going to go ahead and just do Chapter 14 all over.

Four informal and formal assessments that you will use in your lesson plan to provide you with feedback and involve the students in assessing their own learning.

Informal- As I said before I think that with deaf students, informal assessment is a very important part of tracking their education developments. I could just have a discussion time with the students about a novel we read and seeing what certain students would answer. Another way to informally evaluate the deaf students, is hypothetically speaking, say I have a kindergarten class and I have a deaf student that their parents wish for them to learn sign language. So in class when I am helping this child learn, I could informally check their progress by practicing some signing with them.

Formal- Before I mentioned having the students have a paper and pencil test for the 20 words that they have for that week and are tested on those for spelling. I could even change that and have them take a test on the meaning of those 20 words. There are many different combinations. Another formal test I could give would be maybe about a children's novel we read in class and have the students answer questions about the novel such as who is the main character, plot, etc. 

(14.2) Consider norm referenced assessment and criterion referenced assessment. Are there advantages to both? Are their disadvantages?

Norm-referenced assessments to me sometimes can be a good thing but can also be bad. I think it is good to get an idea of where everyone in the class stands but also think it can be embarrassing to put that on display in front of peers. If you go about assessing it in the right way where it won't show attention to the students then I think sometimes it can be good to get an idea of where everyone compares. Also I think that if we broaden it out and look at it from comparing not just peers but maybe that grade level across the nation, it can be good to compare. While it is comparing the peers or grade level across the nation it really isn't showing the scores of how the students actually learned in the subject areas so I think that is another con against norm-referenced assessments.

Criterion-referenced assessments I think are a better fit with elementary students. It is actually scoring what the students have accomplished or not accomplished up to the standards for that subject area. I think this assessment is better because once I know what the students are having trouble with or are good at, I can bring that out in class time and help the students grow, learn, and become better students. 

Chapter 14!

Looking at the diagram on p. 505 in Ormrod’s text.  Write down some ideas for three or four different types of assessment.

For my elementary deaf class

Criterion Referenced Based- Have a series of 20-30 words that the children have for that week and the child spells them out. Then score it by how many words that spelled correct and incorrect.

Paper-pencil- Probably could have many of my tests structured this way. For example I could give the children a test on what they have learned from the specific novel we are reading. This would probably be best for higher elementary grades like 4th, 5th grade.

Informal assessments will definitely be happening a lot in my class. With deaf children it is really important to note the progress of the children to better help them in there learning. An example would be if I called on a student to ask a specific question, I could note how they answered the question and if it was right.

Teacher-developed assessment- This goes along a little with my last answer. It is important to see the progress of deaf students. I think that in the middle of the year and also periodically I can give tests on specific subject areas to make sure everyone is understanding the materials.

Chapter 13 Questions to Consider

The classroom environment that I hope to establish in my class is one of respect. First and most importantly, I feel that respect is key to having a successful classroom learning environment. If I don't show the students with respect throughout the school year then how will I expect them to respect me. "To get respect you must first show it." I think that if I respect the students and they respect me, then we will have a great year. Yes there will still be some trouble makers, but we will address that later. Another thing that I feel is important for a successful learning environment is open communication. As the teacher we have to be open to communicate with our students and let them know that we are there to help them succeed and allow them to feel comfortable communicating with us. I think that preparedness on the teacher's part is also going to play a huge role in the child's learning environment. If the teacher isn't prepared for class then they wont get much work done within class. My main goal is for the children to feel welcome and that they are there to have fun but to also learn. Because I will be working with deaf elementary students, I feel that for a successful learning environment, that I should often break up the students into small groups to work. I think that by doing that they all get a feel for each others methods of learning and can not only learn the material but also can learn about each other and make friendships.

I liked the high school video and how the girls gathered in a circle to talk about their issues. Sometimes girls just get mad but never approach the other girl calmly to discuss the issue, so I think this approach could work well for high school girls. For my specific case of the third grader that is misbehaving, I think I could handle that situation in a couple different ways. I think the first way I could handle it would be by taking the child aside privately and discussing the issues with them. I think that way would be effective because I'm sure something else was possibly going on to make them behave that way. Another way I could handle it would be by giving the student a choice. Like we discussed in class, giving them a choice is always better than just telling them what to do. In the book it mentioned how when working with an adolescent you should try to find a solution that allows the student to maintain credibility with peers (488) so I think that I could try to deal with the situation that way.

Chapter 11 Questions to Consider

How might you enhance motivation and affect in your students using the theories of motivation?

I think I would start off by choosing a couple of the different theories of motivation that I feel like will be most beneficial and the ones I felt that the kids would most respond to in a positive way. I feel that the ones that I choose would definitely be different from someone else's classroom because not only will I teach an elementary class, but I will have deaf students in my class. Those children already have a hard time at being motivated because they are having to deal with being deaf and that hindering them from learning. I feel that because I will be working with deaf children, that self-determination would definitely enhance motivation in those deaf children. I think that self determination is something that you have to build up. You can't just have it. I think that it starts at home and if the kids are getting it at home then at school. I think that the younger the age they start at, the better. I think one way I could help deaf children want to have self-determination is by giving them "guided choices" like we talked about in class. If they feel they have choices it might make them want to perform the task and have self-determination to finish a task.The other theory of motivation that I think is really important for deaf students is relatedness. Deaf children have a hard time feeling accepted as it is so i think that feeling socially connected (relatedness) would help them want to be motivated to do things because they feel so welcome. For example, if I had the students engage in group activities that would really be beneficial.

Which theories of motivation are most helpful and instructive for you?

I believe that self-determination is the most helpful because, to me, it is the basic for motivation. You first have to be determined before you can be motivated to do something. If you have the self-determination to accomplish the task then in turn you will probably be motivated to accomplish the task. For me, I also think that relatedness is helpful. If I were the student in the situation I think that if I were socially accepted with other peers and teachers that I would be motivated to go to school and motivated to finish my work and want to be at school.