No Child Left Behind & Assessment Presentation

This presentation was full of fun activities and opportunities to show our knowledge and thoughts about a variety of educational issues. The activities - board games, skits, and Glee think-alouds - were motivating and thoughtful.  Thinking about the issues that are implicated in the No Child Left Behind Act brings up many discussion topics - the topics of bilingual students and students who move into a class during their school careers really don't seem to have "official" answers or methods of solving problems in the classroom.

Working through alternative assessment techniques and strategies was a really great activity. It was good to work both with an individual student, where assessment can be tailored specifically to that student's needs, and with a full class environment, where instructors must find an total assessment technique that meets the needs of all of the students in the class.

Technology Presentation

This presentation was very interesting. I really liked the 3 different scenarios that the group set up. I am still somewhat of a Luddite (at least in relation to my peers), so talking about the common trends in technology in education was useful for me.  I am by no means against technology - I just don't see myself as a pioneer of new incoming technological tools. The most troubling of the three scenarios for me was probably the one dealing with what we would do if we had infinite resources - I honestly have no clue! I don't want to bite off more technology than I can chew.  I think that the idea that we raised that was most useful was the use of seminars and observations to see the best practices that technologically-savvy teachers are using.

Motivation Presentation

This presentation was incredibly helpful. Motivation is one of the most important topics that we can focus on as future educators. Contrary to opinions we may have seen at one point, there is no such thing as a too-motivated student. There are some great resources pointed out in this class at the resource station, from the character cards to the BBC History games (!)

The scenario stations were also really helpful. The "nightmare students" seemed like for the most part, they were either bored or were having trouble following the content. Fortunately, these nightmares can be brought to a swift end by the resources and creativity we have available!
Another thing that was really interesting in the presentation and the paper this group made is the focus on our newly-learned philosophies. I really enjoyed learning about how existentialist theories applied to student motivation.

I also really liked the "true/false" intro. That is a great way to fully gauge class opinions on different topics, and gets us moving. It's really interesting to see different opinions. It was also interesting to see the class's response when I took an opposite opinion to them.
The textbook resource section was a good opportunity for me to remember that my own interest in Shakespeare is almost necessarily different from the average interest in Shakespeare. In addition to hearing some interesting perspectives on how to teach math with more interesting sources, I learned how to teach Shakespeare with more interesting sources.

Discipline Presentation

I really enjoyed this presentation. It was interesting to learn about the different disciplinary styles that can be found in my classroom. There was certainly a good activity when each group was given a disciplinary situation to deal with. I was in the group that was generally less authoritarian, and it was interesting to me when the class disagreed with the preferred method of dealing with the situation (gambling in school).
The resources that we were provided with were also fascinating artifacts. I definitely learned a lot about the ways that disciplinary issues have been treated in the past. I feel that discipline in the classroom is a very personal issue, to a certain degree. In one regard, the school has its own policies that come down from the top, but with a lot of small classroom issues, I feel it's best to let the disciplinary technique match the general tone of the classroom. This should be very deliberately thought out.