The third design principle (the knowledge principal) talks
about using tools not just how the manual says we should, but experiencing them
first-hand in the context they are meant for. I particularly like the last
chunk of the quote – “analyze content for generalizable knowledge.” This is
what we did when we created our Kahoots and what we should be doing as we do
all of our readings. I am still working through Mind in Society and I have no idea who the researchers are or who
came up with which conclusion. But do I really need to? I hope not or else I’m
in trouble.
I keep trying to force myself to think of things in terms of
my classrooms. Personally, I don’t really care if my students can sight-read
the music I give them. I don’t care if they write the note names in, or label
the notes with which fingers should be pressed down. I want them to play the
right stuff at the right time so that we create music. VA says I have to care
if they can read their clef, so of course I make sure that’s a part of what we
learn.
When I took out my articles to think about what I wanted to
write for this blog, I came across the Discriminatory Design article we
received on our way out of class. I read this and again compared it to my
classroom, and had a massive duh moment. I put students in chairs in rows, and
then get upset when they drop all seven parts of their clarinet on the floor.
Just sit on the damn floor in a circle! It’s such a simple concept – make
things easy for students (and for me). Maybe I should consider a career in woolly-horse-clubbing.
Unrelated, I had been struggling to grasp the concept of the
open-ended lesson designs. Some of our readings say “make the final outcome
anything the students want!” and then the next paragraph say “make a clear
product.” The AeCTS design article described it in a very helpful way. Make
clear requirements that need to be included, but don’t specifically tell
students exactly what to create. Another duh moment; I’m just getting too
focused on individual sentences when reading these articles.
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ReplyDeleteVery well said - I too get lost at times looking at the trees and not seeing the whole forest. This course, so far, really is about mindset and examining our approach to teaching, no matter what subject, not just thinking what content do I need to teach but the whole experience and culture involved.
ReplyDeleteHow Playing an Instrument Benefits Your Brain:
ReplyDeletehttps://youtu.be/R0JKCYZ8hng
Hi Stacey! I like your honesty and can appreciate it that it's all a learning process. Priscilla said in class that if we get all of these ideas instantly, then there would be no need for 10 classes. That really resonated with me. I also like that you're a fellow music teacher! I have really tried to incorporate music theory knowledge within learning the music itself. I teach elementary music and it sounds like you're middle school... so my curriculum is different in that there is singing and instrument playing but not band, per se. I'm still finding it a challenge to not do dry worksheets of note names, etc... so I look forward to more posts from you to inspire my ideas.
ReplyDeleteStacey,
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you brought up the article on Discriminatory Design. For me that article was really interesting, and I was hoping we'd get to it in class. As we learn to harness technological tools for our students' benefit, I think a lot about the challenges that go along with that. I've experienced them firsthand: how do we make our classrooms 21st century learning environments and still accommodate the needs of all of our students? For example, over my last several years as a classroom teacher, I had endeavored to make my classroom paperless. I got close. My school subscribed to a service called Schoology (like Facebook for school) and Google Apps for Education. These platforms allowed me to post assignments, comments, notes, slides, etc. and for students to upload, comment, ask questions, and engage classmates in discussion. In a military community life can be transient, though. Students would move in and out mid year, and sometimes they'd go months without internet access while their family moved into a new house and got settled. Sometimes kids just didn't have computers at home. So we walk a fine line. What's the best setup to expose kids to a high-tech classroom, while being cognizant of the difficulties of kids who don't have access to all of these tools at home? Are rows the best arrangement for desks? I'm not sure what the answer is, but I'm glad that we are considering these things when putting together our designs for learning experiences.
Stacey, the points that you make are validated by many of us. What we are learning in class and putting into practice as teachers to design lessons is new to us, similar to what our students experience. Like them, we need time to think critically about it, discuss it with others (both in class and through our blogs), have multiple opportunities to use tools within the context of the activity (I love the activities that we do in class together), and have Priscilla to model, coach, then fade as we make our own sense of it all. The readings and information to digest from the knowledge principle and last week's learning principle were complex and challenging to say the least.
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