I have been thinking a lot about snowflakes lately, which is strange because I live in California and it is spring. However, my kindergartner is completely fascinated by snowflakes, mostly because each one is unique, like no other in the universe. And not to sound trite, but so are students. Unique. Like no other in the universe. Recently I spoke at a career panel and was asked by a sixth grade girl, “Why do you like teaching?” I stopped and thought about why I liked being a teacher. What did teaching mean to me? As I looked out over the sea of young women sitting there, I knew my answer. I like the puzzle of teaching to the unique. I thrive on figuring out how to make EVERY child learn what is just right for them. I gauge my success as a teacher upon how effectively I succeed at this. I believe that it is this constant need to advocate for every learner that makes this profession so very interesting. Let’s face it–it requires flexibility, creativity and plain old mental Olympics to achieve this in the classroom.
Posts Tagged ‘Reading’
Differentiation: A model lesson
Tuesday, May 4th, 2010
The iPad is here…now what?
Monday, April 5th, 2010
- Image via CrunchBase
Greetings, devoted blog followers! On behalf of all of us at Edstrom Educational Consulting, I would like to wish you a Happy Spring! It has been awhile since I wrote a blog…did you miss us? This Principal Consultant had her wing clipped six weeks ago when she broke her arm snowboarding and subsequently had surgery. However, now castless, we will resume our oh-so-interesting (and dare I say, controversial) discussion of the iPad and its uses in the classroom.
Ready to Read III: So if not an iPad…
Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010
- Image via Wikipedia
After the launch of the infamous and much heralded iPad last week, I set to my humble blog in order to comment on some reasons I felt that the current functionality of the iPad was not compelling enough for widespread educational use at this moment. I discovered quickly that there are two highly outspoken groups…those that firmly believe that the iPad is a waste of time and those that believe that it is the answer to a lone educator’s prayers (if only it could do parent-teacher conferences). Thank you to all that chose to enter the discussion and weigh in on this exciting topic. I was delighted to find such passionate educators on both sides of the iPad divide…if only we could get this excited about differentiated instruction and communicating with parents, perhaps we wouldn’t need large, unwieldy government standardized testing programs (you know who you are, Nickleby!)
iPad in the Classroom
Wednesday, January 27th, 2010
- Image by Getty Images via Daylife
So unless you live under a rock, you will know that Apple launched its much trumpeted new tablet product, the iPad. Almost immediately Twitter, Facebook and the blogsphere lit up with discussions about how this will change the face of education and publishing. So as not to appear behind the curve, I will add my $.02 about the product, but more importantly discuss how I believe it will (or will not) impact the classroom. I will resume our “Ready to Read” series on a day not so fraught with technological breakthroughs.
Ready to Read II: Making Connections
Friday, January 22nd, 2010Over the past few blogs, we have been examining what makes a reader passionate and have been compiling lists of the books we love and adore. Part of what makes us passionate about reading is our ability to connect to what we read. In fact, in their work, Strategies That Work: Teaching Comprehension to Enhance Understanding, Stephanie Harvey and Anne Goudvis address this very topic. They explain that our context, what we have experienced, know, feel and understand plays a powerful role on how and what we learn. Across the board we find that those that are strong readers will both consciously and unconsciously relate what they are reading to their personal context and will use it to help them comprehend what they are reading. This experience of making connections with the text helps to enrich the quality and depth of comprehension. Likewise, most reading teachers know that struggling readers will plow through their reading assignments without stopping to make the critical connections to their own background and therefore they lose out on comprehension. As teachers, we must examine how we can teach students to connect to the text. A more in depth examination of schema theory can be found at this website.