MEd Program Diigo Group

Week 8: This book is the updated version Autodesk Inventor 2015. In chapter 3: Creating and Editing Sketched features, helps explain how to edit sketches that have already been made. I know my students are always having issues with this and end up creating a lot of extra sketches that are not needed and make the sketch messy. Reading this will help reduce the amount of unnecessary sketches and could help improve the efficiency of how a part is made.

I like to use this dictionary and the dictionary of "student-friendly" definitions. Never think that you have to reinvent the wheel Merriam-Webster already did for you. Look for links to the English-Language Learners Dictionary and the Kids' Dictionary in the m-w.com standard entries for "student-friendly" definitions.

This is a great online dictionary that is free and has an audio function that will say words for struggling students.

These segments get to the heart of the conceptual misunderstanding that teachers encounter when attempting to teach simple circuits. It demonstrates some instructional alternatives teachers can use.

This is an excellent design for a student-centered inquiry activity. I'd like to revise my introduction to circuits next year to work more like this.

How to make it easier for your students to write Expository Essays. Using a chunking method, including a step between brainstorming and writing called Piling, students are able to build up to writing Expository Essays. Kristine and Danica

Week 7: This book maybe outdated for some versions of Inventor, however, Chapter 2: Sketching, Constraining, and Dimensioning, is a great read for students and teachers that are having issues with the different geometric constraints. It shows all the symbols, with descriptions of what they are, for the constrains and how to use them. It can also give teachers a better understanding on how to teach the different constraints.

This article by Sunday Cummins focuses on teaching students how to self-monitor while reading difficult texts. It suggests teaching students the coding method to help them learn how to self-monitor. Using meaningful symbols to mark up a text students learn how to evaluate what they understand and what they still need to comprehend as well how to go about achieving that deeper comprehension. (Week 7)

This article addresses aspects of my groups exploration of student reading level ability and achievement on state tests on critical reading. In this article, the author suggests the implementation of a coding method while reading in order to teach students how to self-inform their reading in order to improve upon the student's ability to conduct close readings of informational text. This is just the sort of strategy that could assist IEP and ESOL students (2 subset groups of struggling readers) to improve the learning gap when it comes to reading for meaning.

Week 7

Week 8 - Virgil

This article makes a very good argument for incorporating e-mail into the classroom to improve student writing. The author explains how students are often bored with traditional writing assignments and editing/revising sessions using Microsoft Word (even though this is technology, it is less interactive). The author explains how having a second party on the other end of the email who will be reading their work encourages students to carefully proofread and make edits/revisions as necessary on their own before sending the e-mails. Students were also more interesting in the authentic writing tasks that e-mail communication allowed (such as writing to professionals in their fields of study/interest and receiving real responses). The author gives a plethora of ideas for utilizing e-mail to improve student writing in various content classes, including Language Arts, Math, Foreign Language, and Social Studies. Kristine and I found this article and are hoping to work in this strategy/component into our Data Action Plan (although we previously did not list it as a strategy to help with our SMART goals). WEEK 7

This article outlines why everyone needs to give Common Core a chance. The author points out that Americans have one of the best education system when it comes to ideas, but we have trouble following the plans out. Students really learn best not from drill and practice but by applying the information to real world problems. That knowing the procedure to working a long division problem isn't the same as the application of long division. By teaching problems with a real world concept the math becomes more concrete.

WEEK 8 - (Chris Baugher, Patricia Bankis and A. Burns) Assessment is the key to good instruction. It shows us what students know and allows us to adjust our instruction. Assessment is tied to learning goals and standards, but students must own the assessment process as well, as they must be able to articulate what and how they are being assessed -- and its value.

This article provides five useful strategies to help students improve and to improve assessments. There are two key factors in this article which ring true for me. The first is "formative assessment and feedback along the way" (Miller 2015) where students are given specific feedback on their assessment on how to improve and continue forward (Miller 2015). "Formative assessment allowed students to experiment and, yes, sometimes fail. However, they were given the tools, both through feedback and instruction, to improve and move forward to success." (Miller 2015). What this entails if differentiated instruction; something my district and school are pushing for. The second is "student ownership of assessment process" (Miller 2015). Giving students choice, options, and freedom allows students to take ownership and responsibility for doing something all while doing their best on it. In addition, students will know more about what is being asked of them or what they're supposed to do in order to earn a higher grade or preform the task more effectively. "These methods mean that assessment is no longer done to students, but with them, putting the focus on the student and learning" (Miller 2015). Hopefully with these implementations and integration, students can feel the focus from assessment scores to learning content and gaining understanding.

This article is useful when considering big picture assessment objectives. In my own experiences, I have touched upon each of these strategies when conducting an assessment, but I've never built each of them into one assessment. The (5) strategies mentioned in this article include: Aligning Essential questions at the beginning of a unit to standars, building in written assessment components for students to describe/explain in writing, creating performance and project-based assessments to demonstrate understanding and application of concepts taught, regular and on-going formative assessments and feeback to help teachers to better tailor instruction to meet each learner's needs, and involving students in the decision-making process when choosing activities and when determining diagnostic measurement tools. As a World Language teacher, I think that these tasks which are challenging in themselves to build into curriculum, become extremely difficult in the L2 setting. I'm wondering how L2 instructors find themselves doing each of these things on a regular basis. Do they conduct all of it in L2, as it is suggested that L2 teachers do, or does some of this end up being done in English?

This is a blog post by Stephen Downes in which he provides a succinct counterargument to Daniel Willingham's thesis that learning styles do not exist. This post and the link to the source with additional reader comments could serve as a reading selection for a PLC.

This 8-day multimedia unit explores the fundamentals of electrical circuits in a highly interactive format for the beginning learner. Folder " Shared Folders " Alexandra Grizinski " Member Directory "

Nuffield Foundation " Practical Physics " > Electric circuits and fields " Simple electric circuits. Practical activities designed for use in the classroom with 11- to 19-year-olds. Have also developed resources and approaches that underpin effective educational practice. These are freely available via our teachers page.

Tests show that pre-service teachers have unscientific ideas about "source of stationary current", "The concept of current, energy and potential differences are used one another by mistaken", "current usage" and "sequential reasoning".

Build your own series and parallel circuits and measure voltages and currents with the brilliant Circuit Builder interactive. Offers voice and text instructions.

("Week 7" Group members : Ruchel and Beth) This website has strategies for teaching the alphabet aside from the common "letter of the week" style. This website can be used as a resource for alphabet related assessments in the Pre-k and Kindergarten classroom.

You know those paper fortune tellers?  They were *the* rage when I was a kid.  I loved them!  And it is time to introduce my kiddos to the joy of Cootie catchers – while reviewing math lessons. We made two paper games, one to review fractions and another to review times tables. . Want to learn …

"The results of the research provide a different picture of student learning and different strategies for teaching physics. The recommendations are aimed at changes required for improvement in student performance in physics and science in general. "