Connectivism and Social Learning in Practice

This week's resources talk about social learning theories and how they can relate to the classroom. After reading this week's assignment I realized that I already do a lot of social learning in my classroom. One of the activities mentioned was Webquests. I have had my students complete a few of these of the past year. The students enjoy them and learn quite a bit of information that they might not get from the text book. I have had the students work in groups to complete the Webquests because I feel that there is too much information for them to handle on their own. Another activity that was talked about in Using Technology with classroom instruction that works was the use of blogs. Towards the end of the year I had my students using blogs each week. I would post a math problem each Monday and the students had until Friday to respond to that problem. They had access to each other's blogs and could blog each other about the problem to get help. They then had to tell me how they solved it, as well as respond to at least two other students in any of my classes. This not only gave them access to me and the students in their class but also to other students I teach through out the day. Also towards the end of the year the school set up a Twitter account. It was mostly used for the school to post things that were going on but parents and students could follow us and post things as well. I am looking forward to setting up blogs for my class this year and using them for other subjects as well as setting up a facebook page for my students and parents and a twitter account. I enjoy using these personally and can see the benefits of using them with the students.

Rachael Threadgill

*** here is the link for my voicethread****
http://voicethread.com/share/568075/

Constructionism

The strategies from this week's reading and video support the theory of constructivism and constructionism. Dr. Orey states that constructionism is "a theory of learning that states people learn best when they build an external artifact or something they can share with others" (2009). The first example is Mrs. Omar's project on interest rates and investments. Having her students complete the spreadsheet allows them to make predictions and the investigate what the results are. This allows students to do what Dr. Orey suggests in that they are building an artifact that to learn from. Another example that also is an example of constuctionism is Mario's travels around the world. This is another project that allows the students to research and build an artifact to share. Any project based or experiment that allows the students a chane to learn from building or creating something is a good example of constructionism.

Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer). (2008). Constructionist and Constructivist Learning Theories [Motion picture]. Bridging learning theory, instruction, and technology . Baltimore : Orey

Cognitivism in Practice

In my classroom I use graphic organizers for many different subjects. Being responsible for all the major subjects for three different grade levels can be overwhelming at times so the use of graphic organizers really helps me. In this week's reading Pitler et al. gave examples of how to use graphic organizers and other technologies to enhance student's understanding. In the past I have always created the graphic organizers my students would use and had them complete it by hand, however after this week's reading I now see how to use something as simple as Word would enhance my students' learning. Having the students create and complete an organizer for pre-selected questions would allow them the opportunity to have some control over the information that is presented.

The section on summarizing and note taking really got my attention. I do many of these types of activities with my students however, I have never used the technologies they presented to do this. In the past I have used foldables to help my students organize the information presented to them. I started by completely creating the foldable down to the questions so all the students had to do was answer them. Further into the school year I began to have the students develop their own foldable for the information and gather what they thought was important. What I began to notice was that the students were just writing verbatim from the book. They did not really know how to take notes. After this week's reading I now have ideas on how to teach the students how to take notes. Using the track changes and auto summarizing parts of Word really grabbed my attention. This coming year I will start with teaching the students how to use these functions of word and other programs so that they will learn how to take their own notes.

All of the concepts presented in this week's reading relate to Orey's description of cognitive learning. Each of these concepts allows the students to move the information from short term to long term memory. It allows them different ways to store the information so that they can recall it at a later time.

References

Laureate Education, Inc. (Producer). (2008). Cognitive learning theories [Motion picture]. Bridging learning theory, instruction, and technology . Baltimore : Orey.

Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Instructional Strategies and Behaviorist Theory

All teachers use behaviorism in their classrooms whether it is through instruction or through changing a student's behavior. Dr. Orey states that behaviorism is focused on operant conditioning which as two components; reinforcement and punishment. The first, reinforcement, can be done through effort. Pitler, Hubbell, Kuhn, and Malenoski state that "the instructional strategy of reinforcing effort enhances students' understanding of their relationship between effort and achievement by addressing their attitudes and beliefs about learning" (2007). The first strategy that was discussed was a spreadsheet that students used to correlate their effort on a particular assignment. I can really see the benefit of using an assignment like this with my students. It gives them immediate feedback on how well they are doing and lets them see the correlation between effort and grades. It also allows them to see the consequences of not putting forth enough effort to reach their goals.

Another strategy discussed this week was through the use of homework and practice. I strongly believe in homework but only as a reinforcement of what we have done in class. I try to never assign my students anything that we haven't already gone over and discussed and I usually try to give them a few minutes at the end of class to get started in case they have any questions. One of the strategies presented this week was with the use of Microsoft Word. I have had my students use Word before but not as a research tool. I can see how that would be beneficial for them to just open up a side window and search what they are looking for. Again it is immediate and gives them the right information they need to continue with the assignment. As I continued to read the next strategy got me thinking about how I could include that in my class. At my school all math students are required to complete a certain number of objectives on a program called Accelerated Math. The teacher assigns the students the objectives and they work at them at their own pace. The objectives are based on what the students are learning in class and the program continuously pulls from other objectives to continue to reinforce those concepts. The problem becomes that the students wait until the last minute to try and get all of their objectives mastered. By having students set up a spreadsheet that had columns for practices, assignments, tests, and mastered objectives the students could plot their effort and see what they need to change in order to master all the objectives required.

I have used the Behaviorist theory on reinforcement and punishment each year in my classroom to curb unwanted behaviors but I never thought of using it to gain motivation and effort in my students where instruction and curriculum was concerned.

References:

Orey, M. (Ed.). (2001). Emerging perspectives on learning, teaching, and technology. Retrieved from http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/

Pitler, H., Hubbell, E., Kuhn, M., & Malenoski, K. (2007). Using technology with classroom instruction that works. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.