Animal School

Animal School (Click on this to watch the video clip)
Once you go to the Raising Small Souls, go to the purple box on this page and watch the video. How would NCLB work in the Animal School? Are there "basic skills/competencies" that are important for all "animals" to master?

Crazy or What?!

Have a look at the following movie clip and ask yourself whether this can be real or not? Seems to me this is about as crazy as it gets.

Useful Websites

Dear Ed Psych Students:

Following are a list of useful websites that you can reference during the second half of this semester and as you begin to develop strategies for effective teaching. There are a few tasks I would like you to do in preparation for this week's classes.

1. Since we are going to be hearing from Decorah School Board members during class on Monday, take a look at the Iowa School Board Association website to get a general idea of the role of school boards with the work of schools and teachers. If you can generate a question or two to ask based on the review of this website, that would be terrific.
2. Compare Madeline Hunter's lesson plan design format with the understanding by design concept. The Madeline Hunter format is what the typical Luther College lesson plan looks like. This webpage gives good descriptions of each section and how the sections connect with the others.
3. Look at the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development website and watch the YouTube clip shown on this page.
4. Take a look at the classroom management link. Do you think this is a good source for thinking about one of the most challenging aspects (classroom discipline) of first year teachers?
   

Classroom Management
Iowa School Board Association
Madeline Hunter Lesson Plan Design
Understanding by Design Resources
Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development

Model Webpage

Check out Decorah 3rd Grade Teacher, Steve Peterson's, Webpage
You will quickly see why it recently won an statewide award for excellence. You should especially check out his students' podcasts of viewing Decorah through the eyes of children. It is a terrific model of how a webpage/blog can be used in multiple ways to enhance communication and learning for his students.

Secretary of Education Margaret Spelling's Speech

Spelling's Speech

Take a look at Secretary of Education Spelling's speech that she delivered about NCLB in January. Do the main points of this speech reflect the main points of our High Stakes School Improvement plan? Does it appear that we would have been in compliance with this legislation and may have even been setting the bar high for other districts to model?

No Child Left Behind Role Play

Government Website for the NCLB Legislation:

The above link is the government website with full description of the NCLB legislation. It is a large site with lots of links but could be your official source to answer any question you might have about this law. Hopefully, we portrayed some of the basics of the legislation with our role play but read for yourself to see what we might not have accomplished very well.

There are many questions that can be raised about the process which we experimented with on Monday night. Included are some that come to mind for me.

1. Would it have been more beneficial to present the guidelines for NCLB for a few class periods and then complete the exercise? Or does this activity provide you with some context and for some motivation to learn more about it? If you spend a few minutes on the website listed above you will quickly learn that it is a long, detailed piece of legislation.
2. Did you make the connections between what we have been talking and reading about in class or should I have been more direct about these connections? Since it is important for all of you to consider learning theory, how students learn best, the relationship or lack of the same between self-esteem and learning, what is meant be "Highly Qualified Teachers" (is this the same as expert teachers?), etc., did this exercise give you the opportunity to see the complexity of all of these concepts in context of a school setting?
3. Did you sense how powerful roles can be even when they are assigned for a one hour activity? Can you begin to imagine what the "role" of schools and teachers can differ for all kinds of different groups? Can you visual what you want your ideal role to be as a teacher and in relationship to your students and families?
4. How would we begin to test your learning for this activity? Would a grading system have changed the dynamic during the activity?
   
5. Is it possible as a teacher to be bias or value free? Can you work well with people who might strongly disagree with you?

I will be interested to see what other questions you have during class tomorrow. I am enjoying reading all of your blogs.