Welcome to Teachers At Risk
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Mar
30
Freedom of speech in the classroom?
Filed Under "At-risk" students, Behaviour Management, motivating students | 1 Comment
“I can talk. I have freedom of speech “, Kyle (not his real name) told me when I asked him to stop interrupting me while I was trying to teach the grade 12 advanced learning strategies class.
Kyle actually thought that freedom of speech meant he could talk any time he wanted to. Talk about mistaken paradigms. I told him his right to freedom of speech didn’t mean he could talk anytime he felt like it. I shared with him the notion that his right to speak stopped short of interferring with the other students’ right to an education. I wonder what his come back will be tomorrow. I’m sure there’ll be one.
Mar
29
Videos can be an effective evaluation tool
Filed Under "At-risk" students, Engaging Assignments and Activities for Students, Evaluation, motivating students | 2 Comments
To tell you the truth, I was a bit apprehensive about just handing over the Utra Flip camcorder and telling my students to create a video without teaching them how to do it first.
Amazingly, not one student had a problem with that, and I wondered why. Then, it dawned on me. Of course! Many of them are already creating mini videos all the time using cell phones. They love filming snippets 0f their lives- think YouTube. Since I’m always looking for ways to engage my students, it makes perfect sense to me to have my students create videos in the classroom to demonstrate their learning. Student created videos are another evaluation tool teachers can use.
I’ve gotten a few pointers about the technical aspects of filming and editing videos from other teachers who actually know what they are doing and when the class reflects upon what well and what could be improved, we’ll discuss these. I’m not evaluating the technical aspects of the video anyway. That wouldn’t be fair to the students.
Mar
27
Lights + camera + action = rich learning experiences
Filed Under "At-risk" students, Engaging Assignments and Activities for Students, Graphic Organizers, Special Education, The Way I See It | 1 Comment
Mathew was right! When I asked him for advice in an email about film making in the classroom, he told me to just take that little Flip Ultra camcorder into the classroom and start shooting. Just do it !!! So I did.
I took my little ultra cool Ultra Flip into the classroom and handed it to my students and told them that I wanted them to create a video about how to do a good presentation. I also told them that creating this video would enable them to practise their problem solving skills since I really didn’t have a clue what to do. I also told them I’d heard about story boards and scripts so they should probably should do those as part of this project too. That was all I told them. The rest was up to them. (I was more than a bit nervous but then I kept telling myself that the force was with me.)
I was really surprised that no asked my why I expected them to create a video when I didn’t know how to do it myself. After all, I was the teacher and supposed to know how to do everything. I guess that’s more my problem than theirs.
I really enjoyed watching the students bring it all together. They demonstrated skills I didn’t know they had, and I had lots of opportunity to catch them doing good. I have to be honest though and say that the experience wasn’t without it’s frustrations. I didn’t enjoy the fact that attendance in the class is a problem for some students so some groups had difficulty getting the filming done. In fact, some still haven’t completed the filming. Grrrrrr! I have to keep reminding myself the reason the kids are in my class is that they need extra support around things like attendance. If they had excellent attendance and work habits and didn’t need extra support, they wouldn’t be in my class to begin with.
I want to share one group’s efforts with you. I think they did a super job- all things considered. They even figured out how to do the editing- that’s next on my list. I told them that my course was not a film making course so I wasn’t expecting everything that a film making course would. (Some of you who know what you are doing when making films are probably shuddering right now. ) I told them that I was expecting to see collaboration, problem solving (lots of problem solving), negotiation, communication and presentation skills. These are some of the skills that they need to help them be successful in and out of the classroom. This assignment was a perfect opportunity to hone these important skills
I’m going to ask the kids to write reflections about this assignment and I’ll share some of those with you. I learned that camera + lights + action = rich learning experiences. I wonder what the kids learned?
Mar
23
Why?
Filed Under Computers In The Classroom, The way I see it | 1 Comment
Last week was March Break so I’ve had a break from the class room and from students, but I found myself asking the following question quite a few times over that week: Why do I keep choosing to teach students who need extra support of one form or another, and why do I enjoy it so much even though I find it a constant challenge?
Just before the break, we were asked by admin to identify what we wanted to teach next year. I indicated that I wanted to teach the Advanced Learning Strategies course again and the Locally Developed Math course again. Both of these courses are for kids who need extra support. I actually look forward to finding ways to help kids help themselves be more successful in and out of school, but I don’t know why.
Do you know why you’ve chosen to teach the subject and age group you do? I’d love to hear you reasons and maybe they will help me understand my reasons.
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