Week+1+&+2

Welcome to our Wiki! Thanks! Awesome wiki-making, GO TEAM!

Bre is purple

Hey guys, guess I will start the wiki for this week and last week! Perhaps if we each have our own text color it will be easier to follow? So ill be purple and then just choose a color when you add to the discussion. I think the main point i took out of week one was that in order to be an effective teacher you need to be creative and able to integrate a wide range of topics into the curriculum. I also think that knowing your subject and being able to communicate it in an effective way is also vitally important. What do you think? The week 2 lecture really put into perspective the different types of students as well as teachers we are likely to see in the classroom. I thought the notion of a/b/c/d kids would be helpful in identifying and categorising the children within your classroom. 

 Nice work Bre! I (Chris) will be green.

I agree with what you said in relation to being an effective teacher, being able to integrate a wide range of topics into the curriculum seems to be a key factor in a teacher’s success. I feel the ability to identify what teaching strategies need to be used to correspond with the different learning styles of the children is another way to be effective, because if the children are not engaged with the content your teaching them then they are not going to take too much away from that lesson.

I found the video featuring Sir Ken Robinson extremely interesting, particularly his point regarding creativity. He believes that rather than growing into creativity, we actually grow (or in fact are educated) out of it. As a result many talented, creative people start to believe they’re not because the things they’re talented in are not particularly valued at school, or are actually stigmatized. As prospective teachers, I think we all need to take note of this and encourage kids to take a chance and be creative.

I also believe that the categorisation of the students into four types was the key point in lecture 2 Bre. I think breaking down the children into groups like that will be extremely valuable in distinguishing which kids need to be managed in particular ways. I feel an important page is the one regarding which powers (coercive, legitimate, referent, reward and expert) are most productive with C rated children. This gives us different methods of dealing with those students who are more difficult to manage. What do you guys reckon? 

Ok, I (Lauren) will be blue! I too found the clip of Sir Ken Robinson really beneficial and somewhat inspiring in that it really is important as teachers to foster the learning of children through strategies that are relevant to the needs of the class. It also showed that teaching is more than just the basic literacy and numeracy but also equips students with skills they can use in everyday life. >>>BE CREATIVE!!! (This seems to be the main point we took from the first lecture).

The second lecture discussed the importance of personal & communal responsibility in the classroom to create a safe environment. I found it interesting that approximately half of students learning outcomes are determined by what is going on in the classroom, highlighting the need for good classroom management. We were later drawn to the fact that referent, reward and expert powers have the greatest influence on the behaviour of the four types of students.  

OK, so I guess this makes me red! I have pretty much the same views on the Ken Robinson part, when you think about it we really don't need to teach kids to be creative, we need to allow them to just expand on their own 'creativeness' (ahem, is that a real word?). They have all the imagination and ideas in the world, and that needs to be embraced in the classroom and worked in to whatever lessons are being taught. Also just the basic fact that if something is fun and they are able to engage with it, they will remember more and have an interest in learning about the topic. Also that making mistakes is OK, a good thing even. There is no such thing as a stupid question...actually there is, I ask them all the time, but just to let students know there is absolutely nothing wrong with not knowing something, as long as they try to find out. And generally half the people in the room are really relieved that someone else has asked the question that they were thinking of, but didn't want to say out loud!

Week 2 focused on probably one of the most important things we need to know, classroom management. I think this will be something I will struggle with initially, until I have enough experience to be able to know what type of teaching discipline to use in different situations and with different students. Having the four categories, and then examples of different ways you would actually deal with the kids was good, it is sort of reassuring to have planned ways to deal with things, obviously they won't always work, but just as an idea of methods to try.

Well, I have pretty much actually just agreed with everything everyone said, but I think that this maybe just shows that we all took the same key things out of the first two weeks? 

Yes I think we have managed to collect all our thoughts nicely!