Unit Plan Canvas

The lesson plan I choose for last week was called A Bad Case of Bullying: Using Literature Response Groups. It allowed students to reflect upon the reading picked out by the teacher, two books about bullying. Then it allowed the students to reflect upon the situations and personally connect with the emotions and circumstances that happened in the book, with their own lives. Along with connections, students are asked to discuss bully behavior, acceptable behavior, and how to avoid them.

            I must admit, this was not my favorite way of outlining a lesson plan. I was not a fan of this website. While it was easy to maneuver, I thought it was a little silly to go through all this work, when this topic will be discusses in class. For students, I think it would be difficult to keep their attention while making or looking at this website. There as so many ways to click on things and get side tracked, or accidently click on something that will erase everything that you completed…like I did.

Bad Case of Bullying Canvas

Is Leapfrog the enemy?

Leapfrog Reader

                In the recent times, technology seems to find its way into younger children’s hands. Whether it be the iPhone for games, the iPad for television, or leapfrog readers. When I first heard about the leapfrog readers, I thought they were very cool and very helpful. But as I grew older, and started seeing them in person, I started to think. Is this marring children’s learning experience? The leapfrog reader consists of: a special book, and a computerized pen. With this book, the pen could read the words children are having trouble sounding out. But doesn’t that take away from the child’s learning?

                The pen is practically spoon feeding them the information they were supposed to struggle to learn. As they sit, with the special book on their laps, learning how to read, they are not comprehending the information that is being fed to them. Instead of figuring out the process themselves, they are skipping it entirely. The children sit with the book on their lap, using the pen to finish the book for them, one the reach the end of the book they close it and go play, not having learned a thing!

This problem could only happen if the children are given the regular leapfrog pad. Now there is a leapfrog tablet that is basically an iPad for ‘learning’. With this leapfrog tablet, you could play games to help ‘learn’ how to read, write, and do math. Is this the right way of teaching our children? Though technology, instead of human contact? Should we continue doing this?  Today we are giving our young children so many ways to circumvent learning. Are we harming our children with these technologies? Or are we actually helping them for the future, to be more dependent on technology? What do you think?

Technology & Pedagogy

Spreadsheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Auq91Ju4QG2FdDVuNGhQYXNBUTFMY3Nna2RpRnRxV3c&usp=sharing

The reason why I chose this lesson plan was because of its relevance to society currently. Bullying has become an epidemic, coping skills and reactions should be taught as early as possible to give students some help to deal with bullying. While reviewing the lesson plan, I found the plan to be completely copasetic and flowed wonderfully. The plan worked well by having students work on their own, mostly, and complete the goal fully. While there were not gaps between the teaching strategies that were used in this lesson plan, I did find some technology gaps. Since this lesson plan is available for students in third to fifth grade, it would be useful to have students work on the computers a little more.

 Instead of having students write in their journals, have them type them out, print them, and have a peer edited them on the printed version. It would give students a chance to see how to take their peers reviews and change their writing on the computer. It would also give them a change to understand how computers work with writings. Saving, printing, editing, all of these features could also be used in the lesson plan. Also, working with the smart board will allow students to get a taste of what technologies are available to them. It will allow them to have more interaction with the board then they would with post it notes (an activity which students much place emotions on the board with sticky/post it notes).

Computer Games in the English Classroom

I remember when I was in grammar school, maybe first or second grade, we would have time set aside so we could go on the computers and play games. Of course these games were “educational” and not role playing or first person shooter games. But corny children games with spelling aliens or grammatically correct dogs. But as I grew older, I wondered, were these games actually helping me to read? When I would go home, I would sit with either one of my parents for an hour or two practicing sight words and reading easy books, such as Dr. Seuss or Curious George. This was helping me learn how to read. Not silly little computer games. I remember when I would go on the computer, I would either sit there and click on random things, or blur out my vision (space out) and click to hear the noises.

It wasn’t until I was older that I actually knew what the computer games were asking me to do. By the time I knew what the computer games were asking, I was bored with them. It wasn’t helping me, it was schooling me on things I knew already. So why do we continue to use these games? Is it to break students up and give them a break? Or is it to say “well we have supplemental computer games to help them learn” so parents feel comfortable when they don’t have enough time to sit down with their child to teach them how to read? Is it purely for the fact to that it gives parents the peace of mind that their child is getting one on one attention from a computer screen? I personally think these games are silly, students need human help to help them learn how to read. They should be able to go to their teachers or parents or friends to help them learn. They shouldn’t have to rely on a computer to learn how to read.

Do you think computer games are helpful to teach students how to read?

Technology in English Class

Recently, I have been rethinking my post supporting technology in classrooms, especially in English classrooms.  The problem I have with technology in classrooms is that they are a distraction. While I would like to think my students are using their laptops and smart phones for their writing help, I know it is unrealistic. It is more tempting to use your laptop to update social Medias and blog sites, rather than take notes quicker. Students are more inclined to tweet about being in class, than pay attention in class, and that is a huge problem. English has trouble grasping student’s attention, but I believe that is because they aren’t even listening.

English is extremely important for students to know. While they are studying Shakespeare, Mary Shelley, or Jane Austin, they are also learning how to interpret literature, and to read and write at a higher level. Students are too busy texting their friends using shortened words and abbreviations to be learning how to write properly. I remember last year, in my junior year of college, my professor was explaining how he wanted an essay written. He stated “be sure to write out you, and not just use the letter u.” I was appalled that this needed to be reminded to college students.

 I was embarrassed when he continued to tell the class that he had received many papers with the letters “u” instead of “you”, or that his students didn’t know the difference between “too” and “to”. This is why technology should be allowed in classrooms. It is sad that college students do not know the difference between texting and writing an academic paper. Personal technology (such as laptops, and smart phones) should not be allowed in the classroom because it is marring the intelligence of writing academic papers and reading on the academic level. 

History of Technology in English

The Reading Accelerator was used to help students read more efficiently.