Week 2 Post: Part II
One of the past meetings that I had to close out the school
year addressed the quote that, “The curriculum should then be established based
on their (students) needs.” The
vertical alignment meeting that grade 6 teachers had with grade 5 teachers was
established to look at the curriculum in place, and to address the particular needs
of the students within the class.
During the meeting, grade 5 teachers discussed what they did as far as
content throughout the school year and how the students received the topics
covered. This was a very
beneficial meeting because it allowed teachers to match the curriculum with the
students’ needs. Teachers
discussed the academic diversity between the students in the class and how they
adapted the curriculum to meet the needs.
One of my beliefs with curriculum is that it should be flexible enough
for teachers to make necessary adaptations and modifications to meet the need
of students. If the curriculum is
too structured and rigid, and doe not allows for modifications, then we are not
meeting the needs of all students.
Chapters
5 and12 addressed the 21st century learner, an interesting topic to
discuss. After looking through
these chapters, I realized that there could be (and needs to be) more
integration of technology in the classroom to meet the current needs of
students. This idea goes back to
the idea that the curriculum should keep up with the times and address the need
of current students. Heidi Hayes
Jacobs states, “As educators, we have a duty to examine the effect of these
trends and respond to the question, ‘What does it mean to be educated in the 21
century?’” Today’s students are
much more technology driven and technology savvy. Some of my 12- year old students know more than I do with
certain technology tools that we use in the classroom! It was quite humbling to be taught how
to use certain computer applications from a 12-year old student. This just goes to show educators how
technology driven the current students are. With that being said, educators should make every effort to
integrate technology into the curriculum whenever possible because it is a way
that the current learner can become successful. To quote a phrase from Dr. Jacobs, it is “or duty,” to
integrate technology because it is through the use of technology that we are
meeting the needs of the students.
Yes with several caveats...
ReplyDelete1. We need to allow (require!) our students to assist us in using technology for learning. Why should we have all the fun...and do all the work? Kids want to do this type of work. This year I helped Warsaw MS set up a student tech team where kids helped other kids and their teachers with all types of tech. Students were amazing, teachers appreciative and learned a lot, and the kids love it...and learned a lot too.
2. Tech is tools...and we need to focus on the task not the tool. For example on assignment 2 in our course, a number of people wrote written papers, but some recorded podcasts and one did a Prezi. All achieved the same result...responding to the questions I posed...but in different ways that suited them. We need more of that!
Wow! That sounds like an amazing project to do with students and technology. I'm sure that I had some students in my class who would have loved to do something along those lines. I think it is great when students are able to help and learn from one another. It seems to be more meaningful (at times) when their learning is coming from a peer rather than an adult. Students love to help one another, share ideas, and explain how the preformed a certain task. Some students love to teach!
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