Reading Assignment- Chap 2A, 2B, and 3

Chapter 2A pp. 27-56

This first part of chapter two talked about how teachers need to be decision makers. Something I realized is that teachers will be making a ton of decisions everyday in and outside of the classroom, during and making lessons. Teachers need to consider what is best for the students, sometimes every decision won't be the greatest one and thats okay. As teachers are making these decision they need to reflect before and after, asking themselves if the decision they are making will benefit their students or if it was necessary. As they reflect, analyze and judge their decision making process its important they think about what they could do differently next time. I feel its always important to have a second plan incase the first one doesn't go as planned. For some events you can't always plan for what will happen and have to act on instant, which I am kind of scared about because, this is something I can't always do, I like to think and plan things ahead of time. I think that a great way to know if something worked or didn't work during a lesson would be to ask the student or those involved and see what they learned and benefited from that lesson.  They also briefly discussed the importance of safety and rights of the students and teachers. We need to make sure we are aware of the school districts policy and follow those rights and rules to make sure we are treating others equally and being appropriate towards one another. 

Chapter 2B pp. 57-78

This section gave a ton of great characteristics thats teachers can use in the classroom, which was about teachers using all their resources and understanding what they are learning. It is also important for teachers to be learners as well. As teachers we can not know everything and are always learning, its important for teachers to keep updated in each subject and with upcoming technology. We also want to model for our students and give them inquiry and those hands on opportunities. I believe this is the best way for students to learn. I know it is how I learned in school and lectures didn't help me at all. I really want to use those hands on experiences in my classroom. Teachers also want to be able to connect our lessons to our students interest and real world situations because it makes it easier for students to then understand and grasp those concepts. As teachers are creating those lessons we need to think about what kind of things will benefit each of our students. If one thing doesn't work we need to be quick on our feel to change up our lesson. We all went to school and have had many different teachers but those who were positive, encouraging, and funny, were the ones we remembered most and learned the most from. I want to be that teacher who is there for my students and give them those different learning opportunities. For everything that teachers do we need to have a reason for and just because we think it may be a better way to learn something research might prove us otherwise. Its the same thing that if something isn't working, we need to reflect and rethink that decision we have made.  They also touched upon preventing those unwanted behaviors. This starts at the beginning, as we need to set those guidelines and rules at the beginning of the year and continue to follow them. Once we don't our students won't take us seriously and not listen to us and misbehave. We want to make sure our students are staying on task, and things that go into this is making sure we are giving clear instructions, giving them the right questions and using those proper tools that would benefit our students. In my classroom I want to do everything I can to help them benefit and learn the lesson and concept. 

Chapter 3 pp. 81-108

Chapter three focuses on thinking and questioning strategies. It is important that teachers are using those higher-level questions when asking their students questions to allow them to really think, connect, and relate those questions to the content. The teachers and students in the classroom need to listen to one another. If the students answer a question wrong, its important that you don’t have another gender correcting that student, and try to have the student you asked answer the question by asking him or her questions that dig deeper. There are many different ways you can have students think and figure things out for themselves for example inquiry learning. Another way is questioning. There are so many different benefits from questioning students, and as a teacher you could find out a ton, from what students do and don’t know, if they understood something, those that are struggling, what they are thinking, etc. I remember learning in one of my classes all about the different kinds of questions to ask your students. There are tons and you don’t want the questions to be yes or no and really want students to think about those higher level thinking questions. There are analytic, clarifying, convergent-thinking, cueing, divergent-thinking, evaluative, focus, etc. As teachers it is our job to make sure we are asking the right questions and changing it up. We don’t want to just give the students the answer because they will never learn that way. When we ask these questions we want to make sure we are using the right wording, being clear, allowing time for students to think, and involving as many students as possible.