Final Reflection
Looking Back
I think it’s best to begin this paper by looking at where I was when I first began this program. When I applied, I didn’t really understand what STEM was. I knew what the acronym meant, but as a math teacher, I really didn’t see how I could incorporate all of the different elements into my class. I also felt that, at our school and in general, the “M” part of STE was getting the short stick. It seemed easier and more organic to incorporate science, technology and engineering together, with serving as a friendly helper along the way.
So, what have I learned this summer? Plenty. In fact, using TPACK, I can now see how the three parts of STEM can co-exist wonderfully together. When I originally considered how TPACK and a Flipped Classroom would work together, I wasn’t really sure if they would work, as the entire notion of flipping was completely foreign to me. But after discussing flipping with Missy, talking about it with my group and Candace, and doing some research on my own, I can now see how it could work: I would use a video posting program to put a video of the basic concept on a site (maybe YouTube); have students watch, take notes and comment or ask questions of it online; and then, in class the next day, posit questions that the students can work on together in class. When I couple that with various activities we’ve used in class, such as World of Wonder and Quickfires, I can see how everything I want to do with regards to my ImagineIT Project, Perseverance in Problem Solving in Math, can build on each other to create an amazing, interactive learning experience.
I have also learned about the many ways technology can be used to aid teaching. I had incorrectly assumed that calculators and visual aids were the sole technologies I could use in teaching math. But now I know there are so many I could use. For example, I could use Tagxedo Word Cloud or Kahoot! to quickly assess levels of understanding. Or I could use CrazyTalk to shake up learning by having famous people “discuss” topics. Or I could use Songify to create a weird mnemonic device to help remember the steps to a problem. I could even use an actual image as the basis for a word problem. (All of which I plan to do next year). These seemed flippant to me when I first saw them demonstrated, but then I realized that these are the things that will get students excited about learning, and these are the things that students will remember years from now.
Finally, I have learned that there are many meaningful articles about teaching that I should be reading. I don’t think I’ve read an article or book on teaching since my first two or three years in teaching - not that I haven’t wanted to. Unless I read one in a professional development setting (which I really just skimmed through), I relied on my own expert opinion on how to approach teaching. But in teaching, it’s good to remind ourselves that backwards design is the best way to approach teaching. Starting with the idea, trying to figure out how to teach it and then writing a test is an easy trap that we all fall into. The work we did this summer woke me from that stupor and made me realize how vital it is to always employ backwards design templates.
I found that various authors we read also championed much of the pedagogy I had been using, pulled mainly from my own experience, the past few years. For example, only recently did I decide to put students in groups for the majority of class in order to work together. I knew it made for better discussion and I hoped it would make them better thinkers. How happy was I to find that Wilson and Peterson support this as learning as a social phenomenon and that Sawyer supports this as Improvisational Peer Collaboration.
Looking Forward
When I consider all that has transpired this summer, it’s hard to see it not influence me in the future. By far the most influence has to be the conversations I’ve had with other Fellows and instructors. For example, as I said earlier, I am going to implement a Flipped Classroom this coming year. I never would have considered, prior to this summer, the possibility of doing that; I would have run things the way I always did. But talking with Missy and reading articles, including articles that go beyond Flipping, made me totally reconsider the way I was teaching my advanced math classes. The author of the article, Shelly Wright, after months of practice, inadvertently created an ideal classroom where students work at their own pace and self-differentiate according to ability. Her students started off in a flipped setting, but became what I would term self-aware learners and acquired the ability to learn independently of the teacher, regardless of the type of classroom. This seems like quite an ideal to live up to, but I believe that it only came to fruition because of Flipping. Might I go further and try and implement this? Maybe. I think it could be done, but students would need to have a great deal of practice in this independent environment, and not just in my classes. The entire Math department would need to buy into this, and I’m not sure if or when that would happen. For now, I’m going to stick with Flipping.
The ImagineIT project we were asked to come up with over the summer at first seemed easy, but then as we learned more about it, for me, it became terrifying. My topic was so broad (Perseverance in Problem Solving), it seemed impossible to implement it properly. But once I conferenced with Candace (who talked me off the ledge) and narrowed it down, it became very manageable. Now I feel confident that the direction I am taking my project will be successful. I also am going to take some personal experiences from this summer and use them in my class. For example, I like the idea of students, one group per week, presenting a World of Wonder like we did in class. I think it’s one of the many ways we can relate math to other subjects and show that there is more to math than simply solving for x. I also would like to try experimenting with the idea of using Quickfires in class. I loved the Quickfire concept and had some of the most fun over the summer when in that element. I would use it to get students to quickly choose a path when assigned a task and to solve it quickly, eliminating their paralysis of choice and fear of being incorrect, which is one of the basic aspects of perseverance.
I’ve also learned that I don’t teach in a vacuum. I kind of knew that already, but now I really know. By ‘a vacuum’, I mean that these past 12 years, a lot of quality teaching has gone on. Many great articles have been written. Innovative pedagogies have been developed. And I knew nothing about them – until this program. The MSUrbanSTEM program has clued me in to all of this. Had I not been accepted, chances are I would have come across maybe one or two of these resources. Now I am part of this incredible network of articles and resources – but that’s not the best part. I now have 55 amazing new collaborators I can tap into in a variety of ways. I can bounce ideas off of them. I can discuss pedagogical methods. I can learn new technology tips. I can discuss assessment techniques. It is quite a tremendous gift that I have been given, and I certainly will use it to the fullest as my teaching career progresses.
Bibliography:
Bergmann, J., & Sams, A. (2012). Flip your classroom: Reach every student in every class every day. Washington, DC: ISTE; and Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
http://plpnetwork.com/2012/10/08/flip-love-affair/
Wilson, S., & Peterson, P. L. (2006). Theories of learning and teaching: What do they mean for educators? National Education Association
Sawyer, R. K. (2004). Creative teaching: Collaborative discussion as disciplined improvisation.Educational Researcher, (33)2, 12-20. P. 12-20.
I think it’s best to begin this paper by looking at where I was when I first began this program. When I applied, I didn’t really understand what STEM was. I knew what the acronym meant, but as a math teacher, I really didn’t see how I could incorporate all of the different elements into my class. I also felt that, at our school and in general, the “M” part of STE was getting the short stick. It seemed easier and more organic to incorporate science, technology and engineering together, with serving as a friendly helper along the way.
So, what have I learned this summer? Plenty. In fact, using TPACK, I can now see how the three parts of STEM can co-exist wonderfully together. When I originally considered how TPACK and a Flipped Classroom would work together, I wasn’t really sure if they would work, as the entire notion of flipping was completely foreign to me. But after discussing flipping with Missy, talking about it with my group and Candace, and doing some research on my own, I can now see how it could work: I would use a video posting program to put a video of the basic concept on a site (maybe YouTube); have students watch, take notes and comment or ask questions of it online; and then, in class the next day, posit questions that the students can work on together in class. When I couple that with various activities we’ve used in class, such as World of Wonder and Quickfires, I can see how everything I want to do with regards to my ImagineIT Project, Perseverance in Problem Solving in Math, can build on each other to create an amazing, interactive learning experience.
I have also learned about the many ways technology can be used to aid teaching. I had incorrectly assumed that calculators and visual aids were the sole technologies I could use in teaching math. But now I know there are so many I could use. For example, I could use Tagxedo Word Cloud or Kahoot! to quickly assess levels of understanding. Or I could use CrazyTalk to shake up learning by having famous people “discuss” topics. Or I could use Songify to create a weird mnemonic device to help remember the steps to a problem. I could even use an actual image as the basis for a word problem. (All of which I plan to do next year). These seemed flippant to me when I first saw them demonstrated, but then I realized that these are the things that will get students excited about learning, and these are the things that students will remember years from now.
Finally, I have learned that there are many meaningful articles about teaching that I should be reading. I don’t think I’ve read an article or book on teaching since my first two or three years in teaching - not that I haven’t wanted to. Unless I read one in a professional development setting (which I really just skimmed through), I relied on my own expert opinion on how to approach teaching. But in teaching, it’s good to remind ourselves that backwards design is the best way to approach teaching. Starting with the idea, trying to figure out how to teach it and then writing a test is an easy trap that we all fall into. The work we did this summer woke me from that stupor and made me realize how vital it is to always employ backwards design templates.
I found that various authors we read also championed much of the pedagogy I had been using, pulled mainly from my own experience, the past few years. For example, only recently did I decide to put students in groups for the majority of class in order to work together. I knew it made for better discussion and I hoped it would make them better thinkers. How happy was I to find that Wilson and Peterson support this as learning as a social phenomenon and that Sawyer supports this as Improvisational Peer Collaboration.
Looking Forward
When I consider all that has transpired this summer, it’s hard to see it not influence me in the future. By far the most influence has to be the conversations I’ve had with other Fellows and instructors. For example, as I said earlier, I am going to implement a Flipped Classroom this coming year. I never would have considered, prior to this summer, the possibility of doing that; I would have run things the way I always did. But talking with Missy and reading articles, including articles that go beyond Flipping, made me totally reconsider the way I was teaching my advanced math classes. The author of the article, Shelly Wright, after months of practice, inadvertently created an ideal classroom where students work at their own pace and self-differentiate according to ability. Her students started off in a flipped setting, but became what I would term self-aware learners and acquired the ability to learn independently of the teacher, regardless of the type of classroom. This seems like quite an ideal to live up to, but I believe that it only came to fruition because of Flipping. Might I go further and try and implement this? Maybe. I think it could be done, but students would need to have a great deal of practice in this independent environment, and not just in my classes. The entire Math department would need to buy into this, and I’m not sure if or when that would happen. For now, I’m going to stick with Flipping.
The ImagineIT project we were asked to come up with over the summer at first seemed easy, but then as we learned more about it, for me, it became terrifying. My topic was so broad (Perseverance in Problem Solving), it seemed impossible to implement it properly. But once I conferenced with Candace (who talked me off the ledge) and narrowed it down, it became very manageable. Now I feel confident that the direction I am taking my project will be successful. I also am going to take some personal experiences from this summer and use them in my class. For example, I like the idea of students, one group per week, presenting a World of Wonder like we did in class. I think it’s one of the many ways we can relate math to other subjects and show that there is more to math than simply solving for x. I also would like to try experimenting with the idea of using Quickfires in class. I loved the Quickfire concept and had some of the most fun over the summer when in that element. I would use it to get students to quickly choose a path when assigned a task and to solve it quickly, eliminating their paralysis of choice and fear of being incorrect, which is one of the basic aspects of perseverance.
I’ve also learned that I don’t teach in a vacuum. I kind of knew that already, but now I really know. By ‘a vacuum’, I mean that these past 12 years, a lot of quality teaching has gone on. Many great articles have been written. Innovative pedagogies have been developed. And I knew nothing about them – until this program. The MSUrbanSTEM program has clued me in to all of this. Had I not been accepted, chances are I would have come across maybe one or two of these resources. Now I am part of this incredible network of articles and resources – but that’s not the best part. I now have 55 amazing new collaborators I can tap into in a variety of ways. I can bounce ideas off of them. I can discuss pedagogical methods. I can learn new technology tips. I can discuss assessment techniques. It is quite a tremendous gift that I have been given, and I certainly will use it to the fullest as my teaching career progresses.
Bibliography:
Bergmann, J., & Sams, A. (2012). Flip your classroom: Reach every student in every class every day. Washington, DC: ISTE; and Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
http://plpnetwork.com/2012/10/08/flip-love-affair/
Wilson, S., & Peterson, P. L. (2006). Theories of learning and teaching: What do they mean for educators? National Education Association
Sawyer, R. K. (2004). Creative teaching: Collaborative discussion as disciplined improvisation.Educational Researcher, (33)2, 12-20. P. 12-20.