The key to teaching kindergarten is the ability to break things down to the most minute and discrete units of information. When things go horribly wrong in the lesson, then you know that you needed to break it down that much further. Leave nothing to chance. This is the way in which I was able to make connections to my classroom and the models of instructional design. The reading of 'Pebbles in the Pond', an instructional design model, helped me to see that we are often doing exactly this in our instruction; identifying the problem, finding a process of learning, identifying the skills needed for mastery, designing the lesson to this end, review and adaptation of lessons to meet the goal of mastering the problem. In connecting this to my classroom experience I thought of a time when my design was way off. I wanted a small group of struggling students to learn sight words and because they seemed to not be able to remember or recall the sight words taught, I thought it best to have them create the words with play-do in the hopes of creating a tactile memory. While the students enjoyed the activity, it was not well designed to help them to read, write or recall the sight words that they had practiced. The instructional design failed to solve the problem. The play-do was a distraction, rolling it out took too much time, the creating of the words with the dough did not help them to make a connection to the words on a page or how they would recreate the words with pencil. A better instructional design was having students find and circle particular sight words on a page, tracing them with pencil and rewriting them as they spelled and read them on another sheet. Seems so obvious now.
My expertise and my dilemma is in keeping instructional design simple and palatable for the young learner. Young students need visuals to construct meaning for abstract and concrete concepts. However, sometimes I think my students are suffering from visual learning overload. Understanding how to read and write letters, words, mathematical symbols and numbers can prove to be a strain on many of the students new to academic learning. My most challenged students still struggle to understand the difference between a number and a letter. If, as Clark would like to point out in Chapter 4, a chair is a chair, then why is a 0 (zero) not the letter 'O' and why is a 'q' not a 9? If a chair is still a chair when you turn it upside down, then how is a 9 not a 6? Context is most valuable here, but it takes time to construct the context for the student and for the student to construct meaning for themselves within the context. How are we to be certain that the visual input is actually being processed as information in the mind? In the end, students must master visual learning if they are going to meet the end goal of reading and writing, but also for building concepts.. Precision of instructional design is needed. Here is where I need to take a closer look at the SITE Model, so that the instructional design is best meeting the needs of my students. SITE- "The SITE Model is a learner centered framework for designing and implementing contextualized learning experiences. The SITE Model embodies an educational context." Ways in which I can apply this model to my instruction: Socialcultural-Student centered, student engagement-bring the learning to the mind of the student. Informational-What already exists that I am not using? Who and what are my resources? How can I improve what I have? Technical-Tools and strategies needed. How exactly will they meet their goals? Educational-Are my students learning to learn? This sub-context requires the other three contexts but it is also here where I find that my driving question connects. DQ: Do systematic mindfulness practices effect the academic outcomes of kinder students who are undergoing chronic stress? In other words: Can a mind be taught if it is not in the room?
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AuthorJennifer Wade ArchivesCategories |