Content Knowledge (Course II)
1.
Describe how outside-school experience(s) have
expanded or deepened your subject area content knowledge, and tell how it
enhanced or changed your understanding. Include at least one specific
experience.
Outside-school
experiences have expanded and deepened my subject area content knowledge in a
multitude of ways. I feel that a great deal of my content knowledge has been
acquired outside of the classroom. These experiences include going to work with
my dad and asking a never-ending series of questions about his job, going to
museums and exhibits with my family during the summertime, helping the girls I used to
nanny for with their homework, and various different volunteer jobs.
One specific
experience I can remember is when I was in middle school and I was part of a
youth council. We completed a number of different community service projects
throughout the year, but one project specifically that I remember was when we
went to the Monument Crisis Center and spent time with the children and
families there. One of the families at the center had two young girls, probably
in about 2nd or 3rd grade. The girls were working on
their homework and so my supervisor said that I could go and sit with them and
see if they needed help. One of the girls was working on her math homework
where she was working on multiplication problems. I remember that she was stuck
on a particular problem and I was trying to figure out a way to explain it to
her. I knew that she understood her addition facts because I could see she had
worked out the previous addition problems without trouble. I decided to
encourage her to solve the multiplication problem by adding the numbers
multiple times (using repeated addition). Having to think of a different way to
explain a multiplication problem to the girl helped me to expand and deepen the
way I thought about various math problems, a subject I was not particularly
good at.
2.
Respond to the class discussion of Ball’s “The
Subject Matter Preparation of Teachers.” Have your initial judgments or
opinions change based on the discussion?
The discussion of
Ball’s “The Subject Matter Preparation of Teachers” really just reaffirmed my
own thinking while reading the article. I was really surprised that an article
that was written so long ago still had so much relevance and truth in the
education profession today. It seemed as though a majority of my classmates
found themselves asking the same questions that came to mind for me as I was
reading: How can teachers really have all the subject matter knowledge to teach
prior to going out and actually teaching it? What can we do to better prepare
teachers in training? How can we as teachers work to improve our subject matter
knowledge when we teach so many subjects in such a variety of grade levels?
My small group
focused on discussing the quote on page 9 of the Ball article: “Helping
students learn subject matter involves more than the delivery of facts and
information. The goal of teaching is to assist students in developing
intellectual resources to enable them to participate in, not merely to know
about, the major domains of human thought and inquiry in the discipline.” We
particularly were discussing this quote in its relationship to History and
Social Studies and how many teachers simply present students with facts and
dates to be memorized. We discussed how this does not adequately prepare
students because they are not forced to think critically about what they are
reading or to look at history as a narrative—a story told from a point of view.
We all agreed that it is important to encourage students to question what they
learn, even in a discipline where information is often presented as concrete
facts, and participate in intelligent discussions about the content.
3.
Where are you in developing and pursuing a line
of inquiry? What is your question? Are you satisfied with your question? At this point, what do you know about the research
available in this area? What ideas do
you have for possible experiential learning sources?
I am focusing on
investigating the topic of students with autism in mainstream classrooms.
Specifically, the two major questions I have been researching thus far are: How
does the mainstreaming of students with autism improve their communication and
social skills? And also, what strategies are most effective for managing
problem behaviors of students with autism in a mainstream classroom?
While my questions
are still somewhat broad, I am satisfied with them.
I have found a
variety of research available in this area, ranging from articles published in
psychiatric and psychological journals to studies of autistic students in
general education classrooms and their social interactions with their
non-autistic peers. Most of the sources I have found thus far are secondary
sources. I plan to search for several books that I have heard about through
friends who are special education teachers that are written by autistic
individuals about their own personal experiences.
For possible
experiential learning sources, I was thinking about trying to find general
education teachers who have had autistic students in their classes and
interviewing them about what strategies worked well both for developing those
students’ social skills as well as behavior management.
An additional, and
vague, idea I had was to search for autism organizations and see if there were
any conferences or resources I could utilize.
A few informative, interesting resources on Autism:
Hi Alaina! First off, looking at your blog, I am wondering... how did you get it to look so cute?! Now, when it comes to the content itself, I really liked how you shared the fact that your past job experiences and curiosity for your dad's job, really contributed to the development of your subject area content knowledge. I agree that I have learned more from my past jobs, than I have in a lot of my schooling. Putting into practice, what so many of my past teachers have taught, really helped my development/evolvement in my subject area content knowledge! Also, when it comes to Ball's article, I really enjoyed chatting with you (in our group) about how teachers bring their own attitudes towards the things that they are teaching, which in turn, affects how the students perceive the material being taught. You also showed me to look at the date of when things are written, because you are right... just because it was written long ago, doesn't necessarily mean that its not applicable to today. Lastly, I really like your guiding questions and how they are interconnected with each other. Autism is a huge topic in today's classrooms, and I see you not only being able to find a lot of research to support your thesis, but also being able to put the thesis into action in your future classroom!
ReplyDeleteAlaina-
ReplyDeleteI can relate to your feeling that outside experiences added to your content knowledge. Like you, I have had some experiences with Monument Crisis Center (MCC). For several years my Girl Scout troop collected food from our local neighborhood and took it to Monument Crisis Center. I have stayed involved with MCC, because our community does an annual bike drive in November- December. I have assisted in collecting, cleaning, and delivering many used bikes to clients at Monument Crisis Center. Through that experience, I have met families who live in the Monument Corridor, and we even deliver bikes to children who attend Cambridge Elementary School. When delivering bikes at Cambridge, I met some of the teachers and the outreach staff. This connection led to my participation in a kindergarten classroom where I tutored a little girl in reading for a semester. That experience was really rewarding to me, because I saw the growth of a nonreader to a reader and how excited she was to have the world of books open up to her. I have found that participating in community service offers opportunities to learn content knowledge and sometimes it is unexpected. Delivering food, clothing, bikes and school supplies can lead to tutoring children in need. You learned more about math and I learned more about reading from our volunteer experiences. Helping someone who struggles academically made me look at different ways of teaching reading like you had to look at different ways of teaching math.
Hi Alaina!
ReplyDeleteIn regards to your experiences outside the classroom... I also believe that asking questions is one of the best ways to learn? I remember that in my childhood (as well as currently in adulthood), asking a multitude of questions helped expand my knowledge of many things. A student may remember what an item is called, but seeing it used in real life and hearing an explanation about what it does will ingrain further knowledge in the student's brain.
Ball article: My group and I discussed the article around the same quote as you! Critical thinking is SO important, as are other transferable skills. How can we as teachers make sure we are encouraging that? What is the balance in a classroom between teaching the content, and allowing time for discussion and critical thinking?
Finally, I love your research ideas. I have a history of working with children with Autism in and out of the classroom, and I have seen many benefits of mainstreaming. I especially like that your research questions incorporate the "HOW" (how does mainstreaming help?) and the "WHAT" (what strategies are available?). In this generation of teachers, it is especially vital that we be knowledgeable on this topic. The cases of Autism are more prevalent than ever, and we are all bound to encounter a student or two each year we teach. What you learn from your line of inquiry will be not only interesting to all of us, but very useful as well!
Alaina,
ReplyDeleteI really like your project idea. As a classroom teach I get so frustrated with the lack of knowledge about my various students with autism. I work with plenty of people who do not believing in mainstreaming students with autism. As a result there is a lot of resistance to helping those students which do not do those students' social skills any justice. One thing I would love to know is comparing classroom social skill development between groups of autistic students who go to group therapy (inside or outside the classroom) and those who do not. I know that might make the project a little more detail specific but social group therapy can be a useful tool in helping acclimate students with autism to the classroom.