Alexis Stepney
  • Always a Learner
    • EDUC 701-Page
    • EDUC 790-Page
    • EDUC 791-PAGE
    • EDUC 792-Page
  • EDUC 701-Blog
  • EDUC 790-Blog
  • EDUC 702-BLOG
  • EDUC 791-BLOG
  • EDUC 703-Blog
  • EDUC 792-Blog
  • IRB
  • Tools and Resources
  • Always a Learner
    • EDUC 701-Page
    • EDUC 790-Page
    • EDUC 791-PAGE
    • EDUC 792-Page
  • EDUC 701-Blog
  • EDUC 790-Blog
  • EDUC 702-BLOG
  • EDUC 791-BLOG
  • EDUC 703-Blog
  • EDUC 792-Blog
  • IRB
  • Tools and Resources

EDUC 791
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Final Thoughts...

7/23/2019

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     Over this course I know i have evolved as an educator and as an innovative thinker because I no longer view things in the same way. When I'm introduced to a new idea, or strategy or tool I no longer think to myself that's nice but I could never do anything like that in my class. Now my brain starts moving a million miles a minute about how can I make that work in my classroom. I start asking myself, what do I need to change to make it fit us?
      Now that we have a moment to breathe and take it all in before the next semester I think it's important to go back with fresh eyes and a fresh brain to explore the work of previous cohorts for inspiration to help guide the creation of our prototype. I personally have forgotten many of my original ideas that might support my current work along with input by my cohort members from old blog posts.
Also a huge opportunity I'm glad I took advantage of was going to the poster presentation of cohort 16. It really added light to what our expectation is in our final semester.
Lastly, I think a challenge of mine is actually coming up with the innovative ideas for lessons and activities for my students to do. I'm still learning howto do that type of thinking but having the SAMR model to refer to has been great for me.
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Sense-making, Transliteracy and TPACK

7/13/2019

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     While preparing my next draft of my capstone prototype, the new readings, definitions/information and Punya Mishra video gave me a lot to think about.
      I couldn't help but think of these six year olds entering this new environment(my 1st grade classroom) and jumping in being required to make sense of everything I am throwing at them then expecting them to adjust and or adapt as soon as changes need to be made. It seems a bit far fetched(especially to their parents) but they need to begin to get prepared for this ever changing world now.
         TPACK's components help ensure quality teaching so that students keep up and/or stay in touch with the world they will soon enter not only as functioning citizens  but in the workforce as well. For teaching to be innovative teachers need to do something hasn't been done before and as long as we keep doing the same thing we have always done schools are not properly preparing our children for how to live 20 years from now.
        I realize I will need to consider activities/lessons that offer resources and ways for students to find methods and/or tatics to respond new or challenging information so that they can process it correctly. The importance of students being able to engage in various ways to communicate learning whether it be by print, digital, multimedia, or orally is something that must be practiced daily. Lastly, the context of how and what is taught is the key that could open up doors to produce the kind of thinkers needed in the 21st century.    

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My Message/Learning

7/8/2019

3 Comments

 
     One of the many take aways so far had been on the best strategies on how to present to an audience. Because I now know more than 80% of people are visual learners, images done correctly are the best way to make a lasting impression. My focus has primarily been about behavior and it's effects due to student motivation and engagement so to get my message across I would use images that displayed classrooms that were heavy on collaboration, teachers coaching small groups of students, different students working on different things. More of an "organized chaos" rather than traditional setting in rows with teacher standing in front of room.
​    I went from my essential question based on what to do with early finishers/advanced students and how to manage a classroom that was heavy on differentiation and academic grouping so that a handful weren't so distracting to the rest of the learning environment(or annoying me) to how can I change my teaching practice so that all learners are included and start and finish assignments at the same time and still get what they need to out of it.
        I think the most difficult part is coming up with innovative ways for your students to learn. Because getting out of substitution and augmentation teaching with technology is a process for educators to move out of in itself, changing our brains to "think outside the box" is a struggle. As more educators transform into redefinition we can hopefully become a resource to each other so that the wheel doesn't have to be reinvented.
        TPACK has really guided my thought process when it comes to my lesson planning. I definitely always consider or have in the back of my mind how to tie in "the sweet spot", even if it doesn't always work out for every single lesson or activity it remains a goal in my teaching practice.
          
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Building a Bridge

6/29/2019

3 Comments

 
     I have learned so much so far on my journey through this program and this is only the beginning. Entering the program my biggest want to know focused primarily around engagement. The designs, models and authors have given me so much insight and ideas on how to grab the interest by activating background knowledge/thinking of my learners and how keep their attention through accommodating their individual thinking process with helpful visual and/or technology tools and offering plenty of support to gain students confidence and celebrate their victories.
       When I think of SITE Model and it's goals on how to design instruction for my learners and myself as a learner one thing that inspired me was the comparison of literacy vs. mediacy. It discusses reading to learn rather than learning to read. I think I often get caught up with my main objective being my students have to leave the first grade knowing how to read which is very important but there is so much more than that. Through my experiences it is just as equally important to teach students reading is a part of the learning process to help them gather so much more valuable information. I teach them reading is their pathway to getting their brains smarter!
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Challenges of Creating Resource

6/24/2019

2 Comments

 
     When creating a resource to share with others a few obstacles come to mind that I might need to address. From our reading of Dervin, Baggio and Clark there are many factors to consider. My DQ askes, "Does implementation of a 21st century inclusive design reduce disruptive behavior?." If my audience cannot relate to the issue of what my resource is trying to help, they do not have any background knowledge and there goes my buy in. I've lost my audience already. If my resource does not apply to them I don't have their interest which could be a potential problem. To address this problem I would need to give some sort of scenario with a demonstration or a movie clip to reel them in and get the wheels turning.
        Another potential problem could be maybe they have this issue as well but it's not what their focus is. They might not really care or want to know more about it. In this case I would need to make it personable. I could provide data and have personal testimonies of other teachers to gain sympathy for others to see a concern.
           Lastly I learned the way the information is presented is very important as well. You can loose your audience if your presentation is too wordy or visually unappealing. The strategies to make information received long-term
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Key Ideas

6/16/2019

3 Comments

 
Dervin:
* sense-making can be defined as making sense of what people do in their everyday experiences
* discontinuity is the fundamental aspect of reality
* sense-making focuses on behavior
* perceptual filters determine how you see people/things based on your values/beliefs
​* the "gap" is the moment where an individual focuses on  a method to cross the "bridge" or barrier
* external conditions(i.e. economic class, income and education) minimize creating new responses
* there have been more than 40 different sense-making studies to date
Baggio:
* the brain works in patterns
* learning has 3 influences:
     1. prior knowledge- NAP(neuro-associative pathways are familiar roads in the brain) 
     2. context-provides relevance/significance/importance
​     3. expectations-what we imagine to be true or likely to happen
* about 85% of people are visual learners
* visual design must not overshadow the context
Clark:
* employees are ineffectively trained for workforce causing loss of productivity
* ISD-( Instructional Systems Design) training that produces learning outcomes
* four ingredients of instruction:
     1. information
     2. performance outcome
     3. instructional methods
     4. instructional media
* in 1998 60 billion was spent on training
* structured lessons have four major sections:
     1. introduction
     2. knowledge needed
     3. major task of lesson
     4. summary

3 Comments

Sense-Making

6/8/2019

2 Comments

 
https://julianstodd.wordpress.com/2014/03/14/sense-making-and-storytelling/
The link above will take you to the visual I found represents sense making methodology. 
     I am very appreciative to the fact we were given fair warning about the dense content of this paper. Like recommended I printed it out and had my highlighter, colored pen, sticky note pad and google dictionary ready. I used a close reading strategy that I believe was a combination of various kinds I've come across over the years. With the highlighter I highlighted things that were interesting to me and I wanted to now more about and I used a colored pen to underline repeated or similar ideas and the sticky notes were used to write out the definitions to the words I didn't know.
     When reading through the paper I tried to look for a common theme or something that kept being repeated and I noticed even though it was slightly restated a little different each time, the steps of what sense-making is and how a person begins to go through the process was the same. After I digested what the 25 pages were about and what I was looking for like how different methods can be used to conduct studies and seeing each study discussed time-line and questions it began to come together.
     What I basically got from Dervin was the sense-making methodology is the way individuals deal with a situation by identifying the "gap",(the problem or barrier) finding a "bridge"(using a resource) and then going on to get the answers they need to make a decision about the initial situation(solve the problem).  
     This paper and the more than 40 studies done to date are important because they provide insight on what people struggle with or want to know or need information about and if researchers, doctors, lawyers, law enforcement, teachers, etc are aware of these human behaviors in sense-making they can become the resource to bridge to help positive human life experiences.
     If I were going to teach this to a high schooler it would definitely take place over at least a weeks time period. I would use a Cognitive Dictionary to help with understanding new and difficult vocabulary and have the students view related images because the content is so word heavy to explain ideas. I also think less teacher talk and more student led-discussions would be more effective.
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