FIAE Chapter 8 synthesis

As teachers it is likely that we will struggle with decision on how to grade attendance and participation and if we do what weight it should have. Some teachers have rigid attendance policies, and have varying amounts of emphasis. Grading participation is even more hazy and grading attendance tends to benefit a certain population of students. If you decide that class participation will be incorporated in a students' final grades then you should have some preconceived notion of what kind of participation you expect in students.

FIAE Chapter 14

Most teachers tend to get bogged down in the differentiated instruction model when it comes to report cards. We all want to follow this but it is difficult to represent what students know in a simple form. Report cards and progress reports need to somehow reflect that the students may have been taught differently. Simply saying that the grade reflects differentiated instruction should not cause negative thoughts about the student's grade. This is something that I am personally scared of even though I probably would not admit it in person. With the competitiveness of students and parents I think that they are still going to want a simplified version of how their student is doing.

FIAE Chapter 13

In this chapter we are told that our grade books will almost certainly reflect our lessons. It will most likely take me a long time to figure out exactly what grade book format will work for me. When formatting the grade book we need to make sure that we are not only designing it based on what is easiest for us, but will accurately reflect a student's achievement. When we begin a unit, all the grades for that unit should already be in the gradebook, this reflects the backwards design model in this way. None of the examples provided in the book really appealed to me, I guess I will have to be like John McCain and be a maverick and find my own way.

FIAE Chapter 12

As the title of the chapter would suggest, we are told about grading scaled in this chapter. We as teachers tend to use the the 100% grade scale since it is traditional and most efficient to use. Wormeli however suggests using the 4.o scale since it's more subjective and puts less of an emphasis on the grade. Since there is less variation in the smaller scale it is easier for faculty to agree upon what criteria is required for each grade. This provides more consistency for students and teachers. Making rubrics, which is something that is required for the 4.0 scale can seem daunting but it will be worth it in providing students and teachers with a more accurate reflection of student achievement.

FIAE Chapter 11

Chapter 11 tells us more about grading and how it reflects student achievement. I was interested in how much recording a zero as a grade negatively effects the students grade and does not accurately portray a student's level of achievement. The section on here regarding how to grade gifted students kind of angered me. They didn't really offer any kind of real suggestions other then to add some sort of supplement or make sure that the name of the class is reflected. This is unfair to gifted students since they are taking on more challenging work, without adding a weight to these or anything, the incentive for taking honors classes is lost. The rest of the chapter pertains to late work and making sure that we are not grading automaticity instead of concept attainment. This are all important to me in helping me decide how I will tabulate my grades.

FIAE Chapter 10

The topic of this chapter is redoing work for full credit. We should basically trust our discretion when deciding if work will be allowed to be redone because students should not take the ability to redo assignments for granted. Take into account outside factors that may have played a role in the quality of a students work, listen to them and try to put yourself in their shoes and think about how you would want to be treated if you were in the same situation. Wormeli suggests having parent sign an agreement about make up work policies. You should change the work that is being made up so that students cannot simply memorize something. The two sections that I found most important were not allowing students to make up grades near the end of a ranking period because at this point students are only thinking about the grade and to have students attach previous work so we can see progress. Basically use you best judgement and discretion.

FIAE Chapter 9

Chapter nine basically did exactly what the title suggested it would do: It suggest "Ten Approaches to Avoid When Differentiating Assessment and Grading." That chapter wants us to avoid using nonacademic factors when we are determining the final grade. We should not penalize students when they need several attempts to master something, and similarly homework that is meant for practice should not be factored into the final grade. We need to make sure that whenever scaffolding is needed that it is made available to our students. When we are grading we should not use assessments that do not accurately assess how well a students has mastered a subject, and extra credit is not cool. We should not give group grades and zeros do nothing to motivate students to learn and do their work.

FIAE Chapter 8

Most teachers do not like grading, they see it as unnecessary and time consuming. Grading has to be diplomatic and tedious. The six main purposes of grades are to document student and teacher progress, to provide feedback to the student and family, and the teacher, to inform instructional decisions, to motivate students, to punish students, and to sort students. The last three reasons are not useful, usually when a student receives a bad grade they are not motivated, they end up shutting down. One of the most difficult issues to grapple with when grading is how to make sure that the grades do not cause students to turn away from the subject being taught, yet not all students can receive high grades because that is an inauthentic measure of learning.

FIAE Chapter 7

Grading is an aspect of teaching that many teachers do not like to address. Summative grades have little use in helping students expand their learning. When we put a student's grade into a symbol it is immensely over simplifying how much a student knows and what we teach. When we grade things we need to actually define for ourselves what each grade means. There are so many variables that go into coming up with a single grade. This is the reason why we like to assess using portfolios and other summarizing methods so as to have a clearer picture of what the student actually knows. The chapter stresses the importance of self-evaluation as a better means of assessment.

MI Chapter 12

One of the most pressing and unresolved issues is helping students retain what they have learned. This was basically a repeat of the previous 11 chapters, if you teach students in a way that works with their intelligence, the will truly learn it better and will retain it in their long term memory for much longer. Just like before, if we observe how a student thinks and problem solves, we will better be able to judge how a student will remember the content. The chapter also discusses how Bloom's Taxonomy can be used to chart the development of your students. You want them to gradually rise up the ladder of knowledge as you teach your unit.

MI Chapter 11

The concentration of this chapter is on students with special needs and how the MI theory can be applied to them. Most teachers view students that have an intelligence deficit in some area as a problem, something that we must work to avoid. When we are teachers however, we will use a student's intelligence profile for the best interest. We will harness the students most dominant intelligence in order to propel the student into success. By studying the chart of high-achieving people facing personal challenges we can see that people are able to work past their inabilities and become successful.

MI Chapter 8

I do not want to run into the same situation as described in the beginning of the chapter with me having to yell. We were offered a variety of ways in which we could grab the attention of our students. The other area that attention is needed is when making transitions, to lunch, to break and to go home. Allowing students to help come up with the classroom rules serves to enforce their knowledge of them more. It's difficult to list all of the great ideas that this chapter offers in order to manage behavior and help form groups, but there is a ton of great ideas in here.

UbD and DI Chapter 8

When we are grading and reporting achievement of our students we must balance the desire to encourage and be advocates for the students we teach, and the obligation we feel to meet the perceived dictates of the grade book and report cards. The backwards design model applies just as well to grading as it does to instruction. The first part is to clearly identify the goals and to then make sure that grades reflect how well a student reached those goals. This section also reminds us that the grades should not have on base on arbitrary norms, and that there is no need to include everything in a grade. The actual grades that are given, the ones that count should be based on achievement, other factors can be reported or filed separately. Once we begin using the backwards design model to teach, using is to assess will come naturally.

MI Chapter 14

The last chapter basically just through a wrench into everything. Howard Gardner defines existential intelligence as "a concern with ultimate life issues." The existential intelligence has not yet been included in the line up because it does not quite fit perfectly with his criteria, nevertheless, we still need to be aware of it and prepare some possible applications. Something that is constantly reiterated is that the intelligence need not be associated with religion or any type of spirituality. In the realm of history education, it is suggested that it is almost impossible to teach history without running into some sort of issues surrounding religion. An understanding of existentialism is important when discussing cultural and political shifts in geography.

MI Chapter 13

The focus of this chapter is to tell us about the application of MI theory in computer technology, cultural diversity, and career counseling. There are software programs that are designed to interface with any of the eight intelligences. As we have been learning in class, with technology we can create projects that incorporate all intelligences. "According to MI theory, an intelligence must be valued by a culture in order to be considered a true intelligence." Different cultures place a different degree of importance on each intelligence but all cultures have and use all eight. "If students are exposed from an early age to a variety of adults demonstrating real-life skills in all eight intelligences, they will have a firm basis on which to launch a career once they leave school." It is important that when doing this what we do not attempt to match a child's proclivities to a career.

MI Chapter 7

This chapter is about the multiples intelligences and the ecological factors in learning. What I took out of this was a guide to making sure that the classroom is a comfortable learning environment for all intelligences. The book suggests using different areas so that will help all the different types of students. The suggestion is to have four different activity centers. The permanent open-ended activity center where to specific tools for each intelligences would be kept throughout the school year. A temporary topic-specific activity center would change frequently depending on the unit of lesson. For a temporary open-ended activity center you might set up a quick activity for each intelligence in order to introduce a topic to your students. The permanent topic-specific activity center would be used for year long themes and the idea is a little difficult to grasp for me. The idea of these "activity centers" is foreign to me, right now I can't see myself using it, but as the chapter explains, there needs to be a fundamental change in how we picture classrooms.

UbD and DI Chapter 9

Chapter nine served as a summary of the backwards design model, and understanding by design. It offers some examples of a unit and a performance task, this was helpful since it put in context what all this work has been for and I hope that my units and lessons can look like this. The chapter then goes on to discuss how we go about applying the knowledge we have taken in. A classroom that follows this model will be one that is engaging where all students learn. The chapter leaves us with the idea that being able to apply the information in this book won't be easy and we cannot expect to be experts right away. What makes a good teacher great is being able to adapt to the conditions presented to them. It left a little more excited about actually becoming a teacher.

MI Chapter 6

As we should have learned by now, there is no one set of teaching strategies that will work for all students all the time. Armstrong presents us with forty teaching strategies in this chapter, five for each intelligence. It is difficult to condense all of these guides into a small chapter review so I'll just list them. Linguistic intelligence is usually what teachers find easiest to teach to since traditional teaching methods usually cater this type. Logical-Mathematical intelligence is traditionally restricted to math and science courses, the critical thinking movement has helped change this though. Spatial thinking for some is the most untapped resource, it is present in more people than we usually think. Bodily-Kinesthetic learners can show answer by using their body as the medium, since our bodies are always with us, it is important to use it as an instruction means. People with a musical intelligence can often use music to memorize things, I had a hard time uncovering however, how learners are able to go in depth into a subject. The best strategy to help interpersonal learners is to allow them to bounce ideas and topics off other people, they have been helped a great deal by collaboration. Intrapersonal learners need to have come time to feel like they are alone and to reflect on ideas deeply to themselves (like me). Anything that we can do to either bring our students outside, or bring the outside in, will help naturalist intelligences.

MI Chapter 5

This chapter seems to reiterate a lot of what we have already learned. Part of what MI theory is what good teachers have been doing for ages, the methods should go beyond what students see in the textbooks and the blackboards and cause the awakening of students' minds. Instead of using a flavor injector to insert herbs into parts of the Turkey, heat the bird up so it can acquire the flavors of its surroundings. Pages 40-43 provide more examples of required elements of teaching to different intelligences. After we find what the desired goals for our students are, we should think about lesson plans and units as ways to translate our content into something that can be understood by students who possess all intelligences. A procedure, that looks simple to follow is presented in chapter five. Hopefully I will be able to remember to refer back to this when I begin my lesson plans.

UbD and DI Chapter 7

Chapter seven tells us how to make sure that we are teaching for understanding (something that students should remember for the rest of our lives) instead of memorizing (which may or may not be remembered for more than a week). Many of us experienced the "covering" though process, "we really need to cover chapter 4," or "we've finished covering that so it's time to move on." The key is to uncover material, and go in depth. As we've learned in class, we need to identify essential questions that we want students to be able to answer at the end of a unit. The book offered an acronym to keep in mind when planning what we are going to teach. A theme that was present in this chapter, that I've noticed in most other chapters is that students constantly need to be able to identify how content relates to them personally.

UbD and DI Chapter 6

"The focus of this chapter is instructional decision making in a classroom built on the principles of backward design and differentiation." In order to be an effective teacher we need to be flexible, allow for changes in curriculum based on the needs of students. We also need to learn how to cluster students based on their abilities, both by levels and learning styles. Students need to be able to learn the basics of our content and be able to apply it before they are forced to move onto more challenging situations. Personally, the most important part that I took out of this chapter is how we need to be able to adapt to different situations. The final section explains how it is difficult for teachers to break old habits. This made me thankful that I am able to learn these methods now, when I do not have many preconceptions about how I should teach.

Multiple Intelligences-Chapter 10 Synthesis

We already know that in our classroom we need to create lessons that teach to all eight (or more) intelligences. This chapter tells us that we also need to assess to all of the intelligences and gives us some ideas for how to do that. In our classrooms we will need to be doing a lot of observation. It is important that we keep clear and useful records of student accomplishments and non-accomplishments. When creating the ever popular portfolio make sure not to slip into the easy trend of simply requiring or accepting the easy documents like terific tests and exceptional essays. Have students include a variety of evidence of their own learning in their portfolios.

FIAE Chapter 6

When designing tests, it's important to mix both traditional and not-so-traditional questions and prompts. Interpreting questions would are good examples of constructive response sections on a test. When making a test, act like you are the test taker, the assessment should test how well a student knows the content, not their stamina. A test should not be assessing how well a student takes tests. Avoid giving timed tests, in most cases the restrictions impede accurate data collection since students have anxiety about when time will be up, it becomes a test time management. The most accurate assessments of how well students have learned content are small and given over time. the most important lesson to learn from this chapter is to make test simple and efficient. Students should not get bogged down by the intensity of our questions, and we should not feel burdened by correcting the tests we give.

FIAE Chapter 5

When using tiering we need to emphasize the ratcheting up or down of the challenge of a level in order to match the readiness of a student, the interests and learner profiles should be addressed, but not emphasized. When adding to the complexity of an assignment, or making it simpler, refer to the list on pages 57 and 58 and add or remove one suggestion for each level. It's important to try to pull back tiering gradually. We can using "learning contracts" in order to help tier an assignment for a student, negotiation and then making sure they are held accountable. We can change the excitement level that students feel towards a prompt on for response question simply by changing the words, and be more specific about what we want for a response. To help consider tiering we should think about what we would need to do if all of a sudden we needed to teach our same lessons to students in a lower or higher grade level, there are many ideas in this chapter, too many to synthesise into a blog review this short, so I should refer back to this chapter for ideas.

FIAE Chapter 4

With portfolios, interpretations of students' mastery are more valid, and subsequent decisions we make are more effective. When designing a rubric, there are several factors that must be identified. Chapter 4 gives us directions for how to design a rubric. It is important to decide whether you want to design a holistic, or analytic rubric, a holistic grades the major ideas as a whole, it usually takes teachers less time to grade this way, and we must use more discretion. When designing a rubric it is important to keep in mind what you expect a piece that will earn a perfect grade will look like. Student self assessment is a great way for students to receive feedback about how they are doing. This will aid their learning.

MI Chapter 10

It would be hypocritical to assert the importance of Multiple Intelligence theory and teach using its guidelines, but assess in a non-MI way. To avoid using standardized pencil and paper tests, the best way to assess competency is observation, making sure to keep records. Just as a subject should be able to be taught in eight different ways, it should also be able to be assessed in eight different ways. It is important to allow students to try out different performance tasks to see which ones work best for them. We don't have to teach every lesson in eight different ways, but when developing a unit we should try to incorporate tasks for as many different intelligences as possible. When using portfolio assessments it is important to include allowances for many different types of work to be showcased, and the assessment for the portfolio should no look like standardized test results.

FIAE Chapter 3

It's important to remember to differentiate with a purpose, not simply to say that we did it. When differentiating, it is always important to establish what your goals are first. Do not get bogged down in making sure that students know facts, in differentiated classrooms, the focus is on essential and enduring knowledge. There needs to be three different types of assessments, the pre-assessment, the formative assessment, and the summative assessment, all are needed. Be sure not to over assess your students, it will just be useless. In the best cases, assessment should actually add to the learning. It is not acceptable to ask a student whether they know a topic.

FIAE Chapter 2

"Mastery is more than knowing than knowing information, of course, but is can go beyond manipulating and applying that information successfully in other situations." I found where the six six facets are introduced, and understand the building blocks to reach self-knowledge. Many assignments can show hints of mastery of a topic, but no single one can exhibit mastery by itself. We need to identify the specific criteria that students will need to know before they are able to successfully describe a response to the desired goal on page 15. There is a long list of great resources on page 17 that first year teachers can use to help establish what content is important for their students to master.

FIAE Chapter 1

It is likely that all of our teachers differentiated instruction to us in some way. It's becoming more obvious why it worked because we have discovered more about how the brain works and how people learn in the past twenty years than all civilizations combined. We still are not sure how to apply all of this new knowledge in the classroom however. It's important that we are sure that our students do not become dependent of differentiation, we need to make sure they strive to find what methods work best for themselves, give them autonomy. A student who's instruction is differentiated will still do well on standardized tests. It is important to offer children the tools that they need to be successful. The most important part of differentiation is that we need to have the right attitude about it, it needs to be accepted and embraced.

UbD and DI Chapter 5

This chapter taught me that when profiling a student, I need to be sure to base judgment on a wide variety of factors and not a single test (photo albums versus snapshots). It is important that we test whether a student understands something, not just if they know. We should be teaching so that students understand big ideas. I was introduced to the GRASPS frame, a useful tool. I also learned that it is important to assess before we teach so that we can gauge previous understanding of a topic. It is also a good idea when assessing student to offer choices that are appropriate for the subject being covered, and feedback on these assignment should be given early and often. The most important piece to remember is that the importance of effective assessment lies more in being able to properly assess ourselves as teachers. This way we will not make the same mistakes.

MI Chapter 4

Chapter 4 explains that children benefit from instructional approaches that help them reflect on their own learning. It is important for students to know about the MI theory so that they can see how they use their different "smarts." Students can be introduced to the MI theory easily, using the author's instructions. The eight intelligences can be taught in a variety of ways. Some ways that stuck out at me the most is to do a marathon using all eight intelligences. The other one was the method using tables that require students to use a different intelligence at each table. This one stuck out because it triggered a memory of me doing this in first grade.

MI Chapter 3

For most students, by the time they begin school they have developed "inclinations of preferences for learning styles. Two great ways to identify a student's proclivity are to observe how the student misbehaves and what he or she does during their free time. It is important to develop a sort of profile of each of my students. I can do this be looking through school records, pay special attention to reports by kindergarten teachers. Some of the best ways to find out more about a student's different intelligence inclinations is to talk to our colleagues. Parents are one of the best sources for information about the children. It is a good idea to introduce my students to the idea of multiple intelligences and for them to recognize some of their own preferences.

UbD and DI Chapter 4

It is important that we as teachers recognize that learning has more to do with the ability to organize and use skills than the retention of data. It is important that I recognize that I am directly responsible for the success or failure of a learner. Teachers should see themselves as catalysts for powerful and engaged learning. We do this by identifying to ourselves, and our class, clear goals of what students should know. We should strive to know everything about all of our students. It is important for teachers to establish high expectations for how smooth a classroom should run and we should have a large repertoire of instructional methods.

UbD and DI Chapter 3

This chapter taught us all about the backwards planning model. The model was created to help teachers solve the problem of having too much content to teach in too little time. States and other administrative units attempted to remedy this problem by identifying standards that students must meet, the result was that teachers taught facts and specific content for students to memorize. Facts and content should be used in exploring and applying larger ideas. A solution to this problem is the backwards planning model, where I should identify desired results, determine adequate assessment, and plan instruction to meet these needs. By using the backwards planning model I should be able to avoid committing the "sin of coverage." The template used in applying the backwards planning model make unit designing look easy. It is important that we only differentiate instruction and that we do not change the needed criteria for students.

UbD and DI Chapter 2

The key idea to take out of this chapter is that the student needs to remain to focal point of teaching. We as teachers need to remember that the best assessment of our instructional techniques is how successful our students are. The lessons of this chapter will remind me that I need to be open to changing assignments and curriculum. Flexibility is important. We need to keep in mind that the responsibility of a teacher is to provide links between students and our subjects, it does not work to force feed curriculum down a student’s throat. Something I have been worried about when talking about differentiation is the feasibility of creating individual plans for every student. This chapter taught me that differentiation is not the same as individualization; we need to find instruction patterns that fit many student needs. While I am designing a curriculum I need to keep in mind that it is gong to be taught to actual human beings.

UbD and DI Chapter 1

The diversity of the students in classrooms across America is changing in almost every way. As teachers we need to use both Understanding by Design and Differentiated Instruction in order to maximize learning. The chapter tells us students that teachers do not find it satisfying to simply serve up a curriculum without regards to who it is that they are teaching. In classrooms that promote effective learning teachers are sure to attend to the question of who they teach, where they teach, what they teach, and how they teach. If any of these elements are forgotten then the quality learning is put into jeopardy. To summarize UbD simply, it is the elements of what we teach, what assessments we us, and what curriculum design model we use. UbD would be ineffective without DI, which relates to who we teach, where we teach, how we teach, and finding an effect process to make sure that everyone learns instruction. What I got out of this chapter is to constantly remind myself to be checking that I am fulfilling the elements to provide effective learning.

MI Chapter 2

It is important to understand what intelligences may be strongest in each of us. This way, we can understand what biases we may posses, and can understand its effect in class. If we are lacking in a certain intelligence there is a variety of ways to make sure that our students do not suffer for it, such as collaborating with other teachers, asking students for help, and using technology. Ideally though it would be best to develop our intelligences that we may be lacking. There are many factors that decide which intelligences are developed and which are lacking in an individual. It should be a goal of teachers to create more “crystallizing” experiences than “paralyzing” for our students.

MI Chapter 1

Chapter 1 of Multiple Intelligences introduces us to Howard Gardner’s belief that society as a whole used to define intelligence too narrowly. When identifying intelligences, he was sure to clearly distinguish them from talents, skills, and aptitude. The chapter used the example of savants as support for Gardner’s theory, these are people who seem to have one highly developed intelligence and a lack of some others. I was taught about the eight different intelligences, this should give me an understanding of the theory and help me recognize what intelligences are strongest in my students. Gardner believes that everyone possesses all eight intelligences, but in different levels. Everyone is unique in their levels of each intelligence and how they interact with each other.