ED 640 Reflection Blog 4 This week I gave the students a homework where they chose an organelle and had to find 5 facts about it. I have to say that the standard of work was noticeably higher than usual! I also continued the exercise by having students take precut bits of paper and wander the room to look at other students creations and give feedback. They had three bits of paper and had to say something they liked, something they thought could be improved and ask a question on each sheet and leave it with the homework they were commenting on. The whole thing was great! They were positive and constructive in their feedback, we had a class discussion that continued in the same vein, with many students saying that the feedback was spot on, and even in transition to the next portion of the lesson there were students continuing conversations on the exercise. It bodes well for my intention to increase project work, and with it, the discussion within groups that are required for such w
Posts
ED 640 Teaching Reflection – Liam Breathnach It is a strange year in terms of how much is going on with Grad School, little Tommy and keeping going teaching the students, but I am really reflecting on how I can change the normal set up of my teaching to put more onus on the students. I think if I can focus on the skills such as research and note taking then they will be more able to learn the content themselves. With time constraints I am not really implementing new ideas too much but I have a word document set up for recording any ideas for future plans or ideas. This week we had a half day PD day on Thursday and our classes were all shortened. I had not thought about that when planning, so I made a last minute decision to group the students and have them find websites to research organelle functions rather than going through the powerpoint. I was pleasantly surprised how it went! Students were in groups of three with 2 researchers and 1 note taker. I switched the note taking r
ED 640 Mod 4 DB Liam Breathnach I have a student this year who is on the spectrum. While there are students in the school with more severe symptoms, he is the first student I have had in class who exhibited what I understand as autistic behavior. I have been trying to watch him during calls and see what he requires from the environment that others may not. I also have been trying to watch my own actions in dealing with him to try and see how I must appear to him and see which of my mannerisms and traits are helpful or understanding and supportive of whatever I felt was required. He was appreciative when I mentioned any concern I had was social, and that I had felt the need to try and alter his behavior with other students a couple of times. Starting the student had a tendency to call out more than I find acceptable, and has had to work hard when in a group as he found the experience difficult, but maybe not as difficult as the other students! I have been trying harder th
I am trying to more pastoral this year. I have always had a short fuse for some behavior, or at least, “I do not suffer fools gladly” as a good friend told me once. Maybe not the best character trait in this profession, but I am working on it. One other thing that may make me less empathetic than is required, is that I think people need to learn many things for themselves, often through mistakes. I tend to let students make their own decisions and see if they do learn, but the Consequences Reflection is for another day. I have a student who raised his hand the first day when I asked – half in jest – who was going to cause me trouble over the course of the year. He proudly announced there would be times when his fidgeting got him in trouble. His charming admission had an effect on me, but now we are getting serious. His grades are poor and I have had to speak to him many times, not about disruption but a lack of focus and resulting poor grades. I returned a test today which was a
Think about the inventions and products which have made over lives easier over the years. Look at how our lives have changed and lengthened. How we are closer together with people from all over the world, how we have made the earth smaller, more accessible and more collaborative. Think back! What are the most wide reaching changes Humans have overseen? Fire? Agriculture? Metal working? The Printing Press? Antibiotics? Electricity? All of these discoveries, inventions, whatever you want to call them came from people wondering why and going and trying to figure something out. I believe that everyone is born to do that! Watch your child and tell me they are not doing that ALL THE TIME! Tell me they are not driven by wonder! I wonder what....? What if....? We need our education to get back to that. We may need advancement and invention and thought and design more now that ever1 And who's gonna do it? We need to have our kids think big, aim high, and design, experiment, build, fail,
ED 690 Mod 4 DB – Liam Breathnach Experience with STEM I am currently teaching in a private Catholic boys High school in Baltimore, and there what I would consider, quite a range of classes available in the science Department. Just in the last couple of years we have brought in a Forensics course and are using Project Lead The Way (PLTW) to teach Engineering. The forensics has proven to be wildly popular. The teacher has done a great job and has been very successful in having lots of hands on learning throughout the year. There are regular crime scenes created, fingerprinting labs and study of how glass breaks. I feel this has been the root of its success. The students get to play with bullet casings, experiment with how glass break and learn how blood droplets and smears can help give evidence. Also the teacher has had some guest speakers come and talk to the class about their various fields of expertise in Forensics. The engineering and PLTW has also been eagerly greeted
I really come in on the Science end of STEM. I am not the strongest problem solver and only worked on one major novel research project for a few months while in college but I have always had a great interest in how the world around me works. I was always fascinated by animals and loved learning about the human body. Chemistry could be great fun in school and I found lots of it to be quite intuitive. Physics was quite boring to me (my teacher certainly was no help), but long after college my interest was piqued, and I do read books and watch documentaries about Space and mind bending theoretical stuff. I can appreciate the arguments that Physics, with its Mathematical basis is the central Science. I try to tell people that STEM should reach back to the childhood sense of wonder, and should allow us to ask more focused questions. Kids learn by trying things out and coming up with predictions about what will happen. What parent does not get slain by the “Whys?” and “but Why’s?”. Ther
ED 630 Someone Else’s Kids Liam Breathnach In the book Somebody Else’s Kids by Torey Hayden you are given a viewpoint into a year in a special education classroom with four students. Boo is Autistic, Lori has severe reading issues due to a traumatic brain injury, Claudia is an over achiever, but is also 12 and pregnant and Tomasso is a real challenge to Torey with his behaviour. Things that jump out for me when reading the book are the goals that Torey has for the year. Education in the typical sense takes a back seat to the overall well-being of the children, and Torey spends time making sure they are learning how to deal with their issues. The foundations of their education are learning how to handle themselves in a way which will allow them to function in the classroom. That moves the goalposts from the requirements in a regular classroom. Through conflict between Torey and Lori’s regular classroom teacher, we see that not everyone is capable of, or wants to make this c
It is Federal Law in the United States that students with disabilities have an equal opportunity for a free and appropriate education (Snowman and McCown, 2015). However, this does not mean the same thing for everyone. Disabilities vary and not all of them will qualify an individual for Special Education. This is where the 504 plans come into play (Understood Team, n.d.). Students with one of 13 specified disabilities or conditions which affect their ability to be taught successfully in general education are mandated to receive Special education by IDEA, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act which first appeared in 1975 as the Education for all Handicapped Children Act. The 13 conditions range from Autism, Hearing or Visual Impairment to Specific Learning disabilities, Traumatic Brain Injury and Emotional Disturbance, amongst others. If you suffer from one of these condition to the point it has an adverse impact on your learning, and you need specialized instru
Special Education Issues Liam Breathnach Check out the Special education timeline attached… http://www.timetoast.com/timelines/1553953 Special education is a topic of much debate. Anyone who knows anything about kids knows that they are all different, and have varying abilities and experiences. Teaching everyone in the same manner and hoping for a consistent outcome is doomed to fail. Modern education works is designed mainly for students within a ‘normal range” but compulsory attendance means schools must accommodate students beyond the norm (Snowman & McCown, 2015). Special education came into being in the middle of the last century due to pressure from public advocacy groups. Teachers began to be trained and after some Supreme Court decisions in the nineteen fifties students with special needs gained the same rights to education that everyone else had. When IDEA, Individuals with Disabilities Education Act was enacted in 1972, schools were required to provi
Heres a link to a presentation I made with friends Tania and Julie on the Carl Hiassen Book Hoot! Enjoy... https://docs.google.com/ presentation/d/ 1reumFApc6W2ybyYmJlEykxoSihxH3 pt8u5fo9zxbjuc/edit?usp= sharing Thanks Liam
ED 625 Literacy Tool Modeling Liam Breathnach In this assignment I will be working with Mindomo www.mindomo.com . The program helps students with the construction of diagrams and flow charts. These tools can help differentiate the way students visualize, link and therefore retain material. The interface for the tool is clean and simple. I found the tools to be quite easy to gain some mastery of. There is a tutorial linked here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmLcA13bsqg . The opening allows for a number of prepared templates, and you choose which basic one you wish to work with. Each heading allows you to drag from it and you can write your sub points or subtopics by clicking on each new opening. You have a tool bar for each which allows you to change shapes, colors, trim, fill and the other usual toys you see in programs like this. I do like that is a similar program to other ones people are likely comfortable with. Bits of Word or Photo Editing programs look similar an