104, Assignment #2

Understanding By Design: The 6 Facets of Understanding

This chapter provided a good opportunity to reflect, as well as step back and re-examine my own teaching. It was interesting to think about my own teaching through the 6 facets-- different perspectives that I had not considered overwhelmingly applicable previously. We talk about empathy so much in class-- but the idea of applying it in a more academic context added a whole other dimension.

Certain perspectives are more strongly evident in my class--- explanation is becoming a bigger and bigger piece, for example. The more I get to know my students, the more I realize how much some of them need the 'who, what, where, when, why.' After reading this, I decided to teach a mini-lesson on this today, and I'm so glad I did. We are working on questioning anyway, through our Interactive Journals, so it definitely dovetails with objectives. Thinking deeper, more critically, etc is going to be a big focus for me in the upcoming months, and I'll be looking for activities and ideas that push higher understanding of deeper concepts. I've already been thinking about doing watermelon vs. seed in terms of writing, but I know that there will be other ways to incorporate/push my students to work harder in Science, spelling, etc.

I think this article was also a good reality check in terms of the explanation piece. I'll totally admit that sometimes, when I heard "Why?" or "How?" too many times, I'll tell my students that I'll just explain it later-- and often, I never do. This week, I had more than a few students who needed extra help approach me with "... but you promised you'd help me figure that out during afterschool program." Since my meeting schedule really keeps this from being possible, I think I need to learn how to give them really strong, good, succinct explanations 'on the spot'... they definitely deserve them.

There are other facets that we are working on pretty deeply right now too. For example, interpretation is big for Reading Comprehension (especially in my Group 2 for Guided Reading... I know a deeper understanding and the ability to interpret what they are reading will help them boost up on DRA). The text-to-life or text-to-self connections are big in our reading groups currently. Application is kind of spotty for me, but this week I am really trying to be consistent with them, following through... what they learned today should carry into their writing on Friday. Building a logical path for them to see this learning is one of my goals for this weekend, and may come through our 'Investment Strategy' (Passports to Learning). Perspective is tough for my students, aside from the occasional "You can do this different ways" or "X might look at this differently, but it doesn't make his answer wrong" discussion. Those do happen, definitely... but I wouldn't consider this a strength of my classroom at all yet.

Empathy tends to come in more in terms of the Core Values, and I'm pretty proud of my students abilities to be empathetic. I have only had one incident of outright one student being mean to another student, and I think it's because I stress empathy. They are first graders, they still cry, and there is always someone around wanting to give them a hug, help them out, etc. They're pretty sensitive to all of this. The idea of 'empathy as a way to insight' seems to kind of tie into the idea of perspective. I want to work on open-mindedness and cultural respect in our classroom (especially since we are doing a big unit on Geography in the spring), so I want to look into this idea more and see how I can work it into my lesson plans, rather than just being part of the Core Values discussions during Morning Meeting or Team Huddle. Self-knowledge is another thing I want to work on-- but I do hope that will come in time, as they become more aware of their own learning.