Why did I ask such difficult questions. Somebody slap me tomorrow.
1) That mirror. Silly me. I thought I was getting a coaster. And then I discovered a mirror, and I was in no mood to look at myself. In fact, it was so difficult to look into the mirror, I closed it immediately. I was busy! And thatʻs when I stopped and looked out at the channel. Windy conditions. A sky that was just a little hazy. All that sun. What kind of teacher did I see? Now that I think about it, I saw a busy teacher who was too busy worrying about the flow of an assessment workshop. Of course it would flow well. The same thing happens before I walk into a classroom.
2) Assessment. No real surprises. I like structure and having the SLOs to work towards provides that structure. At the same time, Iʻd like to redesign a few assignments so that they can help students achieve more SLOs at a time.
Did any new strategies come to mind that might help my students meet ENG 100 SLOs? Name specific things you learned or were reminded of about your own teaching/learning.
Actually, the SLO grid we used for the essay exchange made me think about a grid that I include in my syllabus. Instead of listing the SLOs, I create a grid that maps out each SLO with the assignments. Iʻll share. The grid communicates several things with students. 1) I mean business (but Iʻm really so not threatening). 2) The grid makes clear the expectations of the course and the activities that will help students meet those expectations. 3) Iʻm hoping the course SLOs will have more meaning for students.
3) Accelerated ENG 100. Great presentation. Glad to see someone had a positive experience because talking about accelerated courses made many at my table worry about surviving the semester. But like Porscha said, its all about the planning. The discussion made me really examine my course outline -- cutting out and/or compressing assignments made me nervous. Then Krystal said we should have some kind of "warning" for students who take the course. I figured why not. So Iʻll be creating a How to Survive an Accelerated Course tips sheet for my students. Will read the articles Porscha sent us to get ideas -- and of course, Iʻll check out what gets posted here.
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ReplyDeleteI was so enlightened by the many different approaches to teaching that we learned while discussing accelerated courses. I was ready to break down my larger English 100 course and paste it into the time frame of an 8-week accelerated. But when speaking to some other lecturers, they gave me the idea to break down some larger assignments into smaller ones so that students might not feel so overwhelmed. I really enjoyed Porscha's protest music activity and might use that as a smaller assignment to have students learn about literary analysis. I just love all the little jewels that I acquired by talking to everyone! I feel like a wealthy woman now:)!!!
ReplyDeleteShannon Kiek:)
So like I know that this is totally late and I apologize to everyone. The guilt was weighing on me man, but seeing that everyone else is shy about commenting I'm hoping after I post more people will contribute. Come on people! Here are my thoughts from Day 1:
ReplyDeleteTo start, the mirror thing totally took me by surprise. It was not what I expected. I, like Dawn, immediately thought of all the "bad" people in the world that needed forgiveness because of their evil deeds in order to move on and elevate, but to open the envelope and find a mirror was shocking. The day before I had just put down my beloved Nahele, a 17-year old Collie and Golden Retriever mix dog. He was a rock in my life, grew with me from intermediate days and stayed around more so for loyalty than anything else. He was an awesome dog. The mirror activity reminded me of this event. I thought I was handling his death pretty well, but the damn mirror proved otherwise...
Davin's assessment discussion was great for highlighting the "big ideas" surrounding this dreaded topic. As a former elementary school teacher under No Child Left Behind, assessment was something to be afraid of, to begrudgingly commit to and find your ways around for the sake of AYP (adequate yearly progress). Now I am happy to say I do not feel the same way about assessment, it does not scare me as much as it did in my previous life. The SLO assessment we did this semester made me see some of my assignments differently which was beneficial in having them align better with the competencies and for that I am thankful.
Accelerated learning stuffs is always a challenge, but I was happy to see everyone diving into this workshop. I'd be happy to share my former students' letters on how to survive an accelerated course if anyone is interested. Drop me an e-mail and I'll send them to you.
out,
pd