Strategies for Facilitating Student-Centered Discussion

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As we have discussed across your block courses, effective instruction is student-centered, engaging, and empowering.  The block instructors want to assist you in filling your toolbox with practical strategies to create this type of interactive classroom setting!  In addition to the small forest handouts I gave you in class today, here are a few resources:

Here is a link to a blog post with an excellent list of research-based best practices for facilitating effective classroom discussions.

Here is a link to "Kagan Structures: A Miracle of Active Engagement," a brief article that provides an overview of the basic research/theory underlying active discussion and presents six strategies. (Dr. Wilcox mentioned the great success of a teacher professional development based on the Kagan strategies, during his visit with us this week.)

Student Blog Sharing

Please share your blog web address (http://...) in the comments below.

New to educational blogging? A few considerations

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For many (all?) of you, this will be your first attempt at writing in the form of a blog.  While blogs exist for numerous purposes today, educators typically use blogging as a platform to do one or more of the following:  Engage students in learning/reading/writing, share about class content/activities with students/parents, share resources with students and/or other educators, and share personal opinions related to educational issues.

A few rules for the road to make your journey into blogging a little smoother:

• Make your title both catchy and professional.
• Use formatting to enhance, not distract from, your message.  A few common mistakes to avoid: Using a dark background with white text (difficult to read); using a complicated font style; using excessive images; focusing more on the style elements than on creating quality content.
• Keep it simple!  One image plus a few short paragraphs of text make for a great post. Depending on your message, quality and conciseness in blogging are often more valued than quantity.  Increase the readability of your posts by using headings, bullet points, boldfaced text, and/or varying font size to emphasize certain parts.
• Always give credit to anything that is not your own creation, including words, ideas, and images.  Use hyperlinks to reference other content/resources online.
• Want to share a document or something you created?  Use free Google Docs/Drive or Dropbox (I'll post a tutorial on this later).
• Most importantly, remember that anything you post online, either personally or professionally, is a direct reflection of your professional image.  Welcome to the world of teaching!  Teachers are held to a higher standard than other professions, as we should be.  When considering whether to post something online, ask yourself if you would say it aloud to a room full of people - because that's essentially what you are doing.  When sharing your opinion, be aware of any biases you may have and whether you are able to adequately convey your intent in writing; some things are best left unsaid.  Also, remember to edit for grammar/style.  Some bloggers prefer to compose in a text editor, such as MS Word, and copy/paste their work into a blog post when they are finished.

In the news...

Here are a few news articles related to educational issues which may be of interest to you.  I encourage you to consider the following as you reflect upon the content:  1) facilitation or hindrance of excellent social studies teaching/learning, 2) your role as a teacher candidate and future educator/leader within the current educational climate, 3) potential creative, practical solutions to the issues and problems presented.

'Exemplary' Dallas school skips science, social studies for 3rd graders (Dallas News, 2011)

Senate begins debate on education law, focuses on testing (Washington Post)

Teacher tells Congress: ‘The federal incentives in education are wrong’ (Washington Post)

Best-of-the-Best Teacher Blogs

Here are some awesome teacher bloggers that you will find interesting and informative!  I'm excited that you have begun this adventure as a blogger yourself, and hopefully these blogs will supply you with both ideas and inspiration for posting.

Venspired
One of my favorite blogs, sure to give you new inspiration and passion for teaching!

Cool Cat Teacher Blog
Lots of great info on educational technology and Common Core.

Web 2.0 Classroom
This guy shares relevant and inspiring info about ed tech, leadership, and other topics.  Be sure to follow him on Twitter (@web20classroom) for your daily dose of professional development and inspiration!

Byrdseed
Links and info about gifted education but relevant for all teachers.

History is Elementary
An elem. teacher shares practical strategies and ideas.

History Tech
A history teacher blogs about teaching history, integrating tech, and more.

Edublogs Best Teacher Blogs of 2012
Be sure to check out The Nerdy Teacher and his concept of "20 time" in his classroom.

Top 25 Elementary Teacher Blogs of 2012
A wealth of good content and creative ideas!

Announcing... Our Class Website!

Visit our class wiki at the link below to access all online resources, instructional strategies, and books for effective social studies teaching shared during our classes, as well as former block students' social studies lesson and unit plans.

http://sites.google.com/site/muwed310/

Want to join so you can add content? Leave your Google account email in the comments. (To protect your privacy, I'll delete as soon as I invite you to join.)

Flat Stanley Project

Visit this website to learn more about how schools around the world are using the Flat Stanley series to make geography come alive!

For a homework assignment in this class, you must mail, email, or photo text the flat version of yourself :) to at least one person outside the state of MS. The person must take a photograph with "flat you" in a landmark location in their town/state and mail/email/text the photograph back to you. You are only required to obtain one photograph, but you are encouraged to get as many as you can! With the speed of email and text messaging, this project should be both easy and fun. Awards will be given on our final day of class to students with the most locations and the farthest locations.

What ideas do you have for using the Flat Stanley project in your own classroom?