Last week the class went on a trip to the everglades. This week Skarlot presented our Standards Triple Venn Diagram. She tells me that the class was very happy with our research. The National standards are very basic and easy to understand. The sunshine standards have become more lengthy, but they are also more specific and better to set as direct goals.
My hours at Miami Senior High are getting more intense. Working with my cooperative teacher Ms. Delgaudio is a delight. She has given me a lot of room to interact with the students. I've recognized a student with an articulation disorder, I'm helping a young girl with her self-esteem and I'm going to work with a tactile learner that I also discovered. The students are in an ESE gifted class, 6th grade Biology.
Ms. Delgaudio has a 4 year degree in Biology and tells me that she is amazed with all the Pedagogy Miami-Dade College Students are given in this program. She tells me that it was much harder for her and Mr. Fernandez because they never took education classes, but were expected to come up with a way to teach from the get go. Ms. Delgaudio is loved by all her students. There are students in her classroom that have been students of hers since earlier grades. She is really someone I look up to and hope to be just like her.
Friday, February 29, 2008
Monday, February 11, 2008
Brave New World
Dr. William Schmidt, the director of TIMMS, was in a video we viewed in class, today. The Educational System is being questioned by the Director of TIMMS. The interesting part is that the educational system has been questioned by parents throughout all of United States of "American History." We blame it on the free market and publishing companies that sell useless mediocrity on both paper or software.
As teachers we protest against education being reared to meritocracy. Meritocracy is elitist and divergent on our number one goal: creating civilized people in a free society. We may be a country that may seem to not be up to par with Japan or Germany, but that is not so. Our students have choices. They don't go to our schools because they are afraid to die of hunger or go to jail. They go to school because they want to learn to be leaders and find happiness in a world they were given to live in. We are a humanistic country and we teach everyone, not just one group of people.
What we need are good nationwide diagnostic tests. We want to help our students achieve as much as they are willing to go. Instead, we are forced to dwell in self-pity, wait for an answer or disagree on those we make. We either unite as a global community or we stagnate as sectoral worlds with potential, but no with no performance to convey it.
As teachers we protest against education being reared to meritocracy. Meritocracy is elitist and divergent on our number one goal: creating civilized people in a free society. We may be a country that may seem to not be up to par with Japan or Germany, but that is not so. Our students have choices. They don't go to our schools because they are afraid to die of hunger or go to jail. They go to school because they want to learn to be leaders and find happiness in a world they were given to live in. We are a humanistic country and we teach everyone, not just one group of people.
What we need are good nationwide diagnostic tests. We want to help our students achieve as much as they are willing to go. Instead, we are forced to dwell in self-pity, wait for an answer or disagree on those we make. We either unite as a global community or we stagnate as sectoral worlds with potential, but no with no performance to convey it.
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Exuberant Liberty
I had forgotten how stimulating Professor Marlene Morales' class discussions are. On Monday evening, Professor Morales asked us to group in pairs and merge our responses from the prompts we were given last week. I worked with Joshua "Josh" Williams. Josh came up with great answers and both our list of responses seemed to complement the other. The conversation on the job of a teacher was pretty cut and dry: we both agreed that the teacher should be a facilitator, follow the curricula and adhere to our role as Parenti Loci.
We never discussed our views of the Sunshine Standards and National Standards with the class because we wanted to wait for more information that will be presented next week, but we shared opinions on the idea of state and national standards. My view was that well-defined standards can be used to show the credibility of our Great State of Florida and dismiss any myths about the education level of our people. I told Josh how I felt that National Standards can be used to foster equity. During the mid 20th century, the federal government produced such authority in the southern states that suffered from the remnant of segregation. Professor Morales came over to us and reminded us of the attitudes, views and values of the people that reside in Florida. This past of the activity proved valuable as later on Professor Morales discussed NAEP and other assessment entities.
Professor Morales acknowledged our efforts and presented us with data from TIMMS and a video clip of Harvard graduates and another video clip of a behavioral experiment done on an elementary school classroom. The TIMMS displayed how the U.S. was not in the lead when it came to Science and Math. Our discussion became very heated when we talked about why we thought this was so. My good friend, Monica Bove pointed out that third world countries scored better than our own. This reminded me of the fact that the clergy make vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. By doing so, they have the time to tend to their labor: evangelizing, organizing activities; and, most relevantly, studying medical procedures, languages, music, philosophy, mythology, sexuality, history, geography, laws and pedagogy.
I pointed out that people who have less things to entertain themselves with and are hungry tend to use education as an escape from their reality. Monica disagrees. The fact of the matter is our assumptions are one thing and the findings are another. As she, I still have curiosity on why the U.S. is not a high contender on the TIMMS assessments.
Both video clips were interesting and corresponded well to our daunting question. The video showed how common misconceptions can lead the most bright to false knowledge. Whether it's Harvard University graduates or fourth graders, our students collect ideas in a way that stays in their long term memory and hinders their education. I see the problem in lack of diagnosing. But, can we create a database of questions to fully diagnose the fallacies in their reasoning? How to correct it is another issue on its own. In class, we agreed that, as teachers, the least we could do is prevent from being an additional source of misconceptions to our students.
APA Citation:
The Evangelic Counsel. Retrieved on February 5th, 2007. Source:
The Franciscan Archive. from
http://www.franciscan-sfo.org/fw/Ecounsels.htm
Hynes, G.C. A Biographical Sketch of W.E.B. DuBois. Retrieved
on Retrieved on February 5th, 2007 from
http://www.duboislc.org/html/DuBoisBio.html
Loewen, J.W.(2001). Book Reviews: Lies My Teacher Told Me.
Retrieved on February 5th, 2008, Eric E. Enders Web site:
http://www.ericenders.com/books2_lies.htm
The Nation's Report Card: National Assessment of Educational
Progress: NAEP. Retrieved on February 5th, 2008 from
http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/
St. Dominic C.S.S. Courses. Retrieved on February 5th, 2007 from
http://dom.smcdsb.on.ca/courses.htm
We never discussed our views of the Sunshine Standards and National Standards with the class because we wanted to wait for more information that will be presented next week, but we shared opinions on the idea of state and national standards. My view was that well-defined standards can be used to show the credibility of our Great State of Florida and dismiss any myths about the education level of our people. I told Josh how I felt that National Standards can be used to foster equity. During the mid 20th century, the federal government produced such authority in the southern states that suffered from the remnant of segregation. Professor Morales came over to us and reminded us of the attitudes, views and values of the people that reside in Florida. This past of the activity proved valuable as later on Professor Morales discussed NAEP and other assessment entities.
Professor Morales acknowledged our efforts and presented us with data from TIMMS and a video clip of Harvard graduates and another video clip of a behavioral experiment done on an elementary school classroom. The TIMMS displayed how the U.S. was not in the lead when it came to Science and Math. Our discussion became very heated when we talked about why we thought this was so. My good friend, Monica Bove pointed out that third world countries scored better than our own. This reminded me of the fact that the clergy make vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. By doing so, they have the time to tend to their labor: evangelizing, organizing activities; and, most relevantly, studying medical procedures, languages, music, philosophy, mythology, sexuality, history, geography, laws and pedagogy.
I pointed out that people who have less things to entertain themselves with and are hungry tend to use education as an escape from their reality. Monica disagrees. The fact of the matter is our assumptions are one thing and the findings are another. As she, I still have curiosity on why the U.S. is not a high contender on the TIMMS assessments.
Both video clips were interesting and corresponded well to our daunting question. The video showed how common misconceptions can lead the most bright to false knowledge. Whether it's Harvard University graduates or fourth graders, our students collect ideas in a way that stays in their long term memory and hinders their education. I see the problem in lack of diagnosing. But, can we create a database of questions to fully diagnose the fallacies in their reasoning? How to correct it is another issue on its own. In class, we agreed that, as teachers, the least we could do is prevent from being an additional source of misconceptions to our students.
APA Citation:
The Evangelic Counsel. Retrieved on February 5th, 2007. Source:
The Franciscan Archive. from
http://www.franciscan-sfo.org/fw/Ecounsels.htm
Hynes, G.C. A Biographical Sketch of W.E.B. DuBois. Retrieved
on Retrieved on February 5th, 2007 from
http://www.duboislc.org/html/DuBoisBio.html
Loewen, J.W.(2001). Book Reviews: Lies My Teacher Told Me.
Retrieved on February 5th, 2008, Eric E. Enders Web site:
http://www.ericenders.com/books2_lies.htm
The Nation's Report Card: National Assessment of Educational
Progress: NAEP. Retrieved on February 5th, 2008 from
http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/
St. Dominic C.S.S. Courses. Retrieved on February 5th, 2007 from
http://dom.smcdsb.on.ca/courses.htm
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