Lesson 4
1. The Jones model, “is premised on the belief that teachers
should not get bogged down in the use of language and negotiations with
students but should use the powers of proximity and vision to assert their
will.” Wonderment: Can proximity and vision be taught or are these
characteristics/capabilities that a teacher is born with?
2. “Classroom life has been compared with the soldier who begins
to suffer battle fatigue - a constant drain of energy.” Wonderment:
Is this why teaching is referred to as being in the trenches?
One unruly student can cause the loss of PAT (preferred activity time)
for the entire class.
3. Wonderments: Is it fair to punish the
entire class for the misdeeds of 1-2 students?
4. Is is really OK to use the “always behaved and
on task students to monitor and pick up the slack of the few misbehaved?
5. Are we further excluding those who already
feel ostracized when we do not give the class PAT for the misbehavior of
the few?
6. Would not the peer pressure and peer disappointment
push them even further on the edge?
7. Does not even the idea of Omission training
exclude the at risk student even further?
8. Is there any data to show how effective Jones’ model of positive
discipline is with the students who fit into special categories (ESL, BD,
LD) ?
9. If teachers rely on the PAT system or reward too quickly do
students learn to rely on the rewards instead of building and intrinsic
motivation?
10. Do older students out grow PAT and see the system as immature?
11. Wolfgang states that Jones draws from the knowledge base research
rom anthropology as a study of animal behavior. This seems appropriate
because in my 14 years many of the positive discipline techniques work
well with developmentally challenged students.
12. Does constantly rewarding students cause them to expect compensation
for everything they do? Will this lead to becoming a lazy and unmotivated
adult?
13. Will limit setting actually cause more problems with students
who absolutely hate to be touched or approached?
14. What if a teacher gives a disapproving look to a student with
self esteem issues? Could the teacher create problems between the student
and herself?
15. “Calm is strength. Upset is weakness.” While I have
found this to be true in teaching, this does not seem to be the case among
peers. Why do students who are not calm yield more strength and power
over their peers?
16. After reading the caution to female teachers to wear high buttoned
blouses so that when she leans over she does not reveal herself, it made
me wonder about the students perception of comfort between male and female
teachers. Do male teachers have a more difficult time “moving in”
and using “proximity” as limit setting techniques?
17. Worried wonderment: Jones suggests not expect too much
help from parent conferences, “Get what you can out of a parent conference
and keep your hopes modest. In most cases it’s cheaper to fix it
yourself.” Will this mind set cause teachers to give up before they
start and can this mind set increase the rift between parents, teachers
and schools?
References:
Charles, C.M. (1999). Building Classroom Discipline. New York: Addison
Wesley
Jones, Fredric H., (1998). Positive Classroom Discipline. New York: McGraw
Hill
Kohn, A. (1996). Beyond discipline: From compliance to community. Alexandia,
VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development
Wolfgang, Charles H.,(2001). Solving Discipline and Classroom Management
Problems. 5th Edition. Wiley & Sons, Inc., New York
(1989 - 2004) - Observations made as a teacher of the sciences at Urbana
Middle School in Urbana, IL.
Lesson 5
1. How does one’s cultural background effect learning? Isn’t
the influence of one’s culture going to sway the learners’ interpretation?
2. How does one include this variable in the assessment of learning?
3. If students create own learning by making sense of their experiences
shouldn’t part of Ed Psych focus on the student’s ability to apply new
knowledge to new situations?
4. Is the stimulus in memory retention the only factor in moving
the sensory information from SM to STM to LTM?
5. How does one get a “non understander” to move toward the transfer
process of information of an “understander”? Stimulus alter punishment?
6. Is it the conditions of learning that create these memory outcomes
or are other factors (such as social conditions) over riding or influencing
the learning process?
7. No matter how the material is presented, doesn’t one’s past
experiences greatly or solely influence information processing and ultimately
LTM?
8. How close is negative - solution transfer (Mayer) related to
or in correlation with Skinner’s findings in regard to his “Skinner Boxes”?
9. Something is a miss with this statement; “It may not be possible
to provide learning experiences that improve the mind in general.”
As an educator, this statement bothered me greatly because it seems contrary
to all the research that shows there is a definite need to build pathways
with young toddlers. We are constantly learning through experience,
so what, other than learning experiences, would improve the mind?
10. The age-old adage we have fun with when we age is that “You
can’t teach an old dog new tricks.” Is there an time during our aging
process when our memory gets to the point where learning stops (excluding
illness)?
11. In all, this material seems to spend more time with what the
learner is learning and not enough time on how to help those individuals
(the learner) actually learn. What techniques can be employed to
help the “learner” learn?
12. Does a cognitive change have to occur for learning to take
place?
13. Within the cognitive approach it states, “the focus has shifted
to the qualitative differences in the learner’s cognitive processing during
learning..” How do you measure and interpret the qualitative differences?
14. Much of this chapter left me deflated. If we have such
a hard time getting learning to take place and transferring knowledge,
don’t we need to teach how to study to move the “learner” toward active
cognitive
15. Dementia becomes an influence in our memory as one ages and
is an unavoidable component of human beings. As our brain grows, are
there other unavoidable components that influence our memory development?
References:
Mayer, R. E., (2003). Learning and Instruction. Merrill Prentice Hall,
Upper Saddle River, N.J.
Shore, R. (2002). Baby teacher: Nurturing neural networks from birth
to age five. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Education.
The National Association of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies
(summer 1997) 1319 F Street, NW, Suite 500. Washington, DC 20004.
Wolfgang, Charles H.,(2001). Solving Discipline and Classroom Management
Problems. 5th Edition. Wiley & Sons, Inc., New York
(1989 - 2004) - Observations made as a teacher of the sciences at Urbana
Middle School in Urbana, IL.
Lesson 10
1. "Being able to solve problems such as these can be taken as
an indication of an educated mind." (Mayer)
I wonder why a person with book smarts (educated mind) often can not
problem solve? Common sense seems to skip a few of the learned.
2. I wonder if a teacher has no problem solving skills how can
he teach those skills to his students?
3. "Yet subsequent research showed that his (Galton) tests failed
to correlate with any practical measures of intellectual ability such as
school grades." (Sternberg, 1990)
I wonder how laziness effects a child's ability to learn?
4. I have had a student who I considered brilliant but still
failed the class because he/she turned in no work. I wonder if academic
grades (not ours of course) are a measure of a student's intellectual ability
or just their work ethic?
5. I wonder how to teach self motivation?
6. I wonder if my trigonometry teacher studied Polya? He
always said (after looking at a problem), "OK, What do you know? and Where
do you want to go?" He also said, "There is more than one way to skin a
cat." But that leads to a whole other set of wonderments!!!
7. "Research on intelligence testing, on expertise, and on cross
discipline transfer all suggests that it is best to have students learn
on problem solving tasks that are similar to the tasks they will be expected
to perform later." I wonder if these researchers were teachers? Sorry
but I want to say, "Duh?"
8. I wonder are not learning styles just as varied as personalities?
Just as we blend discipline strategies should we not account for
students with general mental ability and those with specific cognitive
skills?
9. I wonder where a former student fits in? Prior automatization
theory or constraint removal theory? He could read difficult written
material beautifully and discuss it at any length and depth. He was
extremely well spoken and knowledgeable. He could not however write
anything. He would painstakingly create what looked like three sentences
for a full page assignment and hardly any of the words would be spelled
correctly. They were almost unrecognizable.
10. I wonder if apprenticeship (giving help on higher ordered tasks
not yet mastered) can lead to not being able to problem solve independently.
11. I wonder if good problem solvers rely of special techniques
like mnemonics to help them remember specific "relevant base problems?"
12. I wonder (or wish) if there are plans for the same billions
of dollars spent for head start for NCLB?
13. I wonder if a correlation has been made with those having a
lack of problem solving and higher ordered thinking skills with anger management?
14. I wonder if it was a wonderful teacher early in the life of
a "mediationally deprived" (deprived of exposure to the interpretation, discussion
or explanation of events) child who does succeed in school?
15. I wonder (if even though Blagg's study in 1991 showed no significant
increase in general intelligence, reading, skills or mathematics, but the
student's participation level in class increased after taking the IE training)
if these students had more successful lives in adulthood? Pursued
their dreams?
References:
Blagg, N. (1991). Can we teach intelligence?
A comprehensive evaluation of Feuerstein's instrumental enrichment program.
Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Galton, F. (1883). Inquiry into human faculty and its development. London:Macmillan
Press.
Mayer, R. E., (2003).
Learning and Instruction. Merrill Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, N.J.
Sternberg, R. J. (1990). Metaphors of mind: Conceptions of the nature
of intelligence. New York: Cambridge University.
(1970- 1985) - Observations and experiences made as a public school
student.
(1989 - 2004) - Observations made as a teacher of the sciences at Urbana
Middle School in Urbana, IL.
Lesson 13
Wonderments made while reading Alderian
(Dreikurs) Theory
1. I wonder how compatible these two assumptions are: "Students do
not see the reality as it is, but only as they perceive it to be." and "Students
are rational decision-making organisms."
2. I wonder if once a teacher succeeds in helping a student understand his
own faulty goals and provides new avenues for success, can peers still destroy
the process anyway.
3. I wonder what Ronald actually did to make the girl scream twice
and run out of the room crossing her arms. While I believe that the
teacher effectively diffused Ronald, I would be concerned for the victim’s
self being. Was it sexual harassment?
4. I wonder if Ronald’s teacher is creating a feeling of safety in
the classroom for anyone else but Ronald.
5. I wonder at what age you can permanently change a student's thought
process to seek positive recognition? Behavior seemingly modified in
8th grade often reappears in high school.
6. I wonder in today’s classroom of bigger class sizes, multiple preps
and additional assignments due to budget cuts, when a teacher would have
the time to observe, collect and gather information about the student in
situations involving peers and family.
7. I wonder how closely related helplessness and laziness are.
8. I wonder if following the practices to assist helplessness (private
tutoring, remediation plans, peer tutoring) can lead to an increased learned
helplessness.
9. I wonder (even though I like the idea of class meetings) how today's
administration would take to having routine class time designated for class
meetings, especially with the current major status of standardized tests
and NCLB.
10. I wonder just how truly democratic the classroom and meetings can
be or are they just a tool for compliance.
Wonderments made while reading Glasser’s reality therapy, control theory
and the quality school.
1. I wonder what prompted Glasser to change from his trained Freudian
concepts to “reality therapy.”
2. I wonder if not taking responsibility for your own actions
is a learned behavior from parents.
3. I wonder if it is humanly possible to meet all of the different
student’s needs.
4. I wonder if students would still find a way to “evaluate” themselves
if traditional grades were not used. i.e. Would they still see some
of their peers succeeding while others fail?
5. I wonder in terms of a daily class meeting how can a teacher cover
the required cirriculum with increased stress on the importance of standardized
tests and NCLB.
6. I wonder if the people involved with NCLB have read Glasser..”the
use of standardized tests - especially when comparative scores are reported
school by school .. would be akin to reporting how many hubcaps were
used in the factory, with no mention that the theory X factory was not making
a quality product.”
7. I wonder what would happen to test scores if we let student interests
influence the cirriculum in addition to class meetings.
8. I wonder if Glasser took into consideration the wide range of student
interests and abilities when he says that student interests are not being
met.
9. I really wonder what the student did next when Glasser laid down
the law, so to speak, during his internship.
10. I wonder if the class meetings could be made a part of an elective
class like the problem solving class discussed earlier in Mayer chapter 12.
11. I wonder if I could get my own children’s teachers to to evaluate
their teaching with Glasser’s 10 steps to Discipline.
12. I wonder how I found one of my greatest assets, “ the establishment
of care and warmth as a necessary human prerequisite..” when I know
that few, if any of my teachers back in the day, used this idea.
13. I wonder why even though I try to get to know a student personally,
I sometimes feel my classroom is an assembly line. Students come in
and then they go out.
14. I wonder if it is worth all the effort it takes to teach ownership
of a behavior after Glasser stated that it might, “take months of repetitive
loss of study hall before a student becomes aware of what his behavior is
doing to him.” By the time you start to make progress the year is over.
References:
Wolfgang, Charles H.,(2001). Solving Discipline and Classroom Management
Problems. 5th Edition. Wiley & Sons, Inc., New York
