Blog Assignment #11

What can we learn about teaching and learning from these teachers?

In the video Making Thinking Visible, Mark Church assigned his students into small groups and allowed them to get together and discuss a video they had watched the day before. The idea of this project is for the class to discuss in their groups their own personal thoughts and opinions about the video and create one head line that summarize what they thought the entire video was about. I really thought this was a great project that would get the entire class active and allow everyone to voice their own opinion. From a teacher stand point, I learned that group projects help students become better problem solvers, better understand and communicate ideas, work together with others, and produce high quality work. Also I learned that the students were very comfortable with working together and sharing their ideas. The important thing I learned about teaching is that it is highly important to incorporate group assignments into my classroom. When done properly, a good group project helps keep the class active while having fun doing so, which is known to help students store facts into their long-term memory and later recall the information when it is needed or suitable in a particular circumstance.

Sam Pane video Super Digital Citizenship was such a great video to watch. Sam Pane was a very fun and energetic teacher that kept his class active with group discussions and the use of technology. During his class lesson he was teaching his students how to use the internet safely. In other words, he was teaching them what information to search for and what information not to search for. Also he taught his students how to evaluate the correct information they are researching and how to be a super digital citizen. According to the video, a super digital citizen is a person who chooses to act safely, respectfully, and with responsibility. I truly thought this video was extremely helpful because Sam Pane taught me that I have to be a fun and energetic teacher in order to keep my class active and make my students feel excited about learning new things or having open discussions in class. Technology is the new way of teaching and all schools are beginning to incorporate the use of technology into their classroom, so teaching these students how to be a digital citizen at an early age is a great way to reflect responsible value.