Technology

I liked the stations they did. I thought that they represented pretty well the types of things we might encounter in the schools. We will definitely have to deal with sharing limited amounts of technology in schools where there isn't a lot of money. I think that maybe there could have been a little bit more prompting over there but it was really good. The second station was a little bit more unrealistic cause I doubt that we will be allowed to go crazy and get whatever technologies we want. However, I think that it was a good exercise in getting us thinking about what kinds of technologies we could really use in our classrooms, how and why. It got me wishing I had all the money in the world because if I did I could do so much in my English classroom. The station with Mr. Peabody who hates technology was really fun. It was worthwhile to see how we would react to someone who hates technology. It was interesting to see that we would basically say, that's too bad and keep using the technology in our classroom.

Overall, I thought that the presentation was good. I liked that the focus wasn't on new technologies but rather on things that we will encounter in our classroom and how we might use them.

The only thing I might change would be to do the question and answer session at the end. I don't think that that activity really hooked us into the lesson. I was more interested once we started the stations. Other than that though, I thought the presentation was really good.

Motivation

I really liked this presentation. They did a good job motivating the class to do what they wanted us to, which was a really great way to model what they were talking about. I also liked the idea of stations. It meant that each presenter could talk about what they looked at more specifically, the lass could do more activities and think in different ways. The scenarios were really well thought out. They involved things that we will encounter in a real classroom. It helped to think through ways to make things better as a group. I loved all the websites in the toolbox too. They are very fun and creative and great resources for different things I can do in the classroom. I thought that the rationale the rationale the presenters wrote about all of their stations was well written. I agreed with a lot of what they said.

I learned a lot from this presentation. I didn't realize until after the true false questionnaire how important movement was to keeping students involved and motivated. I began to suggest a lot more movement related activities in the scenarios. I liked that it was modeled in the presentation. The cards were also a really great motivator. It created excitement in the classroom because we got to check out our favorite characters. It would be an excellent way to break up students, get them excited or creatively think about a story or character.

I can't think of one thing that would have made the presentation better. It was fun, creative, and interactive as well as informative. The presenters did an amazing job coming up with resources and making us excited to participate.

Discipline

I thought that Ryan and Sarah did a very good job with this issue. I liked that they had us do skits. It was good to see what things we thought worked and what things we didn't think worked. I liked that we did a good way and a bad way. I think many of the behaviors they picked though are things that we won't see in our school. They were a little to specific. Such as the gambling and the PDA in class. I think the PDA is more likely to happen in the halls and I think the gambling is a little less prevalent. I would have liked to see them give us out some alternative discipline strategies and try them out on common situations. For example it would have been interesting to see how the threat of detention works in comparison to the threat of in school labor when dealing with students who are disruptive. We didn't really get to see common behaviors such as talking when they are supposed to be listening or passing notes or cheating or not turning in homework or skipping school. I would have liked to see some alternative ways of addressing these issues because detention certainly does not work. I think that knowing the history of discipline and where we stand as individuals is important but also would have liked some information on other ways of thinking. They really only incorporated that into the end of the lesson.

The books were also good. That was a good way to show some resources that can give a starting point as to how to handle some sticky situations. And it was enjoyable to mock the out of date ways of thinking.

Multicultural Education

I think the group presenting this topic did a very nice job. I liked that they linked it to literature. Literature is already fairly multicultural in that it tells stories and every story is of someone different. I liked the idea they set up to basically have a debate going on in class over the hottest topics in schools right now. Are gender and sexuality important enough to deserve discussion in school? Is important to learn about religions that are different from our own? Should we be learning about them inside of schools? Is it important to have a multicultural education. I believe the answer to them all is yes.

I think that is the only area in which the debate idea may have failed. I think many people believe that these are important issues because they are aspects of who we are as individuals, one of the most important things we learn in school, but I think that people are touchy on them. I think that is why more people gravitated towards neutral and pro rather than con. We all believe these topics are important but we are not sure they are worth risking our jobs over. At least not at first anyway. I think that this is a sad fact.

Students should be learning about the world around them, and the world around them isn't all white, middle class suburbia. Or for that matter it most certainly isn't the white straight male front that men of the Skakespeare's time and after displayed. This is a world that is diverse and open to all walks of life. Our students should understand all of them. So they understand themselves, and others they will interact with. I wish there was a way to do it without getting someone upset but there probably isn't. Lets face it. Despite how much open our world is now than it use to be, there are still many who are close minded and care nothing about people who are different for them. We are going to have to fight them eventually.