Ashley Rogers - AEDU 335 Teaching in the Middle Grades

I found this week's reading especially interesting because I LOVE talking about culture.  In my previously contexts, it's always been around "corporate culture" which I find such an important topic, so I loved seeing how it translates to schools as well.  Part of my own personal reasoning for leaving the corporate world is because of the corporate culture.  The corporate culture of my company has changed drastically since I first began working here over 10 years ago.  When I first started, everyone seemed happy to be at work.  Meetings were joyful and full of support and laughter.  We celebrated success a lot, and successes even included things like birthdays, or service anniversaries.  But through the years, and with the enhancement of IT, more and more people have been laid off from their jobs, meaning we're working with less people to do the same amount (if not more) work.  It's stressful, and exhausting, and because of the fear of being let...

I'll be honest, when I first heard the term "differentiated instruction" I did assume it was very similar to individualized instruction, which to me, does sound very chaotic.  How could a teacher possibly provide different instruction for nearly every student in the class to meet their needs?  How could this not be chaotic, and how could this be possible in a class that only meets for 40-50 minutes at a time? Both articles actually took away some of the overwhelming feelings that always come up when we talk about differentiated instruction.  I especially like the explanation on edutopia, that described different ways to learn fractions, like watching a video, or cutting a cake (even eating the cake!).  Different instruction can be short, but many different ways to explain/show a lesson is definitely achievable, unlike my previous misconceptions.  This article was also a great reminder that in lesson plans I've written for other classes, I've already incorpo...

One of the biggest takeaways from this week's reading both in AMLE and from the Five Key Responsibilities online article, is the importance of working as a principle while engaging your teachers as a team.  AMLE discusses the importance of a shared vision, and from personal experience, this is absolutely huge in corporate America.  Without bringing people together to create a vision where everyone has an opportunity to participate in creating that vision, it can not be successful.  People need to know they are a part of something in order for them to buy in.  If they, in this case, teachers, participate in building a mission/vision statement for a school, then they feel their opinions are valued, their voices are heard, and they are a true part of a team, and therefore more willing to work together and support one another, rather than making it a competition against one another.  The best meetings I've ever run during my time at Kellogg's have been those that...

My favorite part of this week's reading was the "In their own words" section of the online article, "Middle School - Are they ready to move up?"  I thought the teacher advice was great, but I really enjoyed reading the advice directly from the students.  It put into perspective their needs and wants for their teachers, and I found a few pieces of advice in particularly touching.  The one piece of advice that really stood out to me, and will probably stick with me for awhile, was: "I would really, really like it if my teacher would call home for a good thing that I do. My dad never seems to realize any good thing that I do; it’s like he’s blind. So if my teacher, instead of calling home whenever I do a bad thing, she would sometimes call home and let my dad know that I actually try hard, then I would do better.” -- Amelia I do believe this could become a huge undertaking - trying to call every parent expressing something really positive or good about ...

The readings for week 1 provided an introduction to the history of middle school and how it was developed.  It also expressed the importance of middle school education, as well as major goals for this grade level of students. Students at this age are experience a great amount of physical and cognitive development.  According to the textbook, This We Believe, "Young people undergo more rapid and profound personal changes between ages 10 and 15 than at any other time in their lives" (AMLE, 2010, p.5).  Infants also go through an extensive amount of change at this time, but they are not aware of themselves.  Within middle school, there's a huge amount of variability among students of the same gender and ages.  Everyone is developing at a different pace, some much sooner than others.  The first time I ever really witnessed this myself as an adult, was when I recently observed at a high school earlier this year.  I visited a freshman intro to business ...