Category: edci335

Blog Post 4 

The video is a short, thought-provoking video that explores the relationship between a grandfather and grandson. Students may internally reflect on their relationships with family/community members, and the skills they learn outside of school. The video does not inherently provoke students to interact with it, each other or the instructor. Instead, the video evokes sentimentality, and represents traditions that the teacher can help students explore though activities. I propose a Brainstorm Board Discussion.  

Before the activity, the teacher writes discussion prompts and posts them around the room. The teacher could use whiteboards or chalk boards, or use a piece of cardstock for each prompt. The teacher can choose to provide the questions to students prior to playing the video, or reveal them afterwards depending on the class’s recounting ability. 

Ideally the brainstorm board activity allows more students to participate in discussions by reducing anxiety around public speaking, and eliminating discussions formats that only allow one student to speak at a time. The activity also allows multiple discussion to happen at once, so students do not have to wait to express themselves, or cut somebody else off. Students who are confident in voicing their opinions and perceptions will be naturally slowed down as they focus on their own writing, and must read other’s contributions.  

This activity should help students recognize multiple ways of learning, and recognize each other’s life experiences as valid sources of knowledge. It also introduces them to Coast Salish practices and art, and recognize totem poles as meaningful creations.  

Set up for the activity would require minimal work for the instructor; their only responsibility would be to write and post the prompts, and ensure every student has an appropriate writing utensil. For larger amounts of students, the instructor may add more prompts, or post multiple copies of the same prompt so there is more space for students to engage. 

For students who have a difficulty reading other student’s hand writing, or writing for themselves, teachers, EAs or other students can help read and write. Unfortunately, this accommodation would significantly increase workload for supporting adults.  

The teacher may choose to prevent these barriers by using an online discussion board for the classroom, and posting the prompts as main discussion topics. Children can then modify the font within the app, or with a browser extension. Students who are limited by their writing/typing abilities can use a speech to text extension to aprticipate. 

CGI 3D Animated Short: “Totem” – by Ariel Jew 

I don’t think it’s possible to create a resource that is going to meet every person’s needs by design. However, it is possible to create a project that is easily adaptable to suite the skills and abilities of any person. I will focus on possible adaptation to the research stage of our learning design project because it requires the most work from students.  

In the research portion of their project, students will brainstorm driving questions to help guide their research. Creating driving questions will likely be a new skill, so educators should encourage the students to look at the learning outcomes and assessment plans. In this stage students will: 

1. Social Studies 
   1. Ask questions, make and corroborate inferences, and draw conclusions about the content and origins/features of different sources (Social Studies 3, Social Studies 4). 
   2. Use social studies inquiry processes and skills to ask questions; gather, interpret, and analyze ideas; and communicate findings and decisions (Social Studies 3, Social Studies 4). 
   3. Recognize causes and consequences of events, decisions, or developments (cause and consequence) (Social Studies 3) 

2. Ideating 
   1. Choose an idea to pursue (ADST 3/4) 
   2. Generate ideas from their experiences and interests (ADST 3/4). 
3. Applied Technologies 
   1. Use familiar tools and technologies to extend their capabilities when completing a task (ADST 4). 
   2. Choose appropriate technologies to use for specific tasks (ADST 4). 

Learning outcomes 2a and 2b can be achieved through discussion and little documentation on the part of the instructor. However, to asses learning outcomes 1a, 1b, and 1c, we have made the assessment recording heavy. Documentation is important, so children can develop research and analysis skills. Students will need both reading and writing skills to record their questions and answers.  We have planned adaptations for both of these skills. 

Reading Modifications 

• It is possible that one or multiple students in the class may have dyslexia. When using online resources, some find it beneficial to use a browser extensions which make websites more accessible to dyslexic learners. These modifications include changing the font, adding lines between lines of text to help guide readers, and alternating colors between lines or paragraphs. Free extensions include Dyslexia Friendly and Mobile Dyslexic. 
• It is also possible that one or more students may experience a variation of colorblindness. Many kid-friendly sites use colorful text and images to make them more fun or engaging. To combat this, educators can install a browser extension such as ColorBlindExt, which filters pictures and makes color differences more definitive. Students may need assistance when activating/deactiviting the extension. 

Writing Modifications

• Some learners will struggle with typing and/or writing, which bars them from effectively recording their questions and findings. If students have access to a headset with a microphone, they may benefit from using a text-to-speech function to record their notes. 
• Children may also choose to record their research with visuals. For example, they may draw food sources such as salmon and blackberries, instead of writing the actual words. Writing skills are not part of the assessment in this stage, rather recording is. If students can effectively convey their ideas, then they meet many of the learning outcomes. 

This project should be completed at school. Students may also face barriers at home that prevent them from completing external research, just as time or resource constraints. The goal of this portion is not to teach research independence or homework time management. Instead, students will become comfortable with school library resources. 

Direct instruction 

Direct instruction teaching is a “fully guided, [and] teacher led” (Boxer and Bennet, p. 12, 2019) method of instruction. Teachers lead a specific sequence of events, and make learning goals evident to the learners, instead of directing them towards their own discovery. As they design a lesson, the teachers plan to explain, model and demonstrate concepts (Hollingsworth and Ybarra, 2009). Unlike inquiry-based learning, the teacher chooses the content and direction of lessons (Hollingsworth and Ybarra, 2009).  

Engelmann and Steely (2004) explain that if you teach children a pattern explicitly, they will look for it. Explicit instruction, therefore, reduces misinterpretation and ensures that learning is consistent amongst a population. Direct instruction has the potential to more efficiently teach students who are struggling to synthesize information because they can rely on teacher explanations (Steely and Ybarra, 2009). 

As students master skills, teacher can slowly fade away and encourage students to explore the parameters of what they have learned. For example, if students are learning about flotation, the teacher might bring a tub of water and a variety of objects to the learning setting. The teacher will explain that some things, like rubber duckies, float because they are lighter than the water they displace while others, such as rocks, sink because they weigh more than the water they displace. The teacher would then would model their thought pattern by theorizing if the next object, say, a piece of wood, will float or sink.  Students will rely on background knowledge about the wood and apply it to the pattern they are learning. As they make predictions the students know that they are learning about displacement and weight. When the teacher put the wood in the water, the teacher demonstrates how the new skill is applicable to real life. The teacher may guide through a couple more examples then, allow the students to experiment with new objects. They teacher may ask guiding questions to ensure the learners understand. As the student progress, the teacher might then introduce another liquid, such as oil, and ask the students why the oil goes on top of the water.  

Teachers who employ direct instruction techniques frequently use examples to demonstrate what something is, and what something isn’t. Examples make learning more concrete, as children can understand how to apply the new knowledge (Boxer and Bennett, 2019).“Non-examples” (Boxer and Bennett, p. 13, 2019) define the boundaries of a concept so learners know whether or not something is universally applicable. As students become comfortable with new concepts, examples and metaphors guide students to making their own examples and connections, which encourages higher-level processing skills. 

If teachers choose to use examples, they should use common applications so the learning is tangible to the students (Engelman and Steely, 2004). For example, if a teacher sought to teach basic addition, it would make more sense to use dice than to use stars. Students are likely to encounter dice in their day to day lives, and need basic addition skills, however stars cannot be added on a small level, and the students will not need to count stars in their day to day lives. 

Application To Our ILR 

We do not use direct instruction as our primary teaching method in our interactive learning resource, however we do incorporate some key aspects. In each stage, students have full access to the learning outcomes and assessment plan so they can mold their project to suit the needs of the curriculum. The students cannot move on to the next stage of their project if they do not complete the expectation list. If they are comfortable with the tasks, they will not need additional support. However, if they do not meet the expectations the educator can directly support them by demonstrating how to use technologies, or by providing examples of past projects.  

Other than instances that are student initiated, teachers primarily teach skills, not content, throughout the project. Each student’s project is individually relevant, so it is impossible for the teacher to ensure content consistency amongst the students. The final presentation of the project is an open-ended presentation which students create to match the community they researched, so it is difficult for a teacher to provide non-examples. If students are able to justify their choices, the options for presentation are, essentially, limitless. 

Works Cited 

Boxer, A., & Bennett, T. (2019). ResearchED guide to explicit and direct instruction: An evidence-informed guide for teachers. John Catt Educational, Limited. 

Engelmann, S., & Steely, D. G. (2004). Inferred functions of performance and learning. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. 

Hollingsworth, J., & Ybarra, S. (2009). Delivering information to students: explaining, modeling, and demonstrating.  Corwin Press, https://www.doi.org/10.4135/9781452218977.n6