April Sibley

As a 3rd year teacher, I have learned that the students, early on, are just as nervous as I am! I think that when I show my vulnerability but sharing things about me to them, it helps to ease the tension. I make sure to apologize if I make a mistake and the children are very forgiving. Because I teach two of the same classes in one day, I often make adjustments to my 2nd class of the day from the lessons learned from the first class of the day. The lesson mentioned being able to make connections with the… >>>

I often find that the students that are angry are dealing with traumas and situations that we are not privy to. That makes the situation very delicate, but not impossible to conquer. I tend to remove students that provide a disruption that prohibits learning from going forth. I often realize that the other students are watching  and if I do nothing to the student with the disruptive behaviors, then it sends a message that they can too. When it comes to cheating and observing students during an exam, I tend to stand at the front of the class with an… >>>

I have always been told that being firm, fair, and consistent is the key to managing students and expectations. So far it has worked. I can identify each of the different student types that were described in the material. I was drawn to the idea of using the color cards for minimizing the amount of chatter that goes on. I also like the redirection activity of making a center stage student an "observer". This is something that I plan on using because I have several "center stage" students in one of my classes.

I have used a "Getting to Know You" sheet at the beginning of the school year to help me to get to know them and for them to know each other (particularly my 9th graders). I share my sheet with them that I have completed so that they get to know me as well. It was good to know that my syllabus that I have created for my students incorporates visual elements to keep the students engaged with the content. I do like the psychomotor activity and I think that is something that I am going to do with my… >>>

I was amazed to find out that there are many apps available to provide accommodations and modification assistance! This seems like a very good option for students in this day and age since everyone always has their phone in their hand. Identifying apps that are compatible with my lessons and content is something that I would like to implement! I especially like the idea of a text to speech app. A lot of students do not have the attention span that is compatible with reading long passages or copious amounts of notes.

It was surprising to learn that approximately 20% of people have some type of learning disability. That is 1 in 5 which means that in my family of 5 one of us has some type of learning disability! The biggest takeaway for me is the advocacy part. I didn't realize that post secondary education is considered optional therefore any accommodation or modification plans are not required. Preparing my students to be able to advocate for themselves will be something that I will have to make sure that I teach my students how to do so that they know the proper… >>>

This module really walked through the different types of learning disabilities and how they affect cognitive behavior. Too often the students are dismissed as lazy and not attentive to their work, when in actuality, that may be dealing with some type of learning disorder. It was also interesting to learn that a lot of the learning disabilities also co-exist with ADHD. This makes it even more challenging, although not impossible, to come up with a plan to help the students that are affected.

I have learned that the reading process is progressive and in order to move to the next step, the foundations of the previous steps are critical to master. A student that has a learning disability has trouble with each of the steps and can easily become overwhelmed with trying to progress. I was also shocked to learn that 10% of the population has some form of a learning disability. Going forward, I now know more about what the learning disabilities are and am better prepared to identify a possible accommodation to help that student, even if they do not have… >>>

It was an interesting fact that guessers tend to pick "True" 50% of the time. By not only changing the wording, but also requiring the students to provide a quick explanation as to why they picked either True or False, I will be able to better check for mastery and can provide more tailored feedback to their answers.

I have learned that asking "Does this make sense?" or "Are there any questions?" are ineffective ways to identify student mastery. I am guilty of asking these types of questions and will now ask the students the questions that they should be asking me to generate responses and gauge to see if they have reached mastery.