Group Fun

I really enjoyed this past class where we split into small groups and had a chance to teach each other a lesson about Direct Instruction using Direct Instruction. In all honestly, Wednesdays are looong days for me. After being in charge of a classroom of preschoolers all day, I'm exhausted and generally have no interest in sitting through a 2.5 hour class (as wonderful and engaging as the teacher may be ;).

Having our routine broken up like this was definitely refreshing. It was also interesting to see how all my peers approached their Direct Instruction lessons. My favorite group was Wendy, Sally, Kelly, and Pam (Group #4) who had to teach Drill & Practice. Marching into the classroom while wearing Viking (Roman?) helmets was definitely attention getting! If that doesn't immediately engage your students, I don't think much can! I also enjoyed Dawn, Heather, and Jessica's (Group #1) check for understanding when they were doing their lesson on Anticipatory Sets. Breaking us into small groups so we could brainstorm our own ideas for anticipatory sets on our assigned topic was a fun activity.

I also appreciated the exposure to new online resources that I wasn't familiar with before. I'm definitely a computer geek at heart and know that I'll be utilizing as much technology as possible in my future lessons. Several sites that I wasn't familiar with that I'm excited to get a chance to learn about are Voki, Brainsbuilder, BrainPOP, PollEverywhere, and Scratch. Since I'll be in an elementary setting, a resource like PollEverywhere (which provides the ability to poll for instant feedback via text message) may not be appropriate for my students, it was still helpful to be made aware of it's existence.

While collaborating with my own group (Emily and Susan) I had a chance to use GoogleDocs to gather our information and prepare our presentation. I've had a Google account for several years, but this was my first experience using some of the (free!!) utility applications they've developed. Being able to simultaneously and instantaneously edit the same document was pretty wild! I definitely see more use of this feature in my future!