Cues, questions, and advanced organizers:
In my classroom, I do not use advanced organizers very much. The one why that I do is that the kids all have their own note taking guide in math. this is a workbook type of thing that they have to fill in the blanks as we talk. They have to listen and pay attention to the lesson. However, I fill it in on the board with them using my interactive white board. I think this is a good way to run lessons, but I do not think it is always very clear for them. I think many times that the students get confused by what they need to fill in and what they are trying to learn at the same time.
Non linguistic Representation
In math it is harder to use many non linguistic representations. Some ways I can use non linguistic representations is to have my students identify what fractions look like, how different shapes look, and many other geometry topics. I think many times in math, I used more non linguistic things then I realize. In 6th grade we do a lot with geometry, including shapes, visualizing area, and making scale drawings of rooms.
Summarizing and Notetaking
I teach 5th and 6th grade math. As I said earlier in my blog, I use the note taking guide with my students. This is a place where the students can keep their notes and work through sample problems with me. The kids enjoyed this idea at first. However, many times the kids have said that they think it is really confusing. With this in mind, I have decided that I want to teach the kids how to take notes for the last chapter of the book. I think instead of buying these note taking guides, I could teach my students how to take notes. This will save the district money as well as teach my kids how to take notes. They can keep all of these notes in a notebook. I was thinking of trying the Cornell method of note taking. I will try this in April with our next chapter.
Graphic Organizers:
When looking at the different graphic organizers, there were a few that I liked more than others. One that I liked, thought looked easy and kid friendly was bubbl.us. This website does not have many options. It can become difficult when there are a lot of options for the kids to create their own concept map. Another one that I liked a lot was the Webspiration. This is a great tool to use for writing. The kids can make a graphic organizer using concept bubbles. From here, they can create an outline and write their paper. I think this is a great tool to teach kids how to take their ideas and turn them into an outline and ultimately into a paper. Exploratree is really neat. I have no idea that there were so many types of organizers. I shared this website with the 5th and 6th grade Social Studies teachers. She uses many graphic organizers in her classroom. Lastly, I think Mind Meister is a neat way to keep track of all the links you use when making a graphic organizer. This will help to keep all your links organized based on the topic or part of your graphic organizer.
Hi Crystal,
ReplyDeleteI agree that you probably use more non-linguistic representation in math than you think. Although you work with middle school students, you continue to teach new concepts to them, which are often presented in linguistic and non-linguistic form.
As far as advanced organizers go, have you considered using one to help students attach story problems / application type problems? So often those are challenging because students need to pick out the details and decide what is important and what is excess when it comes to solving the problem. The use of a graphic organizer could help them work through the process and recognize what they are doing to come up with their answer.
Crystal, Keep us updated on how the Cornell note-taking method works for your students. I'm interested to see how that method works in practice!
ReplyDeleteI can look back on my social studies classes and imagine how graphic organizers would've assisted in making class more fun and easier to follow. That seems like an area of teaching that would greatly benefit from the inclusion of this sort of learning technology.