Blog #2 Response

Even in a self-contained class of special education students, there are many levels of abilities. One of the greatest challenges is to appropriately reach and teach each of these levels. Additionally, my students' disabilities vary, from autism, to intellectual disabilities, to emotional disturbances. With these different disabilities, it can make differentiating instruction almost imperative. One way that I do this is through technology. 

Each day, we incorporate the SMARTboard into our lessons via our daily meeting/calendar, handwriting exercises, viewing PDFs to mark up during lessons, and for free time (teacher dimension: by process/product). The SMARTboard allows me to include all kinds of different activities and lessons in a fun and different way for my students. Often times, even if it is something they may not normally enjoy, they have fun because it's on the SMARTboard. If I were just lecturing and teaching in the "traditional method," they don't have as much focus.

Additionally, I have (in the past week) created accounts for each of my students on the website brainnook.com (teacher dimension: by content, student dimension: by readiness/interest). With this website, I am able to assign activities for single students or groups of students. Because of this ability, I am able to differentiate lessons for each of my students, depending on their ability level. Furthermore, my students love the website, since they are playing computer games, but learning about math and reading/language arts concepts. The website also allows the students to send their parents emails with updates about their progress.

Finally, we use Istation at our campus for reading interventions. This adaptive program allows for students to increase their skills at their own pace and ability level. With the results from their assessments and weekly practice, I am able to guide and inform my decisions on classroom small group and individual time.

Blog #1 Response.

A review of "Expanding the Possibilities of Discussion"

Ruday, S. (2011). Expanding the possibilities of discussion:  A strategic approach to using online discussion boards in the middle and high school english classroom. Contemporary Issues in Technology and Teacher Education, 11(4). Retrieved from http://www.citejournal.org/vol11/iss4/languagearts/article2.cfm

1. What are the greatest opportunities and challenges for using online discussion boards in your area? 

Let me first say that I have a very atypical classroom from the rest of my classmates. Teaching in a 3rd grade self-contained special education classroom is very different than even a regular 3rd grade classroom. The majority of my students do not know their letter names and sounds, so writing and forming written opinions are quite difficult. Also, due to their limited ability level, it would be extremely difficult for me to implement this in my classroom or as a homework assignment. The greatest opportunity for using discussion boards would be to get my students actively thinking. This is one of the hardest parts of my job - to get my students to think independently.

2. In what ways could/do your students benefit from the use of online discussion boards? Do or would certain technologies work better for your students than others?

I really liked the quote in the article - Grisham and Wolsey (2006) characterized online discussion boards as “interactive, like discussion, but thoughtful, like written discourse” (p. 652) - because it really emphasizes the duality of discussion boards. My students would benefit from a discussion board that allows them to verbally "write" what they are thinking, thus eliminating the errors from writing, and enables my students with writing difficulties and handicaps to participate as well. Additionally, spelling and grammatical errors would be minimized for greater understanding and comprehension with this verbal discussion. 

3. What are the implications of this strategic approach for our use of Discussion Board questions in class this semester?

I really like the idea of discussion boards because it allows you to process other students comments and then reply. Sometimes in a classroom, certain students monopolize the conversation, you may have a great idea and forget it or get interrupted, and/or you're too shy to speak up. Discussion boards eliminate those barriers and allow everyone to have a voice. Plus, it allows us to write comments and questions when we're available, which could be anytime of day. Ruday stated that responsive instruction can enable the students to consider both the positives and negatives of the use and implementation of technology, much like we are doing with this third discussion question.