Team One

Dear Team One,
Your presentation was excellent. I'm sorry that you didn't have enough time to go as in-depth as you would have wanted. Your activities were fun, even though at times I'm not sure what the author was getting to. It sounds like you really enjoyed the book. You were very patient with the groups also.
The activities that we did in class are some that I would probably use in my own classroom, especially the story writing one. I think it's a great way to get creative juices flowing. The designing activity would be neat to use for learning about advertisement or book marketing.

Thank You.

Sincerely,
The girl who brought up tampons

Team Three

Your presentation was very organized, which I liked. Although the information was frustrating at times, I thought you presented it very well. Simple, yet effective. Kudos. Although I wouldn't necessarily use their specific plan for content integration, I can definitely see the benefits of having cross-classroom projects. I would love to team up with a teacher of another content area and create a really awesome project.

Chapter Thirteen - Outdoor Adventures

A.
This chapter discuss various ways to plan a camping trip, or just a general outdoor excursion, and also the benefits.
R.
I would be all about going to camp with my students. I think it would be best to make it a fully integrated program, not unlike how most summer camps, I'm assuming, are structured. While I really like the idea of integrated learning, I still really feel like student will soak up and remember more content if they know exactly what subject to file the information under. This chapter gave really good examples of what you could do with your students, and it's something I would recommend to others and refer to myself in the future.

Chapter Three - Active Learning

A.
This chapter was about, you guessed it, active learning. The author shared advice on how to keep kids engaged by having them move around during class, both in and out of the classroom.
R.
Another good refresher chapter. After reading it, I actually started going over my own plans for my lessons and making sure I had some kinesthetic intelligence in there. The chapters has some decent ideas, it's now up to me (us) to be willing to try them and spend the energy making it happen. It's a lot easier to just have the kids sit in their seats, in their rows, and take notes all class. Classroom control is always in the back of my mind, and I think it would take a little while to achieve a good balance between going outside, learning and having a good time, and going outside, not paying attention to curricular connections and fooling around.

Student-Oriented Curriculum

Synthesis

Turning Points - Chapter 3 - Curriculum and Assessment to Improve Teaching and Learning
A.
This chapter discusses three important elements of any successful middle school: assessment, curriculum, and standards. Every state (except Iowa) has created standards to match or surpass the federal standards for education. Strong standards are important if you are building lessons and curriculum through backwards design, and also can be a helpful guide for new, or even veteran teachers, when planning curriculum. The chapter goes over a list of guidelines to keep in mind when creating standards such as being clear, accurate, brief, feasible, flexible (albeit interpretive) and assessable. The chapter goes on to show how state standards should be a basis for essential questions, which should be the basis for your curriculum. The last portion of the reading focuses on assessment. Although not an extremely in-depth overview, it does offer the advice to vary your assessment, make it authentic, and valuable.

R.
As a class, we were almost evenly divided between being annoyed that were reading about backwards design again, and thinking that this chapter was really helpful. By reading this chapter. some of us seemed even more eager to get into the classroom to “right” standard wrongs, while others alluded to wishing we could read something brand new and fresh. One student remarked, “I read it I want to yell at the text and say that I know all of this, tell me something new.” We all mostly agreed that even though this is a serious refresher, it’s still important information. As far as assessment, I think we all agreed, as one student put it, that “the real world is not one giant standardized test.” We need to make assessment feel important to students, and show us that they have acquired lifelong skills, not just a short term memory. As students ourselves, we know how frustrating inaccurate assessment can be.