welcome knowing your students: a key component to providing effective instruction brandman...

WELCOME

Knowing Your Students:

A Key Component to Providing Effective

Instruction

Brandman University #EDDU 9324

KNOWING YOUR STUDENTS

Let’s start out with a quick quiz.

Match the following celebrities with their life experiences.


1. Served in the Marines for 22 years.

2. Had a stuttering problem growing up.

3. Was adopted.

4. Was homeless during part of their teenage years.

5. Is a cousin of Jenny McCarthy…Playboy model.


1. Served in the Marines for 22 years.


2. Had a stuttering problem growing up.


3. Was adopted


4. Was homeless during part of their teenage years.


5. Is a cousin of Jenny McCarthy…Playboy model.


So why is this information about each of the celebrities important.

The answer is it depends.

The same is true for all of your students.

We each have had life experiences and some of those experiences have had a profound effect upon us.


How we look at life.

How we behave in life.

The motivation we have in life.

Our persistence or willingness to quit.

The goals we have in life.

How we handle adversity.

How we handle success.


A couple of things to understand about life experiences.

The same experience can impact individuals in different ways.

The same event may trigger one person to work harder…another person to quit.


We all know of the individual who grew up in a physically abusive home and turned into an abuser themselves.

Or the individual who experienced abuse and became a kind and loving parent.


So as we look at the life experiences our students have had, we have to be careful not to project how we would feel or deal with the situation, but be open to how they are dealing with it.

Think of the life experience impact on a spectrum.


Impact of a life experience….

Neutral

Negative Positive


One of Joe’s life experiences and one that changed his life forever was going into the military after high school.

Joe graduated high school with a 1.61 GPA.

Needless to say, he was not a stellar student and universities were not lining up to have him attend their institution.


If he hadn’t gone in the military, he probably would have gotten a low paying job, moved out of his parent’s home and barely made it by in life.

In the military he had the chance to grow up and see what he could accomplish.


Discharged from the Air Force, he graduated from college in 3 years with a 3.8 GPA.

Going into the military was the best thing that ever happened to Joe.

But as we said earlier…it’s not necessarily the best thing for everyone.


At your tables, introduce yourselves and share a positive life experience.

Something that put on the path to success and feeling good about yourself and life.

Let’s make sure everyone has the materials that they need.


For each person at you table.

1. Folder

2. Practicum

3. Data Sheet

4. Information Sheet

5. Brandman Registration

6. Paperclip


Please fill out the Information Sheet.

Attach a check to it with the paperclip provided.

The check should be made payable to:

“The LoVerde Group”

If you are paying in cash, please give it directly to Dante.


If you are using credit from a class you didn’t complete, put “Using credit” where it asks for check number and the name of the incomplete class.


Fill out the Brandman registration form and you can pay by check, credit card or cash.

Those checks are made payable to:

“Brandman University”

Please turn in your Information Sheets with the checks attached!


Important Information:

1. This is the first time we are teaching this class. When have specific information that we need to cover each session. Based upon the amount of information, the questions asked related to that information and length of activities, we have no specific time the class will end.


When we have covered everything we have planned for the day, you will be released.

We will not go past 7:00pm tonight!

My son, Lucas Baken is playing in the Homecoming game at the high school so we will be leaving a little early, and put in a full day tomorrow. Please don’t tell Joe!


2. Tomorrow we will take a one hour break for lunch around 11:30.


3. If you bring a memory stick you can get all the power points from me!

Also, I have a memory stick that you can load on your computer.


5. You can turn in your Practicum in either a hard copy or electronic form.

If your handwriting is an issue, please type the Practicum.

We have had a couple of Practicums rejected because Joe had a difficult time reading the responses.


This class is broken into 2 parts.

The first part is the creation of student profiles that we will cover today and tomorrow.

Turn to page #1 in your Practicums.


You’ll see under requirement #1, that you will need to create a “Student Profile” for 3 students you have in your class.

You will evaluate them based upon 6 of 12 factors we will discuss in class today.


It can be the same 6 factors for all 3 students or 6 different factors for each of the students.

It depends upon what you feel is most important to know about each student.

Also, what information you can gather about a student.


Certain information may be easier or harder to collect.


In our November 6th/7th sessions we will review the “Student Profiles” you have created.

We will talk about challenges you might have had in gathering information and how to address those challenges.


We will also begin to look at the actions you can take based upon the information you have gathered.


So let’s get started today and talk about the importance of information about our students.


Knowledge is power!

Some people challenge this concept, saying knowledge is only “potential” power.

All the knowledge in the world doesn’t mean anything unless you take action upon that knowledge.


They cite examples such as…


One way to validate that knowledge is power is to look at the actions people have taken in the past to keep others ignorant.


Slave Masters understood that their control of the slaves could not be based solely on physical coercion. Knowledge was power, and virtually all slave codes established in the United States set restrictions making it illegal to teach slaves to read or write.


In North Carolina in 1830, a law was passed that prohibited teaching slaves to read, write or math. It was punishable by fines of not less than $100 nor more than $200 or imprisonment.

In terms of today’s dollars, that was almost 6 months of salary.


It also stated that, “if a free person of color is attempting to learn to read, write or learn math, they shall be fined, imprisoned, or whipped, at the discretion of the court, not exceeding thirty nine lashes, nor less than twenty lashes.”


The Taliban's main fear is not drones but educated girls.

-Mohammed Hanif


Individuals or organizations who want to control our thinking, give us only the information they want to, in any given situation.

Or they frame the information in a certain way that will make us come up with the conclusions they want.


This is done by groups both on the left and right of the political spectrum.

Also by companies in commercials that give you part of the information or even false information.


Do any of you use


The Airborne company has had to pay over $30 million in damages for false advertising.

The exact benefits to users of Airborne have never been clinically proven.

STUDENTS

In spite of that, the company that was started by a school teacher and her husband, still has sales of over 70 million dollars a year.

STUDENTS

So knowledge allows us to make good decisions.

Decisions about what to buy, how to live our lives and how to deal with our students.

This class is about using knowledge to improve the instruction we provide each student in our classroom.

STUDENTS

Knowledge about your students allows you:

-Motivate them

-Support them

-Tap into their strengths and minimize their weaknesses

-Help them interact positively with their peers


This and other information will put you in the position to be the effective educator that every student needs.


As we go to gather information, we must be cognizant of several factors related to this information.


1. People aren’t always truthful.

There are many reasons for this.


Students and parents will many times tell you what you want to hear or what they wished had been the truth, but isn’t.

This does not mean they are bad people, they just want to present themselves in the best light possible.

Something most of us want to do!


Others will come up with answers to things they know nothing about.

They simple feel they should have an answer, so they’ll come up with one.


Some project…giving a reason for a behavior that would be their reason for acting that way, but not the student’s reason.

A parent might say their child is acting out because they feel abandoned. When it is the parent who is feeling that way.


There are also those that lie because they are hiding something.

Sometimes this can be something minor, but in other cases it can be something significant.


Not to create any tension in the room, but woman tend to lie more than men.

Example:

When a woman starts a sentence, “I find it funny that……”

It is never followed by something she truly found to be funny.


Don’t be upset with me, Joe created that slide!


Individuals also see things from their perspective.

Sometimes that perspective is not that accurate.

As shown by the following video.


To understand perspective, all you have to do is have a conversation with your siblings about what life experiences you had growing up.

It is interesting how differently they remember events in your childhood in comparison to you.


The important point about information, especially important information about a student or parent, is that you should always seek a second source to verify that information.

One individual’s opinion can be wrong!


For example:

Challenges a previous teacher might have had with a student may be unique to that teacher or situation.

By that we mean…it could have been more about an issue the teacher had than an actual problem with the student.


Or the situation in the teacher’s classroom.

For example, other students who were bothering or egging on the student to misbehave.

It is amazing how some student’s behavior is so different in various classrooms.


Who can you trust…


Trust no one…

How to collect the information we need about each student.

1. Observation

2. Conversation

3. Investigation


1. Observation

We are looking at our students to see:

-Patterns in their behavior

-Congruence between what they say and what they do

-Their behavior in different situations

-The quality and amount of work they turn in


-Their attendance

-Their behavior around peers

-Their personal appearance

-Enthusiasm towards learning

-Extra-curricular participation

-Who they eat lunch with

-Who they interact with outside the classroom


-Which family members do they talk about

-What they are interested in…talk about, write stories about, etc.

-How they approach assignments

-How persistent are they in completing an assignment

-Their organization…desk, backpack,


-How often they volunteer in class

-How often they take leadership roles

All of these things tell us something about the student.


We also look at the parent or primary care giver of the student:

-How they interact with each other

-How each one speaks to the other

-Do they ever touch

-Eye contact with one another

-How positive or negative each one is about the other


-How consistent their stories are about what goes on at home related to such things as reading to the child, meals, time together, etc.

I’ve got a math student named Lakota and her and mom had an interesting interaction with each other in front of me. Each person’s perception was so different!


2. Conversations with the …

-Student

-Parent

-Former teachers

-Other staff in the building

-Coaches, etc. that they might be working with outside of school


Ask questions…

There is a saying…

“When you speak, you hear things that you already know. It is when the other person speaks that you can learn something new.”


Ask students…

What are you best at?

What excites you?

Who helps you with your homework?

What do you like to read?

The questions are endless.


Ask the parents…

What’s the best thing about your child?

Do they like coming to school?

How often to you get a chance to help them with their work?


What does it tell you when you ask a parent, “What’s the best thing about your child?” and they can’t come up with an answer?


The more perspectives you can get about an individual the better.

Ask questions of everyone who knows the child, but be ready to filter through potential situational bias. (lies?)

For example: Divorced parents, attention seekers, exaggeration, or students who dislike the individual.


3. Investigations…

This is you looking at the records that exist related to the student.

Sometimes this is difficult as records can be incomplete.


What you can look for…

-Test scores

-Grades

-Discipline

-Attendance

-Testing (Special Ed., Gifted, hearing, etc.)


Also…

-number of schools they have attended

-court orders in their records…a parent who can’t see the child for example

-other


You may find information in a student’s record that you want to discuss or verify with the student or parent.


Please turn to page #2 in your Practicum.


We are asking you to create a “Student Profile” for three of your students.

No names…simply student A, B and C.

For each student you are to select 6 of the 12 factors we are going to cover today and evaluate that student on those 6 factors.


You do not have to use the same 6 factors for each of the 3 students.

Choose the factors that you feel most impact the student’s success in your class.

Also factors for which you can get the information.

Those can be very different for each student.


Pick students that you feel you can help.

In the next section of the Practicum you will be asked to take two actions for each of these students to improve their academic achievement..


If the students you pick are doing the very best they can, it will be very difficult to create actions that help them.


Understand that the number of factors impacting a student’s performance is endless.

For this class, we have chosen 12 that we believe are some of the most influential.


The 12 factors include:

Copy Please!

-Life experiences

-Triggers

-Academic achievement

-Academic ability

-Learning style

-Support system


-Socio-economic

-Self-esteem

-Values

-Maturity

-Interest

-Physical and mental health


1) Life experiences…

We have already talked about how life experiences impact the individual.

Again, be careful to see how that experience is impacting their behavior, not how you think it should be impacting their behavior.


Examples of life experiences…

-Divorce

-Death…parent, grandparent, sibling

-Poverty…homelessness, living in motels, hunger, etc.

-Constantly moving

-Parent in jail

-Etc.


2) Triggers…

We all have them. Things that touch some part of us that evokes an irrational or inappropriate response based upon the situation.

Who would like to share one of your triggers, so that I know what not to do to you in this class?


Something that should illicit this….


Gets this…


What can your spouse, significant other, parent, sibling or friend say that triggers a response from you?

Depends on who is saying what!

What can they do that is a trigger for you?

What student behaviors are triggers for you?


The bully

The sexist

The racist

The cheat

The liar

The helpless

The manipulator


Which one pushes your trigger the most?

Let’s go back a slide and take some time to rank your potential triggers.

Knowing yourself can be very helpful!


One of Joe’s triggers…and he is working on it…is being late. He hates being late to anything.

So when he is going somewhere with another person and they may be taking too long and might make him late, he can lose his usual wonderful personality with them.

For me, it’s condescension! GT?


When you look at your students, what triggers their inappropriate behavior?

-Someone teasing them

-Someone pushing them into a corner

-Frustration with a particular type of work…art, writing, math

-Working with certain other class members


Once you have identified a trigger for a particular student you can…

-Avoid that trigger, if possible

-Educate the student about their trigger and give them alternative behaviors when confronted with the the situation.

These are the actions we will talk about in the November class.


3) Academic achievement…

Knowing what knowledge and skills the student has and doesn’t have.

This allows you to present work that challenges the student without frustrating them.


This is always a fine line and one that every teacher must walk with each student.

Too difficult and the student shuts down.

Too easy and the student loses focus.

That’s why teachers are awesome!


Who are the students in your class right now that you need to challenge?

Who are the ones that need remediation?


4) Academic ability…

This aspect of the student profile deals with the potential of the student.

This differs from academic achievement in the fact that some students that are working at a lower level on the achievement spectrum are doing the best they can.


They must be encouraged for what they are doing…even if it is below the achievement level of other students in the class.

Which students in your class have potential, but are not motivated or never were taught the skills they need to succeed.


5) Learning Style (modalities)…

We can process information in one of three modalities.

-Visual

-Auditory

-Kinesthetic


Students can learn best by…

Seeing the information

Hearing the information

Physically interacting with the information


For about 70% of students, visual is their strongest modality.

About 15% are strongest in an auditory mode and 15% in a kinesthetic mode.


You can determine a student’s learning style by…

Observing them

-If they take a lot of notes, like to create pictures of things, have to see it to understand it…Visual

-Are good listeners, need to hear the explanation of things…Auditory


-Lots of movement, needs to physically interact with the information, stories must have action…Kinesthetic

There are quick tests and surveys you can have your students take online.

Since you are only doing 3 student profiles, it won’t take much time.


Simply Google…

“student learning style survey”

and you’ll see numerous quick surveys you can give the student in less than 5 minutes.


6) Support system…

Every student needs a support system. People in their lives who love them, provide for their basic needs, provide them with academic stimulation, give them a solid foundation of values and help guide them through difficult situations in life.


This support system can come from a single individual or many members of an extended family.

The most important point is that every student needs one.

Students without support are at a tremendous disadvantage.


Does the child have a caregiving that reads to them?

That shows up for school events?

Checks on their progress at school?

Sends them to school…clean, fed and with the proper materials?

Provides them with a stable home?

Encourages them to learn?


Holds their child responsible for their actions?

Instills a desire to learn?

Models long term vs. short term thinking?

Values education?


Some students need a very large support system.

Others have that single person who made all the difference in the world. My sons love that song “One Man Can Change the World”.

So don’t judge the system simply on quantity, as quality is much more important.


7) Socio-economic factors…

The three factors that are normally combined to define socio-economic status are:

Income

Education

Occupation


These three factors impact…

-Health

-Graduation rates

-Incarceration rates

-Children’s initial reading competence

-Initial math skills

-Behavior problems


-Number of experienced teachers a student has in their education

The research is very clear. Teachers transfer, when possible, to schools in more affluent areas.


Is this dynamic true in Durango as well?

Where are new teachers getting jobs?

What schools get the most and least number of applicants for openings?

I heard we are leading the nation in graduating folks with education degrees that they are choosing not to use.


8) Self-esteem…How the student feels about themselves impacts their…

-Willingness to participate

-Challenge themselves, risk

-Behave in class

-Work cooperatively in class

What Matters Most… Is How You See Yourself!


Think of it in relationship to your building…

The more secure your administrator is, the more open they are to new ideas.

The less secure, the more threatened they feel and less likely to be open.


9) Values…

What is important to the student?

Do they see education as important?

If they see education as important, they will work harder!

What strategy could you use to deliver this message to parents?

Home visits?


10) Maturity…

How mature is the student in relationship to their age?

Can they handle the responsibilities associated with being in their particular grade level?

Are they long term or short term thinkers?


I’m sure you have all have heard of or seen the “Marshmallow ” experiment which tests long term versus short term gratification in an individual.

Students are sat in front of one marshmallow. They are told that if they don’t eat the marshmallow until the experimenter returns, they will get a second marshmallow.


What kind of student would you predict would wait for the reward?

How would the three students you picked do with the marshmallow test?

Or the equivalent of it if they are older?


11) Interests…

What is the student excited about?

What do they do in their free time?

What do they talk about…sports, gaming, music, dance, TV shows, movies, books, clothes, etc.


The most difficult students to motivate are those who don’t seem to be interested or excited about anything.

Sometimes the student is hesitant to share…these students take a lot of coaxing and must feel that you won’t judge them related to their interests.


Those that truly aren’t excited about anything…red flag related to depression.

Check with counselor or other support staff in your building!


12) Health issues…

This can include both physical and mental issues.


Physical…

This can include such things as eyesight, hearing, coordination, etc.


Why does the student with the worst eyesight always sit in the back of the classroom if given a choice?

The same dynamic seems to be true for the student with hearing issues as well.


Mental health issues…

We mentioned in last Saturday’s class, the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta estimates that 1 in 88 children in the US has been identified as having an autism spectrum disorder.


The National Institute of Mental Health estimates that 11% of children will experience a depressive disorder by the age of 18.

Females experience more depression than males.


According to the CDC, suicide is the 3rd leading cause of death for individuals in the US aged 15-24.

Suicide accounts for 20% of all deaths in that age group.

La Plata County had 16 suicides in 2012 and nine in 2013. It’s the seventh-leading cause of death in the county.


Robin Williams had more money and fame than anyone in this room is likely to ever possess.

He could not beat his depression.


Identification of any mental issue should be the domain of professionals.

Never be in a position where you offer a diagnosis.

Calling “Safe to Tell” is always an option.


As you do your evaluation of the 6 factors for each student, use hard data as much as possible.

By this we mean…facts.

For example:


Life experiences:

-Number of times they changed schools

-Custody issues…from one parent to another

-Parent in jail

-Loss of a parent


Triggers…

-Patterns of days, situations or other students that generate behavior problems

Self-esteem…

-Number of times they volunteer answers in class


Mental health…

-Identification of specific diagnosis

Support system…

-Number of time parents or guardians have attended events

-Number of calls made home that were never returned


Interests…

-Things they tend to write about, 4 of their stories related to a particular video game for example


Please turn to page #2 in your Practicums again.

Here are two examples of what you might write for one of the factors.


1. Factor: Support system

Evaluation: This student has a very poor support system. I have called home 4 times and have never had one of my calls returned. No parent or guardian has ever called me or attended any school function. Many days the student comes to school with clothes that are not clean. The student seldom talks about their parents.


2. Factor: Maturity

Evaluation: This student’s behavior is very immature for their age. The things they talk about and write about are more in line with an individual 2-3 years younger. The other students in the class have a hard time relating to the student and he/she is often not included in activities or chosen as a partner. They have a very hard time when things don’t go their way.


We also ask that you give an overall evaluation of the student. This is a combination of the 6 factors you chose to evaluate.

Take some time on this as it will be the bases of the actions you will take to improve their performance in your classroom.


In this part of the Practicum, we are also asking you to collect a piece of student evidence that is representative of the quality of work the student is presently producing in your class.

This is to create a baseline that you can use to compare future work to.


So make sure you pick a piece of student work that is truly representative of what they normally turn in.


Questions…


By our next session on November 6th, you should have your 3 student profiles completed or almost completed.

If you are having difficulty getting the information you need, we’ll talk about strategies at that session.


We will also go over the different actions you can take based upon the information you collected.


Cheers for your commitment to professional development and supporting our classes.

See you….??


welcome knowing your students: a key component to providing effective instruction brandman...

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teenage years

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harderanother person

stuttering problem

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