PD for Technology Integration: Best Practices

Significant and long‐lasting changes occur when a school’s “policies, practices, culture, and funding” are structured to facilitate the integration of educational technology. The distributed leadership model is a way to continue supporting teacher leaders and implement shifts in teaching strategies.   Continue reading PD for Technology Integration: Best Practices

Adult Professional Development

In the Educational Leadership journal of February 2009, Jason Margolis writes about strategies that teacher leaders can embed to engage their colleagues and realize the benefits of instructional changes. While there were a number of presentations reviewed, the strategies below produced “observable teacher engagement”. The one constant in these researches is that teachers value the knowledge, innovation and leadership of their peers. Continue reading Adult Professional Development

Universal Design for Learning: Using digital tools to meet all learner’s needs

Digital tools, beyond personal assistive technologies, can be used for all students to become learners through strategies that remove barriers. To help teachers and administrators understand how strategies or tools could be implemented is Universal Design for Learning (UDL). These principles come from the work of Vygotsky, Bloom, and cognitive neuroscience where by understanding the needs of students, teachers can modify the curriculum to meet the needs of all students.   Continue reading Universal Design for Learning: Using digital tools to meet all learner’s needs

EDU 6526: Instructional Strategies: Meta Reflection

My approach this semester was to review these instructional strategies as they would best demonstrate, in my opinion, the possibility of proficient or distinguished designated withFrameworkin the components of domains 2 and 3 in Danielson’s Framework. Since our district has adopted the framework for the teacher evaluation process, the various strategies within the instructional model families can be used to strength weaknesses within those components. While only one of the components was attached to each post, it is important to note that each instructional strategy could be used within multiple components. Continue reading EDU 6526: Instructional Strategies: Meta Reflection

Instructional Strategies: Multiple Intelligence

How practical are multiple intelligence activities?

Before I look at how practical these activities are, I first need to understand what is multiple intelligence? Then I can look and see what activities are considered multiple intelligence activities? When asking my students how they know if someone is intelligent, they have varied answers. Continue reading Instructional Strategies: Multiple Intelligence

Instructional Strategies: CTE & Citizenship

High School is one of the last steps before adulthood, and is one of the last “safe places” for young adults to learn the lesson’s they need to navigate the consequences of their choices. Some of my students need these lesson’s to help them understand their roles and responsibilities in the community. Moral development is a function that we provide, even if it is in the simplest form of reinforcing norms. Continue reading Instructional Strategies: CTE & Citizenship

Instructional Strategies: Constructivism & Zone of Proximal Development

Does constructivism promote academic excellence?

Constructivism absolutely leads to academic excellence because it requires that students are actively engaged in their own learning.  In Classroom Instruction that Works, we read that this type of engagement integrated through Cooperative Learning positively affects “both academic and socioemotional achievement, self-esteem, motivation, and engagement with school” (p.46).  Continue reading Instructional Strategies: Constructivism & Zone of Proximal Development

Instructional Strategies: Advance Organizers for Students with Disabilities

Organizers of any kind, whether they are concept maps, flow charts or story maps, are a good way to assist students to connect foundation knowledge with current and new learning/concepts. What they also can do is help students understand how they learn, they then can master new learning at any phase of their lives.   Continue reading Instructional Strategies: Advance Organizers for Students with Disabilities

Instructional Strategies: Concepts important in my instructional setting

One of the classes I teach is AP Computer Science where students learn how to program in Java. My class is a University of Washington in the High School class and also articulated for credit through several local community colleges. Programming relies heavily on math and very detailed that a missing semicolon in a hundred lines will keep a program from running, thus making it a struggle at times.  Continue reading Instructional Strategies: Concepts important in my instructional setting

bPortfolio

Hello,

My name is Shannon Thissen and this is my 22nd year in teaching, but only my 17th year teaching High School. I was in my senior year of my Computer Science degree when the department chair asked if I were interested in teaching a couple sections of the introductory programming course. My focus was on programming languages and I thought that it would benefit me, what I didn’t count on was enjoying it so much. The following year I worked on my teaching certification. I spent several years teaching at the Community College and Junior High before I found my position teaching Computer Science in High School.  Continue reading bPortfolio