Master Practitioner Portfolio

Standard Three: Middle level English language arts teachers understand the function, the influence, and the range of other media/technology. 

As far as media and technology, there are two aspects of change that I feel are important in engaging students through both communication and assessment in the classroom today. Those two aspects are the “verb vs. noun” theory and “flipping” the classroom.

The verb vs. noun theory is based on the idea that the “verbs” or skills we want our students to learn stays the same as education evolves, and that the “nouns” or tools in which we use to teach those skills are constantly changing. A speaker at Salem College Mr. Marc Prensky stated, “Verbs are the basics of education and nouns will change all the time.” We are urged as educators to ask ourselves, “What are the key verbs or skills I want my kids to learn? Am I using the best, latest nouns to teach my verbs?” Considering these two questions, I reflect upon these questions as I’m developing curriculum for my students as both digital natives and literacy learners.

Reading comprehension and vocabulary instruction has remained consistent throughout the years. The more vocabulary words your students know, the easier it is for them to comprehend reading selections or literature. The “verbs” of comprehension, word identification, and word familiarity are skills that we want our students to know. Students need these skills to be successful readers and learners. In order to improve our students’ literacy skills, we could easily change our methods or tools of teaching to include 21^st century technology and communication. For instance, many teachers are required to deliver instruction through a curriculum model, such as Balanced literacy, Self-selected reading, Word associations, Dibbles, etc. Many of these instructional models are successful in improving the reading comprehension of students. However as traditional as they seem, there are also models that deliver instruction in the same manner as those in the past. By adding tools such as social networking, blogging, wiki, video communication, Skype, and others, we would enrich our lessons with activities and assessments that our students will feel invested in.

Self-selected reading is a valuable part of a balanced literacy curriculum. As students read, they are often required to create a product of some sort as a means of formative assessment. Examples of these products could be a book report, comic strip, foldable, graphic organizer, picture book, or an essay. These products are beneficial in assessing what our students know and understand, and they are a critical part of the self reflective practice of teaching. However, as beneficial as they seem, students, as digital natives, often feel that these types of assessments or assignments are outdated. Video creation and communication, blogging, wiki, and Skype could easily be added to make the assessment more exciting and relevant to our students who are interested in 21^st century technology.

In addition to the verb vs. noun theory, another concept that I utilize as an educator of adolescents is the notion of “flipping” the classroom. This practice involves recording or documenting a lesson and allowing the students to watch the lesson outside of the classroom in preparation for practice and discussion activities inside of the classroom. “Flipping” is a beneficial practice in my literacy classrooms where cooperative learning groups, literature circles, and collaborative pairs or groups are utilized as a means of guided practice. As my lesson is viewed as a quick preview or mini lesson through means of social networking outside of the classroom, the classroom becomes a workshop environment utilized for meaningful student discussion, peer-to-peer teaching, one-on-one mini instruction, practice activities, assessments, etc. With more time in the classroom devoted to discussion and practice, I’m able to transition from the role of teacher to more of a facilitator of learning. The tools needed to “flip” your classroom are many of the tools that the students will find interesting and meaningful such as those mentioned previously.

As Marc Prensky stated, “the reason we should change the way we teach our kids is because the context around them is changing.” Concepts such as verb vs. noun theory and flipping the classroom are practices that allow our students to become authentically invested and engaged in their learning.

Evidence of Proficiency in Standard Three:

-Lesson Plan development incorporating the use of video communication via Skype to gain diverse perspective regarding the skill of making inferences and how the literary skill easily relates to every day life.

-Video evidence of a Flipped Classroom Lesson to be viewed before relevant class practice session.