So now that we're wrapping up our projects and finishing up the semester, I can reflect on this class and think about some of the things that I learned and will take with me into my current teaching career and my future administrative career. I can also reflect on some of the frustrations that I had and probably will have in the real world as well.
An Eye-Opening Experience
It's not often that I have participated in something, classes included, which left me totally questioning everything I do in my job and everything that I have been taught in the past. This, however, is not a bad thing. This is an awesome thing. I found, while taking this class, that my eyes were really opened to how I can make education more effective and why there are so many frustrations in education in the world today. I always kind of complained about the way that certain things worked (like testing, curriculum expectations, etc.), but after this class I can actually pinpoint some of the problems that I see in education and work on bettering them for myself and my students. I know now that I need to really contemplate what I want my students to come out of my class understanding and what I want them to take with them for years to come. I also really need to ask myself if my activities in class are really helping the kids get to the understandings that I hope they will have? Do my means justify my ends? I have learned so many things that I now ask myself all the time that I am really excited to start a new school year and hopefully make more of a difference.
Frustrations
With all of this wonderful information that I have acquired this semester, there are some frustrations that I am still grappling with. One of those frustrations has to do with assessments. I really believe that creating a meaningful assessment to check for enduring understandings is so important, but I also think that this task is very challenging on a couple levels. In creating the assessments for our UbD projects, we constantly kept going back to make the rubrics and expectations more and more specific and I suppose that that is something that may become easier with time. On another level, as I think about transferring what I now know about assessments into the classroom, I am a little daunted by the amount of time that goes into creating these meaningful activities and assessments. I suppose that I would just have to take things little by little.
I suppose that what's more frustrating is that the changes that I am trying to make are changes that I am really making by myself. I will certainly share ideas and concepts with my grade level teachers, but nobody is looking to see that these changes are made. It frustrates me that my district is not working towards curriculum design that follows the UbD format when it's clear that this is the way that it should work. I know, at this time in my life, that this is something that I can't really do anything about which makes it worse! I will, however, share my groups UbD project with my administrators because they are looking to revamp the new teacher program. Baby steps!
Overall, this has been a great experience that has really taught me a lot about the way education works today versus the way that it should work. I hope, after I finish this program, to be able to help in the push to revamp education so that it actually makes sense.
Saturday, May 3, 2008
NJCCCS Handout
Career Education and Consumer, Family and Life Skills
Core Curriculum Content Standards:
Summary of NJ CCCS 9.1 and 9.2:
All students will develop career awareness and leadership skills and hone their personal and interpersonal relationships. Students will learn to prepare for family and business relationships both financially, emotionally, and learn to make ethical and safe life choices.
Career and Technical Education
CCCS 9.1: All Students Will Develop Career Awareness and Planning, Employability Skills and Foundational Knowledge Necessary for Success in the Workplace.
Big Ideas:
· Explore different career opportunities that are necessary in order to make appropriate career and educational choices.
· Develop an understanding of why people work as well as what positive work habits look like.
· Acquire the means to create a resume, conduct themselves on interviews, demonstrate problem-solving skills and recognize how working cooperatively is a pertinent job skill that is transferable from one career to another.
· Participate in real life experiences which range from filling out job applications to working through specific job related problems with a group of students who have a similar interest in the same vocation.
Consumer, Family and Life Skills
CCCS 9.2: All Students Will Demonstrate Critical Life Skills in Order to be Functional Members of Society.
Big Ideas:
Understand how to identify problems in the workplace, home, and school, and map out reasonable steps to solve those problems ethically and appropriately.
Identify ways to improve personal growth and development in order to enhance both business and family relationships.
Understand how the economy can affect business and family life.
Make responsible money choices and create financial plans by participating in related activities.
Develop original thoughts and ideas and learn how to think creatively about solving a problem.
Strengths of Standards 9.1 and 9.2:
Ideas in the standards are important for all students to understand in order to experience success socially in the workplace and in family relationships.
Could be translated into meaningful curriculum writing because some culminating activities are laid out specifically.
Examples:
Designing, implanting and critiquing financial plans
Filling out job applications
Designing a resume
Learning how to interview
Lend themselves to meaningful, hands-on activities which help to ensure the transfer of knowledge and connect students understanding to the “big picture.”
Promote cooperative activities which emphasize good social skills, ethics, and critical thinking.
Offer “out of the box” learners more innovative ways to become skilled at real world situations.
Weaknesses of Standards 9.1 and 9.2:
Unclear how and where these standards would be addressed.
A. some of the ideas from the standards should be addressed across all subject area
B. a portion of the standards seem likely to occur in more of a vocational setting then in a public school setting
Two standards should not be separate because the ideas that are in both should be intertwined into all subject areas.
Language in the standards is much too vague for effective curriculum development.
Example: What are “appropriate work habits?”
What are “ethical behaviors?”
The desired outcomes from the standards are unclear.
Example: What is a “functional member of society?”
What can you as an administrator do to facilitate the learning of these standards?
Make all staff members aware of the portions of these standards that address and look for teachers who promote:
a. critical thinking
b. decision making
c. dealing with conflict
d. working cooperatively
e. making ethical decisions
f. developing self-awareness
g. creating a sense of self worth
Encourage teachers in all subject areas to use rubrics to assess these skills during group work, projects, or culminating activities.
References:
http://www.cde.ca.gov/re/pn/fd/documents/careertechstnd.pdf
http://education.state.nj.us/ccs/?_standard_matrix;c=9
http://www.ntuaft.com/njccs/Webpage/contents/STANDARD%209%Intro.htm
http://www.casel.org/downloads/CE%20in%20CCCS-Summary%20Chart1.pdf
http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0012/001295/129533.pdf
Core Curriculum Content Standards:
Summary of NJ CCCS 9.1 and 9.2:
All students will develop career awareness and leadership skills and hone their personal and interpersonal relationships. Students will learn to prepare for family and business relationships both financially, emotionally, and learn to make ethical and safe life choices.
Career and Technical Education
CCCS 9.1: All Students Will Develop Career Awareness and Planning, Employability Skills and Foundational Knowledge Necessary for Success in the Workplace.
Big Ideas:
· Explore different career opportunities that are necessary in order to make appropriate career and educational choices.
· Develop an understanding of why people work as well as what positive work habits look like.
· Acquire the means to create a resume, conduct themselves on interviews, demonstrate problem-solving skills and recognize how working cooperatively is a pertinent job skill that is transferable from one career to another.
· Participate in real life experiences which range from filling out job applications to working through specific job related problems with a group of students who have a similar interest in the same vocation.
Consumer, Family and Life Skills
CCCS 9.2: All Students Will Demonstrate Critical Life Skills in Order to be Functional Members of Society.
Big Ideas:
Understand how to identify problems in the workplace, home, and school, and map out reasonable steps to solve those problems ethically and appropriately.
Identify ways to improve personal growth and development in order to enhance both business and family relationships.
Understand how the economy can affect business and family life.
Make responsible money choices and create financial plans by participating in related activities.
Develop original thoughts and ideas and learn how to think creatively about solving a problem.
Strengths of Standards 9.1 and 9.2:
Ideas in the standards are important for all students to understand in order to experience success socially in the workplace and in family relationships.
Could be translated into meaningful curriculum writing because some culminating activities are laid out specifically.
Examples:
Designing, implanting and critiquing financial plans
Filling out job applications
Designing a resume
Learning how to interview
Lend themselves to meaningful, hands-on activities which help to ensure the transfer of knowledge and connect students understanding to the “big picture.”
Promote cooperative activities which emphasize good social skills, ethics, and critical thinking.
Offer “out of the box” learners more innovative ways to become skilled at real world situations.
Weaknesses of Standards 9.1 and 9.2:
Unclear how and where these standards would be addressed.
A. some of the ideas from the standards should be addressed across all subject area
B. a portion of the standards seem likely to occur in more of a vocational setting then in a public school setting
Two standards should not be separate because the ideas that are in both should be intertwined into all subject areas.
Language in the standards is much too vague for effective curriculum development.
Example: What are “appropriate work habits?”
What are “ethical behaviors?”
The desired outcomes from the standards are unclear.
Example: What is a “functional member of society?”
What can you as an administrator do to facilitate the learning of these standards?
Make all staff members aware of the portions of these standards that address and look for teachers who promote:
a. critical thinking
b. decision making
c. dealing with conflict
d. working cooperatively
e. making ethical decisions
f. developing self-awareness
g. creating a sense of self worth
Encourage teachers in all subject areas to use rubrics to assess these skills during group work, projects, or culminating activities.
References:
http://www.cde.ca.gov/re/pn/fd/documents/careertechstnd.pdf
http://education.state.nj.us/ccs/?_standard_matrix;c=9
http://www.ntuaft.com/njccs/Webpage/contents/STANDARD%209%Intro.htm
http://www.casel.org/downloads/CE%20in%20CCCS-Summary%20Chart1.pdf
http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0012/001295/129533.pdf
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