Chapters 8 and 9 - How People Learn

1. In chapter 8, we learn that teachers should try to make their learning environment as enriched as possible and to constantly reevaluate their lessons. It is very important that teachers constantly stay in tune to what is new, and to not only learn new ideas from other teachers, but also to learn from their students. Find out what students want to know and what students are interested in; this will make learning more appealing to everyone. This chapter leads to Chapter 9, which discusses technology. Technology is ever-changing, and it is most important for teachers to stay on top of those changes and to incorporate technology instruments into their learning environments, not only to use, but also to have students use so they can be prepared to be lifelong learners as well. Chapter 9 had many different technology ideas and software programs which could be incorporated into a curriculum that would enable cognitive thinking skills. Technology involves many of the cognitive skills we learned in previous chapters, where there is hands-on, real-life learning experiences and top-down/bottom-up processing skills. Reading and writing are both utilized, while working memory and long-term memory are improved.

2. Something I really am not familiar with in Chapter 9 are some of the new programs that were discussed. It makes me want to find out more about Face Book, Twitter, and some of the other interesting software programs and websites available.

3. Something I would like to do to utilize this information with my classroom is to take them to the computer lab and have them do research on any new technology and web learning devices that they could teach me and the rest of the class so that we can all be up-to-date on new information and resources. This would create a collaborative working environment where we can all learn from each other.

Chapter 6 and 7 - How People Learn

1. In chapter 6 we learn that there are four learning environments: learner centered, knowledge centered, assessment centered and community centered. Learner centered is where students' metacognition comes into play. We learned earlier that metacognition is thinking about your thought processes. The knowledge centered environment is where teachers would guide and help students develop an understanding of what they are learning. It would be important for teachers to keep in mind that students learn best when presented with information in a positive manner (the Pollyanna Principle). Assessment Centered environments would allow teachers to know if their students understand what they've learned. It would also let the individuals know if they understand or don't understand something (metacomprehension). Finally, community centered environments would be where students work together to continually improve and learn from each other. The more students are allowed to collaborate with one another and discuss different ideas and viewpoints, the better their memory will be through buidling their schemas.

2. I understand the difference between the four different learning environments, but I'm not sure what the reading wanted us to do with it. Should we be using all learning environments, which is the best, and how should we be using them? Maybe that is for us to figure out.

3. I would apply this to my own teaching by trying to apply all the different learning environments at different times. (Some might be able to be used at the the same time, but otherwise, I think it would be a good idea to apply different ways of teaching at different points in time).

Week 13 - Chapter 10 and part of 13

1. Chapter 10, Language Production and Chapter 13, Cognitive Development Throughout the Lifespan fits into what I have learned already in this course. In the previous Chapter 9, we learned that listening and reading are important for language comprehension. In this weeks chapters, we learned that speaking, writing, and bilingualism are also important for language production. In order to perform any of these skills, one must use their cognitive processes, such as their working memory, long-term memory, metacognition, phonology, etc.

2. What am I still not clear on in this week's readings? The Age of Acquisition was confusing to me because at one point it stated that "individiuals who have already reached a specified age --perhaps early puberty--will no longer be able to acquire a new language with native-like fluency." However, another part of the book mentioned that "several studies demonstrate that adults and older adolescents can indeed learn to speak a new language very fluently." I guess that is up to the reader to decide what they think is true (controversies are so confusing--I like straight answers).

3. I like the information on p. 330 about the narrative discourse. I would definitely use this in my language arts class because so many students have such a difficult time speaking and telling stories in an organized fashion. I think I'll use the comic strip idea we did in this class to help my students convey a message through the six parts of the narrative: 1) a brief overview of the story. 2) a summary of the characters and setting 3) an action that made the situation complicated 4)the point of the story 5) the resolution of the story and 6) the final signal that the narrative is complete. I think this will help students learn to prewrite before they begin writing as well. I know that this activity helped me in this area. I tend to think I am a good writer, but writing a comic strip was a bit of a challenge for me--much different than writing a paper and a bit more fun too.

Chapter 9 - Language Comprehension

1. How does this topic fit into what I have learned already in this course? Language comprehension goes hand in hand with cognitive processes. Chapter 2 discussed visual recognition with top down and bottom up processing and auditory recognition where we must hear the phonemes to sound out words. Chapter 3 discussed divided attention where you can hear two verbal messages simultaneously and selected attention where you are able to concentrate on one message while ignoring the other. Chapter 4 discussed working memory which helps a person store the visual or auditory information long enough to process and interpret it. Chapter 5 discussed long term memory where we are able to retrieve information processed from long ago. chapter 6 discussed tip of the tongue phenomenon where some information is unable to be accessed, and metacomprehension which allows you to understand a what you've learned. Chapter 7 discussed the mental images we create as we read or learn about something. Chapter 8 discussed semantic memory and how we organize information and words in order to keep them straight, just like schemas and scripts are used to help with background knowledge in order to process the language. Chapter 11 was about problem solving and this is important for language because we must be able to create an accurate mental representation of the problem in order to solve it. Chapter 12 discussed deductive reasoning and decision making which are important for putting the information we learn together in order to make better decisions.

2. What am I still not clear on in this week's reading? This was the chapter I completed my worksheet and brochure on so I was pretty clear on everything.

3. Under what conditions would I apply this material to my own teaching/work? I apply this material to my own teaching everyday. Since I am a language arts teacher, I use every concept given. I think it is exceptionally important to teach students to figure out the meaning of a word from context. I also thought it was interesting how Matlin discussed the idea of negative word phrasing, ambiguity, using words in the passive voice, and sentences that contain nested structures make it more difficult for people to comprehend the language.