The competent teacher understands the diverse characteristics and abilities of each student and how individuals develop and learn within the context of their social, economic, cultural, linguistic, and academic experiences. The teacher uses these experiences to create instructional opportunities that maximize student learning.
Middle school students start to recognize what their values and opinions are. Usually, these values may come from their households and peers around them. Some students stand firm on what they believe, however, some students are still trying to figure out what matters to them. No matter what a student believes in, they should be respected by their peers, because in a class we need to celebrate our differences to allow us to work together as a community. A lesson I do with my students is taking a quiz to see what political parties they fall into, and it will show them how many different political parties there are.
The artifacts below are from students who took a political party test and reflected on their results. This demonstrates indicator 1A, which states, "Understands the spectrum of student diversity (e.g., race and ethnicity, socioeconomic status, special education, gifted, English language learners (ELL), sexual orientation, gender, gender identity) and the assets that each student brings to learning across the curriculum." The test helps recognize how different everyone's experiences are when answering questions about social issues because of their different values/opinions on these topics. I have encouraged students to share their results with their class because this will allow their peers to hear and recognize the different parties. This gives my students a chance to recognize they do not have to fall into the standard political party that is just Democratic or Republican. I am giving them more options for them to explore on their own time, and if wanted we can talk about it together.
Following this conversation with my students, I want them to think more about using their voices and stating their opinions, therefore I will pick a social issue from the test to talk about. This demonstrates indicator 1K, which states, "Facilitates a learning community in which individual differences are respected." I want my classroom to show how we can talk about social issues that can be controversial, but be a respectable place for their opinions. An example would be, "Should the death penalty be allowed?" This will give a chance for a student to vocalize their opinion, and hear various answers from their peers. Overall, I will emphasize to my students that, even if they disagree with a person, the most important thing is to respect their opinions because we can be a community with different views.
Political Parties Part 2 2024.pdfParties Part 2 2024.pdfPolitical Parties Part 2 2024.pdfTake the quiz for yourself: https://www.isidewith.com/political-quiz
Middle schoolers' generation lives in a world that is embedded in technology. The majority of people would agree that technology is destroying the upcoming generation, however, there are some positives with these devices. An example would be how parents would say video games are not helpful for students to play, but they help students relax, or be fulfilled with enjoyment. In a classroom setting, they are a great learning tool to allowed students to stay engaged with the lesson they are learning about, because they could become a character during an era in history to help them understand better.
The artifact below is a link to a video game that has been played within my classroom which is called, "A Cheyenne Odyssey". The game demonstrates indicator 1J, which states, "Differentiates strategies, materials, pace, levels of complexity, and language to introduce concepts and principles so that they are meaningful to students at varying levels of development and to students with diverse learning needs." Every student learns differently, when I introduce another form of learning, such as a game. This helps students have a different way to connect to the lesson that is being taught. This game is played after the lesson of the Trail of Tears, but the unit is Manifest Destiny and how American White Settlers are moving on the land. The students are the character named, "Little Fox", who is part of the Cheyenne Tribe, of the Indigenous Peoples. Within the game, the students will have to make choices about what should "Little Fox" do when the White settlers come to their land. They can see what type of interaction and decisions have to be made to protect their tribe from danger.
After the students play the game, they will do a small assessment to reflect on what they have learned from the character "Little Fox", and how they feel about Manifest Destiny. An artifact below is from one of my students, this helps the student be able to put themselves in the shoes of someone who is a part of a tribe and what it felt like to move out of their land. The reflection demonstrates indicator 1E, which states, "Understands the impact of linguistic and cultural diversity on learning and communication." The students have an opportunity to use technology to their advantage to expand on their understanding of how Indigenous People have always been belittled. They can have a new insight to recognize how our World is trying to turn this around and have them understand more about why we celebrate "Indigenous People Day".
Emily Baxter - The Journey of Little Fox.pdfhttps://www.mission-us.org/games/a-cheyenne-odyssey/