Books for research.....say whaaaat?

I am currently in the middle of a museum project with my class. I got the idea to have the students turn our classroom into a museum and each create their own exhibit after reading an article by Dr. Eakle on museum literacies assigned by Melissa in the previous class of hers I took. I thought it was a great idea as I love to create projects based around student interest.

This week we began talking about doing actual research for their exhibit topic (previously we had written memoirs on how we became interested in the topic to stay in line with the CCSS). I asked my class how people research topics they are interested in. Not surprisingly, the majority of my class told me that you should hop on google, type in the topic and pick a site for any answers you will need. Although this is not incorrect, it got me thinking about the world in which kids are growing up in and some of our discussions on how much technology to incorporate in the classroom and at what age. I found myself somewhat saddened by the fact that the answer of how to research something is no longer immediately to go to the library. I already knew that I was going to have the students use online resources as part of their research papers and have collaborated with my media specialist but I made a decision then and there to not make using a book source optional. Today I assigned going to the library and getting two books on their topic as homework and sent out an email to all of my parents making them aware of this and asking to please let me know if they would be unable to go to a library in which case I would go for them. I then went to my school's media center after school and checked out every book I could find on each of the student's topics.

Today I was hit smack in the face with a harsh hit of reality and the need to constantly remember that the things I valued and experienced in school will not always be pertinent today. I left school today with the knowledge that I want my students to not only understand how to research given topics, but to understand the importance and benefit of all types of sources.

Will we ever reach a point where we have to build using books into lessons as opposed to building technology into lessons?

RTI

      We are all aware that no child learns in the exact same way as another. As education progresses, methods and programs are created and enhanced in order to meet the needs of all the different learners in a classroom. From our discussion last week on ability grouping and differentiated instruction, I began thinking about the newest push in ways to reach all students. There are still plenty of educators out there who remain in the school of thought that you only need to change one aspect of your classroom to be able to meet the needs of all students in the room (generalizing here). In reality, to be an effective classroom teacher and have the most beneficial learning environment you need to be implementing many different things. Grouping needs to be fluid and able to change according to student needs, interest, ability levels, etc., instruction needs to be differentiated according to the method of instruction, product the students are to be produced and guided and reassessed according to formative assessments.
        One reasonably new approaches to education is the Response to Intervention (RTI). It has not been adopted in all states and school districts, but I believe it to be a good program. While teaching in NYC, the school I was in began using RTI and I found it to make sense and be extremely useful. RTI states that there are levels to interventions to meeting the needs of all learners, there are constant assessments and reassessments so students are never kept in one intervention when they don't need to be. I like that the teacher is held responsible for documenting and rationalizing what interventions are chosen and why, if they worked and why/why not, and that any intervention chosen after tier one has to have proven research based results to support the use. The link below explains with good visuals how RTI works and how each tier of intervention works together to benefit each and every student. What I like most about the RTI method is that it 100% supports inclusion in the classroom of not only special education students, but also students from diverse backgrounds.

http://www.rti4success.org/whatisrti

Universal Pre-K Push Down Problem

         I am fully on the bandwagon that Pre-K should be made universal and offered in all public schools. As education continues to move forward, as America tries to distinguish itself as a leader in the classroom, and as teachers experience the top-down approach to curriculum, it only makes sense that within the near future students are going to need to go to Pre-K in order to be ready and successful with the ever increasing objectives that students in Kindergarten are expected to meet. We already see the disadvantage students experience when they have not been to an academic preschool/daycare before entering Kindergarten. Giving students from all backgrounds access to begin their literacy learning in an academic setting earlier rather than later will benefit them for all of the school years to come.
         With that, as nice as it would be to think that making Pre-K mandatory would shrink the achievement gap, it is completely unrealistic. Just as with educational objectives having things pushed down, the same would happen to affluent families and poverty stricken families. Currently, students who come from affluent backgrounds go to the "best" preschools that money can buy and students from poorer families may go to a family babysitter during the day or a head start program, that because of funding, cannot provide the same experiences as schools with higher funding. In this day and age, most parents hold jobs where they need their children to be taken care of during the day. Just as it is now, wealthy parents are able to send their children to great preschools while parents who are struggling to get by on their wages have no choice but to send their children to the most cost efficient setting. Even though I think that having Universal Pre-K would be a good thing, I do not foresee it doing anything to change the gap that we already see between students when they enter Kindergarten...we are just going to start seeing that gap arise at a younger and younger age and the next question to be asked will be 'what are the skills a student entering Pre-K needs to be successful?'