They were based more on operant conditioning theory.

2. What kinds of behaviorist techniques did she learn from the professional trainers? I can find at least 3. (Note: we called these by different names in class.)

   One behaviorist techniques is cueing. She used a cue to reinforce that she didn’t like that certain behavior and changed her husband to doing what she wanted, not what he wanted. The second technique would be positive reinforcement. For the good things that he did he would recieve a reward like giving a kiss if he put his dirty clothes in the hamper. The third technique is ignoring the bad behavior. Teachers do this a lot because giving the problem even more attention causes even more problems. The wife ignored the husband whenever he lost his keys.

3. What do you think of the animal trainer’s motto, “It’s never the animal’s fault?” If the motto holds true for animals, does the motto also apply fairly to school children too? Why or why not?

  I think it holds true for school children also. They may be exposed to bad language, bad manners, hitting, etc and early school children mirror what they see at home. So if a young student says a bad word it couldn’t be their fault because where did they learn that first. We as teachers should set a good example for our children that do not have a positive role model at home.

4. Amy talks about trying to change her husband using “nagging.” Nagging doesn’t seem to work very well. Given her story as well as your personal experiences, why doesn’t nagging work any better than it does?

   Nagging is annoying. Continuing to nag is even worse. It does no good to nag, it always causes more problems and makes situations worse than what they need to be.

4.

The teacher calls each student by their name and asks them questions about their lives outside of school by asking them about their pets.

2. What kinds of limits does the teacher set for students’ behavior?

She reacts to the students immediately. If a student is doing something they are not supposed to, the teacher calls on them and tells them about a student who is doing what they are supposed to do and has them do the same.

3. Does the teacher create an overall sense of community in her classroom? If you think she does, give examples of specific strategies she uses. If you don’t think she does, justify your decision.

Yes I think the teacher creates an overall sense of community in her classroom because she has groups of students and its very well-organized. The students who are not being read to work very quietly on their assignments at the desk and it is a functioning classroom.

4. Do you see any behaviors to suggest that students feel psychologically “safe” in the classroom?

I see that the students respond to the teacher and react with the teacher and sit closely to her. They respect her and listen to her immediately after she tells them that what they are doing is wrong. They know that she is looking after them.

I agree with the statement “Be nice, work hard.” I see where the teacher wants to create trust to the students because that helps them work harder and care more about their work. As teachers, we are the everyday example for the students. Some students may not have a wonderful mother and father, and since they see us everyday, we are who they look up to. So as teachers we must do as we say and have them follow our example.

2. What do you think about his claim that most classrooms are based on fear? Is he right?

A lot of teachers may not want to come across as a scary teacher, but they do anyway, and some teachers want their students to fear them. The problem is if a student is fearful of a teacher, there won’t be any communication. I was fearful of my 11th grade AP English teacher in high school. I would never talk to her and everyday I was afraid to walk in the classroom, scared of what her lesson plans would be. I was uncomfortable. As a teacher you want to create a classroom environment that is comfortable enough for the students to focus and learn.

3. He lists his year-long objectives for the subjects he teaches. What is your reaction to these?

My reaction is that if might be a little overwhelming at first for the students to take in, but as the beginnings of class calm down, they will ease into the work process. There is a lot expected out of them, who wouldn’t be overwhelmed?

4. What do you think of his schedule of activities for each day?

I think the activities for each day are a little much. Expecting a student to run a mile a day is not possible. Though it may be healthy, there is no way students will want to or do that. It is good that the teacher has a 20 minute break in the morning for the students to run around if they want to. The twenty grammar sentences may get a little old, but the teacher already knew the students wouldn’t like it (Dreaded Rewrite). My question is will all of this be effective and the students will learn? Or is it too much for each day that the students will start to get lost?

5. He has a comment about homework at the end. Compare his opinion with what Ormrod, your textbook author, says about homework. Who is right?

Ormrod states in the textbook that motivation for homework is largely extrinsic, that students only do it for the teacher. Therefore, the teacher’s note at the bottom of the lesson plan about homework may not be the best way to go about homework. Though the homework they may do will have quality, but there is no motivation strictly from the teacher.

There lots of evidence that indicates that the students are interested in the lesson. First, the teacher put the students in groups, which always helps students interact more with each other as well as the lesson. Second, the teacher uses their own classroom as the basis of the problem. Third, the students are encouraged to move about the room in order to get their measurements and work together.

2. Motivation can be personal, meaning that the person has a long-term personal interest in the topic. But motivation can be situational–something about the situation (the materials, the activity, etc.) sparks the motivation. Are the students in this video motivated more by personal interest or by situational interest?

I think the motivation was situational because the students got to use tools and move around the classroom with the activity.

3. What aspects of the lesson are probably helping to capture the students’ interest?

I think that the teacher allowing the students to move throughout their own classroom to determine how the carpet should be measured and how to solve the problem helped capture the students interest. 

4. How could you improve the lesson to make it more interesting?

Perhaps motivate the students through a contest, encourage them to work together more, and keep the noise level down.

In the first video, the teacher addresses the students asking them what problems they can solve using the graph of the jelly beans.

In the second video, the teacher is trying to explain a reading of a character through words used in the text. The teacher is trying to ask questions in regarding to the text to solve the questions. Using questions to answer other questions in the reading.

In the first video, the teacher is trying to get the students to come up with their own problems and writing their answers down. The teacher is also encouraging the students to give the answers.

In the second video, the teacher is using questions out loud to the class, reading to the class, as well as writing thorough responses to questions in class in a log.

In the first video the teacher asks the students what their personal favorite jellybean was to conduct the lesson in the first place.

In the second video, the teacher uses pictures and descriptions to try and characterize these characters.

With the jellybean video, the easy question would be to use things other than jellybeans to come up with other math problems for the students such as asking what their favorite pizza toppings are, or favorite color, etc. The teacher could also ask to list the color jellybeans from favorite to least favorite and add the poll from there. Perhaps this would be a little bit more confusing, but a possibility.

In the second video, the teacher could ask the students to look at how we view adultery today. Make it a more current event idea and go into depths on opinions, perhaps not aloud, or you could start a debate on if she should be punished or not.

If I were to become a high school art teacher, I would have private conversations with my students and ask them what their goals were for the year. I would sit them down and take notes of what projects they wanted to do and where they feel their work is headed. I would ask if the students wanted to major in art in college, and I would push them harder to get to their goals. If the students were to slack off or slow down on their final goal, I would try to motivate them or do a project that is opposite of what they are doing for a short period of time.

 When I was in high school, my teacher did all of this and it helped me as a student tremendously. It taught me to stay on task and to stick with what I knew I wanted. Though I did not get this attention and help until high school, high school is when you are thinking of your future and you want to be on task for your major and thinking about college in high school. Its important to build up from high school and focus on the future ahead. I would have my students focus on their future and their goals being to graduate high school as well as college and know that they can do both successfully.

    A teacher would want the students to write down what they knew and what questions they had before the lesson to help get the students thinking about the subject and to think of how the students themselves were thinking.

2. What do you make of the questions the student had about trees beforehand? What does this tell you about this particular child?

    The questions this particular student had were very well thought out, and detailed. The student asked many questions and it made the student seem interested in trees and wanted to learn from the lesson.

3. If you look closely, you can see that the teacher left some feedback on this second page (”Questions I Have”). Consider the teacher’s feedback. Do you think the student will find the comments helpful to his or her learning? If so, in what ways? If not, what could the teacher have done instead?

    The teacher’s feedback on the paper is helpful to the student. It allows the student to feel as though they are on the right track. I think that the teacher needs to have a time where they address all questions either during or after the lesson. The teacher may not know, but a lot of the students may have the same questions but are too afraid to ask. This gives the students the opportunity to learn even more about the subject, and may create outside discussion.

4. Take a look at the student’s last page (”What I Learned”). Considering the questions the student had before, what do you think of what the student had to say after the lesson? Should the teacher have done something to make the unit more fruitful?

    Personally, when I get excited about a subject I learn a lot from it, therefore I can write a lot of stuff down. Therefore I do not feel as though the student was really excited about the lesson because of the lack of writing on what the student did know. Maybe none of the questions that were asked were not answered, if they were answered I’m sure the student would have written them down. I think the lesson could have been more fruitful by answering a certain amount of questions about trees from the class. Perhaps reading off a couple of questions per paper not pertaining to the lesson exactly. Even if it was about trees, it would get the students thinking and excited about learning the subject.

    The students changed too many variables at one time. This causes the experiment to be chaotic and confusing.

2. In his first trip to the group (scene 2), how does the teacher try to help the students to recognize where they went wrong?

    The teacher tries to get the students to look at what they have written down and decide as a group what effects the experiment the most.

3. What mistake does the group later make? (The video is a little hard to see, so here’s a hint: if you add paperclips to increase the weight by just clipping them together, what happens to the length of the pendulum?)

    They are changing yet another variable by adding the extra paper clip. Changing the length will give the students inaccurate numbers, causing more harm than good. This is not good for further comparisons.

4. The teacher comes back to the group later (scene 4). How does the teacher now try to help the students see where they have been going wrong?

    The teacher comes back and talks the students through how they got to their conclusions and tries to help them determine how to only change one variable at a time. He continually asks questions until the students end up with the correct answer.

5. Any sign of the confirmation bias in what the students are doing?

    One of the girl students towards the end of the video is still running into the same problem as before and is hanging on to the old information.

6. This kind of activity is often called an “inquiry activity.” Given that students construct their knowledge, what advantages and what disadvantages do you see with this kind of activity?

    Some advantages with this kind of activity is getting every student involved. A student may not like to be called out in front of the entire class, and smaller groups allow the student to speak up. Another advantage is everyone is learning from one another and they are learning to cooperate with others. Another advantage is the teacher is getting to spent more time with smaller groups of children and understand their thought processes and how their minds work.

 Some disadvantages would be the noise level in the classroom. It would be easy to get side tracked with all of the noise. Also some students may not be talking about the task at hand and it would be hard to hear who is talking about the task at hand or what they are having for lunch, for example. Another disadvantage would be arguing groups or some children that are willing to do all the work, and some students who do not want to do any work.