STCBlogPosts

  Today, I (we) will be talking about a potential increase in defeatism in students. Admittedly, there is not much research done on this topic, particularly as it relates to students in secondary education, or grades 6 through 12. Personally, I think more research needs to be done about this topic as it relates to current events. And by that I mean in a post COVID-19 world. Of course, since it’s only been almost three years since COVID started and less than a year since it’s really ended, there is even less research about this topic. Honestly, there’s not really any research about it at all. For the purposes of this podcast, I’ll be referring to levels of hopelessness in students as well as defeatism, with references to depression and anxiety, because there is more research done within these topics, and the implications of studies on hopelessness, depression, and anxiety could very well be linked to defeatism. So, before I jump in, I’d like to ask… What is defeatism? Defeatism is d...

  Defeatist Attitudes in Students in a Post-COVID World What do you know about the problem? It doesn’t matter if a student is truly “defeated” or not, it’s the mindset that ruins their chances Defeatism is the mentality that, no matter how much things progress, they will never actually get better This is a learned response Increases in anxiety and depression (relating to financial and social health) can lead to a more defeatist mentality Not much is said in research about defeatism and high school students Much is said about hopelessness in secondary education You can’t discuss hopelessness/defeatism without taking external factors into account All the results I’ve found for why students feel defeated/hopeless do not seem satisfactory https://m.aliran.com/web-specials/2015-web-specials/aggrandisement-and-defeatism-in-politics-and-education https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ1068744 https://web.p.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=0&sid=baac3c6a-6c21-4999-b928-6d05bafe41e4%4...

  Maus Lesson Plan Subject: English/Language Arts Grade: 7 Lesson Plan Day 1: Introduction to Maus and the Holocaust Purpose: Elicit prior knowledge in order to identify student understanding; Provide context as to why the content is important and in what ways it is relevant Anticipated Outcome:   Able to identify students’ knowledge of the topic Students have begun to make connections between literature and history Students are primed to identify rhetorical devices and think critically about the text Students are primed to think about the author as a character and narrator Hook: Immediately utilize prior knowledge and student participation through discussion Typing students responses out on slide so they can see and consider their responses Googling facts and allowing students to see on screen research being done Discussion Question: What do we already know or what have we already learned about the Holocaust? High Leverage Practices: Modeling Research Leading Discussio...

I chose my own lesson plan (it is only 1 day long)  that I wrote for Dr. Shaver’s class. I am still not sure I am meeting these standards for gifted and talented students, however I do know that I am asking a lot of seventh graders to ponder the questions I am posing. However, I do think that, with G&T students, I might be able to skip my front-loading activity in which I ask students about definitions like prologue and foreshadowing. I am worried that learning definitions might be tedious to them, but I might simply be able to go over it quicker than planned and, instead of having working definitions for the class, I can simply just identify them for my students. Even though I identify three different standards this lesson plan usually addresses, I would like to focus mainly on the first and last of the three. One component I like about my lesson plan that the previous one I chose to analyze is that I think my own plan has more diversity, which I firmly believe is the stepping...

  Lesson: Utopia and the American Dream (Notes) Lesson 1 Questions could probably be a little more open-ended for a gifted group (example: In what ways do you believe Winthrop’s ideas are manifested in society today? How are they not? Lesson 2 I like the focus on contradicting ideas of the American dream Comparative texts Lesson 3 I think the questions could, again, be a little more open-ended; Linking Kennedy and Winthrop is smart and makes sense in terms of front-loading information, but probably should have been done on day 2 Should have asked questions like: How has the American Dream evolved over time? Lesson 4 (1.2) (1.3) I don’t think we needed to refer to another president. This lesson plan appears to lack diversity. Why not hear a story from a regular, everyday person? Lesson 5 Questions seem too leading (except the first one asked in both images. That one is perfect) I like the choice of using pictures like this and drawing parallels again Lesson...

“Differentiation” “When you hear that word in a teaching context, what does that mean to you?” Differentiation makes me think of Montessori classroom and the integration of multiple outlets and mediums to accomplish a particular task. I think of differentiated instruction and think of what I could do or use to help students better understand the context of what I’m trying to teach/accomplish. To be frank, I could be way off base with what this means and could really be thinking of something else. But, to me, differentiated instruction means to connect diverging paths. Hopefully, it also is a means to help students understand a topic better than using my traditional teaching style.  Universal Design for Learning