FIAE+Chapter+15+Block+2

Synthesis FIAE C15 B2

One piece of advice that really stood out to me was the importance in keeping a sense of humor about you. Nothing is worse than a bunch of bickering teachers who are incapable of laughing at themselves. Like the book says, everything is easier with a smile. ||
 * **Names** || **Abstract** || **Reflection** ||
 * Barnes Mckell || The final chapter in the book Fair Isn’t Always Equal provides tips for teachers who are moving towards a differentiated classroom. One big suggestion the book made for these teachers was to speak to other colleagues in the school about their grading practices. Sharing ideas and other useful teachers throughout a school is the best way to differentiate a classroom. || I really like the way this chapter provides tips for teachers who are moving towards a differentiated classroom. I think the suggestion about talking with other teachers is a great way to get started. I think this chapter did a great job wrapping up the book with the tips and suggestions provided. ||
 * Brennick Christopher || Chapter 15 of Fair isn’t Always Equal gives us six tips for to supporting colleagues as they shift to a differentiate classroom. This chapter starts us off with some quick tips about talking to colleagues. This second section is about ways you can start discussions about responsive grading. Creating a culture of expectancy is just an example of an idea. This is about putting a little a pressure on peers to look at grading and assessing ideas. Another idea is to have common planning times so teachers can talk. Another idea is to begin small. || I really liked this chapter because it gave a lot of ideas on how to start talking about grading one of the most important issues in education today. I really enjoyed it because the toughest part of getting any idea going is starting the conversation on it and this really helped to get the ball rolling. I especially enjoyed the idea of starting small because if you get a bunch of small ideas together you get a bunch of really big ideas that can work well for kids. ||
 * Columbia Laura || Chapter fifteen of Fair Isn't Always Equal raps up the book with a number of tips on how to support fellow workers in their journey towards a differentiated classroom. There were many helpful tips. Though some of them were geared more towards higher authority, such as headmasters and principals. The general feel of the tips suggested were speaking with colleagues about grading practices, creating an atmosphere of sharing, and having folders in which teachers now information about other students to help them understand them better. || Although this information was very helpful, it seemed overwhelming at times. I feel like many of the suggestions were good such as how to discuss grading techniques with colleagues. It is very important for teachers to be open with each other and to challenge each other. Many of the suggestions I thought were more directed towards administrators. Especially as a new teacher, I think it would be hard to go in there and make suggestions about having more staff meetings or different grading practices. ||
 * Coombs Kayla || Chapter fifteen of “Fair Isn’t Always Equal” provides tips for teachers to support their colleagues as they head toward successful practices of differentiation in the classroom. First, it provides tips for how to approach colleagues so as to gain respect, trust and to be able to share and express mutual goals. One should start by expressing an interest in a colleague’s idea, through verbal and body language. One should also initiate whenever there is stress with a colleague. In addition, one should reflect on the important questions that will help make stronger commitments to the school and to working together toward the same goals. Some of these are as follows: “Why do we have schools in America?”, “How can we provide feedback to students most effectively and efficiently?”, and “Are we open to others’ points of view-why or why not? (183). Some of the ideas that were introduced in the chapter to discuss and train for responsive grading and assessment practices are: make it so teachers feel a little peer pressure to examine or start to practice grading and assessing ideas, have faculty meetings which include an opening where a group shares their experiences with grading and assessing ideas, hold department meetings that include discussions of at least one knew aspect of grading and/or assessing ideas, create a faculty portfolio of ideas in which each faculty member has the opportunity to submit work that relates to grading and assessing, provide teacher in-service opportunities, support teacher that are already embracing the new grading and assessing ideas, have book study groups that discuss text on grading and assessing, provide funding for teachers that want to pursue additional training in grading and assessment, include parents and the community on the school’s emphasis on new grading and assessing ideas, keep everyone up-to-date on the latest thinking in cognitive theory, and encourage visits to other schools that are farther along on their practices of grading and assessment. || I thought this chapter had a lot of good ideas for encouraging and supporting colleagues as they head toward implementing the new grading and assessing ideas. However, I do not think I would take it upon myself to do many of the tips that are suggested in my first few years of teaching. I most likely would wait to push anything upon my colleagues, as I will be trying to establish myself as a qualified and successful new teacher for the first few years of teaching, and I will be more internally focused on things that hit closer to home, like my classroom, and how to maintain, organize, and instruct it successfully. I feel like I will need to prove to my colleagues that I am a good teacher before they will trust my knowledge on such things. ||
 * Cummons Michael || Chapter 15 of FIAE is about working as a team of educators to make learning happen in a differentiated classroom. When a colleague expresses an idea about something, it is good for you to express interest, even if you are not impressed by the idea. This keeps the gates of communication open for future conversation about. Teachers must work to respect each others opinions at all times. Once put downs or other disresectful things occure there is fear of bringing new ideas and constructive criticisms up in the world of education. Sharing materials and ideas with teachers is the best way to improve an educational community and to make learning happen in a differentiated classroom. || Chapter fifteen brings up some really points. Respect of colleagues is very important in the world of education. Teachers are life long learners and so much learning happens during discussion. Criticism and encouragement help all teachers. With out the tool of colleague conversation education has little room to grow and improve. I think knowing how to approach a colleague to offer criticism can be very hard. You need to know how to tell them that they are doing something wrong with out hurting their feelings and/or making them angry. ||
 * Damboise Kelley || Chapter fifthteen discusses thirty-six professional ways to work with colleagues to move towards successful practices for differentiated classrooms. There are so many different areas that the book touched upon, but because of lack of time I am only going to describe a couple of the big practices for differentiated classroom. First, one of the opening paragraphs discusses how important it is for teachers to talk and collaborate with one another, and that educators need to understand that they don’t all share the same opinion. This is fine so long as teachers can respect one another’s opinions; one of the suggestion the book gives is to first try and understand what they person is elaborating on, and then it becomes the other teachers turn to let their opinion shine through. The chapter focuses on different ways to assess who and how these project or homework should be graded. One example described in the book was the faculty portfolio of ideas, because this allowed every teacher the opportunity to contribute to the grow of the portfolio. The portfolio is used to collect data about grading and assessment practices. Some schools even offer a teacher-in-service program where teacher can go to a conference and discuss the different ways in which the students are learning. || I found this chapter to be extremely informative because it offered a wide variety of different processes to try and help schools find new and better ways to grade and assess. I like how there are so many ideas, therefore, if one idea was not working for a school system they have about thirty other ways that they could go about changing the way they grade. This chapter also shows the importance of collaborating with other teachers because we all know that there are strength in number, and if a school system was to achieve something this is key. ||
 * Kelley Kathleen || Chapter fifteen in Fair isn’t Always Equal gave thirty-six new tips for future teachers to use as they embark on their journeys in differentiated classrooms. The different tips were categorized under the following: culture of expectancy, faculty meetings, department meetings, expert in the lounge, faculty portfolio of ideas, dedicated intranet folder, instructional roundtables, teacher in-service, monthly or quarterly meetings, central clearinghouse on students, model model model, incorporate grading and assessing practices into professional goals, provide funding, get multiple copies, book study groups, critical friends groups and action research groups, become a lab for a university or college, make use of teacher mailboxes, update parents and the community, promotional materials to inform, use humor, affirmation, comparisons, examples and non-examples, cognitive theory, peer observations and mentoring, core values, small beginnings, school visits, reflective practitioners, common planning times, publishing, risk-taking, staff health, CBAM (Concerns-based adoption model), and publish timelines. || All in all, I thought that this chapter was a nice way to finish up the readings for this practicum class. Having those thirty-six tips listed in the books are all things that will be important to us when we become teachers, but they are not something that we have had to deal with yet in the schools since we are still students ourselves. My three favorite tips are model, model, model, cognitive theory, and staff health. The first tip “model, model, model” was great because it really reinforced that idea that new teaching and assessing practices are important and should be reinforced within the schools that we are going to be working in. Standing behind that person and sharing ideas in order to make progress are going to help your schools and the students in it succeed. I think that the second tip on cognitive theory is a great idea because it is going to reinforce the idea that each person learns differently and if they aren’t taught in a way that works for them, then their grades and cognition are going to reflect that. Students are still building their cognitive skills through secondary education, so it is important to inform the teachers to they can better help the students. The final tip may be one of the most important, and I chose it because we haven’t really discussed it at all this year. Our classes have been based around students and how they are feeling. Tip three had to do with staff health whether it be physically, emotionally, mentally, etc. While we may form great relationships during the years with our students, we will also be forming them with our peers, so it is important to take care of them during the school year. ||
 * Knowles Christina || This chapter focuses on giving us 36 different tips on how to work with other teachers and administration. Some of the tips encourage us to help other teachers out and give input. Each tip is different. This chapter shows us how it is important for respected teachers to be able to work with other teachers. || I did like this chapter because we have been focusing so much on the relationship between the teacher and students and it was good to read about something different. We need to realize that the relationships between us and other teachers are also very important. If we have good relationships with them, then it allows for ideas to be shared and for allows us to become even better teachers. ||
 * Mourkas Margaret || Chapter 15 of the book Fair Isn’t Always Equal talks about all the different ways you can interact with your colleagues at the school that you teach at. It talked about how you as a teacher should discuss with your colleagues about their personal grading system or how they might deal with certain disciplinary situations. This way everyone with in the system can use similar systems of discipline and grading. || After reading this chapter I really hope that I will be able to communicate with my fellow teachers in a manner that will be productive and will benefit the students in great ways. I have a fear that I will be hired into a school system where no one will communicate with each other and every teacher is for themselves. ||
 * O'Neil Christopher || Chapter fifteen discussed thirty-six tips on how to support colleagues as they move toward successful practices for differentiated classrooms. Through out the chapter, readers will learn about different ways in which to help other teachers become better at integrating differentiated instruction in their classrooms. Each of the thirty-six tips has an explanation as to how to go about using that tip. A lot of the tips discussed seemed to be geared more towards the administrators of the schools than the actual teachers. However, there were some that could prove to be useful for teachers. || This chapter will prove helpful to me in the future. The tips that were given in this chapter will be very useful for me because of the information they provide. However, a good portion of these tips will be not as helpful to me because they are geared more towards school administrators. I could still use the tips in one way or another, but they won’t be as useful to me as they would to an administrator. ||
 * Richardson Cassandra || Chapter fifteen of ‘Fair Isn’t Always Equal’ suggests thirty-six support tips for helping colleagues develop and move forward with their successful classrooms. The chapter allows for a discussion of each tip as well as providing practical applications for each of the tips. Many of the suggestions revolved around grading, assessment, and discussions for colleagues. || I feel like this chapter is one that I will look back on a lot, because as an aspiring teacher, I believe it could give me ideas for support for myself in my own development of a differentiated classroom. I really enjoyed how the chapter stressed the importance of working together with colleagues as a team. I found, however, that many of the tips were administrative-y, in that I feel like they were geared more toward teacher-administrators rather than teachers. ||
 * Trundy Monique || In chapter fifteen Wormeli covers the possible complications of grading within a teaching staff. Wormeli offers five tips to help teachers discuss assessment with their co-workers. First, it is important to remember that a teacher is not a bad teacher just because they disagree with you. Second, do your best to understand where your co-worker is coming from. Third, if you are feeling stressed about a disagreement with a co-worker it is likely that they are feeling the same. It may be helpful to approach your co-worker and talk things out. Fourth, try to focus on answering the big questions instead of focusing on smaller disagreements. Fifth, a large portion of people are embracing changes in assessment and very few are resisting. When dealing with co-workers try to focus on the larger group of individuals who are willing to make the necessary changes. Wormeli also provides an extensive list of useful teaching organizations for teachers to join, and a host of ideas for ways to better the working environment and discuss assessment civilly. || Wormeli posed a question in the beginning of the chapter that really got me thinking. He asked: What if the principal makes me do something with my grades that I don’t want to do? To be honest, the idea of having to change my grading for anyone is not something I look forward to. I am not adverse to receiving advice from my superiors and fellow staff members, and I would willingly make changes to my grading technique if I felt it would benefit my students. What irks me is that a principle may ask me to change my grading system without understanding how my system works and benefits the kids.
 * Webb Christopher || Chapter 15 in FIAE went through a list of Thirty-six tips to support colleagues. A lot of the ideas that were presented had to do with grading practices and assessment strategies. Some were about how to talk with colleagues in general about a topic you might feel unclear about and want to discuss. They gave a lot of great ideas such as having in services with companies that actually put them on and following up on those so you know teachers are getting something out of it. || What I liked most about this chapter were the ideas which got teachers to work together. The ones regarding in services were alright but teachers are usually required to do such things. It is when they take it upon themselves to call the round table meetings and such that real great ideas get presented and things get accomplished. One thing I did not like was how thyey suggested running some teachers out of the profession by ostracizing them. In Dr. Grace's class she is always saying how everyone can be taught anything then why can we not teach our colleagues the benefits of these new methods. ||
 * West Simon || This chapter was dedicated to working with colleagues, much of this discussing the ability to approach and converse with a colleague about a topic that you may find unclear or want to know more about. Other parts of this chapter included talking to colleagues about grading and how to assess, and different strategies to help with assessment. || I found this chapter important because it emphasized teachers working together. The chapter reminded me of my department meeting with Mr. Tierney and how well they different language arts teachers at Mt. Blue worked together. I really enjoyed this chapter and the idea of teachers taking it upon themselves to work together. ||