Gaming and Learning

Video games versus learning, video games versus parents, and video games versus everyday living skills-the other day I came across this fascinating discussion on a parenting forum. Members quoted lots of studies on how detrimental they were in every area-learning, attention, social skills…and then I saw this article in NY Times:)

Learning by Playing: Video Games in the Classroom
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http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/19/magazine/19video-t.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&hpw

I am totally clueless about gaming and have taught many of Kai ‘sound alikes’-trying to decipher their vocabulary is a challenge. So of course I had a smile every time the writer described Kai. But the quote that struck me was “Kids are literally wearing digital media,” … “It’s present everywhere in their lives, except for in the learning environment.” How true is that?

There is a lot of work yet to be done to understand how effective such classrooms would be for the general population (there must be kids who are indifferent to gaming). It poses another challenge though-what do teachers have to know to be able to teach students with mixed reality technology?

I couldn’t completely agree with the teacher’s objections to some of the conventional learning though. You may be able to find the capital of a state or a country through Google, but seriously, imagine yourself at a social gathering and the conversation taking a turn about other countries. How interesting would your contribution be because you didn’t know some basic general knowledge? Are you going to Google it, during the conversation?

Similarly with spelling-even in the digital age, people write reports for work. Spell check is great (my husband who is dyslexic said his college life was better for it) but even there several options come up, don’t they? If you don’t know which one of those words makes sense in that context, you will have a very interesting work report going out. You do need a basic understanding of spelling!

I’m all for technology/media in the classroom-having seen the motivational and cognitive benefits. At the same time I feel it’s a good thing to use technology/media to aid learning in all areas and not restrict ourselves to learning only what is necessary for technology or media.

Ms. S

Teaching Sequencing Skills to Young Children

In young children, language plays a big part in learning sequencing skills. Teachers should make a concentrated effort to use and explain words which tell

• when an event occurred in time (before, after, between, from, etc)
• where an event falls in a particular sequence (first, second, third, next, last, finally, etc).

Ways to incorporate sequencing skills in the classroom:

Following multiple step directions relating to classroom routine: “Put the blocks away before you go to the reading table.” “To get a book at the library you must do three things. First, you must select a book, second, check it at the counter and third, get it stamped.”

Students have to remember the different parts of the direction and follow them in order. The first set of instructions has to do with keeping the classroom environment clean and manageable. The second set requires them to listen, retain the information and follow the steps in an order to be effective. You can’t check a book before you select it. It isn’t logical.

Before, first, second and third cue the students about the order of their actions. Effective teachers ask the students to repeat the directions back with leading questions-What do you have to do first? What happens second (next/after that)? What happens third or last? It targets memory, and leads the student to talk through his work (“I have to do…., next … and finally do…”).
You can also use art activities and language games with multiple step directions.

Book Time: When reading to your students, prompt them to identify the beginning, middle and end of the story. Ask leading questions such as, “What happened first?” “Which house did the wolf huff and puff at first-the straw house or the brick house?

Give your students picture sequences from the stories and have them arrange these in the right order. Put the pictures in order yourself with one event missing. Ask the students to identify the missing event.

Cooking: Following recipes during cooking activities is a great way to work on sequencing skills. There is a finished product at then end of all that work and who doesn’t want to eat in class? Make sandwiches, fruit salads, decorate biscuits…your creativity sets the limits here.

In my class we took pictures of every step (with the students adding ingredients or working on the method) and labeled the pictures. For older students we made cookbooks-each sheet showing the pictures for one recipe. The recipes from all the cooking activities for that year were compiled together in the binder.

For younger children, each step of the cooking activity was on one page. Each cooking activity had its own book. These were some of the most popular books during Rest and Relaxation and we’d often hear-“First you have to break the eggs, and then beat…”

Writing: Encourage beginning writers to use invented spelling, where they identify the sounds in a word (in sequence) and match it to the corresponding letter. For example, “What’s the first sound you hear? What letter makes that sound? What’s the next sound?”
For students in older primary classes, letter writing and writing down scientific experiments are great ways to incorporate sequencing skills. These exercises have written formats which teach students to organize information.

I'm sure you can add more activities to this list based on your experiences.

Ms. S

“I want to become a doctor,” the ten year old told me.

“Oh, very nice. What do you think you need to do to become a doctor?” I asked her. “Mmmm, study every day? Do my homework? Go to coaching classes for the entrance exam?” her voice rose at the end of every sentence as she looked at her mother to confirm the steps. I was impressed she knew the word coaching. Her mum asked me which planet I was from. “Every (school going) ten year old in India knows about coaching classes for medical and engineering entrance exams.”

It is great when students are that self aware and understand that everything we do has a series of steps and that these steps must progress in the right order.

Every day we follow a specific sequence of events to get ready for school, for work, etc. We wake up, brush teeth, bathe, get dressed, eat breakfast, pack lunch, take book bag…The final goal of getting ready is broken down into these smaller steps as part of our routine. Supposing you miss breakfast? You will be hungry soon and it will affect your concentration. If you forget your bag of documents, you’ll have a lot of explaining to do.

Sequencing in the classroom:

Take the syllabus in any subject-the lessons are presented in a sequential order. Why? Because one step must build upon the other. The smaller goals lead to the bigger goals when you follow them in the right order.

Have your students submitted work where you can’t make out head or tail? Their ideas are all over the place. There is no clear cut beginning, middle or end. That’s because they don’t know how to identify the steps or to sequence them in an orderly manner.

Take writing a basic essay-An essay has three parts:

1. introduction,


2. body and


3. conclusion
   

The body can be further broken down into

• Main topic


• Sub topic

The student who does not/can not organize his ideas in this sequence is going to present an incoherent essay.

Go over to the chemistry lab. The students have to do a quantitative analysis of a salt. What happens if your student doesn’t know the sequence of steps? It affects the final answer.

How about history? A specific timeline of events led up to the First War of Indian Independence. Not knowing the individual events and the sequence in which they occurred affects our comprehension of history.

To be continued...

Ms. S

Teaching Planning skills Part II

“On the day of my 10th (board) Physics exam, I was shocked to receive the Maths question paper! So really my marks reflect what I knew of Maths without much preparation,” my classmate told us at the get together.

While this maybe an extreme case, a lot of students go through their school years without knowing the schedule of when assignments are due or how to plan for them.

How do we address this need in our students?

• As always, lead by example. Teachers must plan their lessons well. Keep in mind the time available, the content to be covered and the assessments to be done at the end of the lesson.

• Use planners. Pick weekly or monthly planners based on your student’s needs.

• Through direct instruction, teach students to note down due dates, upcoming trips, test dates and any other important information in the planner.

• Review the information at the beginning of the class, so that it becomes part of the routine. Draw students’ attention to dues dates-How many days are left to…?

• Use verbal cues to highlight stages of planning. “You have ten days to present your artwork for the school exhibition. What is the theme of your exhibit? What materials do you need? When will you start? How will you start…” and so on.

• For specific assignments teach them to set deadlines

1. for gathering information,
2. to complete the assignment
3. to review and add/correct final copy

• Post a master copy of the monthly planning sheet on the bulletin board or wall.

• At the end of the session, provide the last few minutes to complete the planner (for those who need extra time). This way they will catch up with the others in the same session.

• For those who need extra, extra help, use a reinforcement chart or a peer tutor to stay on schedule.

• Teach students to check or mark out completed assignments.

• Follow up with parents to make sure these planning skills are practiced at home as well. Parents can cross check with the weekly/monthly schedules before planning major family events. Further, practicing in various settings (school, home) will help with generalization of skills.

Ms.S

How to Modify Your Teaching for Students With Low Organizational Skills

Here's an excellent link for teachers and parents-easy to read and retain.

Reading Rockets: How to Modify Your Teaching for Students With Low Organizational Skills

Ms.S

OK, your students have a realistic goal in life–at least on the academic front.

What can you do to help them achieve their goal (besides slogging under the weight of that syllabus, limited time, etc)? Teach them to plan of course.

We haven’t yet developed the pill to grow scientists, professional players or musicians over night. They did try to turn babies into geniuses but that’s another story.

Planning

So how do you teach planning skills? Bring it to the attention of the students that small steps lead to bigger achievements. And, that we have to complete these small steps in a timely manner.

Remember you can’t teach a skill that you don’t have. So plan your lessons well.

Teaching young children to plan:

In younger classes, teachers can involve their students in planning for the class-take a chance every now and then and change your lesson for the next week. (I say this because I just saw the lesson on aliens for a primary standard. Everything is planned and presented sequentially including assessment questions, and teachers have very little time for extension activities or for creative thinking. Just think-what fun teaching about aliens can be).

Ask them what they want to learn and enlist their help in planning the activities. Write down their ideas on the board. Are the ideas viable or not? If not, discuss why. What materials will they need for the activities? Who will get them? When should everything be ready?

Do you have special holiday parties for Diwali, Christmas or Ramzaan? If you don’t, then make up an excuse for a small party. It doesn’t have to be religious.
• Ask the children to plan-you monitor to keep it within plausible limits (expense, time, ability, etc) but let them come with ideas an art activity (to keep them busy), food/drink items, decorations, clean up.
• What materials do they need?
• How much of each item would they need?
• Write their ideas on the board.
• Make it into a checklist and post it where the students can see.
• As the students collect the materials for each activity (with your supervision, depending on the age), have them mark it on the checklist.

After the party, talk about how there were many steps to the achieving the goal. If they hadn’t planned the party out, it may not have been so much fun. There may not have been enough to drink for everyone; the food may not have been ready…but their planning in advance helped make it a success.

Ms.S

"I think the real problem is the idea that he is a problem child...

I do recognize that this student has problems in his peer interactions, and that he is too impulsive. But now, every incident in his class is blamed on this boy. Other students set him up because they know his impulsivity will lead him deeper. By the time it comes to the teacher’s attention, guess who is in trouble?" asked Madhu a mentor for the third standard teachers (all the sections) in her school.

This was a common theme I heard from parents and administration and supervisory staff. Many felt that once teachers make up their minds about a student with behavioral problems, they don’t give that child a chance.

Make the child stand outside the class, send to the principal’s office and in extreme cases, dismiss the child from the school! These seem to be the only responses we get from some teachers, they mentioned. Interestingly none of these comments were made on school visits or workshops. These were strictly during personal and social interactions with friends or friends of friends.

And so I have to take the opportunity to mention my friend Anu, a fourth standard English teacher. It was a typical class with all the regulated syllabus and strictly timed activities. I happened to watch her interactions with the children and thoroughly enjoyed myself.

When the students got rambunctious, Anu enjoyed their energy but calmed them down without raising her voice. When they got naughty, she laid down the rules without any power play. She made sure there was enough to keep that overactive child busy without overwhelming him and saw to it that the shy child had her say.

Most of all, I was impressed with the way Anu handled the child who couldn’t regulate his body. He was up every minute, raising his hand, interrupting the lesson –sometimes with unrelated remarks which had his classmates laughing. Anu noticed that his peers said things under their breath to egg him on, and boom! She moved over to his desk.

She used non verbal cues (gestures, pointing) and involved the students so well that no one had the time to think of distracting the others. Whenever this student jumped up, her hand gave a gentle push to seat him back. The students seated at a distance got to be involved as chalkboard helpers or readers, and so no one was left out.

I asked her how she managed her class so well and she said, “Oh, I like all the different personalities in my class. If I step in at the right time and in the right way, I can guide their interactions. I give them room to be themselves without losing control of the class. Besides, they make me laugh.”

At the end of the day, I overheard the busy child say, “That was a fun class, wasn’t it?” I guess that says it all:)

I'm Back...

with lots and lots to write...so there!

Medication vs. Therapy NY Times Article

“My nephew lost his dad a couple of years back and was having a difficult time coping with his grief. The psychiatrist prescribed anti depressants but I am concerned because his behavior is very erratic since he started medication. My parents think the medication should take care of it and my sister is still recovering herself.” Jayanth, the nephew was only eight years old!


This week’s article in The New York Times talks about the conflicts parents (and professionals) face when children are medicated at a very young age. I have seen very young children (3-5 yr olds) with severe behavior problems in the classroom (in a regular education setting).

Parenting children with such severe behavioral needs is no picnic. I won’t go into the rights or wrongs of the mother thinking that medication will solve the problem. But what were the professionals thinking when they prescribed so many medications to such a young child?

Fortunately for Jayanth, he has two things going for him.

There was a clear cut environmental trigger (his father’s death). It made people less judgmental, even if all they said was, “Oh, poor child.” They were willing to make accommodations (unlike in case of those children who develop emotional problems as they grow).

Jayanth's aunt is a very good advocate. She started recording everyday events to see if anything in his environment triggered his behavioral outbursts. Next she sought a second opinion. This child psychiatrist agreed with her that what the boy needed was intensive counseling and therapy as opposed to heavy duty psycho-tropic drugs.

It took several tries to find the right therapist (yes, sometimes you have to shop around to see who connects with the child). Jayanth goes to play therapy and to counseling besides taking keyboard lessons and art classes. Life is not perfect but he is moving in the right direction.

What about those children whose parents believe that the doctor knows best and never question them? Many parents don’t even know that therapy helps children accept their condition or that the therapist helps teach coping skills. I meet many parents who reel out names of the drugs their children are on but when I ask them about therapy, they say the doctor (psychiatrist) said that the medication will do the trick! Who keeps a tab on how up to date these psychiatrists are, with their medical knowledge? I’ve even talked to school counselors who think therapy is a ‘Western’ concept and won’t fit in the Indian society.

Urrrrrrrrrrggggggggggggh!!!

Ms.S