Lensyl Urbano – Page 180 – Montessori Muddle

Co-opting the iPod: Flashcards

iPod Touches are quite convenient little PDA’s. Beautifully tactile, they are a pleasure to use. A few of my students have them and I’ve had to think long and hard about allowing iPods in the classroom because, for a little while there, students were using them under the table for all sorts of illicit applications (games). I was tempted to ban them outright, and I have not yet made a final decision but I thought I’d try co-opting the devices first.

So I now have a few students using the iPod Calendar, taking notes, and now one has found a nice little flashcard app called Cramberry. Apparently, the major selling point was its catch-phrase, “Studying doesn’t have to be painful.” The app costs $4.99 for the full version (the Lite version is useless). I’ve also tested Flashcard Touch myself, which is free this month (March), and it seems to work well (see the screen capture).

PDA’s are still on probation; they can be very useful. The outstanding question is one of trust. Will students use them appropriately, or are they too much of a temptation. A key Montessori principle is that students should take responsibility for their learning and trust is an essential component. I am cautiously optimistic.

Dealing with test anxiety

Afghan_college_entrance_exam_day — Afghan college entrance exam day. From Wikimedia Commons.

In the middle school our students have to take tests. While it’s not quite as bad as the Afghan college entrance exam, there’s the annual standardized test, and then there are the cycle tests every six weeks. Even with the cycle tests, some students have test anxiety. They see a math test with almost identical questions to the ones they have been doing perfectly for weeks and they freeze. I asked Ms. P. to look into strategies for dealing with test anxiety, and as usual, she came up with an excellent list of links.

Her favorite, which I also like, is Penn State’s University Learning Center’s ~~Test Taking and Test Anxiety website~~. They, however, appear to have gone missing, but Effective Study’s How To Overcome Test Anxiety seems a good alternative. TeensHealth’s page is also good and aimed at a younger audience, although there is not much difference in the level of the writing for a middle schooler. If you need a clear list of things to do before and during the test, Study Guides and Strategies has an excellent page.

These sites tend to recommend preparing well and using relaxation techniques, such as deep breathing, during the test.

Other resources:

E. Scott’s About.com page
C. Sorensen’s page at the Gallaudet University
The University of Alabama’s Center for Teaching and Learning’s “What causes test anxiety and Dealing with test anxiety pages.”
Virginia Tech’s Cook Counseling Center’s page.

Exams_in_Jaura,_India — Exams in Jaura, India (from Wikimedia Commons)

Mercenaries on the playing field

These, in the day when heaven was falling,
The hour when earth’s foundations fled,
Followed their mercenary calling,
And took their wages, and are dead.

Their shoulders held the sky suspended;
They stood, and earth’s foundations stay;
What God abandoned, these defended,
And saved the sum of things for pay.

– A.E. Housman

Three themes converged on the playing field today; poetry, competitive sports and video war games. We’d used Alfred Houseman’s “Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries” for a lesson on OULIPO yesterday because it’s short and one of my small groups had presented a week ago so we were all familiar with the poem. We’d been trying post-games discussions after frizbee (and soccer) to learn sportsmanship. We’d been having issues with video games and the definition of the word “duty“. I’ve long suspected (and would love to find a study that looks into this) that video game players are more likely to give up when the odds are against them because they are so used to just restarting the game (or respawning).

Today at the end of our post game discussion, I recited Epitaph to highlight the strength of character shown by some of the players who put up a great comeback despite part of their team stopping playing. It was a serendipitous convergence of three themes we’ve been dealing with this entire cycle (if not the whole year). It was a moment when I really appreciated being able to be so engaged with all parts of the curriculum.

Federal Reserve’s economic data

The St. Louis Federal Reserve has a Summer School program for teachers. Two of the sessions deal with current events (banking crisis and jobs) but the third covers the data and primary source documents that bank makes available online (for free). These include the FRED and GeoFred websites.

Screen shot 2010-03-20 at 2.16.48 AM — Unemployment data for the Eastern US from GeoFRED.

GeoFred produces graphs like the one above showing economic statistics across the country. It can do it on a state by state basis, by county (as above), or by even more refined areas.

FRED plots graphs and even provides the data for economic statistics over time. The graph above shows GDP since they started collecting data in the 1940’s. It also has the times of recessions shaded in. The data in the graph can also be downloaded if you want to do your own analysis.

These seem to be handy little tools for teaching and for research projects, and are pretty easy to use.

The teachers’ training sessions are free though you have to get your own housing. They do provide breakfast and lunch. If you want graduate credit for them however, each three day session will cost around $306 and garner one credit.

Sportsmanship

“Winning is the easy part, losing is really tough. But, you learn more from one loss than you do from a million wins. You learn a lot about sportsmanship. I mean, it’s really tough to shake the hand of someone who just beat you, and it’s even harder to do it with a smile. If you can learn to do this and push through that pain, you will remember what that moment is like the next time you win and have a better sense of how those competitors around you feel. This experience will teach you a lot on and off the field!” – Amy Van Dyken

Sports bring out the best and the worst in us. In victory and defeat. When the competitive fires burn fiercest they strip away facade and open windows into the soul. We’ve been playing Ultimate Frisbee on and off all year for PE and like it because it offers, in a microcosm, a remarkable view into the character of my students. Subtle behaviors in the classroom get magnified on the playing field; the willingness to quit when the score is against you versus the quiet perseverance no matter what happens. Yet, if the way we act when we play sports reflects the our character, then perhaps we can shape our character by changing the way we act when we play. That’s what “they” mean when they say that playing sports builds character.

“How a man plays the game shows something of his character; how he loses shows it all.”
-Tribune (Camden County, GA)

I’ve also come to realize that team sports can work as a substitute for co-operative games if I insist on a half-time team talk and a post game discussion by the whole group. The half-time talks are turning into pep talks and the post-game talks are proving very useful. I choose someone at random to give the talk.

There are times when you’re tired and times when you don’t believe in yourself. That’s when you have to stick it out and draw on the confidence that you have deep down beneath all the doubts and worries.” -Jim Abbot

I have not had many post-match group talks, but I am rectifying that. After each game, the group need to address some reflective questions:

What worked?
What was challenging?
How did you feel?
What did you learn?

Once again, we practice reflective thinking, although this time it’s for the group as well as the individual. We’re building abstract thinking skills as well a character, and hopefully, they both reinforce each other.

“The answers to these questions will determine your success or failure. 1) Can people trust me to do what’s right? 2) Am I committed to doing my best? 3) Do I care about other people and show it? If the answers to these questions are yes, there is no way you can fail.” –Lou Holtz