Weekly Vitamins: Ingredients of a Well-Balanced Plan

Ever heard of someone say that well-balanced meals are full of color? Just as food should have the right mix of nutrients, be paired with similar items on the plate, and be made at the right temperature, so should lessons. Let's break down how this week's readings require that teachers teach with balance and attention to levels of instruction.

The Ramon Noodle lesson

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In my last blog post on the readings, I talked a little bit about objectives. This week, we also had a reading on objectives, but there were a few little things that really struck me. Whittington talks about lower-level objectives (to which I equate to Ramon Noodles). This meal is easy to make and can be done with a low level of knowledge in the kitchen. Whittington says that by raising the bar in the objectives (or maybe making a spaghetti and meatball platter instead), it shows that if they can demonstrate understanding through a more complex level of thinking, then they must also be able to understand the lower-level thinking. 

Food analogies aside, the author says that teachers should be cautious of teaching to lower-level objectives like listing or recalling information. Instead, have students problem solve and apply the lists by explaining or creating. If that can be done successfully, teachers know that the students must also have mastered the recall level.

I think, however, being able to list information is important, and sometimes, it is a necessary step to focus on before diving too deeply into complex areas. At least in the very beginning of a unit or lesson it may be beneficial to take time to focus on rote memorization, and then use that foundation to propel the student into higher levels of thinking. Some students may otherwise be overwhelmed if they don't have some sort of a foundation to begin with, and within their zone of proximal development. For example, one can't explain why parts of an engine work together if they don't first know what the parts are called or what their purpose is. 

The balanced plate

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I loved this quote from the article: "when we write objectives designed to challenge students at higher cognitive levels, we, as teachers must equally challenge ourselves to teach at higher cognitive levels". This statement is so powerful because it says that teachers must mirror the level they teach at to the level at which they want their students to think. Teachers can't teach how to make Ramon Noodles and expect that their students will make a spaghetti and meatball platter. Likewise, teachers shouldn't teach a spaghetti platter and only evaluate at a Ramon Noodle level. This creates confusion of the goal of the lesson and what they are to carry over into the next lesson.

Family meals

So we've set up an idea for the level at which to teach individual students, but now we must differentiate our instruction and give students a chance to practice as a group. There are many reasons to incorporate cooperative or group learning, but one that Groseta and Myers shares really stood out to me. They said that students more frequently use higher-level reasoning strategies when they're expected to explain something to their peers. This makes sense as I think about Bloom's taxonomy and those higher-level objectives as discussed earlier. "Explaining" is much higher than "listing", and students that have to explain something to their partner or small group are more likely to have better discussion and reasoning skills than those that just simply list off the answers. 

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In our Methods of Teaching Agriculture book, it offered some examples of ways to go about group teaching. Here, group teaching can be taken to mean large groups as well as partners or small groups. The idea in group teaching is meant to facilitate other ways to get students involved and learning with one another; not just individual instruction. I really liked how the book emphasized that teachers must teach to their strengths. They should also take into consideration the subject matter being taught and whether the method will best drive home the learning. One of their examples was how a lesson on parts of a plant probably wouldn't be done by role-playing or taking a field trip.

Conclusion

This is important for me to remember as I plan ways to differentiate my instruction. I have to ask myself does the activity or action I'm having my students perform best reflect the objectives I need to meet? Are students being challenged to the appropriate level and by the right way?

Having a firm grasp on those thoughts will aid me as I build a well-balanced lesson plan.

Leaving Thought

"Normality is a paved road: it's comfortable to walk, but no flowers grow"--Vincent van Gogh

Whittington, M.S. (2005). Writing objectives in secondary agriculture courses that challenge

         students to think. Agriculture Education Magazine. Retrieved from

         http://www.naae.org/profdevelopment/magazine/archive_issues/Volume77/v77i5.pdf

Newcomb, L.H., McCracken, J.D., Warmbrod, J.R., & Whittington, M.S. (1993). Methods of

        teaching agriculture. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Prentice Hall.

Groseta, K.J. & Myers, B.E. (2006). Using cooperative learning in formal and nonformal

        education. Retrieved from https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/pdffiles/WC/WC06200.pdf