Return-Path: <nifl-fobasics@literacy.nifl.gov> Received: from literacy (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by literacy.nifl.gov (8.10.2/8.10.2) with SMTP id hBG2JKm03821; Mon, 15 Dec 2003 21:19:20 -0500 (EST) Date: Mon, 15 Dec 2003 21:19:20 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <5.0.2.1.2.20031215175915.00a623b0@pop.ix.netcom.com> Errors-To: listowner@literacy.nifl.gov Reply-To: nifl-fobasics@literacy.nifl.gov Originator: nifl-fobasics@literacy.nifl.gov Sender: nifl-fobasics@literacy.nifl.gov Precedence: bulk From: "Michele Craig (shellcraig@ix.netcom.com)" <shellcraig@ix.netcom.com> To: Multiple recipients of list <nifl-fobasics@literacy.nifl.gov> Subject: [NIFL-FOBASICS:901] RE: Managing Teaching to the test & X-Listprocessor-Version: 6.0c -- ListProcessor by Anastasios Kotsikonas Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Version 5.0.2 Status: O Content-Length: 2574 Lines: 49 George and Others-- I am just newly subscribed to the list, but this is exactly the kind of discussion I was hoping for when I joined. I teach adult basic education and GED preparation. We are very lucky in that our programs have been set up as individualized instruction for a long time. That is, students can use the classroom any of the hours we are open, we do an initial assessment (both CASAS and informal assessments) and then they work at their own speed. When I feel (and they feel) they are ready, they take the GED or they move into the high school diploma program, or they take whatever test (anything from CBEST to department of rehabilitation diagnostic tests). This gives me a lot of freedom as a teacher to be a facilitator. I really see my job as showing them how to learn, so I spend a lot of time, not talking so much about subject matter as how to analyze mistakes, see patterns of mistakes in your own work, how to correct your own mistakes and how to think critically about whatever you are doing. A lot of things on the GED examination are things that people really would find useful if they knew how to do them (write an intelligible essay, calculate percentages, know the basics of American history) but they aren't the be-all and end all. I spent some time the other day ostensibly helping one of my students find photographs of Posadas on the internet for her son's 2nd grade report. It really turned into a lesson on how to use internet search engines. If I had told her, "Today I'm going to show you how to use an internet search engine because I feel you need to know this," she would have told me she needed to work on math for her GED. At another time, I recall that many of my students began playing the game "hangman" almost obsessively. I didn't interfere and that group of students all improved their spelling skills in ways that I could never have done by "teaching" them spelling. Another student who had barely been able to write sentences needed to write a letter so he could continue visitations to his daughter. He wrote, edited and typed a three page letter. If people don't see the application of the skills they study with us, they tend to drift away. I would debate that GED preparation isn''t really the best way for people to learn anything. It is just an incentive to learn. While we have them, then, we have to motivate them, teach them to teach themselves, and hopefully to get them hooked on learning as something they will continue after they pass their exams. Michele Craig
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