A significant part of my teaching pedagogy is focused on brain-based learning. The funny thing I realized after looking through various readings and sources, blogs, and watching videos, is that I have a great deal to learn about how to implement this in my teaching practices.
One of the takeaways that I am going to really strive to perfect after Spring break is the idea that we need to set our students up for learning. We ultimately create the environment that our students learn in and it is our job to read our students and prepare the environment according to their needs and the lesson. For example, if I want my students to do math centers for 30 minutes where I expect them to move around, but also be engaged, I need to create the atmosphere to support this. What I would do with my 2nd graders is have them stand up and do some yoga stretches. I would get their bodies moving a little bit-- but in a relaxing way. I may get their brain ready by doing a few math review problems (ones that I know they will all be able to get) and then send them on their way to do more complicated math. I often do this with my students who need a lot of social-emotional support. In the morning when they come in I talk with them and figure out what state they are in. From there, that talk determines how I structure my lessons during the day. I learned a great deal from other people's blogs, such as Mariah who talked about settling time for the brain after a lesson. I read about this, but after reading it again in Mariah's blog I want to also look into ways to incorporate this in my classroom. Chelsea talked about exuberant discovery in her blog and how this is the core of learning. Students really retain and stay engaged during lessons when they find interest in it. Both Chelsea and I agree that this is an incredibly important part of teaching-- but also equally challenging. Getting to know your students and their interests is the best way to give students interesting/engaging lessons. Shauna was encouraging and appreciated my views on SEL and the brain. I hope that I can help inspire her and others to continue learning about mindfulness and the brain. She also shared similar views on the readings and found them incredibly helpful, but also a lot at once. It is interesting to see that as we are learning about brains and how it can get information overload, both her and I experienced this with the readings. Nothing like experiencing what you are learning to really absorb it! :) Overall, I am excited to continue learning about brain-based learning and figure out how I can make this a natural part of my teaching. I will continue to go back to these readings and chunk it up to really familiarize myself with the research. There are some fantastic strategies out there that I want to learn, and I hope to learn more each time I reread this week's chapters.
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Author2nd Grade teacher at Keet Gooshi Heen in Sitka, Alaska Archives
April 2017
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