Final Reflection

Why Don’t Students Like School – Final Reflection

To be honest, my first thought about this book was that there were a lot of studies shared with us and it made it all a bit overwhelming. However, there were key concepts that I picked out that I feel I can take to my classroom.

• Accept and Act on Variation in Student Preparation – Students come to us with all sorts of different backgrounds and levels of preparedness. As professionals, we need to recognize this and modify as necessary.
• Change the Pace – I get stuck in a routine and I get stuck that we have to keep moving on. I need to remember that I need to switch it up to engage my students and to speed up or slow down based on their needs.
• We Remember Better when Things have Meaning – Sometimes I wonder why we need to know all of this math I can only imagine what students are thinking. I need to improve on creating final projects that will help put meaning to all of this math.
• Background Knowledge – I can’t assume that students are coming to me knowing how to do all the necessary skills. I need to assess that background knowledge before introducing new skills.
• Practice – I need to encourage my students to practice the basic skills to put it in their mental ability to make room for more challenging lessons. Stress that it will help them to reinforce skills, helps them to not forget, and improves transfer.
• Classroom Environment – I loved the analogy that Willingham gave with the TV show House. He talked about all the mistakes Dr. House makes in an episode to get to the right answer. I need to create that environment in my classroom.
• Slow Learners – I need to practice the advice Willingham gave us to help the slow learners. It was a great reminder that the gap won’t be closed overnight but that it takes hard work on everyone’s part (especially the student) to close that gap.
• Keep a Teaching Diary – This would be a great challenge for me to do, but overall I believe that this would help me to become a better teacher.