Concept-based Teaching for Effective Learning!

Concept-based Learning: Boosting Learning Within Classrooms

Teachers struggle constantly with the huge load of facts and topics that must be covered. However, what if we - as teachers - could use a strategy that would help our students make neural connections beyond those facts and concepts hence making their learning process a meaningful one? 

Concept-based instruction facilitates transdisciplinary learning by connecting new mental constructs to prior knowledge, new concepts and ideas across subjects in order to develop deep understanding. Among the strategies that fall under this big title is to allow students make generalizations, develop big ideas, ask questions to connect new information into prior ones as well as to real life. The 'Why we are learning this?' and 'Why is this important to know or do?' center the learning into useful ideas, make students motivated upon learning, and allow the brain to make deeper connections and patterns between macro and microconcepts as well as to mentally construct and organize ideas. 

This type of meaningful learning triggers integrated thinking as students are going to face different types of questions, make discussions that trigger higher order thinking, and helps them integrate between factual and conceptual learning. 

The 5E lesson Cycle

Creating Freedom and Opportunities to Learn!

The 5E cycle is considered to be the most successfully implemented inquiry-based strategy within science and math classes. As its name indicated, it is divided into 5 order stages: Engagement, Exploration, Explanation, Elaboration, and Evaluation. 

1. Engagement

Or what we call the 'magnet' or the 'hook' to grab your learner's attention towards the topic. It is the most important part that should make students too curious and excited to learn more about the concept. As a teacher, you need to make it as much personal as possible to them by bringing in something that they experience every day. Demonstrate experiments, ask questions, tell a story, show a riddle or a video to elicit their thinking, let them make predictions, identify misconceptions and start making connections to reach out an answer.

2. Exploration

Now, it's time to further explore the concept and develop ideas. It is time to make discoveries and try out their own ideas. Let them ask questions, make discussion activities, do some research, draw or write down their findings hence revising and refining their current ideas along with making connections to prior ones.  

3. Explanation 

It is not your turn now as a teacher, Nah! It's the learners' time to verbalize and share their findings and idea with the class using their own words. They are going to present their work and through whole class discussions, they are going to refine their thoughts as deeper understanding will take place hence heling them make meaning out from the previous two Es. 

4. Elaboration 

For concepts to be further refined and deeply understood, there is a need to extend and apply the knowledge to a new situation or a different scenario in order to tell if students have really grasped the desired ideas. It is time to provide new challenges! Real world applications or experiments, assigning group work, giving new questions can all add more details to move from simple into deep understanding. 

5. Evaluation 

At the end of the lesson, it is essential to give students an opportunity to reflect and demonstrate their understanding through creating a product and evaluating it. Rubrics and checklists are one of the ways that are used to provide students with guidelines or criteria for the self or peer assessment hey are going to provide. 

As one could tell, the 5E model falls under the student-centred strategies as all its stages focus on the student as the ones responsible for their own learning. The teacher would be the facilitator of discussions, the monitor of work and the guide to provide help when needed. 

Through inquiry, there is always an opportunity for students to try out their ideas and questions because it strengthens their engagement, elicits their thinking, and fosters their achievements!

Inquiry-based Learning: An Educational Trend

Let them ask, investigate, reflect, discuss, and create!

The inquiry-based method focuses on students' drawing on their own experiences and findings to develop inferences and make sense of phenomena. It strengthens students' engagement, elicits their thinking and fosters their achievements. In contrary to traditional learning, the students' ideas are at the centre of the learning process as knowing the correct answer is no longer the most valuable trait. Instead, students need to be prepared to the world outside the classroom, they need to become skilled in the way they ask questions, use their knowledge to think of answers to their everyday problems, be inventive and creative, and discover the outside world. 

As educators, it is our role to be the guide moving all around the classroom, not the person who is just standing in front of the board, talking and talking and talking all the time, asking them to repeat, and celebrating their high grades for rote learning; but forgetting about the zero they will take when they face life while we are not there for them. 

The Change from Adopting a Passive Learning Process into an Active One!

 What is a thing that you are able to do now and wasn't able to do it a year ago!

Self improvement: A better version of yourself!

During my first year of teaching, I used to be the only active part in the classroom as my teachers used to do. All I wanted was to finish the lessons in lesser number of sessions as much as possible and cover the book. I used to explain the concept or idea, solve exercises in front of the class, and ask them to memorize and solve similar exercises in the same way I've done. Little had been the students who participated or asked questions in the class. So, kind of it was a very direct and passive, teacher-centred approach that was followed and this had made my sessions boring. 

It was up until I've done a 4 months training the following academic year about teaching strategies and started to follow the inquiry-based method where I introduce a question about the topic and relate it to the students' life experiences, use visuals and animations, present PowerPoints with videos, do easy experiments in class or at home when materials are available. They started to figure out the answer themselves through relating ideas together, analysing, making discussions in class guided by me, and hence reaching final conclusions. I realized that engaging students in the learning process rendered learning fun and meaningful for both of us, their participation in asking or solving questions and giving them the chance to discover the concept allowed them to better retain the required information and do better in assessments. Now, they truly enjoy the sessions, not shy to ask or express their thoughts, and always wait for more.

It was not easy at all. I was left to work on my own without having any experience and without any supervision or guidance. To make that move is one of the things that I feel so proud about. My desire to seek the best for the learners and make my sessions much more interesting and engaging was more than enough to think twice about the strategies I use in the class.  There is always one thing that should come into our minds while preparing a lesson: If you and the students didn't enjoy the learning process and the activities done, then you are not teaching appropriately. It is such an amazing feeling when you and your students are working genuinely, all your senses are involved, all your thoughts are organized and focused to reach and master the required outcomes and hence the ultimate goal of enjoying learning and always waiting for the next session. Improving my educator self on a daily basis is what I always seek which in turn makes me feel that I belong here and I can make a difference as long as I am trying and welling to give more, and learn more!

The Challenges of Online Teaching!

What are some of the major problems that we face while teaching online?

We have all recently challenged by the online teaching without having any previous idea about it. We have faced, and we are still facing many issues. Here are some the major problems that we face while teaching online.

One of the most important issues is student's engagement. In most of the cases, online sessions are actually a lecture session that will end up by the teacher being talking to a screen. One of the things that can be done is to design the lecture in a way that involved student's more like asking challenging questions that elicit curiosity and thinking in the students or get the working in teams to let them think and work together in breakout rooms. Student's involvement is essential in online learning and to make sure that they are engaged together and with us as teachers.

Students' participation in online classes has high importance. But, how can we assess their participation and add it to their final grades? In fact, participation includes the quality of the answers students share while attending online sessions, listening to their classmates and building up or correcting their ideas, and the posts they do while answering a given question. These are things that can be taken into consideration when grading student's participation activities. 

Another challenge that we face in online teaching is giving differentiated instructions for students of different learning abilities and interests. We need to make sure that the students who struggle capturing the content and who move at slower rates are also involved in the learning process. One thing that can be done is to dedicate a part of the break or free time that we have to follow up with low achievers and answer their inquiries or give them extra work to solve. It is very important to reach out for passive learners through our differentiated instructions while teaching online to make a huge difference in the life of our diverse classes. 

A third problem that come along with online teaching is the amount of posts, messages, emails, and activities that are given to students. It is very difficult to read all of them and respond to every single student. As teachers, we can set a rule and make them clear for students regarding how, what, and when they can send us inquiries and make assignments clear as much as possible to avoid any misunderstanding. We should take into account how to improve our communication and ways of responses to students as we tend to be their models. 

Giving feedback for student's work might take weeks and this is not what students actually expect when it is related to online learning. Our feedbacks play and essential role in students improvement as they should be done in way that should push students to learn carefully from their mistakes after doing an assignment or activity and how to improve themselves. Feedbacks should be personalized, students feel their importance to us when we do so, and they will be able to respond in their own way to our feedbacks as well.

At the end, it is important to keep in mind that whether it is face-to-face or online teaching, it is supposed to be fun for students as well us for us as teachers! Being ourselves, letting students to express themselves as well, and interacting with them give energy and life to the class and will make us all satisfied with the outcomes!

Online Safety Rules: Tips for Students for Safe Web Surfing!

What should be done to help students stay safe while being online?

We spend a lot of time on the internet doing multiple of online tasks from searching new information, making presentations and school projects, virtual classes and meetings, checking trending videos, playing online games, to simple chatting and sending pictures to friends. Billions of people use the internet and not all of them are  aware of problems that may arise while doing so. Kids and teen are much more likely to be subjected to hackers or even verbal or physical harassment and bullying while being online. Here are some tips that we should teach students at such ages to avoid falling into such problems. 

The first thing that students should know about internet safety is that whatever posted on the internet will stay there forever! Your grandchildren will be able at some stage to read your posts and thoughts! So, when dealing with social media, it is necessary to follow up with the privacy terms they apply. 

The second thing to be taken into consideration is to avoid putting lots of personal information out there and only share what is required with friends. If not, then this causes the accounts to be subjected to attackers and hackers who would take advantage of you. 

A third thing is to not forget about smart phone's safety. Cyber safety should extend to your phones as well when it comes to text safety the same way our parents used to tell us to never accept any candies or gifts or even respond to strangers. So, they should be taught to not answer texts or cell phones from strange or unknown numbers. They should also know to stop communicating with someone who doesn't make them feel comfortable and never be afraid or shy to speak outload with their parents, school councillors, teachers, or other trusted adults about any out-of-normal incidents like bullying, verbal or sexual harassment. Moreover, they shall not meet in person with someone they have already known online unless they take a friend with them a sit in public places. 

Now, being a part of the worldwide web, one should know how to handle hackers in an intelligent way and this would be the fourth thing to be taken into account. A bunch of things can be done relating to the previously mentioned idea. One should know very well that no mater how careful you might be, still your accounts can get hacked! To ensure safety, one can simply change the account's password when it gets hacked and make a new stronger and unpredictable one. In addition, there is always the option of using the two-step verification or using many emails to protect your account. One can also tell friends to report or block hacked accounts, use software to detect viruses, and most importantly to back up important files so that they would never be lost. 

The internet can be a wonderful world to explore but one should always make sure how to stay safe and teach students how to properly act while surfing it. 

Concept Mapping: Definition, Elements, Steps, Uses in Education!

 A Simple Guide to Create and Use Concept Maps: Science Example!

Definition and Importance

When thinking about a certain concept, lots of ideas may come to our mind and may form a mess after a while making it difficult to grasp the main point or details about it. That's where a concept mapping comes in. 

A concept map is a visual way to organize your ideas and make connections between them as well. They improve our ability to understand and remember concepts because our brains process visuals more than texts. 

Elements

A concept map is made up of three basic elements:

• Shapes: representing concepts or ideas (rectangles or ovals).
• Arrows: showing the relationship between concepts. 
• Text: identifying the concepts and relationships. 

How to create a concept map?

1. Topic Identification + Focus question: The first step in creating a concept map is to identify the main concept or the subject of study. For example, I tried to map some of the thing that I know about the immune system. So, I drew a rectangle and wrote within it 'Immune System'. The main idea should be located at the top of the map as everything we write down falls under this main topic. One would say: 'But, I know lots of things about the Immune System!' like history of discovery, structure, function, and disorders. So, a concept map holding all of these information may become messy and hence unuseful. Therefore, it would be much better to focus on one 'Focal question' to specify the issue this concept map will be talking about. In this example, the focus question can be: What are the main types of Immune responses? 
2. Brainstorming: Now, we can start adding any related concept. They should be as brief as possible to avoid having a text-crowded concept map with less visual effects. In our example, we can use names of responses, cells, and organs. 
3. Drawing the map: The concepts should be arranged in a hierarchal format. The map should start with the main concept at the top and then end up with more specific concepts as we move down. The specific and non-specific immune responses are the broadest, so I put them under the main topic.
4. Connecting ideas: To show relationships between ideas, we draw arrows between them with a text that defines this relationship. It is better to use verbs to link concept together and use simple phrases as we move down the map. This is called a 'Proposition' So, when your map is finished, you'll have a set of propositions about a given topic. You may also create cross-links between  ideas to show how they are related together. 
5. Refining the map: Finally, you can add colours to organize ideas and review review the make to make sure of proper connections and probably add some more.

Uses in Education

In education, concept maps can be used as:

• Learning tool: as a visual presentation tool, while brainstorming, making outlines, or testing the knowledge of students. It is an effective tool for students to build on previous knowledge and create connections between newly learned and previously learned ideas.     
• Evaluation tool: to access students' understanding for a given topic and enhance their critical thinking skills while making connections between ideas. 

To create your own Concept maps

www.lucidchart.com is a site that I have used to make my own maps after creating an account or you may find templates for free on the internet! 

Enjoy mapping your lessons!

How to be a digital citizen?

 

Empowering teachers and students with digital citizenship!

Social media has brought a lot of negative impacts on their users in one way or another. Research have shown that people are being subjected to higher risks of bullying and harassment on online platforms. To avoid such incidences, and to protect ourselves and our students from them, it is important to explore the notion of digital citizenship. 

So, digital citizenship is a term that describes how should a person act while using technology and hence the ability to participate and get involved in the society online. It is a term that is directly related to internet safety and etiquette of acting when we are on the internet. 

Technology is embedded in our homes and is allowing us to cross over boundaries in our personal life, work, and society. Not only it has became a part of our homes but rather a part of our schools as well. As educators, technology has became a concern as we spend a significant amount of time while working with it. Here, a part of our role is to teach students how to conduct themselves while using technology and how to deal with the fear of letting strangers enter our life via online platforms. 

Students use the internet at various ages and for many purposes including gaming, watching YouTube, communicating with others, visiting pages for news, sports, social activities, and educational purposes. Teaching safety practices and good behaviours are also a part of our responsibilities because we do all want to create a digital footprint that will make others happy to see. 

Here are some tips to be used by teachers as models for digital citizenship:  

• The teacher must know the proper use of the sites he/she is using and the purposes behind using these sites.
• As teachers, we must utilize technology for the development of our students. 
• Upon using some materials from the internet, teachers must know how to give credits for the sources used.
• Teachers must be ethical online. We must not post pictures or contents without permission from the owner or post any inappropriate material, must not insult or bully people, respect the privacy of others, show good morals especially on social media and treat others the way we like to be treated!
• In addition, teachers must not share lots of personal information and stay informed and aware about all the things that are happening in their communities and all around it.

It is highly recommended that digital citizenship should be embedded into curricula as educators can provide advices hence making schools as gateways for teaching learners as well as their parents about ethical and safety rules, security, responsibilities and respect of rights while using the internet.  

Online Assessment: Tools That Can Be Used!

 

Here are some tools for online assessment.. Set your belts teachers! 🔐📝

As teachers we understand the importance of assessment data in our instruction as this helps in guiding us regarding planning for any future lesson. This actually happens through the identification of any misconception and the continuous check for understanding of a given topic. However, with all the circumstances we are passing through nowadays regarding remote learning, it is a challenge to make sure that we are offering students meaningful lessons as well as assessments. So, basically, here are some ideas that we as teachers can use while performing online instructions and which in turn helps us in gathering assessment data that we need to move further. 

One of the tools that probably the majority of teachers are using is the Google Suite which includes Google Docs, Google Slides, and Google Forms. These are considered as great ways to collect data when assignments are given on Google Classroom for example. These applications can be used in a wide array of assessment. For instance, Google Docs can be used to perform extra worksheets, or they can go even beyond that where students can use Google Slides to present a certain concept and play the role of the teacher themselves. Such tasks can be done either individually or as group work. In addition, Google Forms can be used in the form of quizzes which has the option of being auto-graded hence saving time and efforts in one way or another depending on the question types created. Exit slips on Google Slides or posting questions on Google Classroom are also other ways to use the Google apps in evaluating students' understanding.  

Another online assessment tool is Flipgrid which a platform that allows both students and teachers to post short videos of themselves answering a question or discussing a certain topic. This is considered as a funny way to assess students' understanding and let them present their ideas instead of using the regular paper-and-pen method. It can be also used in the closure part; at the end of the class to recap some major points discussed right away. When the teacher watches the video, he/she can easily identify any misunderstood ideas and basically clarify them. 

An extremely interesting and popular game-like platform is Kahoot. It allows the teachers to create online quizzes that can be done either individually or as small groups as well. It is engaging for students because it is done in a game-like and competition-like way. The teacher will be sharing the questions from his/her device and the students basically are going to observe the answers and interact with questions. Kahoot provides an opportunity for an active and engaging learning process using games which is a thing that kids will definitely enjoy. 

Pear Deck is another online assessment tool that can be used as an add-on in Google Slides. It allows teachers to insert interactive slides within their presentations. These are slides where students can submit responses or where you can insert polls that make the slides more interactive and more engaging as students will be giving real-time feedback. Speaking about real-time evaluation, other tools including Wordwall, Mentimeter, Jamboard, and Padlet are considered highly effective in summarizing some major points mentioned throughout the sessions so that teachers can figure out where do students stand and whether we can all move to the next step. They also include a wide variety of  game-like questions that students will definitely find attractive and hence get engaged in the activities posted or shared. 

These are actually some of the ideas about online assessment tools that we can begin using in our instructions to help save some time, efforts, and most importantly grasp our students' attention and make them feel involved, interested, and enjoying the learning taking place. 

Successful Integration of Technology Into Teaching: "Modern Education!"

Should technology be used in education? If so, then how should technology be integrated in a classroom? 📱📡💻

Technology is rapidly evolving and being introduced to children at very young ages. Kids are playing less outside and being more likely spending time on their gaming counsels, tablets, and cell phones. At school, this can be a major distraction instead of paying attention in class. Such distractions can cause the grades to slip and produce off-task or even disruptive behaviours hence impacting the learning negatively. These are actually some of the misconceptions that are related to the use of technology in classrooms.

Beyond this view, many schools are integrating technology in their curriculum. An important note to be highlighted here is that technology is not a solution for our nowadays educational problems, but rather a tool that can facilitate the learning process in various subjects and under several circumstances. 

Interactive educational sessions that require students to use mobile devices can keep students engaged in the studies by delivering knowledge through a medium that they are comfortable with. Introducing students to technology in the classroom using computers and smartphones attract students more than whiteboards and books do. I am a biology teacher and I can easily sense the excitement during the Profuturo program sessions where I work along with my students on simulations and online games using individual tablets. 

Familiarizing students with this technology will also help prepare them for jobs where they will definitely need to know and have more practical skills related to technology than just academic theories. These skills can include the beneficial use of social media and coding. It is very important to mention that teacher should be trained well to effectively use technology in their classrooms so that the tools they use such as active boards become as entertaining as regular TV shows for students. 

An effective teaching is basically the one who is student-centred. Teachers should be aware that using technology does not always mean interactive classes. For example, teachers may use active boards or visual presentations but they keep talking the majority of time. Moreover, taking online quizzes with immediate feedback for both students and teachers can sometimes ignore problem-solving and critical thinking skills in students even though the majority would think about it as the best alternative for paper-based tests. 

So, how would you, as a teacher, use technology in an effective way in your classrooms? First, you may allow students to simply make research and google facts. At the same time, the students are learning from very valuable resources. Within every week, there is always a session dedicated for research about different Biology topics that I give my students to increase their knowledge in the content studied and present their findings using PowerPoints or Google slides. In addition, technology enhances critical thinking skills where students can evaluate and criticize the content presented. Another important point is the use of technology for collaboration among students and their teachers as well. Group work allows people to share ideas and their voices, discuss them, and build on their previous experiences and knowledge. Moreover, one of the most exciting aspects of using technology is designing or creativity. Students are able to create contents of different types with wide  range of sophistications and present their ideas from videos, PowerPoint presentations to creating designs or data bases on a software. 

Technology is actually present at all stages in the education process. It renders learning more dynamic and related to life. The key is to smartly use technology hand in hand with education in an attempt to prepare our students for brighter futures.  

EDUC561

 

My Opinion About EDUC561 Course!

1. Technology has become a part of our everyday life. In education, it has facilitated our lives in terms of content presenting and assessment. Because of this course, I am now able to use a wide variety of tools that I have never known about them before. I have started implementing them in my classes according to the topic I am explaining. they are very useful in making sessions engaging and interesting. In addition, I like the fact of direct practice we do while learning how to use a new tool. 

2. One of things that can be taken into consideration is having breaks between sessions during the course. Sometimes, we come back from work feeling so tired and we have to put lots of efforts and energy to keep up following with the steps to be done.