Buehl discusses many useful strategies
for teaching to the match; bridging academic knowledge gaps. In this blog post,
I would like to further discuss some of his ideas that were brought up in
Chapter 3. Buehl states, “When readers
and authors match up, comprehension often seems to be a natural byproduct : We
just read the text, and it makes sense” (Buehl 2011). When Buehl discusses
matching with authors, I cannot help but think about the idea that we discussed
of a teacher being the expert. Teachers are expected to match with the work of
their discipline, but in some instances this is not the case. I was really
relieved to see Buehl discuss this because I believe that teachers know their
disciplines very well, but there may be some material that the teacher never
covered. I was glad to see that Buehl addressed this.
When discussing matching with
authors, one’s prior knowledge is very crucial to take into account. I believe
this to be the most important aspect. If
one does not have any prior knowledge in relation to the material they are
reading, they will be at a disadvantage with trying to comprehend the material.
As teachers, it will be our job to teach
our students this prior knowledge to move forward in their academics. An
example I want to discuss is one that took place in a previous math class of
mine. We were told to read a chapter in our textbook for the class. The author
was referencing certain mathematical symbols and definitions that I had not
come across before in the chapter. I thought that I was not going to do well in
this class because I did not know what these symbols and definitions were
referring to. I took it upon myself to look up these concepts and I realized
that I was not taught this material up until now and it was expected to be in
my prior knowledge. I believe that teachers judging what students prior knowledge
is can be very difficult. If this teacher knew that I and other students had
difficulty with this topic, he may not have given the class this reading or he
would have explained it beforehand. Has
this happened to you or one of your classmates before?
If that class was my math classroom,
I would take the time to be sure the students knew the material by using a
strategy that Buehl discusses in the text or ones that we went over in the classroom
strategy presentations. The students could these before and while they are
reading. The students also have to think metacognitively while reading to make sure they are
understanding the material being covered. A classroom strategy may be very
helpful after the students have completed the reading to make sure they
understood what was going on in the text before moving forward.
Buehl also discussed ways of
knowing: text-to self knowledge, text-to-text knowledge, and text-to-world
knowledge. I would like to discuss
text-to self-knowledge more in depth. Text-to-self knowledge is direct
knowledge accrued from one’s personal life experiences. From my experience
firsthand, I can say that I and other classmates of mine have been able to
retain more material when it was retained in this fashion. Buehl discusses the example of field trips to help
students retain this type of knowledge. As I was reading this, I thought to myself that
I could not remember taking a field trip in a previous math class. Instead of
implementing field trips, I would like to implement Modeling with Mathematics
in my future math classroom, which is where students solve real world problems
with mathematics, define variables, formulate a model, etc. For example, a video
may be shown in class of a man laying down toothpicks in the shape of a
triangle, or a woman running up a flight of stairs. These videos are supposed
to demonstrate real life events where students can use mathematics to solve
problems. The students have to come up with math questions, models, and
variables to go with this real life situation such as how many triangles will
be made with the amount of toothpicks given. The students have to formulate
what is necessary to solve this problem. These students are engaging with
text-to-self connections that access knowledge they have accrued in their daily
life and they will be able to see how much math plays into everyday life. What
would you like to implement in your future classroom?
Overall, Buehl discussed many
important concepts that we will need to draw upon as pre-service teachers to
ensure our students comprehend the knowledge in our disciplines.
I enjoyed reading your posts for multiple reasons. One of which is because I definitely understand your experience with trying to read a text and realizing I wasn't given the knowledge needed to understand what I was reading. I think as teachers we should find a way to figure out what our students know beforehand. One way to accomplish this could be to give a handout outlining ideas and topics the students need to know before diving into a lesson and whatever they don't already know we should discuss so they don't feel lost like we have. Also, text-to-self knowledge is important when it comes to reading because having that personal experience helps students put themselves in that situation and understand how to do something and why something is done the way it is. A quote about text-to-self knowledge states, "I can imagine what the author describes, but I will not understand it the way someone who has actually experienced it will" (Buehl, 2011). Your example for math is great because students can watch those videos then do the same thing on their own and doing math in a hands-on manner like that can really help students retain and understand the ideas. As a future history/English teacher I would try something along the lines of having my students act out events from history or putting themselves in the shoes of someone living during that time and trying to understand why certain things happened and what the consequences were. Although the students may not have the first-hand experience they would still have a way of connecting to the author's text besides trying to just imagine it.
ReplyDeleteHello Bess,
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for replying to my blog post. I am glad you enjoyed reading it! I like the idea of giving students a handout outlining ideas. I truly agree that personal experience definitely helps students make connections. I like your idea of having students act out events which will give them that taste of the first hand experience which will hopefully help them understand what is going on.
Hi Elizabeth,
ReplyDeleteYou wrote a great discussion over the reading. I definitely think that as math students sometimes it is assumed that we come into a course with prior knowledge. Some of the strategies we are learning about through the class presentations may help with this. For example there could be a definition sheet or the Frayer-Model to really help students learn these. Personally, I think that I will begin the course by going over commonly used symbols that we will be using over the course of the year. By doing this and providing a supplementary sheet we can better help create a group of students with the same basis. I also wanted to comment on your real world application approach. While I was in high school I served as a tutor for a Summer Enrichment Program. I was one of the math tutors who was in charge of a group of students. We used real world applications to help teach our students such as Fibonacci sequences and series in general. For example, we had students draw out the Fibonacci spiral as well as find some in nature in order for them to have a more hands on experience. Another application was having students understand geometry by measuring the base and height of a piece of artwork on campus in order to find the actual height (hypotenuse) of the artwork. I myself still remember being a student of the program even before becoming a tutor and it really helped me remember these things!
-Marisol
Hello Marisol,
ReplyDeleteThank you very much for your reply!I totally agree. Math symbols are like a brand new language to students which can be very overwhelming. Thank you for your personal experience reference! It is amazing how we are able to retain different types of information depending on how it was first introduced.
I agree with your point that it is difficult for teachers to judge the prior knowledge of students. Students all come from different backgrounds, some might have been exposed to material that their classmates have not. I see this a lot in my history classes. I am currently taking a history 300 class having to do with church and state. The professor sometimes assumes that the majority of the class is familiar with a topic in class and teaches his class based on his presumptions. If it wasn't for the fact that he stop to ask if anyone is familiar with the topic he would keep going with the majority of the class being lost. I think that being in a university only magnifies the problem, as people who have transferred to UIC have taken different courses than those given at UIC. I feel like this skews the knowledge trajectory of students and makes it harder for professors to gauge prior knowledge.
ReplyDeleteHey Liz,
ReplyDeleteAs you know, math is incredibly hard to understand. Thinking about trying to implement mathematical literacy in our classrooms can be a daunting task. I love real world problems and agree that real-wrold problems can help students with the text-to-self metacognition. Everything I do (school, work, exercise, etc) is focused on practical uses for my life. Math is so useful and helping students see the practicality can help reach those skeptical students. Growing up, my father would always ask me to help with the "handy man" activities around the house. Almost always I would see my father taking measurements and figuring out the logistics of the project. Because of this, I feel I am biased in the notion that math is useful. But nonetheless I believe that we as teachers need to stress the importance of the practicality of mathematics.