Rita Soledad Fernandez

EDUC X 462.3
Dr. Howland
March 10, 2018
Week 08: Let’s Apply: Personal Reflection
Dear Soledad,

In about five months, your sabbatical will end, and you will be back teaching math to

middle school students. It will be very easy to get distracted by the day to day tasks of

teaching but I want you to remember what you learned from taking your UCLA

extension Foundations course.

 Engage your students in reflections.

o Creating time to reflect on learning objectives demonstrates to students

that you value those learning objectives. In the past as a teacher, you

have not remained consistent about having students reflect on their

learning. Plan backwards and think about how you may create a class

structure that requires students to reflect regularly. Consider the following:

 How often do you want students to reflect? Every week? Every

unit? Why do you think every day is not possible?

 Reflection formats should vary. Dr. Howland required students to

reflect using videos, surveys, class wiki page, three-minute paper,

directed paraphrase, and course evaluations.

 Ask for feedback.

o During the assessment module, you created google slides that

incorporated links that you could use to get student and parent feedback.
 Use them! Remember how valued you felt when your professors asked for

your opinion. You always start doing this and then you stop. DON’T

STOP.

 Continue with learning logs but incorporate writing assignments that engage

students in Process Writing.

o Learning logs or math journals are great ways to have students practice

writing and you need to continue using them. However, engaging students

in Process Writing requires that they do the heavy lifting. Students will

learn more from brainstorming, creating a draft, reviewing, editing and

publishing then just completing an assignment and you grading it.

 Teach vocabulary explicitly EVERY day.

o You started doing this last academic year with fidelity after your coaching

sessions with Mendoza and Yuli. You thought you were doing extra work

and thought so highly of yourself. Wrong! Teaching vocabulary is essential

for developing students’ cognitive academic language proficiency.

 Use the SAMR model to evaluate your use of technology in the classroom and

REDEFINE tasks with technology.

o You have always prided yourself in using technology daily in your

classroom. You were disappointed in learning that technology in your

classroom has been used to AUGMENT tasks. However, you did some

research and found great resources that could help develop how use

technology to REDEFINE math tasks. Right now, you feel overwhelmed

so you can gain the confidence to do it yourself.

 Students need to be doing the heavy lifting.

o You know this but sometimes you feel rushed. Sometimes you feel like

you need to expose students to material but when students do the heavy

lifting they are doing the learning. Dr. Howland wrote “I tend to use a very

socio-cultural and constructivist approach to the course (even in an online

environment) so your participation will be imperative if we are going to co-

construct our understanding of how we play a critical role in the creation of

classrooms that facilitate learning and the role that this course should play

in developing our practice as teachers of literacy and language

development for English learner” in her welcome course and you felt

inspired to do the same with your math students. Don’t forget!

 Rubrics outline the steps to exemplar work.

o Until taking your online courses with UCLA, you had never earned a 100%

in a course. When provided with rubrics you made sure to use the rubrics

to meet all the criteria of the assignments and as a result you earned a

100%. Give your students the tools to earn a 100%.

 In the beginning of the year, know your students’ reading levels and gather a

writing sample.

o Student’s reading levels will impact comprehension be aware of their

reading levels so you can scaffold as necessary. Spend some time

thinking about you will develop your students as writers. Think about the
 assignments you want students to be able to complete at the end of the

year and plan backwards so that your first writing sample can be used to

show how students have grown over the course of the year.

 Remember the freedom and frustration you felt with zero-point assignments and

assign accordingly.

o You often questioned, “Why do I have to do this if I am not earning any

credit?” and yet you learned the most while completing your zero-point

assignments. You did not feel the need to show understanding for

someone else but rather to develop your own understanding of content.

You spent time searching and reading online texts in order to get ideas for

your zero-point assignments. You were inspired, and you learned during

this time and it improved the quality of your graded assignments.

Remember that zero-point assignments did affect your graded assignment

scores so there was still accountability for not completing them. Keep this

in mind as you think about how to assign zero-point assignments for your

students.

 If you truly value bilingualism, develop your own bilingual literacy capabilities.

o When you completed your model infographic, you created a school that

had a dual-language program even in middle school. Would you be able to

teach mathematics in Spanish? Though your basic interpersonal

communication skills are strong, you need to develop your Spanish

cognitive academic language proficiency. I challenge you to do so. I think

academic achievement gap.

 It is your job to develop student schema!

o At some point in this course, someone referenced schema. You googled

the term and came across this from www.teachervision.com “Call

it schema, relevant background knowledge, prior knowledge, or just plain

experience, when students make connections to the text they are reading, their

comprehension increases.” You decided at that moment that checking that

students understand the context of word problem is not a fun activity but

necessary for students to understand the problem. Keep doing it!

 Video introductions are fast and fun.

o This was the first time you were required to create a video introduction.

Considering the ease and frequency students create videos using social

media apps, you need to bring this into the classroom. Think about how

you can use SeeSaw or Class Dojo for students to create digital portfolios

of their learning.

 Language objectives are essential not extra.

o You once thought incorporating measurable language objectives into

every lesson made you a distinguished teacher…nope. Language

objectives should be required at all school sites to make sure students are

developing their speaking, reading, writing and listening skills.

 You need additional professional development in developing adolescent reading

comprehension.
 o Upon reflecting on the course objectives, you felt confident in feeling that

you have mastered all of them except:

 Explore research-based methods of reading instruction for English

Language learners.

 Explore research-based methods of content area reading and

writing instruction for English Language learners.

o Your explorations made you feel overwhelmed by how much you do not

know about how to teach struggling readers.

Keep reflecting, keep reading and keep documenting your learning. When you know

better, you can do better.

😊 Soledad