CRITICAL THINKING IN TEACHING VOCABULARY

Hello everyone! Welcome back to my blog . 

Today I am going to talk about critical thinking skills especially how important is it for children or pupils to develop and practice it since in the very beginning years of school. This ability to think critically is an asset that will stand your child in good stead as they move through primary school into secondary and throughout their adult lives.

Why critical thinking matters? 

Critical thinking is a vital part of children's development and learning to use it help them to make sense of the world around them. Also , it helps them make value judgements and try to figure things out if something don't make sense. 

How to develop critical thinking skills?

Children are not very capable of critical thinking from an early age , but they actually do it , too. 

For example children as young as five and six use counter examples ( Not all birds fly : chickens  are birds , and they don't fly ); draw  distinctions( Heroes are not the same as superheroes ) .  So that means that the pupils of grade 2 or 3 are better critical thinkers compared with those of the age five or six. 

Here are some advice to help your pupils  to use critical thinking as they grow ! 

Every teacher should encourage their pupils to give reasons and examples that  show agreement and disagreement about different topics and discussions. If we ask a pupil 'Why? or Do you agree? Or is something wrong or right ? and so on so forth. 

To help your child develop critical thinking skills, get into a habit of questioning them about their thoughts and opinions. There are five simple ways to do this:

• Ask why: get them to provide justification, explanation, purpose or motivation.
• Ask for clarification: ‘Can you say what you mean by…?’
• Ask for more: ‘Can you say more about that?’
• Ask for an example or counter-example: ‘Can you give me an example?
• Ask for conditions: ‘Can you say what it would depend on?

Perhaps the most important thing you can do to help your pupils  become a critical thinker is to model good critical thinking yourself,’ . ‘Notice, monitor and evaluate your own critical thinking, and, if necessary, take steps to improve it.’

EDUCATION, TEACHERS AND TECHNOLOGY !

Nowadays  university education is faced with new challenges necessary for a successful learning process because of the very rapid advance of communication technologies and information, especially in all aspects related to internet. In the near future education will have to incorporate interactive webs as teaching tools , where the web platforms will be turned into virtual classrooms with the aim of making easy the learning process. These interactive tools promote the autonomous learning and increase the student's motivation. At the university level, the goal of using these tools is not simply to accumulate knowledge but also to learn how to use these tools.

The use of audiovisual tools in teaching process is progressive due to the continuous development of technology. Videos and computer presentations are examples of these variants introduced in the field of teaching. Teachers should transfer the technological advances of the present society to the field of knowledge , and avoid the imbalance between learning method and real life. 

• Do good teachers need to use technology?

All the teachers should be open to new ways of doing things. Yes, I think all the teachers even the best one need to use technology. Good teachers maintain an avid interest in new technologies with a view toward improving the effectiveness of their teaching. Every teacher should be familiar with what's available on the Web in his or her subject area. The Web is a magnificent resource for teaching and learning. Teachers need to use technology because, by technology, they share more information and collaborate beyond schools walls. Realize that only change brings progress.

•  What technologies do you use with your students?

Good teachers should be constantly on the lookout for ideas about how to do a better job in the classroom. One of the best ways to do that is to join an online discussion group, where teachers get together in an open e-forum to share ideas about teaching and learning. I will use with my students Google Documents, Classroom app, Google Translate as far as I'm an English teacher I will allow my students to use Google Translate app in class, where they can translate new words into their native language ( Albanian ) .Social Medias such as Facebook and Twitter where students can create groups with a teacher in order to take announcement and to share with each other links related to the subject.

· Will technology replace teachers?

Technology in its way is the one which can not be challenged, but absolutely it cannot replace
teachers. Technology is just a tool used by the teacher to have a meaningful and active class. Teachers are
those who teach us how to use technology.

The use of technology in teaching process is very important and helpful. It helps the teacher to make the class more interactive and the students don,t get bored. These tools motivate the learners and make life and lesson more easy. 

Constructivism and DDD-E Model

Hello everyone, welcome back to my blog. This week I am going to talk about the Constructivism and DDD-E Model.

First of all let's say some words about constructivism. Constructivism learning theory is a philosophy which enhances students' logical and conceptual growth, which argues that people produce knowledge and form meaning based upon their experiences. According to social constructivism learning is a collaborative process, and knowledge develops from individuals' interactions with their culture and society.  Constructivist learning theory underpins a variety of student-centered teaching methods and techniques which contrast with traditional education, whereby knowledge is simply passively transmitted by teachers to students.

What is the role of the teacher in a constructivist classroom?
The primary responsibility of the teacher is to create collaborative problem-solving environment where students become active participants in their own learning. From this perspective , a teacher acts as a facilitator of learning rather than an instructor. The teacher makes sure he or she understand the students' preexisting conceptions, and guides the activity to address them and then build on them.
In order to have a constructivist classroom every teacher should follow these steps:
1) To provide experience with the knowledge construction process. That means that students determine how they will learn.
2)To provide experience in and appreciation for multiple perspectives . In other words the evaluation of alternative solutions.
3) To embed learning in social experience , so to collaborate .
4) To encourage ownership and a voice in the learning process.
5) To encourage the use of multiple modes of representation, (video, audio, texts ect)
6) To encourage awareness of the knowledge construction process. ( for example reflection etc).

The biggest disadvantage is its lack of structure. Some students require highly structured learning environments to be able to reach their potential. It also removes grading in the traditional way and instead places more value on students evaluating their own progress, which may lead to students falling behind, as without standardized grading teachers may not know which students are struggling.

The DDD-E Model of instructional design has it's basis in multimedia instructional design. The Model stands for:
Decide
Design
Develop
Evaluate.
The decide phase focuses closely on overall assignment development . The subject , the learning standards and roles of team members are determined.
The design phase takes into account the stuctural integrity of the assignement.
The develop phase is when actual hard artifacts are created to support the framework built in the design phase. This is where video, audio and imagery are created and assigned to aspects of the design plans.
The evaluate is focused on assessment. This includes assessment for student progress through the assignment , completed student work and student engagement levels.

Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences Theory and Cooperative Learning

Hello, everyone! Hope you are doing well and are staying safe at home. This week's assignment was really interesting and I enjoyed reading about Gardner's multiple intelligences theory and also cooperative learning. Well , I am going to write down some interesting facts about these topics and hope you like it. 

Gardner’s multiple intelligences theory is based on the belief that “traditional psychometric views of intelligence are too limited.” He first outlined the theory of multiple intelligences in 1983 when he published Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences. In his book, he discusses eight different intelligences as well as a possible ninth intelligence known as “existentialist intelligence.”

    Gardner reveals that to truly understand the full talents and abilities of people, it’s pertinent to not limit them by a single intellectual capacity. Rather, you should categorize them among multiple intelligences. He goes on to say that while a person might have one intelligence area that he or she is particularly strong in, there’s a good chance the person is strong in other intelligence categories as well.

Also, as part of Gardner’s theory, he argues that it’s not how the information reaches our brain, but what matters is what our brain does with the information once it is received.

What Are the Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences?

The eight different categories of Gardner’s multiple intelligences are:

1. Musical-Rhythmic
2. Visual-Spatial
3. Verbal-Linguistic
4. Logical-Mathematical
5. Bodily-Kinesthetic
6. Interpersonal
7. Intrapersonal
8. Naturalistic Intelligence

10. Over the years, Gardner’s multiple intelligences theory has become prized by teachers, many of whom have made the intelligences synonymous with learning styles. However, it’s important to note that multiple intelligences are not learning styles.Gardner sought to set the record straight regarding learning styles and multiple intelligences when he said the following:
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    Cooperative Learning.
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16. Cooperation is working together to accomplish shared goals.  Within cooperative situations, individuals seek outcomes that are beneficial to themselves and beneficial to all other group members. Cooperative learning is the instructional use of small groups so that students work together to maximize their own and each other’s learning.  It may be contrasted with competitive (students work against each other to achieve an academic goal such as a grade of “A” that only one or a few students can attain) andindividualistic (students work by themselves to accomplish learning goals unrelated to those of the other students) learning.  In cooperative and individualistic learning, you evaluate student efforts on a criteria-referenced basis while in competitive learning you grade students on a norm-referenced basis.  While there are limitations on when and where you may use competitive and individualistic learning appropriately, you may structure any learning task in any subject area with any curriculum cooperatively.
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18. Cooperative learning activities would invite students to be more active participants in their own learning, to share and discuss their ideas, to engage in argumentation and debate, to play varying roles within the group, and to internalize their learning. 
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20. Teachers who wish to use cooperative learning should ideally base their classroom practices on theory validated by research.  The closer classroom practices are to validated theory, the more likely they will be effective.  When more directly practice is connected to theory, furthermore, the more likely practice will be refined, upgraded, and improved over the years.  There are, however, few classroom practices that are directly based on validated theory.  The close relationship between theory, research, and practice makes cooperative learning somewhat unique.  It also creates a set of issues for teachers using cooperative learning.
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    THANK YOU!