Learning Styles

What is my learning style?  In order to help answer this question I went to Howard Gardner's Multiple Intelligences and took the Multiple Intelligences Inventory.  The results did not surprise me.  My highest score fell under the Interpersonal category.  I relate well to others and work best in a team setting.  I enjoy having conversations and getting to know all types of people.  My friends and family often refer to me as a "people pleaser" because I am constantly concerned about how others feel.  I want to make sure everyone is happy all the time.  This is a great skill to have as an educator because a large part of the job is working with others and making sure people are pleased with your work.  In regards to my students, my interpersonal skills help me relate to them and sense how they are feeling.

My own personal learning styles are by far not the only ones I need to consider in the classroom.  Each student has their own ways of learning best as well.  It is very important that I cater to their needs so they can learn to the best of their ability.  This is not an easy task because no one teaching method will effectively reach all students.  It would be impossible for me to accommodate for each student in every lesson or even every day.  In the past I have given my students a Learning Styles Inventory to complete at the beginning of the school year so I have a better understanding of how the majority of my class learns best.  This way I can also come up with ideas on how to reteach a lesson in a more effective format to students who need extra help.

One component of my class I would like to improve on is center time.  I think that considering each students learning styles would be a great contribution to the development of my center activities and the creation of student groups.  I could have a listening center, a center where students make something (like a flip book or a poster board), a writing center, a reading center, and a center where students can talk to each other (such as a debate center, speech center, or a read aloud center).  Another way for me to consider organizing my centers would be to give students a choice within each center.  For example if it was a reading center, the student could read independently or pair read.  If it was a comprehension center, the student could write a summary or make a poster board.

Overall, these inventories have been and will be helpful to me personally and professionally.  I enjoy growing and learning as an educator and I look forward to applying my new knowledge about Howard Gardner's Multiple Intelligence in my classroom.

Creative Commons

Photo Attribution:
Original image: "Moonsaic"

by: Oliver Bacquet

Released under an Attribution-2.0 Generic

Creative Commons Licenses by 2.0

I thought that this picture would be very useful for my science unit about the phases of the moon.  I especially like the way it is laid out. I could have the students label each moon to demonstrate their understanding of its phases.  It is one that I think my fourth graders would greatly benefit from.  

Below is a picture I took of my in-laws.  I uploaded it to my PicasaWeb account and licensed it using Creative Commons.

Photo Attribution: 

Original Image: “Four Generations and a Dog"

By: Kimberly Anglin

Released under an Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share Alike License

Creative Commons Licenses by 2.0

PC Maintenance and Security

I chose three tutorials from the Atomic Learning PC Maintenance and Security workshop.  This is what I learned about each.

Making Email Safer

I chose this workshop because I get emails from people I don't know every day.  I did not know what signs to look for to avoid scams.  One thing I learned that I will definitely be sharing with others is a phishing scam that looks like it's from Bank of America but it's really not.  It asks for your login, password, and social security number.  I would like to share this with others because it looks so real that I'm pretty sure I would have fallen for it myself.  That's scary!  It completely surprised me how professional the email looked and how much it truly resembled the Bank of America website.  I'm glad to learn how easy it is to block spam and junk mail from my inbox.  

File Backup Options

I chose this workshop because I have moved and changed jobs quite a few times and would like to learn better strategies to backup my files from computer to computer.  One thing I learned that I would like others to know about is that there are several websites that will help me do this such as www.karenware.com and www.foldershare.com. Also, my computer itself has it's own built in backup system.  All I have to do is use my Windows Backup/Restore Wizard.  With this I can backup all or some of my data such as My Documents using a flash drive or disk.  I was shocked to learn that there is an "incremental" option which will make it so that it will only update files on my flash drive that have been changed or added since the last time I did a backup.  I wish I would have know that seven years ago!  

Clean Up & Speed Up Your PC

I chose this workshop because I have a fairly new laptop and it is so slow!  It didn't used to be so slow.  I'm sure that part of the reason it slowed down so much is because of all the games I allow my son to play on it.  I have downloaded many games that he never uses and I don't even want to know how many games my (four year old) son has downloaded on his own without me knowing.  One thing I learned that I will share with others is that there are a few small things that you can do to make a large difference in the speed of your computer.  After performing a couple of the cleanup options I learned about, I was surprised to learn how many files I have on my computer that I not only never use, but that I didn't even know I had!