Ridgedale Elementary School is located in Morgantown, WV. Morgantown is found in north central West Virginia along the Pennsylvania border. While the city of Morgantown is growing, its residents continue to describe it as maintain its hometown feel.
Morgantown is home to the largest university in the state, West Virginia University. Since the town is home to such a large university and two major hospitals, Morgantown’s population is much larger than most of the towns in West Virginia. According to Morgantown’s official website there are over 28,898 students enrolled at the university. Along with the student population, the medical, cultural, and commercial hub, the region’s daytime population estimates around 70,000 (Morgantown, 2000). However, without these factors, the records show, those who acknowledge Morgantown as their residence, is only around 26,809 people (Fact finder, 2000). From these 26,809, 97.6% are white, 75.1% are black or African American, 12.3% are Asian, 0.9% are Native Hawaiian and other Pacific Islander, and 5.5% are other races (Factor finder, 1999). Families in West Virginia that fall below the poverty level are around 9.2% compared to the rest of the United States.
Ridgedale Elementary School is comparable in size to the other elementary schools in the area. Ridgedale is located in Morgantown, WV off the interstate I-79 exit 146 or the Goshen Road exit. The school is located on the Goshen Road.
This year there are 320 students enrolled with 32 professional staff and 12 service personnel (Ridgedale, 2011). The professional staff consists of academic teachers, academic coach, special education coach, IEP Compliance Specialist, psychologist, two interventionists, speech pathologist, three relat...
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To evaluate prior knowledge the teacher gives each student a test in each of the subject areas. For example for math the students are tested on addition, subtraction, fractions, and place value at the beginning of the school year.
At the beginning of the school year, each student also participated in a survey to determine their learning styles. After conduction these surveys the teacher objectively observes the class. Combining the results of both exercises the teacher determined the learning styles. While some students learn best at stations, others seem to do better when the teacher is teaching as the student listens. Different learning styles are addressed in this classroom through song and dance, listening, and hands-on stations. Considering Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences the teacher addresses the kinesthetic, auditory, and the visual learner.
We then meet Nova who goes to Oak Park High. Oak Park is in the suburbs of Chicago. The students seem to mostly be Hispanic and White. The school itself is pretty up to date, and is the third best school we see in the documentary.
The Park Slope School, Ps.282 is located in Park Slope Brooklyn. Ps.282 is a Kindergarten to eighth grade school full of diversity. The school’s staff was pleased to assist me with any of my needs. Although finding the right time to schedule an interview with the parent coordinator and guidance counselor was difficult, both parent coordinator and guidance counselor were more than willing to dedicate their time to focus on the interview.
Howard Gardener is a psychologist and a professor of neuroscience at Harvard University who also designed the nine theories of Multiple Intelligence (MI). In 1983, he introduced the first seven theories of multiple intelligences in his book Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences; then, he introduced his last two theories in his 1999 publication of Intelligence Reframed. According to Parkay & Stanford, “Howard Gardener believes that human beings possess at least eight separate forms of intelligence” (2003, p.300-301). Thus, Gardner’s theories began to question the conventional beliefs about how students are educated in the classroom. This paper will examine the teacher’s role in incorporating these theories into the classroom, the definitions of MI including classroom activities, and benefits of using this theory. Gardner’s theory of Multiple Intelligence includes the following intelligences: linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, naturalists, and existentialist. Only two of the intelligences are commonly recognized in most classrooms: linguistic, and logical-mathematical. There are five intelligences that are frequently overlooked by educators: spatial, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, and intrapersonal. The last two are generally not considered in the classroom: naturalists, and existentialist, but naturalist can be applied with the use of science context. According to King, the theory of MI has “…motivated educators to develop programs that instruct students in multiple domains” (2010, p. 250).
The West Virginia Statewide Afterschool Network (WVSAN) was established by state agencies and afterschool personnel throughout West Virginia with the purpose to create and sustain a statewide partnership that raises the awareness of the importance and accessibility of high quality “out-of-school time” programs for all school age children. West Virginia state agencies work within their own spheres of influence and need opportunities to communicate and collaborate with each other around central issues. Additionally, the network service as a means for organizational members and afterschool providers to voice their needs, gather a consensus and work together in developing resources to meet those needs.
Search for Public Schools - School Detail for Banks County High School. (n.d.). National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) Home Page, a part of the U.S. Department of Education. Retrieved March 28, 2012, from http://nces.ed.gov/ccd/schoolsearch/school_detail.asp?Search=1&InstName=banks+county+high+school&SchoolType=1&SchoolType=2&SchoolType=3&SchoolType=4&SpecificSchlTypes=all&IncGrade=-1&LoGrade=-1&HiGrade=-1&ID=130024000169
Today I spent the day focusing on trying to observe the individual student in Mrs. W.’s classroom. I know that I only have a short time with them, but I wanted to try to get to see their unique personalities and temperaments. I paid particular attention to the student’s strengths to determine how many types of intelligence I could see relating to Gardner’s eight frames of mind: “verbal, logical/mathematical, spatial, body-kinesthetic, musical, intrapersonal, interpersonal, and naturalist skills” (Santrock 116-117). As I focus on individual students in this journal entry please know that I have changed their names for privacy.
One important aspect of building this bridge is to understand the various learning styles evident in the classroom. Teachers tend to have their own preferences, or strengths, concerning their styles (Thompson, 1997). According to Thompson (1997), teachers noted for their excellence tended to teach in ways consistent with their own styles but found ways to reach students whose preferences differed. These ways included finding material and activities that spurred the student’s interest, and once the student was engaged, allowed the teacher to facilitate the course material. One method is for teacher’s to create learning centers with resources and materials that promote involving the different intelligences (Giles, Pitre, & Womack, 2003). Giles, Pitre, and Womack (2003)
Most of the time, music is seen as the extra curricular activity in schools. However, music is an essential aspect of education in the learning of attention, art, and cooperation. Music teachers face the challenge of bringing those crucial principles to their students. In doing so, it is necessary to use learning and cognition theories in order to understand how students' minds work and therefore adapt their teaching style accordingly. Although I recognize, Piaget's theory of schema and representation as well as Vygotsky zone of proximal development, I also believe that learning drives development, and that a growth mindset grounded in Gardner's multiple intelligence theory are essential for students' success.
According to the learning styles theory there are three main learning styles. The first is visual. This is a student who prefers to see the information through notes, pictures, or demonstration. The second is auditory. This type of learner prefers to hear the information through lecture or recordings. The third is kinesthetic. A kinesthetic learner prefers to learn information through practical exercises and physically performing the task being taught. The learning styles theory is that if you teach a student by using their preferred learning ...
The theory advanced by Howard Gardner referred to as Multiple Intelligences, suggests that there are varying degrees of intelligence that an individual possess. Gardner proposed that there are seven forms of intelligence: linguistic, musical, logical-mathematical, spatial, body-kinaesthetic, intrapersonal and interpersonal. This theory proposes that teaching and learning should be based on an individual’s different and unique form of intelligence, (Armstrong, 2009). The traditional teaching method encompasses and focuses on verbal linguistic and mathematical logical intelligence. However, the theory by Gardner suggests that there are five other forms of
In closing, implementing only one theory of learning can be limiting to the success of students in a classroom setting. A more effective approach would be “draw from two or more theoretical perspectives… to better capture the complex nature of human thinking and learning” (Ormrod, 2012). According to Howard Gardner, there are multiple intelligences in human individuals that are based on biological and cultural elements (Brualdi, 1996). Since each of the intelligences work independently of each other, but also complement each other individuals learn, teachers should teach accordingly (Brualdi, 1996).
There are several ways in which a teacher can accommodate every learning style by doing simple things in the classroom. Examples of this would be a certain seating arrangement or even just changing all the time to reach each students style. Knowing and learning styles might be one of the most important things to learn from your students at the beginning of each school year. There are several tests out there that can help with this, but know each style is also important. Knowing your own learning intelligence as a teacher will also help you and is important. This allows you to know in which way you will best be able to absorb information that is important in our teaching. Multiple intelligences are a vital part of any teacher’s lesson plans and are especially necessary in the ever-changing diversities of the schools. Learning styles will bring out the strengths and weaknesses.
I attended Seminole elementary school from first grade to the first half of my fifth grade year. Seminole elementary is located in Mt. Clemens, a small town just south of Detroit, Michigan. This is where my home was for most of my childhood and where my dreams of