INTASC+Standard+06

__INTASC Standard 06__

The teacher uses knowledge of effective verbal, nonverbal, and media communication techniques to foster active inquiry, collaboration, and supportive interaction in the classroom.

__Specific Category of Standard 06__

INTASC.6.D. The teacher knows about and can use effective verbal, nonverbal, and media communication techniques. INTASC.6.E. The teacher recognizes the power of language for fostering self-expression, identity development, and learning.

__Understanding Sentence__

The teacher uses a variety of effective communication techniques to build curiousity and research skills, as well as helping the students work together.

__Artifacts__  
 * Webquest
 * Bio Poems

__Reflect__

The first artifact is a webquest for which I designed for third grade students. The topic is a question that asks “What does it mean to be a good citizen?” Students follow the directions in the webquest to explore different internet sites, answer questions, and work together to eventually contribute to the community or country in some way. This directly relates to INTASC.6.D. in that it shows that I can use “media communication techniques to foster active inquiry, collaboration, and interaction in the classroom”. Webquests are designed for active inquiry and interaction, and I prepared it so that students work in pairs or small groups to help with the workload and thus collaborate.  The second artifact are three “Bio poems.” Two of these poems were taken from a film analysis project. I watched two videos and wrote a bio poem for each of the teachers in the videos. The third poem is about a Kindergarten student who I observed and assessed over the course of a semester. At the end of the assignment, I included it as part of my creativity section. This artifact directly relates to INTASC.6.E. because it demonstrates the power of language in writing poetry, fosters self-expression in writing poetry and builds identity development in analyzing and knowing the people to write the bio poem.  __Project__

Both of these artifacts say a lot about my future practice. I am a strong advocate for increasing technological applications in the classroom. I believe that there are a lot of computer skills that students need to learn in school and not all students will have the same chances to develop these skills outside of school. I think that it is a lot more fun to work with computers for certain types of assignments and that students will be more engaged with what they’re doing if they are using a computer. Using a webquest to increase learning and actively engage students is something that I want to continue to use in the future. Regarding the bio poems, I feel that this is something that I want to incorporate into my future practice as well. I did not see a lot of poetry until I was in high school. Although I love it now, I wish I had had more exposure to it in the past so that I could have experienced more of it and become a better writer myself. I believe that there are a lot of benefits of including poetry into my future practice no matter the age of my students because it builds self-expression, plays with words, fosters literacy, can be a sensory exercise, and can also be short enough to actively hold the readers’ attention and truly think about what is being written or read.