This evaluation is about the 2nd Semester. What would you like to see more of in the second semester? Were there learning experiences/lesson plans that you enjoyed that you'd like to do more of? If so, what? If you have taken part in something really cool in a past history or literature class, tell me about it so that I can consider it for the rest of the year.
Also, I want to know what you'd like to see less of in the second semester. Knowing that fewer homework assignments and tests and quizzes are NOT going to happen, give some suggestions as to ways that the class can improve. Are we doing too much history and not enough literature? Or vice versa?
Provide one or two examples for each question.
Thanks.
"After a hard day's work diggin' up the sod, we're ready for chow."
Welcome to our class's blog. We are discussing the latest topics we're studying in American history and literature. This website has been active since December 2005. Selected Excel 10 students will take turns posting their thoughts, and other Excel 10 students will comment on these posts. Parents, staff, and other interested persons are invited to add their comments on our musings. Any inappropriate comments will be deleted.
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
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29 comments:
Well a couple things I've always enjoyed was some how combining the learning with an activity. I find that its fun and it helps me remember. I also like the visuals that you put up, it help me understand was going on.
One thing that I found didn't help me as much was just writing down and copying notes. It was extremely boring and I didn't learn as much. If instead you would some how connect the learning with an activity or a visual, it would help improve the class for me.
I would like to see more of doing activities that went along with what we were learing. This helped me understand the information by actually doing something instead of just being told information.
Something I would like less of is the boring movies. Some movies are fine, but the ones that are just a guy with an english accent talking the whole time get really boring.
I don't think we do as much literature as history, but i like that. I think the whole class becomes more interactive when we watch good movies (Newsies, Supersize me...) and that helps me learn because everyone becomes enthusiastic about it. I think we should review more on our papers becasue usually by the time we get them back i forget everything that I've written and we don't really cover what specifically it is that we should be writing about or specific grammar or other mistakes that people often made. Also when we read book we usually have tests on them the day that the reading is due which is cool and all but when I'm reading im trying to concentrate what might be going on and i don't have a "wickersham train-of-thought" process, so usually I do poorly on the tests because of small details with hidden symbols or patterns of writing that i hadn't noticed. I want to talk about the books and key things for a good amount of time before having any test or quizzes, that way it allows me to remember these things when i read the next time and look for them for later tests and such.
In the upcoming semester I would like to see more hands on activities. We already do a lot of hands on things but I like them and they are a lot more fun then note taking. Taking notes bores me, and I know that it has to be done, but the less we could do, the better. It would like it if we didn't take notes why we are watching movies. This is becuase I only listen to what I'm supposed to be writing down and I miss the rest of the movie. I don't like it and I don't feel like I really get to watch the whole thing.
I enjoyed watching movies that had a historical background but not the videos that just tell you facts. I like doing debates and possibly socratic semenars. I think that doing group work and projects are really effective. Watching videos that go to fast to take notes is annoying and hard to do. Taking notes isnt bad becuase we barely do it or we just highlight articles. I like doing more history rather than literature because its more interesting.
Next semester i would like to do an other hands- on thing like imigrantion dress-up. Or i would like to do more group things. I like wokring in groups because it helps with team work.
I would like to see less movies and notes. I would like to just watch the movies and not have to worry about thaking notes. I would also like to do more history because i like learning about the past.
I enjoyed a lot of things in the first semester of this class. I would like to do more history and watch more movies in the next semester. I think movies teach you better than notes, and I think that history has a bigger impact on your life than english, and I think that history keeps the class' attention better than english as well.
In the next semester I would like to see less notes. I would rather get notes that are already written and then discuss them. I think that discussions would give me a much better knowledge about the subject, than wasting some paper. We are doing too much english and not enough history.
AJ
In the near future i would like to watch more movies and learn about more history and less liturature. Also i would like to say that the note taking is brutal. We take mass amounts of notes and i think that it is unnecessary and uncalled for. When we take notes on the movies i dont learn anything because im am to focused on taking the notes then paying attention to the information given in the video.
I would like to see more hands on or intersting lectures and activites in place of the note taking. I think that this would help me larn and remeber the stuff more.
Bob
I would like to read more novels. I have enjoyed all the novels that we have read so far, except the Red Badge of Courage. I really liked My Antonia, Martin Dressler, and The Great Gatsby. I have found them interesting and enjoyable to read.
I did not like, however, how many movies we watched. Eventually, watching movies became boring, especially because we had to take notes on them. However, I did enjoy some of the movies we watched (see my comment on the 1st semester evaluation part 1), but taking notes ruined many of the others.
I enjoyed the group debates and discussions. I think they both really help to better understand the lessons that were learning. I really liked watching movies because its really helps to understand when you actually see it. I think that when were reading chapters in the book for homework, that we should go over them in class before we take the quiz's because if your confused on something or don't understand something going on in the book, that would really help to do better of the quizs. I think that were doing a good balance of history and literature.
MELISSA
Some things that I would like to see more of in the second semester are...more simulation type activities (like the immigration simulation), and more interesting movies.
Some things that I would like to see less of in the second semester are...less reading of boring books, less note taking, and a little less bookwork.
I think we are doing just enough literature and just enough history. I don't think we should change the balance at all.
Jay
My favorite part of Semester One was the 1912 election. I really enjoyed working on that project, and working with politics. I think the whole class got into it, and really took a stand. We had a great class discussion on it, and everyone was involved. I would definitely like to do something like that again.
What I would like to see less of is note taking during movies. I feel like when I am jotting down notes, I can’t concentrate on what is really happening, I prefer to watch a movie and process it rather than racing down notes.
In the second semester I would like to experience more of the history like we did in the Ellis Island Stimulation. I would also like to have more in class discussions on certain topics, but not everyone has to talk in them. The things that i would like to see less in the second semester are the boring videos and debates. Maybe insted of the debates we could have people express their points in class. I liked the distribution between the literature and the history because it seemed equal.
In my first semester classes i liked how my teacher related his lessons to real life or personal things. He would give us stories about his life and how it related to what we were learning. This helped everyone understand the concept instead of just reading it in a book. One cool thing i did in one of my classes was that we did a project where we had to make up a game about our topic and i enjoyed this project.
I owuld like to see less of jsut reading in our text book and memorzing vocab. I wouldnt want to just read but more hands on things that we can learn from
-David
This semester, I would like to learn about the Supreme Court and WWII. I liked doing the 1912 convention and I think that we should do more things like that.
I think that we should watch less videos and do more group work and demonstrations.
I think that the balance of history and literature is good and should stay about the same.
-Maggie
Somthing that I really enjoyed in first semester was the debates adn Socratic Seminars. it was a good way to learn about a topic. i can remember everythiong we did from those. The only thing with the debates was that you only got really in depth on one side of it, although you reasearched the other side to prove them wrong. But it is important to have opinions. I also liked the election and the treaty of versailles vote.
Theres not really anyhthing I can think of that I would want less of in this class. I think that there was a good balance of English and Socail studies and they were tied in well together.
This semester I think that we can do more hands on or demonstratin things like what we did for the Immigration simmulation and The Convention of 1912. Maybe we can continue the group stuff like when we split up and discuss the book in small groups then come back together again.
I think that this semester I would like to see a little less of the videos and more with simulations and group work because that is not as boring as sitting still and taking notes.
I think the balance between history and literature is good, but when we do read a book it is about what we are learning in history. And when we write a paper it has to do with history. So, in that sense I think we might be doing mor history then literature.
In the second semester, I would like to see more creative writing assignments, but NOT journals. Writing completely from my past experiences and knowledge with total creative control over the peice is something that I find fascinating and would very much like to improve on. I think that it is a life skill that we all need to learn, even if we are not all considering careers in that field. An example of how we did this in a previous class was write a short story with a theme.
I feel like we take too many notes in class that we don't really use. In studying for finals, I found that half the things I had been taking notes on for the past semester were not included in the review sheet. By providing this example, I am not suggesting that we are being assessed on too little information. I am, however, suggesting that we are taking too many unneccesary notes. I feel like these are especially derivitive while watching movies, because everyone is trying too hard to listen for what's required on the notes sheet to actually pay attention to the rest of the movie and take it all in.
I loved the Ellis Island lesson when we got to dress up like the country that we researched. I actually didnt mind writing the paper, because I learned more about my family history.
I kinda liked that group projocts. I really enjoyed presenting them but I couldnt rely on others. Often I found that we were not given enough time in class and it was hard to contact/get together with other classmates to work on a big project. I did still like sharing my ideas othes and making the project better with more ieas.
I think that there was the perfect amount of reading. When we learned something in the history part of class, there was always a great book to back up the lesson.
I am all out of smart things to say...
-Alyssa
Since this class is completly new to me, im excited to see what this class has in store. I would like to see group discussions, and what other students feel about what we are learning. I loved how Mr.Sherman taught, in how he would explain history. So i would like to see that. I also loved how Mr.McClaren would relate what he was teaching to the real world, which was easier to understand to.
From past expierences i don't like watching biographies, i think that they are boring. Other than that, i'm excited to see what this class has in store for me.
I liked the 1912 election when we made posters and voted. Doing things like that help us to get the feel of how things really worked and how people voted back then instead of just sitting through an entire class writing notes. I dont like answering questions during movies because the only thing I'm listening for is the answer to the next question and I'm not even hearing everything else that's said in the movie.
Next semester I would like to see more interactive things with groups. I like doing the election-type things. I think that it was fun making posters and such. Reviewing books together and the themes of them help me understand it fully.
As for my old classes, we really didn’t do anything that was exciting that I would like to do this semester. Right now I think that the excel class is balancing the English and history pretty much evenly. We read a book that goes along with the history era that we are learning about at the time and we write a paper that goes with them.
One idea that i think would help us understand topics more is to do group work with classmates. it is a learning expierence and to talk to other friends in the class about productive topics. And i think we need to focus a little more on literature than history. like most of the movies we watch were about histroy. the only literature things we've done were read books. mabye there are some more literature movies we could watch..
-emily
For myself, I would like to see me trying a little harder. Not that I haven’t in the past, but I am always told I do enough just to get by, so my "new years excel resolution" will be to do the very best that I can do.
In the class, I think we should, again, do more projects. Some people would dred it, but if we came up with the rubric as a class, and what it was going to be about, I think it would be a hit.
Something that I hate doing is getting into groups, discussing something, and then standing in front of the class and "reporting" what you found to the class. Its not that I don’t like talking in front of the class, cause I could do that for hours, but it just gets very repetitive. When a group is up there, chances are the people that are supposed to be listening aren’t, and only a select few are actually taking notes. I just think that when we do that every class, it gets old.
There is a perfect mix of literature of and social studies.
Overall, I liked the way 1st semester was taught. I really enjoyed the simulation and the mock elections. I liked getting involved with the subject we were learning about, it helped me have a greater understanding. I also liked watching the movies. It was good to be able to see what we were learning along with writing about it. This semester I would like to see more interactive learning and movies as an alternative to taking notes.
One thing I would like to see less of is the long note taking. Taking a lot of notes in a short period of time is difficult. It is hard to understand all that we are discussing when wer move at a fast pase. It is easy to lose focus while taking notes. I find it easier to consentrate on something that i get involvesd with or watch. I don't want notes to be taken away completly, but I would like there to be a little less.
I would definately like to see more of the simulations, mock elections, etc. I learned the most from interesting things like those, as we were able to actually visualize and be a part of the topic. I hope to do more of these interactive learning experiences this semester, as they really taught me a lot.
I would like to see less note-taking this semester, as I don't really get much out of that learning style. I don't really take in what we are writing down, as I am more focused on getting them all down quickly. I'd rather do more interactive learning than note-taking. Some notes are still necessary to get important concepts down on paper, but I feel that the bulk of learning should be more interactive.
I agree with Alex and say group activities are a easier and more efficient way to learn information. I am more a visual learner and even though things written down on the board are ok, information i look up and do with other people seems to come better to me. Also, you can get more done in groups assigning each person something to do then getting back together and sharing what everyone learned.
Movies would be good to have around twice a week. They help go indepth more about the subject and learn more about the material being covered. However some of them can be very boring and sort of useless in my opinion. Having less but better movies would be alot better.
~Q
In this next semester i would like to see more activities that relate to what were learning. I know that i learn and take it in more effectively through activities. I really like watching the movies too.
I also would like to see less quizzes on the reading. Sometimes (well at least for me) I read what we are suppossed to, but i dont really grasp what is going on and then we have quizzes on it. I kind of think it would be better if we learned the book, like you helped us understand it before taking the quiz, and then took maybe a bigger test on it or something that it would definetly help.
brit
I would like to see more group activities and more hands on stuff. It helps me learn better. I agree with Alex S. when he was talking about the movies with the english guy just talking and giving us facts. That's pretty boring and I tend to not pay attention durign those kinds of movies. I also think it would be better if we didn't have to take notes during the movies that we watch because you're just trying to get the information on the paper and not listening to the rest of the movie.
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