Day 11: teaching strategies and wandering

Today I would like to comment on teaching strategies.  Since I am not familiar with Norwegian culture and the way things usually work in Norway it has been a really good time to ask questions and to think about what makes the most sense.  I don’t just have to do things the same way as other people.  We are working through some economics in the math class right now and I was asking Erlend about how would be the best way to teach it.  Students are always able to try and work things out by hand using mental math or a calculator.  However, this is not always the most effective method of solving multiple problems that are similar.  Erlend was telling me that if the students were to get a question on a term test then it would be during the section where the student would be able to use their resources such as geogebra and excel.  Because of this we used laptops and used excel to work out some exercises dealing with a budget, accounting and loan calculation.  I really like that idea because that is something that the students would be able to do later on as well.  They may not always have excel since it is a paid program but they would at least be able to use the open source equivalent to it.  We opened the door to excel so now I think that the students are more likely to use it later on.  Maybe even figure out how excel can help them on other tasks as well.  This will make me reflect on what other resources students will have that they would be able to use to complete tasks.  I really like using geogebra and some other teaching aids.  If the idea is to teach the students so that they are then able to apply the teaching then I should be teaching using those programs that they are going to have available at appropriate times.

Another teaching strategy that is similar that was employed today was using YouTube.  In English class the students were talking about different kinds of English, specifically accents in America.  I may know those accents but I do a horrible job trying to actually speaking with those accents.  It didn’t take very long to look on YouTube to find a couple videos that had people showing a bunch of different accents in America.  There was the New Yorker, southerner, mid-west and California person.  It was very effective.  Had I had more time and access to my personal laptop I would have downloaded the videos and had them embedded in the presentation themselves. 

I had to talk with a teacher after school so Kylie and Brooke left me.  So I had time to just wander.  I wandered the grocery store to know if there are good prices there or in Rosendal.  I also stopped in a furniture store to get a feel for "euro style."  I looked at pillows but didn't actually buy one.

This carpet thing was right around the corner.  I walked around the corner and bam!  There it was.  I thought that it was a dog.  I am not sure what it is for but it gave me a start.