M&M&M Analysis

            I have been observing my teacher for four weeks now and have already learned a great deal about teaching and the relationship between teacher and student.  Each student is different and learns differently and we need to prepare our lessons so that we can effectively teach our students and motivate them to keep learning in other classes.  Those skills that they learn transfer from one class to another and we need to be uniform as teachers so that we are giving the students the best opportunity they can get to achieve greatness.

            Many different needs that need to be met for student success.  One of those things is pertaining to metacognition.  Metacognition is the process of thinking about what you think.  Partnered with that is self-regulation, or reevaluating what you are learning and thinking through it, checking for self-understanding and clarity.  There are different steps with metacognition, declarative, procedural, and conditional.  Declarative is how you learn best, your strengths and weaknesses.  Procedural is strategies that you have at the ready to help you learn.  Conditional is skills you have that help you accomplish a task and help you accomplish it the best way possible.  Knowing these different approaches can help us understand how students can implement metacognition into their everyday use.  I want to plan lessons that create a safe environment for students to show their strengths and weaknesses and that they can feel like they can try new things and approaches based off of different conditions that they are faced with.  I want to push each of these different knowledges to increase metacognition.  Structure lessons and goals for the students to see how they plan, monitor, and then evaluate the results.  Have students plan out what they are going to do to accomplish their goal and then monitor how they are doing as the process is going on.  Do things need to change?  Are they getting the outcome they are expecting?  If things are going good, then they can evaluate the results and plan again for future success.

            We then need to look at a student’s mindset.  Are they a fixed mindset or a growth mindset?  Fixed mindset is the thought process that “something” is measurable, either they can or cannot do the task.  They believe that if they failed once, they will never be able to accomplish the goal and frankly won’t try again.  I plan to steer students toward a growth mindset.  Growth mindset is this incremental learning.  That knowledge can be learned and obtained through practice and believing in one’s potential to expand.  Growth mindsets use all the resources available for them.  I want my classrooms filled with resources for the students to use and that they can get help from one another and from me.  Having posters on the walls that explain information taught throughout the quarter/semester are great tools.  Students are constantly looking around the room and those little reminders help them to grow. 

            Motivation is crucial to student’s learning.  They need to be motivated to want to learn and grow.  But each student is motivated differently, so we need to make sure we are prepared with different approaches.  I personally love the Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.  This theory addresses that students need to have certain needs met in order to motivate them and have them in a place ready to learn.  They need to have their physical needs met and then need to feel safe.  Those are the two beginning levels of this pyramid and I completely agree with them.  I also plan to implement self-determination theory.  There are three levels to this theory, autonomy, relatedness, and competency.  All of these things boil down to fun and our brain craves to have fun.  Having something that we choose to do (autonomy), that we have this sense that we belong (relatedness), and to feel that we are effective in what we are doing (competence).  Making sure that students have options when it comes to assignments (unless they need to do a certain project to obtain a certain understanding), but making sure that they feel they can express their knowledge in a variety of ways.