Thursday, February 28, 2013
How can teachers break the boring ways in making a portfolio and create something that is fun and memorable for the children and that you enjoy doing as well?
Throughout my previous early childhood courses at HCC I have learned how to create activities, plans, running record and anecdotal observations. A lot of the articles and readings I have been doing for the past year or so makes be believe that a simple observation of child can be made into something bigger. On page 156 it states, "The process is ongoing: teachers continue to generate new hypotheses, investigate them in their classrooms, and look for additional examples of group learning." There is so much that can go into an observation of a child. I never really viewed observations as meaningful teaching tools that can be an art form. There are so many new ways of observing a child and making it meaningful. One could create a diary of a child that can have every milestone of the child while in school. I feel that diaries are much more meaningful and memorable than just a regular portfolio. The school I work for is about to get re-accredited in the next couple of weeks or so and I observe teachers just putting whatever inside the children's portfolios. It doesn't seem that the teachers really care about these observations and portfolios, but just as a responsibility and a need to be accredited. Why can't teachers really care about observations of their children and treat them as if they were important (because they are)? Why doesn't teachers just keep up with their portfolios and observations, than maybe it wouldn't be such a hard task later on? I know observations take time to do, but if you do them more and more it becomes a habit and it will be easier to do them. I feel that every teacher has their own way of doing their own observations and portfolios. I think every teacher needs to step back and reflect on what works for them and what doesn't. You can still follow the guidelines and standards of what is expected from the school you work for, but just make it more fun. How can teachers break the boring ways in making a portfolio and create something that is fun and memorable for the children and that you enjoy doing as well?
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Dear Ashley,
ReplyDeleteI’m glad that we were able to learn about the use of a diary. I feel it was really important for us to learn about another documentation method used in an early childhood setting. I am also glad that through our education courses we were able to learn how to do running records, create activities, plans, etc. I think with this experience and knowledge we will be able to incorporate these learned skills within our teacher responsibility of documentation. It was surprising to hear that the teachers were just throwing things together to make their portfolios for the children. You would think because they would be more passionate about their work and more respectful towards their students and their families, especially since they are in the process of being reaccredited. I thought your question was really interesting and it is obviously a question for teachers to think about. If I were the teacher I would plan an arts & crafts scheduled time daily for the children to use different art materials (crayons, markers, paint, sand, etc.) and assign them a theme. The pictures that they create would be inputted into their portfolio either as a background or section dividers. This way the portfolio includes work the student did, it is more meaningful for the student and their families and this task is more entertaining and fun for the children. Thank you again Ashley for sharing and allowing me to comment on your blog.
Hi Ashley,
ReplyDeletePractices like portfolios are commonplace in many classrooms -- yet, what you notice is how the standardization has lessened the importance. Does it become more about collecting enough to meet a standard rather than understanding a child? How often do you hear teachers stating how they understand a child through the child's portfolio? How might portfolios be rethought if teachers consider The Diary of Laura or the documentation in Making Learning Visible as a lens on the portfolio? What would be glaring evident in the portfolio? What would be missing? Could this lens be a means for changing the purpose of the portfolio? Is the purpose of the portfolio what informs the actions of the teachers working with the portfolio system? How do you imagine the teachers in our class text describe the purpose of documentation? How might their purposes further/challenge our purposes as teachers and documenters?
Jeanne
Ashley,
ReplyDeleteHi, I really understand when you said observations take a lot of time to do. When I was part of a student teacher at a preschool, we all were assigned to make at least 100 observations per semester. We were at the preschool only once a week and at the end of the semester, each of us needed to make about 2 to 3 children portfolios. To prepare for the portfolios, we were actually gathering those observations frequently. We had a format on the clip board and those were located all over the classroom that any teacher could reach anytime and we could write what we saw about any children. We also had to categorize things that happened into developmental stages. We all gathered together every Thursday and had a meeting and at that time, we actually read what kind of things were happening to all the children and discussed about what we could do to make any part of them improve. We were also told how many observations were made at that point of the week. I honestly stressed out a lot about the observations and did not enjoy when I was making portfolios at the end of the semester. It was because I felt that I was forced to do this and observations were something that was giving the teacher opportunities to know about the children (Yes, I was not really thinking that we could actually learn from this as a teacher at this point) and help us how we can help children develop more. However, what if I keep on doing this for years and years? Do you think I can start to enjoy this process? Do you think I can easily reach to more than 100 observations?
What I realized this time is that parents can make great diaries with beautiful pictures about their children and I am pretty sure that they are more than enjoying to making it.
What if I can actually feel about the same way as their parents and make portfolios? Do you think it will be a whole different level of portfolios that I will be able to make? Why do you think it feels different when we do the things related to work or if we relate the task to our personal joyful things that we do?? Can we love and feel joyful about being a teacher and at that time, will making portfolio or observations be different?
Miwa ;)
I remember doing the exact same thing during my lab at LCC's children's center. It was stressful but the end product of the portfolios was amazing. I hope that when I become a teacher I can do the same and feel the same when I put together children's portfolios. I love how the clipboards around the classroom and outside kept observations easier and more fun, since they had the foundations of an observation on the first page. Definitely a good experience to go through :)
DeleteHi Ashley,
ReplyDeleteYour question, "How can teachers break the boring ways in making a portfolio and create something that is fun and memorable for the children and that you enjoy doing as well?" makes me wonder the same thing. Personally, I really enjoy implementing the activities for children. However, when it comes to collecting observations for the portfolio, especially finding the observations that will match most of standards, I sort of feel stress sometime. This is because I have to make sure that all the standards areas in children's portfolio get filled up. Moreover, many times children are also doing some activities that don't fit in any standards but it was a really big progress to their development, I kind of put those observations on the side and I might mention to the parents later, but unfortunately, sometime I forget to do it. I don't know if this is because all I worry about is the standards that I forget the real meaning behind the child portfolio. I feel like if I have a chance to do the diary report instead of a portfolio with standard I will never even put those amazing observations on the side.