Guided Response: Review a number of your classmates’ posts and respond to at least two surveys. Consider contributing additional questions that your classmate could add to the survey that may have not been included and provide your rationale. How might the additional questions you suggest support student learning based on interest? Be sure to respond to any queries or comments posted by your instructor.

1. Melissa Cagno

Here is my get to know you survey I created:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/NT9RD7T

• How might you use the survey results to differentiate your instruction based on student interest? 
  Student interest can make a boring lesson fun. If there is a lesson that is dry or you seem to lose students attention, you can try to use the students interest to capture the classes attention. Also the survey will allow me to get to know my students and their backgrounds which will help me understand their strengths and weaknesses.
• What if a student on a survey stated that they did not like mathematics, but they loved football? How might you draw upon their football interest to motivate the student during math instruction? By learning that the student loves football you can incorporate that into a math lesson. Football is a sport that require a lot of math which most people do not realize. A lesson including both will peak the students attention and show them how to make math fun.
• Reflect on a time when you were given an assignment that you had no interest in completing. Consider how that teacher might have differentiated the activity based a personal interest and describe how this relates to one of the seven themes of addressing student interest in the classroom found on page 116 of our text. As a student I always had problems in History and I believe that if the teacher would have done something to peak my interest I may have enjoyed it more. History is a subject that can be either extremely boring or a lot of fun depending on the teachers approach. But by making it interesting and engaging you can capture the students attentions, they will enjoy the class more and they will learn the material better.

Sousa, D. A., Tomlinson, C. A., & Ann, T., Carol (2010). Differentiation and the brain: How neuroscience supports the learner-friendly classroom. Bloomington, IN: Solution Tree Press.

Guided Response: Review a number of your classmates’ posts and respond to at least two surveys. Consider contributing additional questions that your classmate could add to the survey that may have not been included and provide your rationale. How might the additional questions you suggest support student learning based on interest? Be sure to respond to any queries or comments posted by your instructor.

1. Brian

My SurveyMonkey link is https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/QSV8DL5

How might you use the survey results to differentiate your instruction based on student interest?

I would take the top results based off the children’s top interest and tie them into subjects that maybe less desirable for them.  If there was a topic like the use of the Life Cycle of a Frog (from last week) I could tie in their interest of animals or other things as an example in the discussion. 

What if a student on a survey stated that they did not like mathematics, but they loved football?

I would use the example of yards gained in a drive as a way to subtract or add.  For example if the Washington Redskins drive for a touchdown was 87 yards and 24 of them were on the ground by the two running backs.  How many of the 87 yards be from passing?  If the class was an older group I could use percentages or averages of the running game. Or dig even deeper and use the percentages in the Red Zone (within 20 yards of the in-zone) to determine the play with the highest success rate.

How might you draw upon their football interest to motivate the student during math instruction?

As the light bulbs come on and the comparison of the football and math becomes fun, I will show the students how learning can be helpful in everyday life.  This is one of the hardest thing to get students to do, is to understand that you will use portions of math throughout life.  This can be used in determining a trip and how long it may take to get there.  Use the interest in cars or vacations they have been on to draw their interest. 

Reflect on a time when you were given an assignment that you had no interest in completing.  Consider how that teacher might have differentiated the activity based a personal interest and describe how this relates to one of the seven themes of addressing student interest.

I can think of a time when our assignment was dealing with the difference in cells in our high school Biology Class.  We were looking at the overhead projector (yes this shows my age) and he showed the different types and shapes of cells in different items.  He played us into this because he knew he was being boring.  Looking at #4 in the text, the teacher took out the microscope and an onion.  After he showed us that the cells are different in the skin of an onion we were in awe.   We cut thin layers of the skin and placed them throughout the room for us to walk around and observe.  He tried to get us to determine which ones were cut from the same area of the onion.  I was impossible proving the difference of the cells.  He had us interested to learn.