Dramatic Arts in the Classroom

In school I was very involved in theatre. The truth is, I can remember more about the plays that I was in than some of the classes that I took. So here is my question. Did I learn from the plays because I enjoyed them, or because I was forced to act out what I was reading? Here is my theory. If students act out what they are reading, they will remember more and therefore comprehension will be better. I think that readers theatre is an excellent way for children to read and learn from stories. I know that many teachers already use this way of learning but I think that every class should use this atleast once. In my fourth grade class we made puppets and acted out our stories. In middle school we put on plays and did workshops with the high school theatre group. Those were some of the most beneficial ways of comprehending stories for me and I think that many other students could benefit from the same experience. Opinions?

Special Education and Physical Education

Have you ever considered how important it is for special ed students to participate in a gym class with general ed students? I think that gym is one of the only times in school that students are truly engaged in either working together physically. In the classroom they may have to work together to solve a problem but in gym they are physically active and using high thinking and problem solving skills. It seems to me that these are some of the main goals that special ed students are expected to achieve in their schooling. By allowing these students to participate with their gen ed peers they would be socially involved, physically active, and part of a team.

As well, if these students are not mainstreamed into gym classes, I think that gym teachers should have to take a specific course on creating activities for these students. I was observing recently and I went to a gym class with a physically disabled classroom. I noticed that the teacher seemed to be making up the activities as they went. There was no pre planning involved for these students. I think that gym is extremely important especially for the physically disabled. It helps to strengthen muscles that are often not used in the wheel chair as well as create a sense of team work. I would like to see some more effort being put in for gym for special ed students. Anybody have opinions?

Psychology in regards to education

I am currently enrolled in an educational psychology class. Lately we have been talking about the difference between language effecting our thoughts and our thoughts effecting language. There is a debate concerning if we speak before we think about things or if we think about them before we speak of them. I have not formed an opinion on this yet but I am leaning toward speech before thought. Even if we do not speak about things ourselves, don't we learn as we hear other people talking about them? This in turn trigures thoughts about a certain topic.

After thinking about this for a long time, I had a question. What if we truely do think about things before speaking about them, or if different people have different sequences of thought and speech. Perhaps this is why people learn in different ways. Opinions?

Introduction

First and foremost I would like to explain that the focus of this blog has changed dramatically since the last time I used it. This blog began my junior year of high school and was used for a graphic design class. I don't suggest exploring my past posts or other blog because that would be both embarrassing for me and boring for you. I wasn't very good. Since then it has evolved into my thoughts on specific topics scripted from my instructional technology class that I am currently enrolled in.

Today I would like to share a little on one of my favorite topics in our world of education. That being inclusion of special education students into general education classrooms. This highly debated topic is at the core of my values as a future educator. I believe that the benefits of inclusion surpass all expectations of the original goal. (To allow special ed students to interact with their "normal" peers.) I think that not only do special education students increase in their social skills but their academics are raised as well.

It is not healthy to be secluded from their general education peers for the majority of the day. Students feed off of each other and if students are learning from others who have the same social and academic discrepancies, than they will never have the oppurtunity to conqure those issues. Also, being in a seperate classroom automatically attaches a stigma to the child as being "different." This kind of stigma effects the way that the child thinks about themselves. How can we expect a child to excell academically when they don't beleive that they can do this?

Including special education students into general ed classrooms is essential for their successfull completion of their education.