On Friday, March 20th, I attended the 2015 MACUL Conference at the Cobo Center in Detroit (MACUL Site for more information). This is an annual education conference meant for promoting the effective use of technology in education.I was only able to attend one day of this conference, and thus only made it to 4 different presentations during the day, learning something new from each. The presentations I attended were called "Collaborating to Assess Student Learning Using a Variety of Methods," "Editing, Commenting, Suggesting, Oh My!", "Things I Learned Teaching Mathematics With Khan Academy," and finally, the "Lightning Talks." Although I could talk about each of these presentations, I would like to focus on the first one, which has helped me to consider new ways in which I can structure my instruction to better meet the needs of my future students.
This first presentation was given by a high school math teacher, Ms. Nelson, which ended up discussing differentiation in the math classroom. I was really excited about this topic, because I found it difficult to figure out ways in which I could differentiate instruction for my student, and this talk provided one of achieving this that has numerous benefits for students. The main idea that struck me and my peers attending this presentation was the idea of using Menus in my classroom, so students are provided the choice in how they achieve their desired grade. An example of her Trigonometry Menu can be viewed at her website (Ms. Nelson's Website MACUL Page).
I had never understood the concept of Menus before, and I think this is because this knowledge is used more often in unit planning, rather than the daily lesson planning. Ms. Nelson's Trigonometry Menu is clearly laid out and shows how students can earn a C, B, or A in that unit. She explained that each student is provided their own physical copy of the menu for that unit, and she will sign off on the points they get on each assignment they choose to do. She does not record these scores until the end of the unit, so it becomes the students' responsibility to keep track of this document and to decide when they want to have their work in any of the sections assessed. I think it is important to note that some of the more artistic items in the menu were graded mostly on content, and not the student's artistic abilities.
Ms. Nelson creates these menus with the other math teachers in her school, so I think it may be difficult to create such menus on my own, without that collaborative aspect, but it is definitely something I would like to look into and consider in my future teaching. She provides plenty of resources to do so at the link provided above, and I would definitely recommend checking these out, even if you are not teaching mathematics! Menus are one instructional method that can be used for all subjects!
