The Sweater Article

This was an interesting article because it was based on the experience of a teacher using constructivism for the first time. Therefore, it touched on a lot of the questions I've been having about this method of science instruction. The students in O'brien's classroom believed that sweaters kept them warm in the winter because the sweaters themselves emitted heat. After discovering this misconception, O'brien decided to have the students test their idea. It's important to have this "let's find out!" attitude in the science classroom because it shows students that science can help them understand real world problems. Experimentation also makes it easier for students to change their misconceptions. Simply reading or hearing the teacher talk about the science won't be strong enough. Afterwards, the result is often a subconscious split of scientific ideas at school and the real scientific ideas at home.

O'brien found out just how strongly her students were rooted in their conviction, because they stuck to their original idea even after three days of experimentation which seemed to prove them wrong. In her journal, she wondered (as I often have) how long students should be allowed to "construct" the knowledge on their own. (As a side note, I thought it was great that O'brien had her own science notebook which she wrote in at the same time as the children. This emphasized that it was an activity that was very real to life outside of schoolwork.) The article explains that in a constructivist classroom, the teacher should not be passive. Students at the elementary age will often revert back to earlier stages of development and not believe the evidence that is before their eyes. Therefore, teachers need to step in to introduce the true information.

I was sort of confused, however, on when this information should be presented. In one part of the article, there is a quote from Pasteur: "understanding favors the prepared mind." For that reason, I thought maybe it would be better to tell the students the correct information before they experiemented. However, later the article made it seem like the sweater lesson was a good example--that you should start with an experiment that contradicts students' misconceptions, then provide the correct information, and finally do another experiment to show that this information was correct. I think that this latter method is more effective because students are experiencing scientific inquiry that is more real.

I was really glad that the article pointed out the problem of time. Learning in a constructivist classroom creates a dilemma. On one hand, you can't cover as much material, but on the other hand, the students will truly understand the material you do cover. As we've discussed in class, oftentimes we learn the same things over and over every year but never truly understand the concepts. If students truly understand the topic the first time, perhaps we don't need to cover as much material in one schoolyear. However, it's still something that makes me hesitant about constructivism.

Keeley et al

This is an introduction chapter to a book that focuses on formative assessment, specifically on the "probes" or questioning techniques which can be applied by teachers. These probes are designed to bring students' misconceptions out into the open. Research has pointed to the most commonly held misconceptions, and these are included as possible answers to the probing questions. In order to be considered formative, findings about student preconceptions must then be used to make changes in teaching methods or provide feedback to students.

I will definitely use formative assessment probes in my classroom. The reason they are so important is because teachers need to know students' background knowledge in order to teach them something new. Based on their prior experiences, students' ideas about science are very strong, so it is best for teachers to build from those ideas and address unscientific ideas head-on if needed.

One thing I didn't agree with in this chapter was the idea that misconceptions should be considered "alternate frameworks" instead. The authors argue that students' ideas may conflict with a scientist's formal ideas but might not be completely incorrect. Even though it's important to stress that science is all about testing unproven theories, I feel like this terminology just gives students more reason to continue believing in their misconceptions.

At first, I was also concerned with how the chapter presented the idea of "probing questions" as part of a paper-and-pencil pre-test. I remember doing this throughout all my years in school and never truly understanding the purpose. It was usually just a multiple choice test that we never saw again after the first day of class. I think that it could be helpful to inform students about the idea of misconceptions so they have a better understanding of the pre-test. Maybe a teacher could even demonstrate how misconceptions are often carried with students throughout all their schooling (as we saw in the video about astronomy concepts).

Another important thing that was missing from these pre-tests was the reasoning behind our answers. Without this information, my teachers didn't understand the details of my misconceptions, so how could they effectively work to change them? The conversation between student and teacher is what brings out the child's ideas. I was glad that the chapter mentioned other ways to use probes--through journaling or discussions, for instance--because I think the paper-and-pencil pre-test can get old. Talking or journaling can lead to more engagement and deep thinking about the topic as well.

Peters

This article discussed the views of Piaget and Vygotsky and how they can be implemented in a constructivist classroom. The differences between Piaget and Vygotsky's ideas were specified as well, and this is important because I think it's a good idea to find what you like from each point of view and use that in combination in your classroom. Piaget focused on cognitive constructivism and the different stages of development. He thought that students had to be at the correct stage of development in order to enhance their learning. Vygotsky, on the other hand, focused on sociocultural constructivism. This has more to do with how the environment around a student contributes to learning, and he believed that learning led to development.

In my opinion, it's important as a teacher to pay attention to Piaget's stages of development for a general outline of how to teach your students. For instance, in the concrete operational stage (upper elementary school), students are able to do more thinking processes but still can't think abstractly. Therefore, it's important to include a lot of concrete materials and real life experiences to make their learning more meaningful. I think that it's also important to stretch students in this stage to think abstractly so that they can move on easily to the formal operational stage (especially if they are 11 or 12 years old).

Personally, I think it's more important to focus on Vygotsky's ideas because he placed more emphasis on learning being constructed through social situations. I think that it's very important for students to share their thoughts with each other in class and to encourage social collaboration. Peer tutoring is also a good idea because students at a lower learning level can benefit from being scaffolded by a more capable peer. The problem with this, as I mentioned in my response to the Krajcik article, is that teachers need to make sure that higher level students still have a chance to be challenged. Ideally, students would be switching the role of teacher and learner so that everyone benefits in the end.

The ideas presented in the article about the scientific language were also interesting to me. The whole language approach has the merit of being more in context, but I wonder how I would approach teaching difficult words. It seems like students would struggle to read something if they didn't know many of the scientific terms. Maybe we could discuss them as a class when students come across those words.

Overall, the constructivist approach seems very beneficial and like it would make learning meaningful, but I'd really like to see it in action to know how to make it flow smoothly.

Krajcik

Overall, social constructivism says that when students are involved in constructing their own knowledge, they will have a better understanding of science concepts.The most important features of the social constructivist model are that students are able to be actively engaged, apply their knowledge, represent their knowledge in multiple ways, learn in a community, and partake in authentic tasks. These features all relate back to students being involved in their own learning instead of just passively taking in what the teacher says. By making the learning experience their own, it is more meaningful, therefore resulting in more learning.

There were a lot of ideas in this article, but some of them really stuck out to me as ones I would like to use in my future classroom. However, several questions also arose while I contemplated which ideas I would implement.  I like the idea of a problem-based classroom where students are searching for the answer to a relevant question. Encouraging discourse with students to help them understand what they know and to realize what questions they have is important as the first step towards beginning this project. I was unsure, however, of how to make this work smoothly. The question must be relevant to the student, but it also must facilitate the achievement of learning standards. Teachers can guide students towards a question about a certain topic, but it seems like this would result in students asking about something they don't really care about. Perhaps some projects throughout the year could be completely student-initiated, whereas others would require the teacher to spark some curiosity about an otherwise uninteresting topic.

I really like the idea of students using this project method to take action to improve their world. The Science Technology Society movement focuses on topics like health, population, resources, and the environment--all of these are avenues for projects which could have a real impact in the world. I think this provides for some of the most meaningful learning because students see a true purpose behind their lessons. Finding out the answer to a question is great if you're a curious person, but projects that improve the world show students that the lessons they learn in school can be applied to real-life siutations to promote change. One problem with the project method and a constructivist classroom, however, is that it takes up a lot of time. It's worrisome to think that important topics might not be covered, but I think that it's possible to integrate many science topics into one project.

I also thought that Dale's Cone of Experience was interesting, and I will pay attention to how I present concepts in class. The use of more concrete materials and less simple lecturing will help students be more active learners.  Self-evaluations and revising was another area of social constructionism that I found interesting because I know that a lot of kids hate these activities. It's probably a good idea to do self evaluations and revisions often so students get more used to them. Another important aspect of revisions is that students will be more willing to revise when their work will be public. If they are partaking in a meaningful, real-to-life project (such as organizing a recycling campaign for the school), other people will often see their work and they will want it to be good.

I will also strive to create a learning community in my classroom because kids learn best when they are discussing their ideas. The classroom needs to be a very social, comfortable place because otherwise some students will feel like they can't speak up. Another important idea is that students should be peer mentors working within each others' zones of proximal development. I love the idea of finding something that each student is good at and posting a sign which tells students who to go to with questions about certain topics or tasks. There is one problem with this, however. Even though lower level students benefit from the exchange, higher level students may be held back. They benefit from explaining topics because they get an increased understanding from talking about them, but it's important that they don't get stuck in a tutor role all the time.

Misconceptions Die Hard

The main point of this article is that students will dress up an incorrect idea instead of abandoing it. "Dressing up" an idea means that it is the same notion expressed with different, more complex terminology as the student gets older. Even though their explanations sound more sophisticated, students still don't truly understand the concept.

 I was really surprised to see just how true this was when I read about the study of students at the primary, intermediate, junior high, and college level. College students, especially those majoring in elementary education who will be educating young people, should have had much more understanding than students in the younger grades. However, their understanding was only slightly better; the real difference was in the complexity of their vocabularies. But the use of more complex terms didn't mean they actually understood what they were talking about.

This article made me see that misconceptions at all ages are far more common than is acceptable.That information is important to me as a future teacher for many different reasons. First of all, I need to make sure I don't have any misconceptions. I need to completely understand my teaching topics. Therefore, before each lesson, I should research the topic further if I have any doubts. Otherwise, I'll be passing on those misconceptions to my students.

Another reason this information is important is because I will need to work to prevent misconceptions in my students. The article mentions that one of the reasons misconceptions die hard in science is because science is not taught enough at the elementary level. I think that science education has been greatly increased since this article was written, but many would argue that we still need more, especially in the K-2 grades. It makes sense that without enough early education in scientific ideas, students would use their intuition more heavily and form misconceptions which are hard to break later on.

The article also mentioned several good strategies for catching and correcting misconceptions. Communication is key because through asking probing questions, the teacher can observe students' true levels of understanding. Another way that this could be accomplished is through science journals. Reading students' entries give teachers a direct window into their students' thinking. Using labwork is another important way to catch misconceptions because students have to have a more meaningful understandning to use the concepts in a real experiment. I will use all these methods to be on the lookout for misconceptions in my classroom.

Diffendoofer Day

1. What does it mean when someone knows how to think? It means that someone is able to be creative and come up with their own ideas instead of just memorizing facts. If someone has a lot of knowledge but isn't able to actually utilize it practically, there isn't as much of a point to that learning. 2. How does a teacher teach a student how to think? Teachers teach students how to think by making them be more creative. They don't just use rote memorization in their classrooms. Instead, they help students to ask questions about the world around them and connect their learning to their real lives. They also help them synthesize new creations like stories or ideas for a science experiment so that their learning has an actual purpose. 3. Have you ever been in a class where you really had to think? I have been in classes where I've really had to think. One class that made me really think was a philosophy class I took last year. I actually had to analyze what I thought about abstract concepts like morality. There were thought experiments like "would you kill your mother if you wouldn't get caught and would be reborn in a perfect life and have no knowledge of what you did?"

Line of Learning

1/19/12

It is of course necessary to have some teacher-directed lectures to help students learn facts, but overall, I think that elementary students learn science best through discovery. A lot of experiments are important because this makes the lesson more hands-on and interesting. When students make their own discoveries, the learning experience is much more meaningful.

The environment that best facilitates elementary students’ science learning is very interactive, as I mentioned already. It also should be an environment where questions are greatly encouraged. No one should ever feel dumb for asking a question. Instead, students should know that this is what good scientists do.

I think teachers should know how to capture the students’ attention by designing experiments that will peak their interest and make them want to ask questions. I think that teachers should also know how to implement a science notebook because this is a good place for students to express those questions, along with other observations.



1/31/12

Another thing that I would like to add is that elementary students learn through talking about their learning. Social collaboration, as Vygotsky points out, is what helps students develop. Class discussions and dialogue between student and teacher are really important because they allow for more explanation of what students think. Teachers need to watch out for students' misconceptions through the use of probing questions along the way instead of just using summative assessment at the end of a unit. Through discussions and the use of journaling, misconceptions come out more clearly. Then, through experimentation in a constructivist environment and scaffolding in the students' zones of proximal development, the students are better able to break these misconceptions. It's important also that the experiences in science are authentic tasks so that students feel like school isn't completely isolated from the real world.



2/7/12

This week, I've added even more understanding about how hard it is for students to let go of their misconceptions. The Sweater Article showed that the best way for students to work towards breaking their misconceptions is through constructing their own learning. Also, it's a good idea for teachers to use probes so they can identify these misconceptions early on. It's important for students to explain their reasoning behind the answers given during these pretests so that their preconceived notions are clear. The environment that best facilitates science learning might be one that goes deeper into fewer topics so that misconceptions are less likely to stick in kids' minds. One other thing I learned in class this week is that it's always important to make learning fun. Teachers can do this through funny stories that relate to science.



2/14/12

This week, I've added more understanding about objectives. Instead of thinking about objectives, it's important for science teachers to consider "learning performances" so that the students' specific learning will be shown. They must be able to perform in some way, not just have a general "understanding." These descriptive goals should be written AFTER formative assessment because then teachers can understand where students are at the beginning of the lesson. We also talked about standards this week. Standards are important because they set up a system of accountability in our schools, but if there aren't good standards established, this can be detrimental to students' science learning. Newer standards are potentially on the way in Iowa which will measure creativity and higher order thinking skills more than rote memorization. There will possibly be less content that needs to be covered so topics can be dug into more deeply. I like the idea of incorporating science with all the subjects to create a very cross curricular school system, and I've learned that students would benefit from this. Science is everywhere, so it should be related to the rest of the curriculum so that students can see its relevance.



2/21/12

One very useful thing to include in an engaging science classroom is coupled inquiry. This is an experiment which gets the students intrigued about a topic they might not have been interested in before. That way, students don't always have to generate their own questions but they are still engaged in the task at hand. Subject matter is important as well because students can't learn everything they need to through inquiry. Through more direct teacher instruction, they can gain a foundation before they start experimenting. Along with this, students need both "guided" and "open" inquiry. "Guided" inquiry helps them better understand particular concepts, and "open" inquiry helps them with their scientific reasoning. I think as the year goes on, more and more open inquiry can be included as kids get the hang of the process.

Another important concept we learned this week is the 5 steps of inquiry--learners are engaged, collect evidence, explain evidence, evaluate the evidence, and communicate their learning in a way that justifies what they learned. A lot of times, teachers leave one or more of these ideas out, especially the evaluation stage (which involves looking to other sources after an experiment to see if their conclusions are supported). Communicating the learning is also very important because it makes the learning have a purpose. If students are going to show their learning to someone a more public audience, this can really increase the quality of work. If teachers make their instruction meet all of these requirements, students will have a much more meaningful learning experience.



2/28/12

This week, we learned that there is a continuum for inquiry learning. On one end, the classroom is very structured around the teacher's ideas. The teacher will provide the scientific question for students and even possibly provide them with the data and tell them how to analyze it. On the other end, the classroom is very student-centered. Students come up with their own questions and are working towards analysis on their own with only scaffolding by the teacher. It's beneficial to consider your specific teaching situation in order to decide which part of the continuum you should strive for. Some students may not be able to handle completely inquiry based learning because it takes a lot of higher order thinking skills. It's necessary to work up to a true inquiry situation. Students will need modeling and guidance about how to ask their own questions and design their own experiments in the beginning of the year. Overall, though, the more inquiry you can include, the more deeply students will learn. They will be more engaged and committed to the process of science learning. As we've mentioned in class, they will be less likely to cause classroom management problems because of this higher level of engagement. We've also talked about the importance of specifying learning performances so we can actually see evidence of students' science learning.



3/26/12 (Discussing the weeks of 2/28-3/6 and 3/6-3/13; skipping 3/13-3/20 b/c was spring break)

One thing I learned from the week of 2/28-3/6 is how powerful it can be when you integrate science with other subjects. We discussed pendulums and tied Galileo into the lesson because he made a pendulum-based clock. Then, we discussed how this clock did not work as well on a ship because the ship was always moving. In this way, we were able to tie our study of pendulums into a study of colonization since the colonizers used the pendulum-based clocks.

We also discussed assessment this week. The most important idea is that you must ALWAYS be assessing. Assessment should be formative and measure the students' progress. Even summative assessments at the end of the unit should actually have a formative element to them so that students will be given the chance to grow. It is unproductive when teachers simply move on after a test without re-teaching concepts that students still don't understand. Assessment can take many different forms, and it's important to include a variety so that all students can demonstrate what they know in the way that best suits them. Another element of assessment which I considered more this week was grading based on improvement and effort. If a student receives the same high score at the end of the year as he did at the beginning, without any improvement, this should be taken into account in his grade.

During the week of 3/6-3/13, we were focused on our midterm test. Even though we didn't have our normal class discussions, I did learn some important ideas that could transfer to my future classroom. Since we were focused on our exam, these ideas relate to the prior week's ideas about assessment. I think that allowing as much time as needed on some assessments is a good way to help students truly show everything they have learned. Sometimes there are concepts which need to be tested based on time because being able to complete them quickly is integral to their mastery. However, respecting students' different test-taking styles is a good way to have a student-centered, individualized science classroom.



3/27/12

This past week, we were focused on our LTI presentations, but I still learned some ideas which can be applied to my future classroom. In my group, we didn't focus on our data enough in the explanation of our experiment. For a science classroom to represent real science, students should be encouraged to look only at their data before they search for their evaluation using other sources. That way, they can see the legitimacy of their own experiment. Also, as I saw with several of the other presentations, more learning can come about when students try harder to discover why they didn't come up with the scientifically accepted explanation. Another important idea is that students should be encouraged to investigate topics further even if they don't align with their original question. One of the groups became interested in several other ideas related to mold as they did their research, and I thought that was a great example of scientific inquiry breaking away from stagnant and boring investigations.



5/5/12

Over the last month of this class, I've learned a lot which I'd like to address. First of all, we had a very interesting discussion about creativity in schools after watching a Sir Education video. This video highlighted how the history of education has resulted in schools that are like factories. Our students are trained to listen to bells to tell them what to do, and they take standardized tests that lack any kind of excitement. There isn't any life in the schooling process, and we're telling our students that there is only one right answer. But divergent thinking--creativity--is what is most important to solve the problems of our current world. Students start off with amazing creativity skills in Kindergarten, but those skills are just stripped away as they progress through the grades. Also, schools should move away from compartmentalizing students into "academic" and "non-academic" groups so they feel less distant from each other and more able to collaborate. Through more inquiry-based science classrooms, we can help our children achieve divergent, collaborative thinking.

After this, we focused on technology. We watched a video about Khan Academy which made me think about teaching in an entirely different way. This program is a combination of thousands of instructional videos focusing on all different school subjects at different levels. Some students have actually said they enjoy learning more through this program than through a regular teacher because they are able to learn at their own pace, in private. They can pause and replay the video until they reach mastery--whereas, with a normal teacher, they might get embarrassed or feel like a burden if they ask a lot of questions. The video also mentioned a "flipped" classroom, and this was very intriguing. The students watch the Khan Academy videos at home to learn the lessons, and then they do their "homework" and other more enriching activities at school. This makes a lot of sense because the teacher is there to help them as they practice. A flipped classroom could also allow for a lot more inquiry-oriented learning at school because teachers wouldn't be taking the time to formally teach the hard factual information. One problem I could foresee is that children wouldn't have a teacher there for asking questions while they learned the material. But these questions could be addressed the next day on a more personal level. This would make the class much more individualized so that some students don't get held back and others don't get lost. It's a very interesting idea that I would like to try in my future classroom in order to make in school science learning more meaningful.

We also discussed several other technology ideas that our class researched. One of my classmates told us about a program called CyberScience 3D. This program allows you to manipulate plants, animals, machines, etc. in 3D for a very hands-on experience when it wouldn't otherwise be possible. Another classmate discussed the NASA website. There are several inquiry-based lesson plans available for educators' use. Another really exciting aspect of this website is that classes can send in a suggestion for an experiment, and the NASA scientists pick one to actually perform. This would be a great way to connect learning from the classroom to the real world. It could be part of the "communicate" stage of inquiry, and this would be a great justification for the importance and relevance of their topic of study. The technology that I researched was GPS and the activity of geocaching. This can make learning about the coordinate system and the environment much more engaging for students. It's very important for teachers to look into new technologies because these tools can make learning more meaningful, and technology can make the teacher's job more efficient as well.

From group work on the SLPE project, I learned that often the best ideas for a science lesson come from collaboration. Our group needed to think of a way to compare other life cycles to the butterfly's life cycle, so we decided we would all come with ideas to our next class. I thought it would be good to talk about the human's life cycle because we could make it very relevant for the kids. They could bring in baby photos, measure each other's heights, and even go to other classrooms in the upper grades to measure their heights. As I explained this idea to my group, they liked it, but they pointed out something important--these were second graders, and we wouldn't want to risk having a discussion about human reproduction with them. In the end, we decided that each of us would focus on a different non-human organism and relate it back to humans on occasion to make it relevant. This worked out very well. We were able to make the kids' learning very personalized and possibly more in-depth because we each had a small group.

From peer teaching and watching other groups peer teach, I learned that collaboration in the education profession is also very important because of the constructive feedback you can receive. Teachers can improve their teaching to better serve their students in this way. Practicing the lesson was very important because it helped my group get much more prepared. Even if teachers have a great, inquiry-based lesson idea, knowing how to handle the details is what makes that lesson actually work out in the classroom. While peer teaching, and even more so while actually teaching in the 2nd grade classroom, I learned that even though students learn best through inquiry, sometimes a little direct teaching is required to guide the students--especially when the children are younger. It requires a great deal of teacher preparation to scaffold the students effectively. Teachers also need to be prepared by knowing that anything can happen while they are teaching, so teacher flexibility is a great asset to the students' learning. Sometimes, your lesson is going to be too short (which happened to one of the groups), so you need to improvise. In an inquiry-based classroom, it's very likely that this would happen since it isn't completely teacher-directed. One extra activity that sounds like a good learning tool for students is the "5 Minute Mystery" because this helps students to think critically even if they are finished with their science learning for the day. Great science classrooms are guided by a very prepared teacher who is able to adjust to his or her students' learning needs and create a atmosphere where science is a relevant and justified inquiry process.

Five Good Reasons to Use Science Notebooks

Having science notebooks in the classroom seems like a very beneficial practice that I would like to incorporate into my teaching. To get started, I liked how the teacher in the beginning of the article guided the first observation in order to model how students should write and get them excited. It reminded me of a discussion in my Language Arts Methods class when we talked about getting kids started in a writer's notebook. The teacher would tell a personal narrative (one which all the students could relate to their lives) and then told the children to think of their own stories about this topic. Before everyone was able to unleash their narrative verbally, the teacher said, "Now I want everyone go back to your desks and write down your story." Without this excitement, students often just stare at a blank sheet of paper with no idea what to write, and the same would probably be true for a science notebook.

I think that the first benefit listed by the article--that science notebooks are thinking tools--is the most important. The science notebook is a great place for students to express their "wonderings" and practice writing accurate observations. Since all the students have to write in their notebooks, they will be more likely to be really engaged in thinking about science (which may not happen if the teacher just called on a few students). Also, if students simply fill out a worksheet, they are not required to do as much of their own scientific thinking. When students think about how to word and organize their own observations, the concepts are much more meaningful. Also, their attention to the topic is heightened because the notebook is tailored to their own unique interests.

I also agree that notebooks would be very useful for the teacher because he or she can see the level of understanding of each student. Misconceptions will be more likely to show themselves and get cleared up. Another important benefit listed in the article was that science notebooks enhance literacy skills. Last semester, I had a reading and writing buddy who absolutely hated writing. Science, however, was his favorite subject. For a student like my buddy, science notebooks would be a great way to ease into the writing process through nonfiction writing. Differentiation is also supported through science notebooks. Students can write at their own level, and I really liked the idea about allowing ELLs to write in their native language and slowly work towards switching to English. That way, these students aren't losing any valuable scientific information while they learn English. Finally, I thought that meeting with a group of teachers would be very helpful for exchanging ideas about organization. That way, students have more possibilities and are more likely to find the organizational strategy that best facilitates their learning.

One thing I wondered about as I read this article was how I would incorporate a science notebook if my students already used a writer's notebook during another part of the day. I think it might actually be beneficial to have both notebooks (or to include them in the same notebook) because students need to understand that writing is not just confined to language arts. Writing extends to the descriptive, procedural, and explanatory texts one writes for science and other subjects. The two could even overlap when, for instance, a student decides to write a fictional story about one of his or her scientific "wonderings," creating a science fiction tale.

Rising to Greatness

The main point of this report is that Iowa needs to commit to improving its education system in order to produce graduates who are more career- and college-ready. In the early 1990s, Iowa led the nation in NAEP and ITBS scores. Today, our scores in fourth grade reading and eighth grade math are equal to (or sometimes below) the national average. Also, the percentage of our eighth graders in advanced math classes is one of the lowest in the country. I was actually very surprised while reading this article because I thought that Iowa still had one of the best education systems in the country. I knew that Governor Branstad introduced a new plan for improving education, but I did not know the extent of the problem.

Some people point to the changing demographics of the state as a factor that contributes to this problem. The number of minority students has increased, along with the number of English Language Learners and students eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. But one very important point from this article is that demographic change has very little to do with the problem. In fact, the average scores of non-poor, white students of Iowa still fall below the national average of similar students. This shows that the entire student population is being affected by our lackluster education system. However, there are still signficant and unacceptable achievement gaps for minorities, the economically disadvantaged, and also students with disabilities. I was shocked to read that Iowa has the largest gap in achievement between non-disabled and disabled students.

The root cause of the problem is that Iowans, as demonstrated by my own incorrect understanding, have become complacent about education because of our prior successes. In the meantime, many other states have been improving their education systems and testing scores while Iowa has stagnated. Now that changes will be taking place in our education system, my students and I will be greatly affected if I teach in Iowa. I've often considered moving, but after reading this report, I see there is a sense of urgency for improvement here in my own state.

Because reading and math seem to be the focus of this article, I'm sure there will be a renewed emphasis placed on these subjects in order to boost performance and get more students on the advanced track. This may result in less time for other content areas, so I will have to be aware of this in order to creatively integrate the subjects. It seems like there could be even more emphasis on testing, so I will have to make sure I support my students' learning and innovation by not simply "teaching to the test." I will also have to work hard to accommodate all students in order to lessen the achievement gaps. By thoroughly understanding how to implement Response to Intervention, I can help to increase achievement for students with disabilities. Also, including technology in my classroom whenever possible will be very important as children need these skills in our global economy. Finally, high expectations for my students will be needed in order to help them break out of mediocrity.