MAT Blog

Six Ways to Build a Foundation for Learning through Research.

  

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Educational research did not hold a lot of meaning for me as an undergraduate student. After spending time in the classroom, I developed a context to frame my understanding. I realized that small changes in my approach could have a significant impact on students’ beliefs and performance. Revisiting motivational theory helped me to establish a foundation for independent learning despite the push to “cover” content. Here are six research-based pointers that K-12 teachers can use now, along with the official terms to impress everyone with your knowledge in the teacher’s lounge!

1. Promote positive beliefs about learning. A child’s underlying beliefs, including the ability to be successful in a task, are directly tied to self-motivation and self-regulation. 

2. Use “Constructive Failure:”  We must promote recognition of failure as a learning experience.  Children who learn to attribute success or failure to effort as opposed to factors outside their control will exert greater effort in the future.

3. Foster “Incremental” versus “Entity Theory” of Intelligence:   Discouraging the belief that intelligence is “fixed” biologically and unchangeable can enhance motivation. We must help students to understand that intelligence is “incremental” and can be increased through a student’s own learning behavior. (Burhans & Dweck, as cited in Stipek, 2002)

4. Encourage “Internal” versus “External Locus of Control:” Students who believe that events in their lives are controlled by forces outside themselves (luck, chance, fate, biased others) are said to have an external locus of control.  We must socialize students to believe that outcomes are generally contingent on their own behavior (internal locus of control). (Dweck, 2000 as cited in Stipek, 2002)

5. Avoid Comparisons and Competition: Teachers should avoid inadvertent comparisons to classmates. This tends to cause anxiety and frequently undermines effort and motivation. As much as possible, students should be encouraged to compete against themselves by measuring their own progress and setting goals. Oftentimes, what looks like a cooperative activity is really a competitive activity; e.g. when table one competes with table two.

6. Limit the Use of Rewards:  Studies have shown that overuse of tangible rewards can actually hinder motivation to learn. Rewards can be most effective when motivation is low and/or when a task is unpleasant.  When motivation is already high, rewards have been shown to reduce children’s desire to complete a task. Extrinsic rewards should be removed once a pattern of motivation has been developed.  When tangible incentives are used for the long term, studies have shown that children can lose sight of the learning goal and focus only on earning the reward. (Brophy, 2002)

The American educational theorist Edward Hutchings believed that “the object of education is to prepare the young to educate themselves throughout their lives.” Reinforcing healthy attitudes and beliefs, in combination with the teaching of skills and meaningful content, will have transformative value in how students perceive their own education.

You, too can become a Master Teacher! Enrollment for summer classes ends Wednesday, May 2. Hurry and apply now!

Margaret Reed earned an MAEd from Michigan State University and taught middle and high school history for ten years. She has been a Marygrove mentor since 2009. As an outgrowth of her work in curriculum development at the secondary level, Margaret is pursuing further graduate studies with the goal of commencing a second career in instructional technology design.

 References

Brophy, J. (2004). Motivating Students to Learn (2nd ed.) Mawah, New Jersey: Laurence Erlbaum and Associates.

Stipek, D. (2002). Motivation to Learn: Integrating theory and practice (4^th ed.). Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

Teachers of the Year Have One Thing in Common: Commitment.

  

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Exceptional teachers are easy to spot. We immediately know them when we see them, but articulating the difference between an exceptional teacher and all of the others isn’t so easy. Test scores and observations alone cannot define the teacher that stands out ‘head and shoulders’ above the rest: teachers like Christie Sabon, Marygrove MAT ’06.

Christie is a nine-year teacher with a passion for teaching students to read and write. She’s the teacher who always raises her hand to sit on review committees if it will improve her craft or benefit her students. Her dedication has earned her Teacher of the Year in the Farmington Schools district in Michigan. She even won a free one-year lease on a new car from a local dealership--that’s how much the Farmington community values its educators!

Talking with Christie takes you back to all the favorite teachers you’ve had in school. She is compassionate and kind, and so enthusiastic about her work. It doesn’t take long to realize that she views her job as “figuring out what makes her students tick,” and the reasons for her award become crystal clear. 

“My second graders love to read the “Black Lagoon” series from [humorist, children’s author] Mike Thaler, so for National Reading Month this year we went all out and decorated the room like a jungle, complete with a giant alligator to greet you at the door!” Sabon says.

Not one to do anything half-way, Sabon says her students benefit the most from her modeling good behaviors; something she learned from the Marygrove Master in the Art of Teaching Program.

“I always make sure my students see me reading at my desk, and writing in my own journal,” Sabon says. “Sometimes I read my journal entries to them…they are so curious about what I find interesting. My students really keep me on my toes—they ask me to read two picture books to them each day, and they hold me to it!” So she makes the time.

Sabon also credits the Marygrove MAT program with training her to interact with parents effectively. Good teachers know that success comes more easily when you involve parents in classroom goals. But forming positive partnerships does take extra time.

“I connect with parents every single week, whether it is through e-mail or a newsletter I send home with students,” Sabon adds, “It’s important to touch base with the home front; it is really appreciated…and my students like that I tell their parents about our adventures—it makes them feel good, too."

Sabon knows that informing parents of progress on individual/class goals and upcoming events is best practice in education, and the rewards are great.

Research supports it. Renowned Johns Hopkins researcher Joyce Epstein has been touting the virtue of frequent interactions between schools, families, and communities for years. She asserts that the more time teachers spend communicating with students’ families, the more likely students will receive messages about the importance of working hard and staying in school.

From what we hear, this is not a problem for students in Ms. Sabon’s class at Hillside elementary--Sabon’s students never want to leave her classroom!

So, we congratulate this Teacher of the Year who is not only very giving of her time, but is also generous with her endorsement of her alma mater. If you want to be a better teacher, Christie Sabon highly recommends earning an MAT degree as a way to improve your game. “Many of our teachers in the [Farmington] district are Marygrove MAT alums, and we are big fans of the program.”

Thank you Christie, and thank you Farmington Schools!

Hurry and register for summer classes, and get started on your way to becoming the outstanding teacher leader you always wanted to be! We are taking applications through Wednesday, May 2!

K-12 Teachers: Know your gurus in math.

  

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If you haven’t heard of Marilyn Burns, well, you should. She’s a leading researcher and practitioner in teaching mathematics, and she has created a series of math interventions aimed at offering additional instruction to students who have fallen behind. The interventions are focused on numbers and operations, providing reteaching and remediation in mathematical computation, problem solving, and number sense. Her materials can really make a difference.

The Marilyn Burns math intervention series, Do the Math,® supports students and teachers in three critical ways:

1. The instruction is focused on whole numbers and fractions to rebuild the foundation for further, more complicated algebraic learning.
2. The lessons are designed around research-based, instructional practices.
3. The embedded professional development allows teachers to learn more while also implementing the intervention program.

It is worth mentioning that there are two different programs as part of the Marilyn Burns math interventions:

Do the Math (for grades 1-6) and Do the Math Now!® (for grades 6 and up). The elementary version is divided into 13 modules focused on basic mathematical operations and fractions. The secondary version, Do the Math Now, is designed as additional, year-long instruction for students who have exhibited significant weaknesses with operations and number sense.

The elementary version of the Marilyn Burns math interventions has been found to be incredibly effective in remediating struggling math students by:

•Rebuilding mathematical fluency. This approach is focused on whole numbers and fractions by returning students to some of the most basic mathematical concepts to rebuild and strengthen their foundation. Students lacking these basic computational and number-sense skills are less likely to become proficient in more advanced concepts. So Do the Math Now! helps to clear up misconceptions and rebuild the basic math skills of these struggling students.

•Enabling student and teacher flexibility. The program is designed for a variety of grade levels and a wide range of abilities. This flexibility allows teachers to meet the true needs of an individual student by using quality intervention materials.

•Employing research-based methodologies. The intervention program is built around the concepts of eight research based principles: explicit instruction, scaffolded content, multiple strategies, student interaction, gradual release, meaningful practice, vocabulary and language, and assessment and differentiation. These principles guide teachers on the implementation and effective use of the Marilyn Burns math program to best meet the needs of all learners.

•Providing accessible assessment tools. The Do the Math Now! intervention program has a variety of assessment tools available to teachers in order to provide ongoing feedback and progress monitoring. There is also an additional, web-based assessment component (Progress Space) that can be customized to suit student needs. The information provided from the Progress Space reports allows teachers to carefully monitor student achievement. 

Marilyn Burns, founder of Math Solutions®, has been a teacher/researcher/author for more than 40 years. Her professional development sessions and mathematics resources are considered best practice in education. Inducted to the 2010 Educational Publishing Hall of Fame, Burns and her website should be favorites for math teachers everywhere.

Need fresh ideas, inspiration, or innovative ways to help your math students? Check out our Math Literacy Guide, with authentic tips and suggestions from teachers in the field.

Three Cooperative Learning Strategies in Middle School Math.

  

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Middle schoolers are often naturally social and many of them love to work in groups during class. The middle school mathematics classroom is a wonderful environment for promoting these social learning connections while mastering math concepts. There are a variety of cooperative learning strategies that benefit the middle school math student. Here are three excellent ones you can use now:

1. Jigsaw Lessons are not puzzling at all.
Often implemented in social studies or science, a jigsaw lesson can work equally well in the math classroom. Certain mathematical concepts, such as geometry, lend themselves nicely to the jigsaw format. 

As in all jigsaw lessons, the teacher will divide the class into groups and within each group assign students numbers. The number of students in each group is dependent on the number of concepts in the jigsaw lesson.  For a lesson on triangles each student is assigned the task of creating a specific triangle based on defined attributes.

For example, one student in the group may be asked to create an acute scalene triangle while another student is tasked with creating an obtuse isosceles triangle. All students in the class with the same task form a temporary new group to complete it and plan ways to explain it to their original group. Once the triangles are created, the group will reconvene with their starting team. Each group member must then display the triangle, describe the assigned attributes, and clarify the process they used to complete the task. By sharing ideas and answering questions, students have the opportunity to reinforce their own understanding and learn from one another.

For your reference, we found an excellent, thorough description of the jigsaw instructional strategy from Instructional Strategies Online, by Saskatoon Public Schools in Canada.

2. Quiz Show helps students win at math literacy.
Using the quiz show format teachers can plan a cooperative learning activity that spans an entire unit and provides a fun review session before the final assessment.  It is great for learning math vocabulary and reviewing concepts. 

The teacher begins by assigning groups at the outset of the unit.  This is best done using heterogeneous, or mixed, groups so that students will collaborate, learn, and become stakeholders in the group's success. Over the course of the unit's instruction, the groups will meet periodically to write quiz show questions. The teacher can front load these collaborative question-writing sessions by providing a framework for questions or requiring a specific format (multiple choice, multi-step problem solving, true/false, etc). These questions will be submitted to the teacher as possible questions for the final quiz show competition.

On the quiz show review day the students compete in their original teams and the teacher chooses the questions that will be asked.  (You should include some questions written by students and others that you have composed yourself).  The students will review the unit material, enjoy working in teams, and be thrilled when one of their own questions is used!

3. Student Peer Coaching is more than a game…it’s leadership training.
Teachers may choose to use peer coaching in the middle school mathematics class in an effort to give students the opportunity to observe how others approach problem solving.  Since students have different ways of solving the same problem, giving them the chance to learn from one another allows each to experience a different perspective.

Implementing peer coaching as part of a math lesson requires a simple structure and is highly effective at expanding students' understanding. The teacher assigns students a partner (or small group) and they work together to solve a problem as a cooperative group. The group must come to a consensus on the problem solving steps, computation, and the final answer.

Eventually, each student will be responsible for completing a similar problem independently. Adding a self-reflection journal question that asks students to identify a part of their problem solving process that was impacted by working with others will provide data about the effectiveness of the peer coaching.

No matter which strategy you try, we know each of these promises to engage and enlighten your socially-oriented middle school students…many of whom are afflicted with severe cases of spring fever…especially on those seemingly never-ending Fridays!

Download our Guide on the Highly Effective Instructional Strategy of Cooperative Learning for a brief refresher on how to conduct it with success!

Finding Joy in Ongoing Assessment in Math.

  

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International best-selling author and wellness expert Greg Anderson once said, “Joy is found not in finishing an activity, but in doing it.” This may be true, but for most teachers and students, joy is probably not a word either would associate with assessment in math. It’s undeniable, traditional methods of assessment carry a significant amount of baggage—for both teacher and student. Perhaps it is time to ditch this baggage, and rethink the old paradigm of how we evaluate student progress!

More recently, discussion about assessment has shifted from focusing solely on the finished product to an ongoing, process-oriented approach. Unlike traditional methods, ongoing evaluation assesses students throughout the process of “doing.” Teachers constantly interact and collaborate with learners, and students continuously engage in self-reflection. This multi-faceted approach is happening all the time, in and out of the classroom.

Ongoing assessment has long been used in the rigors athletic training.

At each practice, a football coach continually provides feedback to players in order to improve individual and team performance. In every drill the coach analyzes the strengths and weaknesses of each player and the team as a whole, and modifies future practices to reflect their needs. Ongoing feedback is provided based on observation and analysis throughout the actual games, and the data are used to plan the next series of practices. This coaching model is very similar to the work of a teacher who uses ongoing assessment. It works.

There are multiple benefits of implementing ongoing assessment in mathematics:

• Clear, relevant criteria. Ongoing assessment in mathematics utilizes clear, easy to understand criteria that are explicitly articulated at the outset of a unit of study.  For example, in a primary unit on telling time the students understand that there will be informal, ongoing performance assessments. A teacher can utilize a variety of assessment to gather ongoing data such as performance assessment, student reflection, anecdotal observations, student/teacher discussion, and problem solving.
• Frequent feedback. Students frequently receive feedback when a teacher is using ongoing assessment in mathematics. This feedback continues from the beginning of the unit to the final assessment, and at every instructional point in between.  In the previous telling time example; the teacher doesn't wait until the end of the unit to determine if the child can tell time to the minute. Instead, there is ongoing data regarding the child's progress in telling time to the hour, half hour, quarter hour, five minutes, and minute. At each of these points there is feedback to the students.
• Instructional modification. Ongoing assessment in mathematics provides feedback not only to students regarding their performance, but also to the teacher regarding lesson planning.  As the teacher collects data from the ongoing assessments, future lessons can be shaped based on needs. These modifications can be for the entire group or targeted for students who need remediation. They may also be used to provide additional, more challenging concepts to students who are already displaying mastery. For example, the teacher may find that when monitoring students' ability to understand place value to 1000, there are some that need remediation and reteaching on place value to 100 and others that have completely mastered the skill. The teacher can then use this ongoing data to shape future instruction. 

Ongoing assessment has a rhythm to it, and takes some time and practice to master. New teachers should start out slowly; soon you will feel the joy of doing it, as you are able to measure the impact on your students' progress! 

For more ways to boost your students’ enjoyment of math, download our Math Literacy Guide full of helpful hints from teachers, for teachers!

Poetry reading is a great explicit word analysis exercise!

  

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It’s National Poetry Month! We celebrate it wholeheartedly, and can’t help but wonder why poetry is often overlooked in the elementary classroom as a way to teach a multitude of skills. We know that poems are excellent for practicing fluency, learning the different forms of rhyme, and understanding the genre.

Having students participate in poetry reading is also an effective way for teachers to teach explicit word analysis (EWA) skills. Explicit word analysis includes training in phonological awareness, phonics, and the alphabetic principle that letters represent sounds in a language. These core foundational skills are vital to emerging readers, allowing them to identify and read words with ease. EWA also helps prepare students for future, more difficult reading.

Consider this EWA exercise using the following poem by British children’s literature author James Reeves from the book 70 Wonderful Word Family Poems by Beth Handa and Jennifer Wilen:

Run a Little
Run a little this way, 
Run a little that!
Fine new feathers 
For a fine new hat.
A fine new hat
For a lady fair - 
Run round and turn about
And jump in the air.

Run a little this way,
Run a little that!
White silk ribbon
For a black silk cat.
A black silk cat
For the Lord mayor's wife
Run around and turn about 
And fly for your life!

There are many different ways teachers can use this poem to teach explicit word analysis skills. Here are a few good ones:

• Copy the poem onto large, chart sized paper for the entire class to read together.  Used along with your students’ own personal copies, this large version allows for choral reading and word analysis.
• Read the poem multiple times aloud to the class. Students should listen for any words with a specific sound (-at). If they hear a word with the identified sound have your students put their hands on their head each time they hear it during the reading, then raise their hand at the end of the reading to share.  Students can come up to the poem on the chart to underline the specific sound in that, hat, and cat.
• As your students become more familiar with the poem, through repeated readings, they can increase their participation in the reading. You can have them point to their ears or clap when the targeted word is read.  
• You can add the targeted words of that, cat, and hat to index cards to use for sight word practice. This is especially powerful when targeted words from previous poems are also included. The words can be used in a pocket chart or on a word wall as additional practice during a center or independent activity.

Outside of identifying the targeted sound of -at words, teachers can use this poem to teach and reinforce a variety of explicit word analysis skills.

• On individual copies of the poem students can "mark" the paper to identify certain sounds, words, or phonemes. For example, you can have your students identify every word that contains the /l/ sound by underlining the word with a red pencil or marking the word with a highlighter. Next, they could circle every word with the /r/ sound with an orange pencil or use a different color highlighter to mark the word. Finally, the teacher can direct them to box all the words with a /t/ sound with a blue pencil or mark the words with a third color highlighter.
• Students can use highlighting tape to identify rhyming words on a large, laminated copy of the poem.
• Once you have completed using the poem in direct instruction it can be added to center or small group work. Your students will gain additional practice in fluency and word analysis based on individual need. This is an activity that can be easily differentiated to meet the needs of a variety of learners. 

We hope we’ve given you some good ways to celebrate National Poetry Month with your students. For more ideas and tips on infusing EWA into your classroom of eager readers, download our guide, today!

Sign language helps the hearing child learn to read, too.

  

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Although sign language and fingerspelling were developed primarily for the hearing impaired, teachers have embraced their benefit for use with early readers. The use of sign language and fingerspelling provides a kinesthetic and visual approach to early literacy that may be helpful to a wide variety of students. Young learners find that signing is fun and teachers notice the benefit of integrating multiple learning modalities into their reading lessons.  

The use of sign language and fingerspelling with early readers has many advantages in the classroom:

• Aids instruction in multiple intelligences. Howard Gardner's work in multiple intelligences suggests that presenting information in a variety of ways, based on a wide range of intelligences, provides more pathways to learning for students.  Using sign language and fingerspelling is adaptable for several of Gardner's defined styles of learning.  A child who is an interpersonal learner will enjoy the group dynamic of fingerspelling and sign language while a kinesthetic learner will benefit from the physical movement they require.  The use of sign language and fingerspelling in early reading acquisition provides an additional avenue to learning for students.

• Boosts development of oral language. Teachers may choose to use sign language in an attempt to present new information to students via multiple modalities.  This is especially powerful when developing oral language and content specific vocabulary.  When a teacher signs a word, the child has the opportunity to both see and hear the word.  The connection of the visual to the auditory can be a powerful connection for students.  In turn, when a child signs and says a word he is further engraining the meaning through both a kinesthetic and auditory channel. This will boost a child's oral language development and the recall of new vocabulary.  

• Supports knowledge of print and phonemic awareness. Knowledge of print relates to the student's ability to recognize letters and relate them to the corresponding sound and phonemic awareness. Sign language and fingerspelling reinforce the ability to auditorially identify and manipulate sounds in spoken words.  Students combine these two skills to sound out words as part of their emerging reading skills.  A teacher may use fingerspelling to represent letters, their sounds, and other letter/sound combinations.  Using the hand shapes, teachers provide students an alternate method for learning and understanding the letters and sounds.  Fingerspelling utilizes discrete hand shapes that may also help to eliminate confusion between similar letter sounds such as /j/ and /dr/ or /c/ and /z/.  

• Integrates easily into almost any reading program. Using sign language and fingerspelling to boost early reading development is another way to acquire important skills.  Since their use is an ancillary support method you can easily integrate it into any existing reading program.  Sign language and fingerspelling fit nicely into the sequence of skill development required for early reading acquisition. 

Download these cool sign language posters for your classroom! You can get a good alphabet chart from any of several websites on the Internet.

If you find that you need a few new ideas to help students engage in word play, grab our FREE Explicit Word Instruction Guide and energize your reading lessons, today! Have fun signing with your class. Try it; your students will love it!

Reading Specialists are Educators who Specialize in Student Success!

  

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Many elementary schools in the U.S. employ the work of a reading specialist to develop and provide “prescriptive,” or targeted instruction for struggling readers. These certified teachers are crucial both to the individual student's reading progress and to the overall reading goals of the school. Since the reading specialist works in tandem with classroom teachers, the administration, and families— they have a unique role and perspective in ensuring students' success.

Qualifications and requirements for reading specialists will vary both by state and school district. However, most reading specialists have completed additional training and education especially designed for educators to provide targeted, individualized reading instruction to children that will bolster classroom instruction. Many reading specialists have attained a master's degree specifically in Reading and Literacy.

Our Marygrove Master in the Art of Teaching program offers an Elementary Reading and Literacy master's degree designed for the working K-6 teacher. This program offers students the knowledge necessary to assess and instruct struggling readers, and teaches how to develop intervention plans tailored to the individual student.

If this sounds like something you would be interested in, we’ve outlined “A Day in the Life of a Reading Specialist” below! We applaud the expertise these professionals represent, and the difference they can make in a child’s learning.

A Reading Specialist:

• Works in a clinical setting separate from the child's classroom.
• Focuses on the individual child through careful diagnosis and remediation of reading weaknesses.
• Is primarily responsible for students who have been determined to be at risk of failure via school, district, or state reading assessments, but may also spend time with gifted readers to extend their learning experiences through differentiated instruction.
• Collaborates with the classroom teacher to ensure the specific reading instruction is aligned with the current classroom curriculum.
• Creates curriculum and instruction for struggling readers that is individualized and strategic.
• Monitors the progress of the struggling reader regularly to ensure that specific interventions and instruction are being translated into improved reading ability.
• Connects with the student's family to support at-home reading and learning and provides ways for family and friends to help with the specialist's reading instruction.

A typical day may include:

• Conducting short, focused sessions with individual children or groups of children (usually 20-30 minutes) who need additional intervention as determined by assessment data.
• Assessing students who currently receive additional support in reading and entering this data into a reporting tool or maintaining a data spreadsheet.
• Updating the Principal or Curriculum Director on the progress of struggling readers or on the program as a whole.
• Participating in grade level team meetings or collaborating with individual teachers to coordinate classroom instruction with the targeted reading interventions.
• Maintaining anecdotal and performance-based records to carefully monitor student work and progress.
• Communicating with students' families via e-mail, phone, or in-person conferences.

If you have a passion for reading and would love to help students master their own abilities, a Reading Specialist position may be for you. The forecast for growth is especially good for these educators, as English Language Learners (ELL) and English as Second language Learners (ESL) populations continue to rise in the United States.

Contact one of our MAT Enrollment Specialists today at 855-628-6279 for information on how you can get your career on the path to success! We are enrolling now for summer, classes begin May 7!

The Impact of Thinking Maps® on Reading Comprehension, with a Focus on Read-Alouds

  

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Register for our Free Webinar Series

Part One Wednesday, April 25th at 4 p.m.

Join us on Tuesday, April 17, as Marygrove College Adjunct Professor of Education and Literacy Specialist Patricia Edwards presents her own research around Thinking Maps® and their impact on comprehension. Developed by researcher Dr. David Hyerle, Thinking Maps are visual teaching tools that foster and encourage lifelong learning. They are based on the simple premise that teachers and students of all grade levels benefit from teaching the same thought processes. 

We’ll also hear from Dr. Diane S. Brown, Academic Director for the Marygrove Master in the Art of Teaching program, who will share her insights on the relevance of Thinking Maps for the classroom, drawing on her 20-plus years in K-12 education.

If you are not familiar with Thinking Maps, essentially, they are eight visual spatial teaching tools, each linked to a fundamental thinking process. More flexible than the traditional, task-specific graphic organizers that have been used for years, Thinking Maps allow for multi-faceted, dimensional problem-solving combinations across disciplines. With repeated use in the classroom, Thinking Maps become a common visual language for all types of learners at all grade levels, and in all subjects! 

In fact, we have so much to share with you about Thinking Maps that it just couldn’t fit into one 30-minute session! Part I of The Impact of Thinking Maps on Reading Comprehension Webinar with Dr. Pat Edwards reflects on her observations of students using, the Circle Map, Bubble Map, and Double Bubble Map. Part II of the series focuses on the student use of the Tree Map, Brace Map, Flow Map, Multi-Flow Map and Bridge Map.

Bring your imaginations and your questions with you as we lead you through a provocative world all its own!

We’ll explain how, based on Dr. Edwards' research, Thinking Maps influenced reading comprehension in two Midwestern urban elementary schools.

You'll see how this method:

• Boosts comprehension
• Promotes interdisciplinary learning and integrated thinking

In honor of "Celebrate Diversity Month," Marygrove MAT applauds the inclusive nature of Thinking Maps, as classrooms across the country become increasingly more diverse in every way. Giving teachers the appropriate tools for classroom success is what our program is all about! Won't you join us? Register now!

Thinking Maps® is a registered trademark of Thinking Maps, Inc.

Dr. Patricia (Pat) Edwards is an Adjunct Instructor for the School of Education at Marygrove College in Detroit. She also works with the University of Michigan's interim teacher certification program, Teach for America, as an elementary school Field Instructor in English Language Arts. Pat is a state trainer for Michigan's Behavior and Learning Support Initiative (MiBLSi), a project designed to help schools develop school-wide support systems in reading and behavior. She was a former Instructional Specialist and Literacy Coach in the Detroit Public Schools, and a nationally endorsed consultant for Project Read Language Circle, a curriculum that provides a direct, systematic, and multisensory approach to  language arts instruction. She is a board member of the International Dyslexia Association Michigan Branch.

Pat earned her doctorate degree in Reading Education from Oakland University in Rochester, MI with a minor in literature. She is married and the mother of two adult sons Justin and Ryan.

Top Ten Ergonomics Tips for Online Students: Marygrove MAT Helps you Align Yourself for Success!

  

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Completing an online degree requires students to spend a lot of time at the computer screen; studying online, reading, researching, writing, and participating in online forums and discussion groups. Although the flexibility of pursuing an online degree is very attractive to many, the time spent at the computer can be stressful on a student's body.

It’s important to pay attention to the ergonomics of your workspace in order to maximize your physical performance while working on your Marygrove Master in the Art of Teaching (MAT) online program. Ergonomics is defined as, "…the study of the relationship between people, their work and their physical work environment." (United States Occupational Safety & Health Administration, OSHA).

Specifically for students studying online, ergonomics relates to the connection between the physical environment (computer, desk or table, chair, workspace, etc.) and the user. There are many things that online students can do to make the time spent on the computer better for their bodies. Here’s our top ten:

1. Properly position the computer. Position the computer monitor so it is close enough to see without straining and perpendicular to any glare causing objects.  The keyboard should be at elbow height and the mouse should be positioned near the keyboard.
2. Invest in a quality computer chair. Any old chair won't do when studying online!  Spend time researching chairs that are specifically designed for computer work and invest in the perfect chair for your body.  Ideally, your chair should have armrests, a supportive back, and adjustable height.
3. Adjust the height of your desk and chair. The combination of the computer, desk or table, and computer you're working at is very important. Pay particular attention to the heights of each and how varying these may create a better ergonomic workspace. 
4. Perfect your posture. Sitting up straight and maintaining a 90 degree bend in your elbows may seem unnatural at first, but adjusting your posture to this position is important to long term physical health. Repeated or chronic slumping at the computer screen will cause strain in your lower back, neck, and shoulders.
5. Make sure your feet are flat on the floor. When you are adjusting the height of your chair, position it so your feet are able to remain flat on the floor.  While working, make sure you are limiting the time spent crossing your legs since this can cause strain on your lower back and hips.
6. Stay at your desk. For students working online it is tempting to take your laptop and retreat to another location. Try to avoid moving away from your desk unless you can recreate another ergonomically similar environment.  Working while laying down, relaxing on a bed or couch, or sitting on the floor can be hard on your body.
7. Take breaks. Your body (and mind) will benefit from short breaks in your online studies.  Remaining in a sedentary position for too long can reduce blood flow to your extremities and may cause sleepiness.
8. Organize your space. More than just the computer, chair, and desk your workspace also includes shelving, bookcases, and file drawers.  Take inventory of your space and consider rearranging it so that necessary items are within arm’s reach.
9. Investigate workspace tools. Many students studying online have found various workspace tools to be beneficial to their studies.  Consider investing in a wrist pad, document holder, wireless keyboard or mouse, or glare reduction monitor screen.  All of these may boost your productivity and comfort while studying online.
10. Relax! Your online degree is important, but so is your health.  Focus on your physical health and relax while you are at the computer.  Make a point of taking breaks from your studies to rest, play, and re-energize!

Now is a great time to register for summer classes! Start your Marygrove MAT program this summer, and realign your career with your long-term goals! Registration is going on now. Classes begin May 7!