The Brain in Health and Disease

Strategies

Strategies That Work

"Strategies That Work" ⁹ is a compilation of reading comprehension strategies that can transfer nicely into a brain study unit: Making Connections, Questioning, Visualization, and Inferring. Neurons need to make connections to become permanent, just as students need to make connections to the text to develop comprehension. Questioning involves problem solving, making decisions, and clarifying information for the reader. These are tasks that will activate the frontal lobe. The images created to assist comprehension can be linked to the primary visual cortex and visual literacy. Visualization allows students to create images related to their prior knowledge and the text. Students who use these strategies during reading strengthen their inferring skills and are better able to make predictions, decode unknown words, and draw conclusions.

Making Connections

Learning occurs in the brain by making connections between neurons. The way students create these connections is through connecting background knowledge to current learning. Each student comes to class with prior knowledge, this will be the starting point for new information. While reading, students will make text-to-self, text-to-text, and text-to-world connections. These connections help students to become more aware of different genres, forms, and structures within the text. When students can make a connection to a character within a story, motives, thoughts, and feelings of that character are better understood.

Questioning

"Curiosity spawns questions. Questions are the master key to understanding. Questions clarify confusion. Questions stimulate research efforts. Questions propel us forward and take us deeper into reading." ¹⁰ Teachers need to monitor their students' understanding; the questioning strategy offers teachers an opportunity to check for understanding and clear up any misconceptions. Student formulated questions are an essential component to this process and help determine where the students want to go next in learning of the topic.

Visualization

It has been said, "A picture is worth a thousand words". Learning to interpret images—also symbols, graphs, and facial expressions—involves different regions of the brain. In math class students will interpret graphs, during reading students will illustrate vocabulary words, during group work students will need to decode facial expressions of fellow students in order to help the dynamics of the group remain positive.

Differentiated Instruction

To meet the needs of all the learners in my classroom, I will use Differentiated Instruction. Differentiated Instruction is an approach to teaching content in ways that address a variety of learning styles and needs of students while maximizing the potential of all learners. This will help me to accommodate the diversity of academic needs present in my classroom. My instruction as well as the students' research can be differentiated. I will differentiate according to content, process, or product. Through differentiated content students will have access to a varied level of texts and/or websites and could be "buddied" with a partner at a different level to assist with the learning. Differentiated process will involve the students being offered choices about the way they gather information; students will be given access to books, audio tapes, and videos. When differentiating products, students are given learning contracts which present them with a variety of options to create different products, such as plays, poems, or Power Points, based on their individualized learning style and interest.

A brain research project will exemplify the definition of Differentiated Instruction. Students will be provided texts at an appropriate level and other sources to enable them to have access to all necessary information on their ability level. Students will focus on one specific region of the brain and will choose a final project to showcase and present the information they have uncovered.

Cooperative Learning

Cooperative Learning is a successful teaching strategy in which teams of learners with varied abilities and interests come together to help each other to improve their understanding of the subject matter. Cooperative Learning is used to promote student learning and retention of material, foster positive social relationships within the classroom community, and enhance student satisfaction with the learning experience. The following are examples of a variety of cooperative learning activities that I will make use of throughout this unit.

Literature Circles

Students will form interest groups of 4 to 5 members and choose the text they will read. Each group will be responsible for setting daily reading goals and strategies, partner reading, circle reading, choral reading, or independent reading. After the daily required reading is completed, students will complete a variety of comprehension activities. Next, students will participate in a discussion of the daily reading and activities. During discussions students will have the opportunity to ask questions, share interesting passages, and formulate opinions of the text. Finally, students will complete a reflection journal to summarize the daily experiences and prepare a purpose for the following day's activities. We will complete a cycle of literature circles using non-fiction leveled text and then fiction text that involve the brain.

Think-Pair-Share

During Think-Pair-Share activities, students are given information or a question and must independently Think about how they will react to the prompt. The Think period should last a short time, no longer than 5 minutes. Next, they will Pair with a partner and conference about the prompt. During this period, they may develop new questions or clarify understanding. This period should also last a short time, no longer than 5 minutes. Then they will Share with another partner set, small group, or entire class. All information can be discussed and questions may lead to further investigations. The time frame on this portion will be dependent on the choice of sharing.

As the essential questions are posed to stimulate student thinking, we will use the Think-Pair-Share model to inspire understanding and questions about our topic. This will provide a starting point for me as it can identify what the students already know, what they are confused about, what they know little or nothing about, and also what interests them and what they want to learn.

Jigsaw

This form of cooperative learning breaks larger topics or resources into small parts. Each group is given one part of the whole. The students read the given portion, discuss, and prepare a tutorial project for the rest of the class.

Students will self-select the regions of the brain to investigate. Each group will be responsible for researching and developing a presentation for the class about the function and location of their region.

Vocabulary

Students need to acquire vocabulary directly, explicitly taught, and indirectly, when they hear and see words in context. Word sorts are a hands-on instructional tool used to teach vocabulary. Words and pictures can be categorized based on pre-determined labels. Word sorts enable students to compare and contrast items through a variety of criteria. In order to build interest in the vocabulary and to develop inferential thinking skills, students will develop their own definition based on context clues, discover synonyms and/or antonyms of the word, or draw a picture of what the word means to them. Then the students will look up the words in a dictionary or on-line search site. Students will use reasoning skills to categorize and discover patterns that they can later apply to unknown words they encounter. This activity is very easily leveled to once again meet the needs of the diverse learners in my classroom.

Technology Integration

"Recently, a growing number of researchers have published studies that provide substantial evidence that technology can play a positive role in academic achievement." ¹¹ My students will be using technology while proceeding through this unit. As students study the brain and its functions, they will be using internet search procedures to locate information on this topic. After their research is completed, students will create Power Point presentations to highlight and share the information they have learned with students, teachers, and family members. Students will make entries into our classroom blog reflecting on their learning. An interactive white board will be used to facilitate engaging lessons.

Discovery Notebooks

Journaling allows students time to reflect, make connections, question, and synthesize the information from the day. Students can keep important vocabulary, personal thoughts, answers to questioning prompts, as well as ask clarifying questions in their journals. Students will keep a discovery notebook to chronicle their journey through the brain. This reflection piece will allow students to decipher the day's activities and make sense of the information in their own words. "The art of directing and supporting reflection is part of the art of changing a brain. It is the art of leading a student toward comprehension." ¹²