Lacey Smith's Page

I found a great TED Talk video that detailed some of the biggest issues with classroom math instruction today and how we as teachers can work to solve these concerns. The speaker, Dan Meyeer, explained that the five biggest issues in math instruction now is that students lack initiative, lack perseverance, lack retention, have an aversion to word problems, and have an eagerness to simply know the formula.

One of my biggest takeaways from Dan's speech was accepting that…

The collaborative classroom has 4 main characteristics, which are characteristics I hope to keep in mind when establishing my classroom environment:

- Shared knowledge among teachers and students, where teachers can share their vital knowledge and experiences about content with students while also valuing and building upon the previous knowledge, experience, language, strategies, and culture of her own students. 

- Shared authority among teachers and students, where a…

This article provides teachers with an abundance of easy-to-implement strategies for promoting creativity in their classroom. I tried to pull out some of the best strategies that I would like to use in my own classroom.

1. Use emotional connections. Research shows that the best creativity instruction ties into the emotions of the learner. For example, giving students a project that ties into solving an issue within their community (ex: homelessness) can help sprout creativity…

During my content exploration I found an interesting article that provides readers with a great deal of information on how to create effective assessments for 21st century students. Within the article, I found a helpful chart that provided assessment strategies for each of the different perspectives on learning. 

1. Associative - an assessment where concepts and competencies are frequently assessed at a micro level and in combination through macro-level tasks.

2.…