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I attended an OGT conference at Kings Island Convention Center with three other teachers from social studies, english and science. The topic was OGT scoring, specifically the extended responses; we came out with a lot of great material and knowledge, but left with concerns about the science test. All of the science questions have graph paper instead of normal blanks or lines for responses even though not a single response requires graph paper. We explained that that is confusing to many students. We also had some disagreements with how a few of the questions were scored. Overall, we left with the impression the graders do a great job at trying to reward answers with as many points as they can. |
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This year our principal introduced us to MAX Teaching by Mark A. Forget of the University of Findlay. We were introduced to the program at a waiver day in-service and were allowed to attend an advanced version held at the MVCTC a month later. We came away with a new tools to ply our trade. We then had to discuss our results with using the methods described with a consultant. The consultant was surprised that I had never heard of any of these methods used, and further that I had only been required to take one methods class for my certification. |
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The Marzano text was supplied by our principal and was in place before he was able to schedule the MAX teaching seminars. It acted as a small introduction to different instructional methods that have empirical evidence of success. These texts were to be read, and the method used each month prior to our monthly staff meeting. |
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The link opens to a portion of the syllabus from a summer seminar co-hosted by Wright State University and the University of Dayton and was the first professional activity I went to on my own time and just as I started the Teacher Leader program. The seminar attracted a mixture of Math and Science teachers from the Miami Valley and focused on integrating 9th grade physical science standards with Texas Instruments' TI-8x calculators and Calculator Based Laboratory (CBL) accessories. |
