From: James.Bannan@f369.n633.z3.fidonet.org (James Bannan)
Newsgroups: k12.chat.elementary
Subject: HELP!! I need some advise from YOU!
Date: Fri, 11 Sep 92 22:03:16 PST
Organization: FidoNet node 3:633/369 - City Limits BBS, Boronia Vic

Dear JMD,
    I have only just started teaching after 15 years of other things mainly in technology and the power generation industries.  This year I ahve been teaching Gr 1 because I am interested in educational learning and particularly on the application of the computer as an educational tool in the classroom.   So in this regrad we seem to coming from the same direction.
In many respects you appear to have the same approach that I started with.  Wouldn"t it be just just great to expose young minds to some higher tech equipment and let them just go for it !!!!!!??????  You may find those 1 to 3 % of kids who are talented, gifted or just plain advance for their age at their current point in their life but in the general global view of education, you just can't stick a book in front of a kid anf say "Hey you can read!".  Some parents have come up to me with this very thing an

d  I have  given the child a book with similar vocabulary....the kid could hardly read or identified any of the words.  I pointed out to the parents that if they watched the kids eye tracking, the child "read" the pictures not the words.  In other words they had heard the book enough to memorise it.
Basically what I am saying, give them the early experiences with the magnifying glasses and with their own basic senses of touch, sight, smell and hearing.  Let them learn to observe, to verbalise what it is they sense and as they age and develop then take them into the more complex and complicated world under the microscope and other high tech devices.  My big mistake this year, if I call it a mistake,  is kids generally speaking need to have a developmental approach to their progress.  Yes sometimes they

 will make great leaps in knowledge, but generally it will be a gradual progressive process.
If I had $20,000 (is that US or Aussie dollars, I would want US - their worth more than the Aussie dollar- Aust $1 = about 84c USA) And I was focused in on grades 1 to 4, I would set up four rooms (would the rooms come out of my 20 grand?...oops there goes the dough) with a focus on each sense sight sound hearing and touch and have activities that catered for a range of abilities and skills. Activities like the string tied between two empty tin cans to demonstrate that sound is a vibration would be excelle

nt.  You could feel the vibration in the string as the kids talked and this would lead into the discussion on what the kids felt.  Listen to the string -can you hear the speech?? No but you can feel the sound transferred by vibration.  Why do we hear the speech in the tin can ? (I don't know the answer to that one... can't except my poor brain to supply all the ideas.)
@0 grand doesn't really go far  but a lot of really great science experiments can be developed from recycled "junk".  How does the computer link into all this?  We are often good at observing  things but at times fall  a little short on recording.  Maybe it could be used to develop mutlimedia reports (eg Hypercard on the MAcintosh, Hyperscreen on the Apple IIe or SoundBlaster on the IBM and others) There is also the realm of technoloby control (robotics and climate control eg airconditioning and hence link

s into the weather. robotics - what jobs do we want robots to do--dangerous/dirty/ boring).  I have probably babbled enough.  I hope it gives you some ideas but remember, in Grade 1 (5 to 6 year olds) they are only just developing the formal aspects of language in terms of being able to read and write.  So plenty of simple hands on stuff is the key.)
Cheers  Jimbo Down Under   Melbourne  Australia.


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