Teaching Students with Disabilities
Instructional Improvement Suggests:
Educational Media
This three-times a year news letter is published by the Renton Technical College Library. It is intended to spotlight RTC Library media resources, and issues regarding the use of educational media—the internet, videos, DVDs, audiotapes, software, and other electronic resources.
If you have any questions or suggestions for topics, please call the library at (425) 235-2331, or email Laura Staley at lstaley@RTC.edu.
Education and Diversity Issueson Video and DVD |
Educational Media usually covers resources you might want to show to your students. But this issue is all about resources for you as a teacher.
“Diverse Students”, below and continued on page four, looks at what students who don’t fit the usual college stereotype think and feel in the classroom, and how instructors can make those students more comfortable. Also on page four are several diversity websites recommended by Judith Frey of Instructional Improvement.
“Dealing with Student Conflict”, on page two, offers video and CD resources about dealing with classroom bullies, short-circuiting fights, and creating classroom environments that discourage harassment.
“Teaching Students With Disabilities” offers resources to let you see exactly what some of your disabled students see, and takes a look at a multi-volume video set that gives specific tips for dealing with different learning disabilities.
“Teaching Tips and Tricks” looks at some of the basic tools of teaching, lesson plans, homework, and lecturing, and offers some creative options.
“Better Grading” offers resources to help you think about the hardest part of teaching—grading.
Trivia:
The study of place names is known as toponymy.
This issue’s trivia is from: A place called Peculiar: Stories about unusual American place-names. By Frank K. Gallant. Mirriam-Webster Inc, Springfield MA. Published: 1998.
| Diverse Students |
The Aliens: Being a Foreign Student. Call # 378.1982 DARTMOU 2003. Filmed at Dartmouth College, it looks at the adjustments foreign students have to make at school in the US. Some of the areas covered include social interactions, expected classroom behavior, assumptions about their familiarity with technology, being expected to represent their whole culture, and blending into their new environment. 32 minutes.
Educating Linguistically and Culturally Diverse Students. Call # 370.196097 EDUCATI 1998. This is an ASCD “Professional Inquiry” kit, with video and folders with accompanying material. For example, folder 3, Culture and Learning“offers guidelines for considering culture and it’s influence on teaching and learning.” It includes exercises for personal cultural reflection, cultural expectations about learning, how culture influences classroom practices.
Teaching in the Diverse Classroom. Call # 370.19 TEACHIN 1991d VHS. Filmed at the University of Washington. Diverse adult students discuss what makes them feel included or excluded in the classroom. Methods of encouraging and engaging students, promoting a respectful classroom environment, and dealing with different ways of learning are modeled. Instructors discuss instant polls to evaluate student, anonymous one-minute papers, and other methods of involving all students. 37 minutes.
Supporting Second Language Learners. Call # 370.117 SUPPORT 2003L. Aimed at K-12 teachers , this includes some valuable reminders for instructors of adult students for whom English is a second language. Suggestions include understand their culture, so that you can understand their educational expectations and reactions. Also be mindful that, when you are demonstrating something , your words reflect your actions, so that the demonstration and the lecture reinforce each other. 30 minutes.
Trivia:
Magnet Names. Some towns are given names that are intended to attract new residents. Examples include: Carefree AZ, Eden ID, Neversink NY, Endwell NY, Joy NB, Success MO, Delightful OH, Bargaintown NJ, and Nirvana MI.