Chapters 6, 7 UbD/DI and Chapters 5, 6 MI

The two chapters in MI focus on a MI teacher, as well as MI theory and teaching strategies that exhibit its use. It goes into what exactly a MI teacher’s classroom would look like, as well as some of the strategies that the MI teacher would use. It also discusses some different work-activites to make a classroom MI friendly as well as lesson plans that are MI friendly. It also talks about the importance of combining MI theory with thematic instruction. The book says “themes cut through traditional curricular boundaries, eave together subjects and skills that are found naturally in life and provide students with opportunities to use their multiple intelligences in practical ways” (67).

In UBD and DI the two chapters focus on a differentiated curriculum as well as how to teach in an academically diverse classroom. Firstly, it talks about teaching students fundamentals and making sure they reach the “big ideas” of each unit. All of the content isn’t as important as them drawing the fundamentals and finding the big idea. The second chapter focuses once again on how to work with a diverse classroom, and different strategies that may be used to make that sort of classroom click. It talks of the importance of using essential questions, as well as giving examples in each multiple intelligence of what essential questions would be. It also discusses the importance of doing a sort of “anticipatory” style of planning. As in planning your lesson plans to the common trends of students you have seen in past classrooms in order to hopefully fit your new classroom to meet the needs of many students. This gets rid of some of the pressure to immediately know all of your students and their needs, as it may cover some of theirs already. Finally it goes into talking of the stage 3 WHERETO method. The WHERETO method is a series of questions that are designed to make the teacher think from the perspective of the learner, which is important because that should be the center of the lesson plan/
Through these chapters I have learned a few good strategies and ideas for lesson plans that I could use in my future classroom. Along with those, I have also learned how to phrase questions to appeal to students specific multiple intelligences, as well as the importance of making sure that each student gains an understanding for “the big idea” even if they cannot grasp all of the content in the unit. I particularly enjoyed a specific piece that compared teachers to musicians, it read “ that teacher is always aware of the melody - the curriculum goals- but finds many different ways to the melody” (89). A teacher needs to have different routes to reach the same goal, because not at all students can follow a singular path, some may need different tools than others. These are some of the ideas I would like to apply in my future ( hopefully universally designed and differentiated) classroom.