Kathie Nunley's Educator's Newsletter
---Mid- August 2005 Edition--- (current subscribers: 15,312)
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News and updates to http://brains.org and Kathie Nunley's
Layered Curriculum (tm) Site for Educators: http://help4teachers.com

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Newsletter subscription available at: http://help4teachers.com/newsletter.htm
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SECTION ONE: Teaching Tips -
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1. Make an accommodations check list and check it off each day for
students with an IEP. It's great for documentation. I make a template that
can be used for 5 days. Gayla Wiggins, ESC Region 2, Corpus Christi, TX.

2. When having students exchange papers for grading, fill out an answer sheet
on a transparency and put it on the overhead. It makes grading more accurate and
poor readers / spellers can check without asking so many questions. You can call
out the answers as you move a cover down the transparency. Kathey Collinsworth,
Breckenridge Jr. High, TX.

3. Everyone in my room has a job. I put a picture of the job on a clothespin. I make a
list of student names and just rotate the clothespins. This makes every student feel like
they have a purpose in the room each day. Krystal Woolarl, Merkel Elementary.

Send your favorite teaching tip to: kathie@brains.org

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SECTION TWO: Hot Topics
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HOT TOPIC #1: When it comes to spatial competence, children's brains
see striking developmental growth between the ages of 18 and 24 months.
Their ability to mentally "view" multiple locations, see relations among
objects and mentally recall a location long after being there, all come into
maturity during this time period. All this is primarily due to major
developmental maturation in the brain's hippocampus at this age.
Sluzenski, J. et al. (2004). Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience. Vol 16(8), 1443-1451.

HOT TOPIC #2: When we are in a noisy room or environment, we use a
speaker's body language to assist us in understanding what is being said.
Lip reading and hand gestures both give us clues to speech comprehension.
Researchers in Australia are using fMRI imaging to find how these cues are
handled by the brain. While the left hemisphere processes both of these
non-verbal aids, the regions do differ. Lip reading is handled in the area
called the left posterior superior temporal sulcus whereas hand gestures
are interpreted by the intraparietal region. Obviously one's dependence on
one of these non-verbal aids would vary from person to person.
Thompson, J. et al. (2004). Cognitive Brain Research, Vol 21(3), 412-417.

HOT TOPIC #3: Most of us are intrigued by the Deja Vu experience - the
feeling you get that you have been in a situation or place previously when
in fact you know it to be novel. Alan Brown at SMU in Dallas shares how
current neuro-research has presented 3 possible theories for this interesting
mental phenomenon. 1) Identical messages are processed by two separate
regions of the brain and get separated briefly due to a change in neural transmission
speed. 2) One perceptual experience is briefly separated into two due to
some internal distraction. 3) Our implicit familiarity is mistakenly activated
without the normally present conscious recollection. Brown, A. (2004).
Current Directions in Psychological Science, Vol 13(6), 256-259.

More Hot Topics at the websites!

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SECTION THREE: Supplies, Books, and Layered Curriculum training materials
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**** BRAINS.org Shop
Our bookstore is always open. Stocked with suggested and
recommended reading http://brains.org/store/

**** Layered Curriculum texts and workbooks are available at a
discount when ordered direct from us. http://help4teachers.com/books.htm

*** Layered Curriculum Video Training Packages are available at:
http://help4teachers.com/video.htm

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SECTION FOUR: Kathie's Email
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Dear Dr. Nunley,
First and foremost thank you for making so many wonderful materials
available on your websie. I applaud your efforts to disseminate this
information. I have a couple of questions that I hope you may be able
to clarify. This year we are moving to full inclusion and I have been
asked to provide an inservice on inclusion and differentiated instruction.
Your work is clearly the best developed I've seen and offers an exellent
pathway to thinking about and organizing oneself for differentiation.

Yet in all truthfulness I have a major concern, which I hope you might
be able to address. The idea of explicitly outlining A, B and C levels
of assignments within a unit plan, color coding them and grading students
for their "level of complexity," is unsettling. It seems counter to what I would
hope for a more seamless and undetectable incusive unit design that
privileges peer-scaffolding etc., enabling students access to the same
curriculum without reinforcing in their minds that they are tackling work
that is less challenging and thus by design worthy of a lower grade.
Isn't it therefore contradictory to elaborate a virtual tracking system
within the clssroom, that we ask students to self-select?

If I have failed to understand any nuances please forgive me, I don't
wish to discredit any views, rather I want teachers to be accountable to
the heart of IDEA and serve their students appropriately without giving
themselves a loophole. I fear that teachers with too many students and
not enough instructional support,will opt to offer the differentiated approach,
instead of working to increase student's performance and stimulate
their love of learning, by letting "those" students select the C path, for a
C grade. I appreciate your reply. E. C

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Dear E. C.,

Thank you so much for taking the time to write and share your
interest and concerns about Layered Curriculum. If I'm understanding
you correctly, I think you may misunderstand some of the Layered idea.
First and foremost, I expect EVERY ONE of my students (even in full
inclusion classrooms) to work in ALL 3 layers. Students are not
"choosing" a C and just working through that layer. All students
start in the C layer, then move to the B and then to the A layer. Grading
against a rubric, some students may not actually earn a letter grade of
A or even a B, but they are still expected to work and think at those levels.

The color coding is for units. In other words, if we are working on a Bacteria
unit this week, that may be "yellow" - but we all are working off the same
Yellow unit sheet. Color coding should never be used to individualize one
student's game plan. One of the beliefs I hold most near and dear is not to
offer accommodation to only one student. If it is offered to one, it should
be offered to all.

A Layered Curriculum classroom is differentiated but never "tracked" in
the traditional sense. All students work off the same assignment sheet,
are free to choose from any of those offered and are expected to move
through all 3 layers. I hope that helps clarify.
Keep in touch,
Kathie


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SECTION FIVE: Who is Doing What (with Layered Curriculum)
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*** Natalie Valenzuela in Fairfax, Virginia sent in a new unit sheet for
her grade 3- 5 self contained special ed class. The topic is Probability and
Statistics. Natalie's unit should be posted at the site this week.
*** Cari Barragree in Salina, Kansas sent a new high school history
unit titled "Negro Leagues Baseball." Cari's unit will be posted this week too
at the site: http://help4teachers.com/samples.htm

*** Layered Curriculum training has been going on all over Texas this past
summer using the new Video training kit. Education Service Centers in
Region 2 (Corpus Christi), Region 4 (Houston), Region 10 (Dallas), Region
14 (Abilene) all are doing teacher training in Layered Curriculum.
Brooklyn High School and the NYC Museum school in New York City are
also training teachers using the video training as well as Columbus City
schools in Ohio and high schools in Idaho and New Mexico. You
can get information on the video packages at: http://help4teachers.com/video.htm

*** The Layered Curriculum trainers have been busy as well. Helen Griffin and
Adrian Sorrell have continued their work with the Houston Education Service Center.
Trainer Linda Pont has been helping the teachers in Lansing, Illinois and trainer
Martha Verde just finished work with high school teachers in Cleveland, Ohio.

*** We're excited to see Layered Curriculum training moving up to the college
arenawith preservice and graduate education courses. If you are using Layered
Curriculum as a text for your course, please refer your campus bookstore to our
reseller's page at: http://help4teachers.com/resellersorderform.htm


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SECTION SIX: Workshops/calendar schedule/misc
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OK, now I definitely hear school bells ringing! I'm hearing from so many of
you this week as schools go back in session. I'm writing you today from
Fargo, North Dakota. I'm excited to be in Fargo, not only because I have
the chance to work with some terrific Dakota educators and pre-service
educators at the Sisseton Wahpeton College, but this marks my 50th state!
I've now been to all 50 of the US states. I'll finish all the Canadian provinces as
soon as someone invites me to PEI. (you can take that as a hint, PEI)

I'll be here in the Dakotas this week and next week, with a quick run this week-end
out to Washington DC for the annual American Psychological Association national
conference.

New Layered Curriculum workshops are in the planning for western New York,
Bermuda, and Texas. My calendar stays fairly updated at
http://help4teachers.com/calendar.htm if you would like to see when I'll be in your
neck of the woods.

My new book, "Differentiating the High School Classroom" is in the final proofreading
process and will be released later this year with Corwin Press.

That's the update for the month. See you in September. In the meantime,
as always, my very best to you and yours,

Kathie
=================================================

> Dr. Kathie F. Nunley
> http://help4teachers.com
> http://brains.org
> Layered Curriculum (tm) - because every student deserves a special education (tm)
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Workshop information is available at the website
> http://help4teachers.com/workshops.htm
> or
> call: 603-249-9521
> email: kathie@brains.org
> Brains.org and Help4Teachers is located at:
> 54 Ponemah Road
> Amherst, NH 03031
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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- posted by Kathie @ 8:46 PM