Similarities+&+Differences

Read and Reflect Students need to be able to see patterns and make connections. I think that good teachers already present students with teacher-led comparison scenarios naturally as we explain relationships to students, without thinking of it as a "strategy". We point out how things are alike and different as a part of our instruction. I think most teachers frequently ask students to identify similarities and differences, and I know that I used graphic organizers with my special education students because the visual representation greatly aids in their understanding. When I think back to my days in the classroom, I recognize used many comparing tasks and venn diagram. I also like the idea of using the compairson matrix, which I never used, but think would be very beneficial if students were instructed how to fill them out proporerly. I found that my students were very good at using venn diagrams or making connections in teacher-directed activities, but not as good comparing things when asked to do tasks independently. I have also asked students to classify ideas, and used webs or bubble charts. I spent a great deal of time teaching English, and having students identify metaphors in literature, or look at analogies and identify their similar relationships. I haven't really asked students to create metaphores or analogies, but think that these higher-level thinking activites would definitely benefit special education students in the classroom. Reflecting on my teaching experience, I have had students complete some of these activities, but used very little technology in doing so.

Apply and Reflect

My concept map was created online and [|here is the link to it]:

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I followed the directions (both via watching the video and printing out the step-by-step directions) and I don't think that this is the user friendly tool that the video refers to it as when it comes to creating Venn diagrams. I would use this site again to create a flow chart for my students, however, never to create Venn diagrams. I had no problems creating my two circles, the titles, or dragging text into the circles. I never could figure out how to make the edges of both circles visable. I only found the options under effects to "sent to back" or "bring to front", which only changed which image was on top. The time I put into attempting to figure out how to show the edges of both circles visable was not an effective use of time. I could have created the exact same diagram in Microsoft Word in significantly less time.