Firestone Experience

     When I think of test preparation, especially for standardized tests, multi-modalities aren't really on my mind. I think that's why I like this assignment, it is forcing me to do something I wouldn't normally think to do.  It also makes it very difficult to come up with a decent idea.  I really like the idea of online discussions, but when dealing with test material who have to be careful with whether or not the students are providing correct information to one another.  Also with standardized tests there are often online study guides that are easy for students to use, but I see those being more helpful at home then at school.  So these ideas lead me to think even more outside of the box.
     Maybe use and online calendar or scheduler and have students set up there own personal plan of when and what to study each night leading up to the test.  Taking the schedules and post them on a class site for other students to see and possibly forming groups out of them.  The groups could be formed based on similar struggles or stronger students with weaker ones, that really depends on the specific class and the students in it.  Students who don't need to study certain parts wouldn't put it in their schedule so if it was missing you could put them with students who had the missing subject on more then one day, something like that.
     Standardized tests prove to be a pretty difficult problem, because as the teacher you have no control over them, so combining them with multi-modalities is understandable difficult.
     Looking back at my Firestone High School experience, I decided to reflect on the amount of modalities I witnessed being used in the classrooms.  The reply to which would be, not much.  In one class they watched a movie based on the book they were reading and that's really about it.  I don't necessarily see this as a bad thing though.  It's definitely better than just using it to use it, because I actually saw a couple of decent lessens without using multi-modalities.
     As far as our dependency on teaching to the test versus the broadening definition of literacy I think multi-modality should be embraced greatly.  The ever-growing field of educational technology and just technology in general is astounding.  Plus more and more students are becoming familiar with these things on their own without the guide of a teacher, so why not use them in a classroom.  Testing students on what they learn is important don't get me wrong, but I think making sure student motivation is there is equally important.  We need to incorporate interesting material into our lessons focus more on students' level of understanding rather than strict by the book lessons.  Teachers need to be free to encourage students' free thinking.  This will help the in school and after school in everyday life.
     Hopefully using a wide variety of material and modalities students will begin to develop different perspectives on how to problem solve in turn raising their test scores.  All of this is set in an ideal world and obviously we must be prepared for our plans to fail, but if you keep your standards high your students should follow suit.
     At Firestone the only form of modality I used during tutoring was really examples.  I tried to base certain situations in the student's everyday life to help him identify with the problems.  When I think of modality I also think of different ways to use critical thinking skills and I think that is what I was trying to accomplish during the tutoring session.  This is also something I worry a great deal about is making the material I am required to teach obtainable, understandable, and relatable to the students and I think multi-modalities will help with this a great deal.  Students need variety in their life, it keeps things interesting and fresh.  Without these emotions in a student you have quite a road ahead of you, but using multi-modality will hopefully do half of this job all on its own.