FP007 – CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT-TECHNIQUES AND REFLECTIONS

ON PRACTICE

ASSIGNMENT
General information:

The subject assignment consists of reflecting on two readings and two issues from the
materials. This assignment must be done individually and fulfil the following conditions:

 Length: 5 pages (without including cover, index or appendices –if there are any-).
 Type of font: Arial or Times New Roman.
 Size: 11.
 Line height: 1.5.

The assignment has to be done in this Word document and has to fulfil the rules of
presentation and edition, as for quotes and bibliographical references which are detailed
in the Study Guide.

Also, it has to be submitted following the procedure specified in the “Subject Evaluation”
document. Sending it to the tutor’s e-mail is not permitted.

In addition to this, it is very important to read the assessment criteria, which can be
found in the “Subject Evaluation” document.

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ASSIGNMENT:

1. Take any two readings and two issues from the materials – for example:
a) segregation of low-track students,
b) the usefulness of web-quests,
c) group dynamics (the 6 types),
d) the relevance of the new ‘key competences’ to language teaching and classroom
management,
e) the way in which the market shift to young and very young learners has changed
the way we think and teach,
f) Multiple intelligences,
g) any other which has attracted your attention.

2. and discuss them separately:

a) Say why you have chosen them from a personal perspective.
b) Explain their importance with reference to the general framework of classroom
management.
c) And try to predict how the topic will evolve in the future.

Important: you have to write your personal details and the subject name on the
cover (see the next page). The assignment that does not fulfil these conditions will
not be corrected. You have to include the assignment index below the cover.

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Name and surnames: Silvina Graciela Abib Romano
Group: 2023-10
Date: January 13th 2024

Subject:
Classroom Management: techniques and
reflections on practice.

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Index

1. Introduction 5

2. Multiple Intelligences 5

3. The usefulness of WebQuest 7

4. Conclusion 9

5. Bibliography 10

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Introduction
Effective classroom management involves the organization of time, space, materials and
of course students, to create a conductive learning environment as it keeps students
actively engaged in their tasks. By recognizing that there is no unique approach strategy
to handle the various aspects of a class, especially with the exposure of diverse
challenges, teachers always turn to multiple approaches.

In large classrooms with a diverse range of learning styles and abilities, establishing team
groups is a strategy where students can support and help each other in achieving
common learning goals and these portraits that making collaborative efforts become
essential. In this context, the concept of multiple intelligences becomes relevant in
adapting teaching methods to individual student needs.

Additionally, integrating activities that maximize group work, like the use of web-quests,
proves to be beneficial. In the following discussion I will dig in into the impact of these two
issues in the classroom, emphasizing the significance of effective classroom management
within the actual educational picture and contemplating their potential evolution in the
future.

Multiple Intelligences

When those of us who started our studies to become teachers at the beginning of this new
century, were faced with many pedagogical concepts, one of them was related to Multiple
Intelligences. Howard Gardner (1985) suggests that there are various ways in which
people can be intelligent, even beyond the traditional notion of IQ. He introduced eight
different and independent intelligence capacities that students may have (Linguistic,
Logical-mathematical, Spatial, Bodily-Kinesthetic, Musical, Interpersonal, Intrapersonal,
Naturalist). In the theoretical aspect it seems to be easy to identify them, but then, when
we are in a classroom full of heterogeneous groups of students and particularly when we
teach L2, of which they have different levels, it turns out it is not that easy to identify these
intelligences in a blink of an eye.

These groups often foster the teacher with challenges full of ideas that are meant to be
flexible and adaptable, besides other factors that need to be taken into account when
planning a lesson like the use of practical material, strategies to keep students motivated,
designing creative activities, self-awareness of their learning process, just to mention
some of them. All these elements can represent an opportunity to make some adjustment
to the curricula and contribute to a significant growth for teachers in teaching English. For
these reasons it is important the selection of activities which fit the various MI, the topics

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and content, the activities to be developed in the subject as well as the course of action
used by students to demonstrate their knowledge and understanding.

As Christison (1999) stated: The purpose of doing the MI inventory was to connect our life
experiences to the ideas presented in multiple intelligence theory. The types of learning
activities we, as teachers select are often directly related to our experiences in the real
world. The choices we make as teachers, in turn, can affect the multiple intelligence
profiles of the EFL students in our classes. As an EFL teacher, we also naturally choose
classroom activities that complement our own multiple intelligence profile. He strongly
believed that teachers need to connect life experiences to the different ideas in the MI
theory, to carefully select learning activities to produce an impact on the multiple
intelligence’s profiles of the EFL students, and by doing this, teachers have a more
complex teaching process but It will not only allow teachers to reflect more often in their
own experiences, but also this will create an unique diverse lesson.

Multiple Intelligence produces a totally different scaffolding in the understanding that we

have about students’ diversity and at the same time how to communicate those
differences while teaching. The question would be how to communicate those differences
and keep on teaching at the same time, and here is where we as educators can rely on
several ways to create an inclusive and supportive learning environment keeping in mind
that each lesson is about to be a non-repeatable one. Some strategies can be
acknowledging and celebrating the diverse backgrounds, experiences; providing options
for students to demonstrate understanding through different assessment formats such as
projects, presentations or writing assignments; inviting guest speakers from diverse
backgrounds to share their experience and expertise; recognizing and accommodating by
offering additional support or resources when necessary; assigning group work that
encourage collaboration and celebrate the strengths of each team member among many
other strategies that can be used.

The relevance of Multiple Intelligence to the setting of classroom management is that,

whether we like it or not, it affects how educators teach their students day in and day out.
From the point of view of Amstrong (2009: 15-17) “our particular fluency (or lack of
fluency) in each of the eight M.I affects our competence (or lack of competence) in
various roles that we have as educators”. Unfortunately, not all teachers have much
expertise in all the MI, but they can rely on other colleague´s intelligence or even develop
that expertise transforming their lessons and content units into meaningful experiences.

I would like to look over two ways to use Multiple intelligence theory in the classroom
depending on Christison, Mary Ann - Kennedy, Deborah

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 1. As a tool to help students know their strength and develop a better understanding
of their personal process of acquiring the L2, and it gives the teacher a better
recognition of the students’ intelligence.
2. As a guide to develop lesson plans that fit the wide range of our students need. A
Multiple Intelligence reading lesson may start with common prereading activities
(reviewing earlier material, predicting what will happen next), followed by silent
reading or reading aloud with discussion of vocabulary and text meaning. Students
can then complete a project, be that individually or in groups, to demonstrate their
understanding of the text. The teacher would probably offer a choice of projects,
such as descriptive writing, map drawing, illustration, creation of a dialogue or skit,
making a timeline, song writing, and retelling.

As time goes by, and realizing that we live in a post-modern world where neuroscience is
growing at a high speed and putting some light on learning processes that were
completely unknown fifty years ago, it is impossible to think about a traditional teaching
process. Multiple Intelligence has arrived to completely change the perspective of the
teacher revolutionizing it in such a meaningful way, that the educator ends changing
his/her teaching process in 180 degrees. I personally think that Multiple Intelligence will
evolve in a short period of time and will reach not only every school, but also the national
curricula of L2 and the IQ idea will be left aside in order to focus the attention in those
different and significant capacities that students have.

The usefulness of Web-Quests

The web-quest is an exploration-oriented learning activity in which most of all the

information students work with comes from the web. Even though web-quests are
designed to use students time properly, to focus on using information instead of looking
for it, and to support students thinking at all levels; here in Argentina, where a typical
public-school classroom has between 40 to 50 students, the exact timing idea that web-
quest pretends to fulfil does not quite apply to every classroom. However, when we talk
about attending the diversity of heterogenous classrooms web-quests are the perfect
answer to work in an easier and stronger way with these classes. In these cases, the
educator needs to organize the classroom in smaller groups to open the door for
interaction between the teacher and the students, and also students among themselves.

Relying on Teacher in Action programme from BBC World service, it highlights that
working in groups is helpful during project works, since students are foster to share
responsibilities and have a lot of peer teaching, so the class stops being teacher-centered
and moves to an autonomy that students discovered by working in this way as they are

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constantly interacting, exchanging information and creating unique projects to share with
their classmates. These types of method encourage collaborative group work as members
of the group contribute through the whole process with one idea in mind, to achieve their
final goal demonstrating in this way that the motivation was always there pushing them
ahead as each of them feels he/she has a mayor responsible role in the entire process.

These kinds of activities are in direct connection to the general principles of classroom
management, as web-quests established a collaborative goal structure within the
classroom. In this scenario, working in web-quests activities facilitates the development of
essential competences that encourage active cooperation among all group members.
Giving individual responsibilities in a certain way guarantee that each student plays a
crucial role in his group, emphasizing that the final outcome is based on the active
participation of all the group members. Verbal interaction throughout the entire process
provides learners with numerous chances to communicate their thoughts, present their
solutions, and share ideas. Social skills are vital for students to reach a consensus and
effectively address the presented problem. Team reflection, particularly emphasized in the
concluding activity, contributes significantly to the overall collaborative learning experience
(Johnson, D.W. et al 2013).

Moreover, web-quests often allow for authentic assessment so students can apply their
knowledge and skills in real life scenarios, orienting in this way a more accurate measure
of their understanding in comparison to simple memorization. Sometimes, we focus so
much on the work they are doing that involuntarily we do not realize that each student is
doing his/her best to manage time effectively in order to avoid being left behind by the rest
of the members of the group and this gives us a clear insight into student´s ability to self-
regulate and manage their learning.

Working in groups also outstands students learning process, as McCafferty .et al (2006)
says that “group activities […] have become one of the key use communicative language
teaching” providing opportunities to students to communicate and integrate listening,
speaking, reading and writing”. Furthermore, Hockley (n.d) states that “group work is an
effective way of stimulating the negotiation of meaning and "scaffolding", which is seen to
lead to L2 acquisition”. As a result, web-quest increase the collaborative interactions, high
level of thinking and certainly some level of autonomy.

Whenever we think about an assessment that not only can recall information
immediately, but also, student´s long-term understanding of content we must think about
web-quests as it provides a rich context for authentic evaluation playing an important role
with educational goals that highlights the development of skill and knowledge able to be

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used in real-world situations. In this way, this approach offers a more comprehensive and
meaningful assessment of students’ learning outcomes.

As globalization and technological advancement continue to evolve, web-quests are

increasingly becoming invaluable resources for classrooms of heterogenous groups. This
is due to the abilities of teachers to integrate technology into the curriculum, providing
students with authentic realia and updated material that enhance their engagement in the
learning process. When Dodge, the creator of WebQuest was consulted in an interview for
Education World (2012), he explains that this tool is: “key benefit to the learners, because
ideally, they'll be getting some scaffolded practice at making sense of new information,
parsing data that comes from something other than a textbook, accommodating the
opinions of others, and organising themselves.”

Nowadays some teachers are taking the risk and they are using web-quests to work
interdisciplinary with other subjects and the results are amazing, as every single student is
involved in the process plus using what they like the most, technological devices. I hope in
the future these interdisciplinary web-quests ideas become something that occurs
regularly in every classroom and above all fostering every student to rely on his abilities
and to feel free to express his/her ideas and opinions.

Conclusion

In this assignment I have talked about the importance of attending the needs of using
multiple intelligences strategies in the classroom as it affects how we teachers organize
the classroom environment, activities, our students learning and also the curricula.

However, these two aspects are connected as multiple intelligences incorporate

cooperative learning methods. In this context, Web-quests proves to be a valuable tool
embracing a wide range of students’ capacities and abilities. It requires the teacher to
skillfully leverage students’ diverse intelligences when organizing cooperative group
activities.

Looking ahead, the challenge is to consider multiple intelligences when designing both the
curriculum and mandatory tests, aiming to avoid standardizing students. In this aspect, the
quick advance of web-quests aligns with the ongoing advances in technology. As
teachers, it is imperative to incorporate these evolving technologies into our classrooms,
being fully conscious that they can effectively improve our students’ learning experiences.

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Bibliography

[1] ARMSTRONG, T. (2009). Multiple Intelligences in the classroom (3rd edition). Virginia,
USA. ASCD.

[2] TAPPING INTO MULTIPLE INTELLIGENCES: HOW DO I APPLY MULTIPLE

INTELLIGENCES (M.I.) theory in my classroom? (2004) [online] Available at
http://www.thirteen.org/edonline/concept2class/mi/exploration_sub1.html [retrieved : 3
January 2024]

[3] HOCKLEY, N. ET AL. (n.d). Classroom Management. FUNIBER. Barcelona

[4] MCCAFFERTY, G. JACOBS, M & IDDINGS, A. (n.d). On Cooperative learning.

[online] Available at http://www.cambridge.org/catalogue/catalogue.asp?
isbn=9780521844864&ss=exc [retrieved: 20 December 2023]

[5] JOHNSON, D.W., JOHNSON, R., AND SMITH, K. (2013). Cooperative Learning:
Improving University Instruction By Basing Practice On Validated Theory. [online]
Available at http://personal.cege.umn.edu/~smith/docs/Johnson-Johnson-Smith-
Cooperative_Learning-JECT-Small_Group_Learning-draft.pdf [retrieved : 19 December
2023]

[6] WEBQUEST’S. (2012) [online] Available at

http://www.educationworld.com/a_issues/chat/chat015.shtml [retrieved : 5 January 2024]

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