Weekly Writing! Cooperative learning, field trips, and questioning!

Let's review the questions-based article - effective questioning techniques reflect the appropriate level of learning. This makes sense, right? Well, you would think so, but I am sure we have all had the incorrect question given a different level of learning or we have asked ridiculous questions to gauge understanding of others. I think it all lies in the context and the students' level of understanding. I love that we again come back to Bloom's taxonomy... He's just a rockin guy and developed this great way to clearly lay out how our minds work - WE ARE TEACHERS, let's use this as a way to develop the BEST LEARNING EXPERIENCE EVER! So let's not ever forget Bloom's... especially when developing questions.

Cool way to look at Bloom's revised taxonomy.

What else has to do with questioning? Open vs. closed questions. In ag, you may think we usually ask closed questions, but it is so important to include open questions - especially since we know (from this article) that both open and closed questions may be used at any level of Bloom's. 
It's important to know HOW to ask questions and what to do with them. Although I love talking to students and just sharing my knowledge, I have learned from leading a Bible study over the past year or so that ASKING questions is so important to gauge understanding and allow students to share what they've learned. It also allows for the most internal processing and, hopefully, cognitive processing to move up the Bloom's ladder (depending on question structure).
So one of this week's readings had to do with cooperative learning strategies (and were from UF!), something that I really enjoy... mostly because of my extrovertedness (take the Myers-Briggs test!).
Cooperative learning = group work? Well, here are some benefits of "cooperative learning," whether or not it's the same as group work: 1. Allowing different level learners to explain the material to each other (orally), 2. higher-order thinking, 3. controversy and clarified thoughts, 4. learning how to cooperate with different people! I think its interesting that the authors, Groseta and Myers, identify groups of 4 as ideal, but I suppose it makes sense. CDE teams are in groups of 4!
Constant monitoring is also important, not to mention keeping on topic and making sure groups are heterogeneous in terms of student levels. Here is how NOT to manage cooperative learning...

Finally... FIELD TRIPS! Who would have thought they had 3 parts?! Pre-trip, trip, and post-trip. Makes sense, especially with the concept of maximizing instructional time. I would have never thought that anxiety is such a concern on field trips? Maybe not ag field trips? It was an interesting claim but one that I will definitely consider as I attempt to plan some trips for practical student experience and out-of-classroom instructional time!