The first dichotomous key I created covered both bacteria domains, the four kingdoms and had viruses thrown in. It took a lot of time, but I was very happy with the results.
After deciding which organisms I wanted to cover I set off to write the key itself. I finally decided to take matters into my own hands and create my own dichotomous keys. I scoured the internet looking for good dichotomous keys my students could easily understand while exposing them to new organisms. I asked veteran teachers who would always claim to have an abundance only to disappoint me with bad runoff copies that contained vocabulary neither my native or ELL students could understand. I am ashamed to admit I spent a good portion of my teaching career looking for good dichotomous keys for my students.
I never used the TV in my classroom so it worked out perfectly for me. I have a small laptop attached to the TV to project the power point unto the TV screen. By the end of this school year, I will have "lesson plans" for an entire year and all I will need to do is adjust the dates! Everything is typed and I can copy/paste what I need from standards. )Īnother advantage is I write my objectives into a powerpoint file that I revise as needed by adding additional slides for the next dates and editing previous slides if I did not get through all the material or labs.
If you have a TV that you are not using, this is an innovative way to post your objectives, plus it impresses your administration. Over the course of years that I have been teaching, I have a high percentage of students who expect me to just tell them instead of reading for themselves. As a secondary science teacher, I want my students to be confident in their reading skills instead of always having me read everything to them. The students come in and take a brief moment to read the screen for themselves. This year has proven much more successful than last year. Teachers on my campus also had to incorporate "We will." and "I will." statements. I have the TV in front of the room so as my students walk in they read it. This year I decided to use a TV to post my objectives, daily agenda, and Texas TEKS. Last year I had my objectives written out in a language style my students could understand but few of them read the board without me calling attention to it.
According to research and studies, students who know what the objective is for the day will be more successful in learning the concepts taught. There is a trend flowing across the classrooms of America where teachers have to post their objectives and standards for the students to view and read every day.