What is it to be CREATIVE?

It's sad to say that this semester is coming to a close. I have learned so much, met some amazing people and strengthened bonds between others. The last day of lab was mysterious and fun. All we were told was to bring a unit plan that we had written and to come prepared to be creative. I was a little nervous since I know I'm not an overly creative person.

Once we were in lab, our instructor said we were taking a field trip. A field trip in college!? We went to the dollar tree to pick out 5 things that would make the unit plan we had in our hand more creative. I chose my FFA unit plan and had no clue how the dollar tree could help me make it more creative. I eventually settled on these items:

Party hats, white out, 2 different colored streamers and a feather duster. Might as well add a partridge in a pear tree! I chose the streams for my students to make the FFA official dress on a group member. My idea was to have it be a timed even where two teams had to dress up one person in official dress. Whichever team had the best dressed person won!

The party hat, white out and feather duster are to practice running a meeting. The party hats would have the different officer positions written on them with he white out. The students would take turns being each officers and therefore wearing each different hat. The feather duster would act as the gavel. I really liked how this lab brought out our creativity. They just let us go in a store with the one mission to make our unit more creative. I really hope they continue to do this lab!! Thanks for reading!

Life Knowledge

For one of my lab requirements I went to my cooperating center, Juanita Valley, and taught a life knowledge lesson. These lessons are found on The National FFA Organization website. They are completed lessons about FFA, SAE, Leadership, and there are many other topics. Since the class I was to teach just had a week on FFA I choose to teach the FFA accomplishment lesson. Students think about things they have accomplished in life, things they can accomplish through FFA and things they can accomplish in their future.

The lesson was quite a bomb, and by bomb I mean bad. It was difficult to complete some of the lesson worksheets together because I thought the students knew more than they did. When reviewing the lesson I didn't take into account that these students were freshman and had barely heard of FFA until last week. They had a very basic knowledge of what it was and I was trying to build off concepts that an upper classman might have. Therefore, I had to improvise throughout the lesson. As a class we focuses more on what the students were good at and where they needed improvement on. I had them draw out areas they felt accomplished in and areas they thought they could use work. They all shared their creations with the class. Next, we worked on how will the continue to improve. We talked about and defined accomplishment and reflected on what makes us feel accomplished. I think it was a good lesson, just not the one I had walked in prepared to teach.

I also got another experience on this day at my cooperating center, one that I wasn't quite prepared for. That day was also the fruit delivery day. Most FFA's in Pennsylvania do a citrus sale as their main fundraiser. My high school had a citrus sale but it wasn't as large as Juanita Valleys. Other than teaching, I spend the day unloading, sorting and stacking boxes upon boxes of fruit. I loved getting to see how they organized everything and got a few ideas of how I would like to do it in the future at my own school. It was a really great bonding experience with the kids. I really enjoyed meeting new students and seeing the students I spend time with in Kentucky for the National Convention. I was beyond tired when I got home but I was really glad it was such a productive day. Thanks for reading!!

Genius Hour - Where Passions Come Alive

Genius hour was the lab I was most excited for in my AEE 412 class. We were told to "geek out" on some educational aspect and come to class to present. It was so much fun to just have time to explore different types of research about teaching and learning. I immediately went to TED Talks. I love the educational TED Talks, I get very inspired. Immediately after watching Angela Duckworth speak about Grit I knew that's what I wanted to show my peers at our genius hour.

To rewind a little I should explain genius hour. This idea was developed and is implemented at Google. Google gives it's employees part of the paid work week (essential an hour) to work on any personal project they want to explore for the company. This is how Gmail the web master for google was brought to life. The employees are given this time to explore anything they want or fiddle with programs to enhance them. It give the employees freedoms which in turn makes some great ideas and motivated them.

Back to grit- Grit came about after looking at keys to success for students in school. There has always been a large portion of student success determined by socio economic status or SES. However, Ms. Duckworth has researched and found that grit can overrule SES. Grit is a students ability to persistently work towards long term goals. It's a students ability to persevere through life's challenges in order to achieve their goal. It shows determination, passion and persistency will help students achieve. So we've recognized what helps students achieve, now how do we foster a grit mindset in our students? BAM... that's the big question. I plan on keeping grit in mind and making a poster in the future to hang in my room as a reminder to my students to be resilient when times get tough.

It was awesome to "geek out" for the glass with all my peers. They had some amazing ideas and it's so much fun to hear and reflect on them all! Thanks for reading!!

First Day of School

During my semester I had a chance to do a test run of my first day of classes. For this test run we had to have our classroom expectations, procedures and consequences laid out. I found it rather difficult to find expectations, procedures and consequences that were broad enough to cover an array of areas, but specific enough to implement in everyday classes.

I started with my classroom expectations. These were a set of standards that I would hold every student accountable to for their actions. I thought of some of the most important qualities in  a person that I look at in my life. There very first one I came up with was acceptance. I want my students to be accepting of one another. Just because you accept something doesn't mean you condone it. Next I had respectful. I felt as though this one word would encompass many behaviors towards myself and other classmates. Lastly, I decided on professionalism. I want students to realize that although they have down time thought out the day and they are around their friends often that school is like their job. They should conduct themselves in a professional way, just as they would at their job. I welcome laughter and love to joke around but there should be a limitation. I changed the words around a little and came up with RAP.

Next was the procedures which I struggled to come up with. I came up with 3 lists before deciding on this one and I also looked up what other teachers were using. I knew that I wanted students to be online and not be wondering around. That's why everyday I will have a bell work for them to do so they come right into class and begin that while I take attendance and set the room up. Then the learning would occur and an ending activity would be in place. For example, I might have students write something on a post-it for their "ticket out" and have them post it around the room. It will be something I use to reflect on what happened in the class that day. Lastly, I wanted to ensure there was something fun and everyone left the class feeling good. Therefore, I implemented the fist-bump rule.

Lastly, to keep my procedures and expectations regulated I have my consequences. I used some of the consequences I've seen teachers use and I researched some. I think that prevention is by far the best option but there has to be consequences for the simple stability they provide. I do put a little note at the bottom that says "these may change depending on severity." I will explain to my students that if their behavior is so irate that it is necessary, I do reserves the right to give them detention right away or send them straight to the office.

 

Teaching these in lab went well. I got some positive feed back on how I was able to be polite yet stern when it came to rules. I obviously want students to look forward to coming to class but they will understand that they are responsible for their actions and will be held accountable. Thanks for reading!

Motivation Restored

 

Early this week I had the opportunity to do a micro-teaching experience at East Juniata High School. Myself and 2 fellow member of my cohort went to teach one class each day. I taught an Introduction to Agriculture class of mostly freshman. I did a mini-unit on horses; the first day being breeds and coat colors, the second being horse tack and the last being types of riding. Each lesson was filled with activities like pin the part on the saddle.

Micro-teaching was a lot of work. I spend so much time preparing the lessons before we went to the school. After I taught the first day I didn't cover all of the material so I had to adapt my lessons which took even more time. One concern I have is teaching multiple classes and preparing lessons for each.

Now with all of the negative out of the way, I absolutely loved it. The time I spent teaching the students or guiding them while they learned was amazing. I loved when they asked me questions and I could clarify for them. The questions showed me that they wanted to learn the information and it got me excited to teach them.



I think the way I displayed the information was really great and the activities paired well with it. However, I planned too much for time I had. Time really flew once we started the lesson. For the last day of my teaching I wanted the students to create a large poster that had different types of riding on them. Each group was given 1 article with all the information they needed on it. Unfortunately, most of the groups didn't finish their poster so I wasn't able to grade them.

All in all it was a really great experience that has resparked my motivation for teaching. I can't wait to get back in a classroom!

Don't spread it!

Hello blog readers! This week on History in the Making I will tell you about inquiry lessons! This was by far the most difficult lesson I have tried to write. It took me several days just to come up with/find an idea. After much consideration and research I decided to do a lesson on how a disease spreads through herds and why it's important to identify the sick animal to remove from the herd.

Inquiry lessons themselves take some finesse to facilitate. When doing an inquiry lesson you want the class to be as student centered as possible. The students should inquire into the information instead of be instructed in. This increases there critical thinking and is very pertinent to everyday situations. Also with inquiry, students should be using some type of method to find their answer. This method will likely follow the scientific method. The "secret ingredient" or twist was that we were required to use some type of scientific equipment. At first I looked at this as a burden but have since completely changed my view. The scientific equipment made the lessons more hands on and interesting.

For my lesson I had my "students" all grab one vial of water. There were to be 6 students including myself so I had prepared 6 vials in all, however one person was absent from lab so I had to adapt and I had 2 of the vials. All 6 vials were half full with water except for vial 3. This magical vial had substituted some water for vinegar. I then had the students exchange liquids with 2 people by them putting half of their solution into another persons vial, and then that person giving half back, therefore mixing the liquids. I then used the "disease tracker", which was a pH indicator, to see which vials had been infected. It turned out that only 2 animals in the herd had not contracted the disease.

The lab went fairly well as far as a lesson can go. Per usual my clarity needed some work. I find it difficult to instruct my peers as though I would instruct high school students on a lesson. However, I enjoyed my lesson and the others I had sat through that day. I see inquiry lessons being very beneficial but equally as difficult to facilitate. I have high hopes that with continued practice and use of them in the classroom I will be able to better conduct these lessons.

Thank you for reading!!

Inquiry Based Instruction

What is inquiry based instruction? The University of Florida explained it well, "Inquiry-based teaching is a teaching method that combines the curiosity of students and the scientific method to enhance the development of critical thinking skills while learning science." This type of instruction focuses on students inquiring into the information instead of being instructed in the topic. When using inquiry based teachers will have the students discover the problem, investigate it, research it and connect their findings. This makes the classroom more student centered while the teacher becomes more of a facilitator. This developed the students skills to think critically about a topic. A skill that is transferable to everyday life.

There are 4 types of inquiry the first being structured. This is when the students are given a step-by-step instruction that has all the information they need and the questions to prompt them. The next is guided inquiry when the students are given materials and asked to make something. They are guided by the instructor but use creativity to make their object. Then there is open inquiry when students are given materials and must discover the process behind how they work. Lastly is the learning cycle when students follow guided inquiry procedures and then discuss their findings.

As a teacher facilitation inquiry based learning can be difficult. First, you must be very knowledgeable in the subject. It is possible that the students take a route that you never planned for and by being an expert in the subject you can help steer them in the right direction. You must identify the procedure (usually the scientific method) that students will follow to inquire into the information. This could be as simple as state the problem, research, findings and conclusion or it could be much more elaborate. Lastly, be sure to work your way into inquiry based instruction. If you or your students are not used to this type of instruction you should work them into it. Start with a small activity that students will inquire into and then developed it into a project or problem.

Thank you for reading!!