Health 423- 6/30 Health Reflection

Today in Health class, our time was spent discussing children in abusive situations.  It was helpful for me to understand the different types of abuse, how they may or may not mannifest themselves in children, and what legal responsibility I have as an educator to report it.  I was not aware of my obligations, but I take seriously the mental and physical health of the students in my classroom.  I have witnessed repeated verbal/emotional abuse before and confronted the parents directly with no success.  I now appreciate knowing my options especially since I will now be an educator with the "excuse" and legal obligation to call CSS.  I plan on also taking notes of the child's behavior if I am suspicious in any way they are being neglected or abused.   The topic today was very difficult to address; I cannot imagine a child experiencing the types of physical, sexual, and emotional abuse we went over.  I therefore take seriously my role as both educator and advocate, in their lives.

Questions I still have:
How can I get a copy of the paper on sexual maturity of different age groups?
How does abuse (sexual, emotional) look in younger ages such as Kindergarten?

Health 423- 6/29 Health Reflection

The most important thing I learned in class today was how learning is assessed across grade levels.  I am new to EALRs and I had no idea that a concept such as "drug awareness/drug abuse" would be located on the same EARL for each grade level and advanced as the age progressed.  This is a helpful way for me to organize the vast amount of information within the state regulations about teaching Health to numerous grade levels.  I simiarly see the value in using "jigsaw" groups so that each student is accountable for their share of information.  This was very helpful to me.
We also had enough time to introduce the assessment 5E learning/teaching model.  I'll be presenting my microteaching lesson soon and I appreciate how our lessons direct my lesson planning.  For example, the first "E" is engage where the teacher not only introduces the topic but uses the introduction as a preassessment.  Our class also discussed a KWL chart. (Know, Want to Know, What I Learned). We are learning a lot of great techniques and ideas about teaching health both in class and from microteaching assessment.  The challenge right now is remembering all the details to apply to the microteaching lesson as well as future lessons.

Questions I still have:
Are EALRs organized in this way in other subjects?
Can we spend more time on the 5 E's?
What other type of table "mix-up" options do I have besides the jigsaw?

Health 423- 6/28 Health Reflection

Today in class we went over the changes to the food pyramid, and it's new form in a food plate.  It was helpful to look at the advantages and disadvantages between both forms.  I agreed with most of the class that it was a decision between being too simplistic or too complicated.  I hadn't realized the original pyramid had been updated with vertical stripes and I agreed with Annie and their sizes were not easily comparable amongst the different catagories.  On the other hand the simplicity of the food plate made nutritional goals easier to remember.  A good adaptation would be including pictures from each catagory in their respective "slice" of the plate.  I think a combination of both would be an effective aid to a nutrition lesson.  Thank you for sharing WA State Dariy council tip, I'll be sure to take advantage of this once i'm a teacher.
Analyzing the constuction of food labels was very interesting as well.  I have not done this before, and it gave me a lot of insight on the accessibility of the information.  I've known people with gluten allergies who need to search through ingredients to see if they can eat a certain product.  The labels currently do not make this very easy.  For students with peanut allergies, as we discussed last week with the epi pen, this lesson could be applied to any classroom with an allergic student.  Both to create a sense of empathy and understanding, as well as to understand the layout of nurtritional facts.  I would like to learn more about different types of sugar.  Our table found a product that listed the nutritional information for the serving size, as well as for the entire package.  This was also very helpful.  Both units helped me think more deeply about my grocery store research.

Questions I still have:
How do I get students more interested/engaged in learning about the foods they eat?

Health 423- 6/23 Health Reflection

I left immediately after class for the grocery store assignment, so I completely forgot to blog after class. I am writing now, the following morning. Sorry about that Carrie!
Today in class we learned several important lessons that will be imperative to my success as a teacher. The guidelines for lesson planning were extremely helpful for me to finally understand the workings of my future career. Basically you have shown me how to structure lessons so that they meet state requirements and can be reproduced by myself or others. I'm ready to dive in with both feet and learn how to best navigate Ealr's and GLE's.
Additionally learning about EPI pens was very relevant.  I appreciate feeling prepared to assist my students in the event of an emergency.

The class's connection to the study of health allows me to focus my attention on one subject rather than all of them at once.  For Microteaching we divided into groups.  My group chose “Bullying” and we soon recognized the challenge of isolating each possible element of the Ealr’s relevant to our planning.  We were also pleasantly surprised to see that elements of communication and bullying were included as part of the health standards for Kindergarten.  It is good to know the states takes bullying as seriously as I do.

Questions I still have:
Where should I start when planning a lesson?  Do I begin with EALR/GLE requirements or conceptualize the idea and see how it fits in with state standards?

Do most beginning teachers craft lessons from scratch?

Health 423 - 6/22 reflection

The most important thing I learned in class today was about concept mapping.  My small table group mapped out health in areas of sex education, anatomy, respect, trust, mental health, and safety.  The advantange of concept mapping was seeing how our differing defintions of health intersected visually on paper.  I also had not anticipated the immense challenge of visually representing the relationships between our catagories and sub catagories.  Instead of being flat and linear, the concept map ideally would be 3D and circular in my mind.  I can see how laying out concept maps can make one aware of their own assumptions about a topic, especially such a broad one as health.  This tool also serves as a unique way to discover how students think about the topic.  I appreciated the graph of photographs you showed as well.  This allowed me to think more creatively of different ways of creating concept maps for my future students.
Questions I still have:
How can I adapt this to other school subjects?
Do concept maps have to be organized in boxes and lines?
How does this look for different grade levels?

Inclusion and Community Building

Last night our group prompted the class to tell your stories of inclusion and exclusion, it was a great night! Thank you all for sharing.  I have been thinking a lot about pulling students out of class for math, reading or writing as a means of exclusion.  This is definitely an issue.  It’s a push and pull between getting the child additional help in academics and making sure they do not fall behind in classroom lessons/activities.  I have witnessed this alot in the classroom from students with learning disabilities or autism.  Often “Greg” would miss the start of an anticipated art lesson due to reading lesson in another room. 

On the flip side, I have seen a lot of encouraging inclusion amongst peers at the school where I volunteer.  I have been many wonderful little boys varying within the spectrum of autism and each time their peers are helpful and supportive during lessons.  One second grade boy, “James” cannot communicate verbally or make eye contact, but he is very intelligent.  His peers do not shy away from his differences, and try to keep him on track when an aid is not around.  The teacher does not treat him differently than any other student, and I believe that is reflected in the atmosphere in the classroom.  In other classrooms, the only time I have witnessed peers not attempting to connect with a classmate such as “James”, is another boy who has trouble controlling his anger.  Overall in “James’” classroom, I believe the instructor’s efforts to explain autism, much like Nyla’s wheelchair, helped the students understand their peer a little better.  It’s a teacher’s responsibility to use their resources (parents, counselors, organizations), to education themselves and their classroom community.

I like how in the reading and our discussion we approached the topic that “community” is not only forged from our commonalities but our struggles together.  This made me think of Jane’s traffic light example.  Working toward a common purpose, the second grade achieved the goal of placing a traffic light near their school.  In an elementary school classroom, I’m anticipating each class will bring a unique set of personalities and therefore a unique set of challenges to overcome.  Perhaps working on our commonalities in ice breakers is a safe way to start in younger grades and build bridges. 

Teaching is like...Photography

Photography, in many ways, can be connected to teaching.  There are numerous techniques and skills to employ which are either technical or artistic depending on the photographer.  Color, black and white, macro, zoom, shadow, texture, angle and blurriness are some of the methods to convey themes of life, death, emotion, metaphor, and nature.  Various photo blogs are available which document the techniques of photographers much like the blogs of teachers we have viewed in class.  I feel like the internet provides a wealth of knowledge about both teaching and photography practices alike, and possible outcomes of employing their respective methods.

Additionally the better you know your camera, or your students, the better the outcome of the picture, or their learning.  I love to document the world around me, but I never know how the photo will turn out until later.  Reviewing my photos shows me how I can change my technique to get the result I want.  When I look through the eye piece to “frame” my photo, I focus my camera lens and hold very still.  I have to be patient and sometimes take several shots, or alter my angle, to get the image I want.  My future students hold the same potential as the subject of my photo.  My ability to adapt my teaching skills to the group and the individual reflects the same patience and determination needed for photography.  If some students are struggling to understand a concept, I’ll need to be flexible in adapting my teaching style to get the result I want.  Photos are to photographers, as student’s learning is to teachers.

When I took a photography art class as part of my bachelor’s, I was encouraged to expand my thinking and technical ability in order to produce a more artistic style of photos.  Whereas previously I used the settings on my SLR to experiment with images of nature, my instructor wanted me to replicate styles, methods and thoughts of all types of artists.  The image above is from my Van Gogh series.  Van Gogh was not a photographer, so translating his art to another medium was a challenge.  Technically the project required me to use large studio lights, external flashes, a tripod, and a remote to achieve the right shadows.  I also was not allowed to use color in photographs, so I had to find ways to make sunflowers come alive in other ways.  Throughout the quarter my photos continually progressed.  I became more comfortable and creative with the idea of “art as photography” and appreciated the challenge. 

The evolution of my work is related to the work I am doing in the teaching certification.  For me, the “ultimate goal” would be to learn effective ways of teaching all subjects in the elementary school classroom.  For example math was difficult for me, how can I make it easier for my students to understand? I have volunteered many hours, but truly the journey has just begun.  By meeting other teachers in the field and understanding what challenges await me, I hope to leave this program fully prepared to run a classroom.  The challenge of adapting my photography into art seemed impossible at the time and I achieved it.  Teaching does not seem impossible, and yet I am similarly facing generations of great ideas to learn, process, and adapt to my own teaching style.