FINAL THOUGHTS!!!

Final reflection!

                  It feels like just yesterday it was the first day of the semester, and I was sitting in class thinking "Oh boy, this is going to be a tough class." I have learned so much from this class, and much more I haven't even realized that I have learned yet. The more I fill out on the edTPA, the more I understand the articles I have read. I did not fully understand everything that I was reading in the beginning of the class. I thought that I was going to be lost the entire time, but as class went on the more the readings made sense and the more things clicked. 

              I have used more technology this semester that I have my entire college career. I have reached out beyond PowerPoint Presentations and have utilized other programs in other classes. I have a better understanding of google docs and it has been very handy! I am not as scared of technology as I was the first day of class, and I plan on using more of it in my education classes and in my classroom.

           Although this class is very intimating I found it very helpful. Having the teacher evaluate you while you teach an entire lesson to an entire class is scary enough, but your peers evaluate you as well. I have never been evaluated liked that before, and I was very nervous about it, but I can guarantee that I am much more comfortable in front of the classroom now than I ever have been. I believe that this experience is one that is needed and is something to grow from. I don't believe that this experience is meant for something to dwell on, but rather reflect upon and grow from, and this is what I plan on doing. I am going to go into the next semester with a new sense of confidence no matter what I am teaching in the front of the classroom. I think the best part of my teaching experience in this class was when a student told me that I said a word wrong. This is something I have always feared, but when it happened I just said Thank you, and I repeated the word the correct way. I was no embarrassed like I thought that I would be, but rather I was impressed that the student said it correctly. I believe that these are the moments where we grow as people and teachers. 

If there is one thing I will take away from this class it is the use of the word "GUYS". I have refrained from using this word in class, and even at work. I was working on a mock lesson plan for another class and my co-teacher put the word "guys" in the lesson plan. I said "oh no, we can think of a better word than that!" 

This class was the most difficult education class that I have had to take, but not because of the content but because of the pressure of teaching an entire class for the first time. I am happy that it was a co-teaching class! This has been one of the best experiences I have ever had, and I know that it will be very helpful when student teaching!

Mock Job Interview

Today in class we practiced for job interviews. Since these were mock job interviews we could do little research of the "schools" that would be "interviewing" us. I had a hard time trying to figure out what to look over before the interview. I am usually the one to research where I would like to work and find out all about that place before going on the interview. I like to know where I am applying and this helps me with what I need to focus on for the interview. It was intimidating to have no information and to be interviewed by my peers. 
I thought that this experience was a valuable one, and one that everyone should have. I feel that I will be better prepared for when I do go on my interviews for my "real person job". I thought that the "Principles" did an outstanding job coming up with questions to make us think on our feet, and to help us see the questions that will be asked during an interview. I am not quick enough on my feet when answering questions, and I feel that this is something I need to work on. I think that the methods classes at MSMC are very good with preparing you for your future. I am thankful that Dr.Smirnova had us practice this very important skill. 

Creating a Pre-test

In class today we created a pre-test for our students. We had yet to meet these students and we were ALREADY thinking of how to create a test to assess their prior knowledge. I was confused on how to design this test with out actually meeting these students. Our class was divided up into four groups and each group had a different topic that they were to create questions for. We had JUST met our group partners and I didn't really know any of them so this was all new for me. We were not sure what to ask the students. We came up with some questions in the end that we were still unsure about. I found this to be difficult and I wasn't sure how we were to use it in the class.

UPDATE! 
So after we had our field work we had asked the students to fill out another assessment test. This was a post-test. When my group started meeting and creating our lesson plan I understood the pre-test. I understood the reason for why we needed to assess their knowledge of where they are in their learning. We needed to know where to start teaching! This I just didn't think of until we had to create a lesson plan and we were unsure of what they had known. 

Grateful is a choice!

Today my teacher asked us to read an article from The New York Times : Chose to Be Grateful. It Will Make You Happier.
     So before I even began to read this article I was caught by the title, and this was right before Thanksgiving and I just sat there thinking about how to make my life happier and if gratefulness plays a part in it. I had decided that Yes, I am happy because I am grateful for everything in my life. Everybody that I am able to call my friends and family, I am grateful for my cats. I had mentally made an entire list of things that I was grateful for and the entire day I just thought about how unhappy I would be if my life was missing these things.
      When I FINALLY read the article some things stood out to me. Like when he mentions about how some people are more grateful than others due to a gene (CD 38), this describes my best friend. You could give this girl one sock not a pair just one and it could have a hole in the toe and she will tell you Thank you, and How much she just loves it. All authentic feelings, she doesn't fake this kind of gratefulness. She has always been this way, and no matter what you get her for birthdays or holidays she is grateful just to see you.  

     I really believe that choosing to focus on the good things in life make you a happier person and a more grateful person as well as positive. Positive people do not focus on the negative things in life, rather they look at the good in any situation. This is something I noticed does really work. I have a job where in one location the workers focus on the bad things that the store manager does. The employees do not focus on the good that she brings to the table, and I bet if you asked them what is something good that she has brought to the company they couldn't name it. They could name it if they tried, and I can see the moral and the happiness in that store plummet when the store manager walks in. The employees are not complete jerks or any thing the store manager is far from perfect and has some social skills that need work, but she does bring good things to the table. My other store is a store that focuses on the positive things in the store. The employees and managers talk to each other like this " Hey Susie! Great job with produce this morning it looks amazing, but did you notice that the signs were off?" She would respond with "Thanks, It was a tough truck. I did noticed I just didn't get to it yet." Then I went on to tell her that I would take care of. Those positive interactions in the store and focusing on the positives really makes the employees want to come to work. The entire staff looks at the store that way. They tell me things like, Oh the truck was hard it was 15 pallets, but at least nothing broke. The positive atmosphere that is that store is inspiring, and they are grateful for the small things like nothing breaking while putting truck out. The two stores have different feelings when you walk into the door, and is felt by everyone. The store that has the negative out look has a high turn over rate and the store that is positive has had some of their employees for 10 years. 
      

      After reading this article I thought about the other day when I took 20 minutes to do nothing but watch a silly cartoon in bed. I was completely relaxed and it felt amazing after the long semester that has been crushing me. I remember getting out of bed and saying "wow that was absolutely amazing!" I had taken that type of relaxation before work or right after a long day at work for granted until I went back to school and forgot how amazing it was to have those moments. I think going back to school and depriving myself of them has made me so much more grateful for them! 

I challenge you to be grateful for at least three things DAILY in your LIFE and they CAN'T be the same things every day! Every day for two weeks has to be a different thing that you are GRATEFUL for! Record this in a journal with your mood of that day, and try it during different times of the day and with different feelings. ARE you going to be MORE positive in the END?

Until Next Time..

Native Americans Research

In class today we had a cooperative learning lesson to research a Native American Tribe and create a power point to explain the tribe to the rest of the class. I was not looking forward to this at first because we have done this in middle school, and I thought that it was just going to be a repeat of what I have learned already. BUT BOY WAS I WRONG...

My group got to explore the Muscogee Tribe and this tribe was very interesting. I learned quite a bit about this tribe the their ways. This tribe was often called the Creek Tribe because they lived near creeks. Although they were forced out of their homelands they re-established their home in Oklahoma. This tribe did not wear the traditional head piece that many Native Americans are "remembered as" The men in the tribe did wear their hair in a Mohawk style.

The Muscogee tribe wore the traditional breech cloth and moccasins. The women wore wrap around dresses. In the winter the men would wear leather leggings to keep warm and mantels made out of deer skin. 

We needed a way to make our tribe engaging to the entire class so I was very relieved when Jenna told me that she knew how to do their traditional dance! I was very excited! She taught the entire group how to do the stomp dance and we got to perform it for the class! Every group had a traditional dance and most of them were done around a fire and to Mother Earth. I found this very interesting. I will use this in my classroom when teaching the students about Native Americans. 

I think my favorite part of this lesson was learning about all of the other Native American tribes and their lives and comparing them to the lives of the Muscogee. We played an awesome scavenger hunt game after we presented the Native American tribes. This was a clever way to make sure that the students were obtaining the information.

A video about the Muscogee tribe that is very relaxing!

Newspapers & Current events ONLINE!

Today I presented a current events lesson with my partners. We presented a lesson on the 5 W's: What, Where, Who, When and Why. We used these to deceiver a news article. In this lesson we taught the class how to use wordle and include that into a current event project. When we were coming up with an idea of what to do we had decided that wordle would make reading a news article fun and interesting. We thought that in our classroom the students could each a news article of a current event that they would need to read for friday and bring it in but in the form of a wordle and explain it to the class using the 5 W's.

This is the wordle we used in our lesson and from this wordle I could explain to the class what the article was about. Who write to article and the article's title. The class all made their own and shared them.This activity can be modified for most ages. The wordle can be added for the middle level grades and dropped for the lower level grades. The upper level grades like fifth and sixth grade could use the wordle to write a summary about their article to present to the class. The wordles could be included in a power point that all of the students contribute to. I had a lot of fun working with this program and making a wordle. We used an online news site called newsela, and I really like this site because you can quiz yourself on the article or highlight important features of the article.

Every group presented a different way to use current events in the classroom and I have found them most helpful in thinking of creative ways to get students excited about reading the paper and involving themselves in the world beyond their front door.

I remember doing current events in school every Friday we had to bring in an article about a court case (it was for a criminal justice class). We had to provide a summary explaining what happened in the court case and who was involved. I found this a lot of fun but it was because it was a subject that I wanted to learn about. I remember doing this current events activity in 8th grade and it was not as much fun. I was never interested in the articles that I picked and that was part of the problem. I would like to take this activity one step further and incorporate the community into the current events project. I would like the students to pick articles that are taking place in their community and how they could get involved and depending on the grade level challenging the students to get involved on their own. The students who are too young to do this I would incorporate food drives or other ways for them to get involved in the classroom, the students would then bring their food to the soup kitchen or church that gives it out to the needy. Having the students see where the food goes I believe is very important for them to grasp the concept of community and helping and giving.

I was given an article "5 Ways Students Can Visually Explore the News." by Richard Byrne
This article was very interesting and gives great examples of how students can explore the news on their own. All of the ways he goes into are all online and all free!! I really liked the Newseum's Today's Front Pages. This website is really awesome! It connects where the papers are written with in relationship to where you are plus it gives you the front page view of their paper! I played around with this site and It was a lot of fun to see how many papers are written in certain states and the distances between them. This can spark a conversation about cities and towns and why there maybe more papers written in the city verses a town.

I would like to challenge you to think of ways to incorporate your class in the community around you. How will you educate your students on the community they live in and how will you get your students to realize that there are people out there less fortunate then they are?!?

Until Next time!

Economics...AHHHHH!

ECONOMICS!
When I first saw this word I cringed, and thought to myself "UH OH, I don't know anything about this boring subject!". Boy was I wrong! I actually knew a lot about economics, and this surprised me. I hear the word and I think boring stock market, and bouncy numbers and positive and negative signs. I know that positive signs is what you want when playing the stock market, and that different investments bring in different amounts depending on how much you invest and at what share. I know that it is a good way to make money if you know what to invest in, and if you know about different companies. I remember investing in stocks in my 8th grade Social Studies class with my favorite teacher. I don't remember how my group did or how the activity was ended, and I think that this is because like a lot of things my class did we just never finished it. I wonder about my fake stocks and where I invested my money, and how my stocks did. I believe that I would use this in my classroom to teach stocks and investment and how it influences nations, communities and people. Stocks can be bought from different countries, and for different companies. If I were to buy a stock in a company in Japan that makes electronics then I have influenced Japans economy. When I buy their product in the store I have influenced Japans economy. I am demanding a product that Japan supplies. Supply and Demand influences communities that have processing plants, or factories. When the demand is up the factories need more workers which means that more people in the community will be hired which means that more money is being made by the people. The people turn around and spend their money in their community to purchase such things as food and goods. It's the circle of Life in the world we now live in.

Economics is the study of the production and consumption of goods and the transfer of wealth to produce and obtain those goods. Economics explains how people interact within markets to get what they want or accomplish certain goals.
Economics can be included in the classroom in many different ways. The students could put together their own Lemonade stand, and learn about supply and demand. I think that for an elementary classroom this is the perfect exercise for them, and the students have to purchase their supplies and market their product, as well as design their store front and sell their product.
I worked for a small business owner throughout high school and a little bit into college, and I had a first hand glance at how the local economy effected his business. When the community was doing well and the tourists were in town the play house was open and the warehouse was on a hiring frenzy the business did great! When summer ended and the tourists went home, the playhouse only opened on weekends, and the warehouse was on a hiring freeze the business did poorly. During the winter he couldn't afford to keep on to his staff so he would let go some of his workers. The rest of his workers were on strict tight schedules and this would last until the holiday season. During the holiday season things picked back up, online orders were coming in, the playhouse was opening a few more days, tourists were back for their families, and other businesses demanded his goods. He would hire back on the ones who he had to lay off, and business would be good. The struggle for the small business is to survive through the winter and emerge again in the Spring ready and open for business. This is becoming harder and harder on small business and they are closing rapidly. I worked for this man for 6 years or so, and It has been a rough ride for him. I had only ever wanted to see him succeed in his visions but I am sad to say that he may not make it through this winter. The economy in my hometown has gotten so bad that no one is able to spend money in his bakery. There have been other shops that have gone out of business recently in that town. Wal-Mart opened down the street from his bakery, and has been winning over his loyal customers, customers who have been going there since they were kids and their parents were bringing them. Wal-Mart is a big business that has had a downsizing effect on the community, although their economy may be doing well the economy of the town is suffering.
--- This is an example of how economics effects the community, and the people who live with in it.

After listening to the class explain and go over the different points of economics and how to apply these in the classroom I don't feel so overwhelmed by this! Every body who had presented put a lot of work and thought into their slides to teach the rest of the class how to use economics in the classroom. I found it helpful that there are so many different sites out on the internet that can be used to apply these ideas of economics in the classroom.

These are the economic slides that my partner and I made for our presentation about Economics influencing People, communities and Nations.

The Glogster that I created that I thought was so much fun. This helped me understand economics better and to really get a handle on it. I thought that this could be used in the classroom as a group project or individual projects. I like that it had different backgrounds but you were not stuck to those you could pick your own. It allows you to add videos and pictures! I like that it is a multimedia poster and I am sure that I will be using this program in the future.

Celebration of Learning

Today with the fifth graders we had a celebration of learning! The students were very well behaved while we taught them. The students showed each teacher patients and consideration while they were being taught. Our class didn't have any outbursts or misbehaving students, and this I am very thankful of. I enjoyed teaching and learning with this class of fifth graders, and I see very bright futures for them. These fifth graders were very bright and intelligent. They came up with some awesome ideas for their cooperation projects and they worked well together. I couldn't ask more of a classroom. We celebrated their learning with white board paddles that the students can use during a lesson to answer questions. The fifth grade teachers were excited to get these paddles, but the students faces lit up when they saw them. The class really appreciated the paddles and that was a great feeling. I am glad that I got to spend time with this class learning. These students had taught me so much, and I will use the knowledge they taught me to further my development of my teaching skills. I can say that I am very blessed to have taught such a wonderful and well behaved fifth grade class.

Jeopardy

Jeopardy in the classroom sounds a fun and engaging way to make sure the students understand and know the content that you have been teaching. It sounds like it would be a fun way to review information with students. I remember playing jeopardy in class growing up, and I remember how much fun it was. I remember learning information that I didn't learn the first time around and I remember it being engaging and fun. BUT what I don't remember is that when this game would be introduced the fighting would begin. Students would jump up and demand to be captain of the teams and the teams were never "fair". I played this is college recently and still the fights continued. The arguments of the teams not being "fair" was thrown out by different teams (the ones losing at that time). I should have remembered all of this when we decided to play this game with the fifth grade class.
   What an adventure! I am glad that we did this experiment because I now know how to handle my own class when it is time to review. I am not sure that Jeopardy is right for every classroom, and for this classroom it was not the appropriate game. This should have been clear when the class was having trouble working with certain students, but this was over looked. There would be some things that I would do differently in my next adventure of playing jeopardy in the classroom.
           FIRST I will make strict rules of the game. I will not assume that the class already knows how to play, because that was the problem we ran into. I will reiterate the rules every time this game is played so there are no questions about "fairness" of play. These rules will include ONE "leader" from each group that will speak or write their answer. This will include HOW the groups are divided up, and this will depend on the class size and how the class interacts with each other. Students will be reminded that BULLYING is not allowed, and that talking  down to any other player will be an automatic point deduction and kicked out of the game. Although, I suspect just mentioning that will discourage and end any thoughts of talking down to other players. 
              Jeopardy is a great way to review topics with students as long as the students realize that there are rules and they should and need to be followed so everyone can participate and learn. Some students learn with competition and others do not learn that way so making sure that the game is for your classroom is important before introducing the game. Students should be motivated to play the game and so offering bonus points on tests or homework is a good way to make sure that everyone participates.
   I would like to try to play Jeopardy again in the classroom but I would make sure that ground rules are laid out first and agreed upon. The students need to agree to play by these rules or they will not play by the rules and all chaos will break out.
          Playing Jeopardy with the fifth graders was an eye opener to the different types of personalities and learning styles that will be present in the classroom, and this should be taken into consideration when these types of games are designed. Although, I didn't think it was a complete waste of a day because some of the students left the game with information that they didn't know before, and that's the goal of the game. The game should be designed to go over information already gone over in the lesson, and the questions should be designed to get the students to think. I think that the questions were mixed between difficult and easy questions which there should be a range of questions of the range of learners. I do wish that the game would have allowed pictures to be added for the visual learners. I believe that I will use this game again in the classroom.

What are Artifact Bags?!??!

This week in class we have been working on artifact bags! We first got to play the role of the student and in a group we were historians! We got to research and try to figure out the Five W's (Who, What, Where, When, and Why) these items were important. We had to solve each artifact to figure out who the person was, and we did it! Together my group discovered that the person was our teacher Professor Smirnova! I really enjoyed doing this activity because it was a fun way to learn about our teacher. 

   Then...the roles changed! We became the teachers and we were told to put together an artifact bag that contained three or four artifacts , a book, a primary source and a website for our classmates to try to guess who or what we were! These artifact bags were based off of the unit plans that we taught to the fifth graders, so one person from each group met with another person from the other groups and we taught each other using our artifact bags. This was a fun way to learn about each of the groups assignment.

            BUT WHAT DID I PUT IN MY ARTIFACT BAG?!

I tried to come up with a few clues that could only belong to John Smith; as well as, clues that could have belonged to someone else. I took this approach because I wanted to challenge my fellow classmates. I chose the charter given to John Smith from England to settle in Jamestown. I choose this charter because I thought that it was a good primary source of information. I also thought that it could help my classmates figure out who but not giving it away completely. I chose a map of Virginia from the 1607’s. I chose this because I needed my classmates to know where the mystery person went. I chose tobacco and a tobacco leaf because, this was the cash crop of Virginia. I chose the family crest of John Smith, because this is something unique to John Smith. The family crest was something my classmates had to look up to figure out what it was, and what it was used for. I chose the book “The Jamestown Colony” by Gail Skaurai, because  I wanted to give my classmates some information about Jamestown. I included a few websites that I found that I thought would be helpful in their research. 

I used a website from the history channel, a website that contained a lot of history of Jamestown along with a video. 

Teaching each other these lessons was a good way for us to practice and to become more confident in teaching lessons to a class. I thought this was a creative way to teach social studies. 

IN THE CLASSROOM

This can be incorporated into any topic that you teach. It is tool that can be used to have students wear a different 'hat" while learning. They can become historians, researchers or archaeologists. 

My challenge for you is to use artifact bags to engage your students in a new aspect of learning.

Until next time

Teacher Observations.

All week in class we have been watching other groups present their lessons, and we are asked to watch these lessons and figure out what is wrong with them, and what we liked about them. Each group has grown and has expanded their lesson plans. Each group has brought something different to the table. I liked that each group presented three lesson plans, and got to teach them all. I enjoyed watching the other groups teach their lessons. I have learned so much. The students seem to be very engaged in each lesson. I think that as the groups teach the students become better at transitions because they know what the teachers expect. Each group has done something different for their inquiry and cooperative learning lessons, and I like that we get to see different ideas for each type of lesson.

    I like that our teacher gave us specific things that each one of us need to work on to become a better teacher/presenter/educator. I like that each of my peers will be sending me feedback on my groups performance. I think that this will be super helpful. I am always looking for what I have done wrong and what I can improve on.

  I think that being observed is one of the most terrifying feelings. I don't mind that my peers will be giving me feedback, because I am looking forward to this. I just don't like being watched, and I know that this is something that I will have to get over because with Ed TPA and the new certifications I will be observed quite a bit. I like that we are being taught how to handle these situations by being observed during class.

       HERE IS A CHALLENGE FOR YOU! WHEN GIVING FEEDBACK TRY GIVING SOME POSITIVE FEEDBACK, BECAUSE NO ONE WANTS TO HEAR JUST THE BAD THINGS THAT THEY HAVE DONE. SHOWING SOMEONE THEIR FLAWS IS A HARD THING TO DO,SO WHY NOT COMPLEMENT SOMETHING THAT THEY DID GOOD BEFORE YOU ASK THEM TO CHANGE ANYTHING OR SWITCH ANYTHING.

Until next Time!

Discoveries from lessons in fieldwork.

This image sums up the experience I had with teaching in front of an entire class. This was my first time teaching in front of an entire class so it was learning while I was doing. 

What did I discover about planning the lesson :

       I Enjoyed planning the lesson, but found it difficult at first. I wasn't sure where to start or how to start. I had to get information from the group before to figure out where to start my lesson at. I found it easier to write the lesson plan and the power point at the same time.

       I thought that the cooperative learning lesson was a challenge to figure out how to teach the idea that we had. I still get nervous when teaching.

I believe that over planning, and over practicing are the keys to a good lesson. My group had a few actives but we could have have more.

What did I discover about teaching the lesson:

   It was Different, and I was not use to the whole class. I have only ever had three or four kids in a group that I was teaching at one time, I enjoyed it but, I just wish I had more time to teach the lesson

   I discovered I do not project my voice enough.

 
Students and how they responded to us, expectations did they meet them or not? 

     It was not as difficult as i first imagined. The students were pretty well behaved and let us teach with out complaining. I thought that some ideas needed to be covered again because the students didn't grasp them, Society and Colony they still confuse the two.

     I thought that the class was smart and he feedback on the homework proved to our group that the students understood the Roanoke lesson. Some of the students had very good insights.

I had made Popsicle sticks to use to pick on different students, but I didn't need to use them.

- The students were eager to learn.  Although next time I would assign roles for inquiry and cooperative learning lessons.

About self : how did I perform in all aspects and in teaching in front of the classroom?

   -In the planning of the lesson plan I believe that I did well. I thought that I gave some great ideas and insights. I thought that most of my group was very informative about their information and tried to help each other out. I did learn that I need to project my voice. I also learned that I need to practice more on how to say the "harder" words, and possibly use a you tube video for the entire class to hear the word and everyone join in saying it.

About team teaching and what did I discover?

   There were lots of ideas, and I thought that we did a great job with working together.

   I thought that we helped each other with each section of the lesson plan and the power points

   We had met a few times, but wish  could have met more. Although it was difficult because not everyone live don campus and some of us worked and had classes late. It was hard to meet up but, we did it.

   It was all of our first time teaching in front of the class, and so we had no experience to go on, except group one. It was difficult to plan a lesson when we weren't sure how to go about it, but with some outside help I think that we did pretty well with the lesson plan its self.

   Working in google docs helped so even if someone couldn't make the meeting they could see what was going on and have some input. 

  We got to depended on each other to get the work done and helped if it got to be to much, or weren't sure how to do something. I liked that we were able to rely on each other, and I couldn't image having to do three lesson plans by myself in that short of a period.

Students learn differently, and it was hard to get all of their needs in one lesson. Direct, Inquiry and Cooperative learning are three different types of lesson plans but all aspects of students learning abilities can be implement in them. 

My question to you is how are you going to use everything you have learned about yourself and team teaching to make you a better teacher? 

Until next time.

  

First lesson!

Today my group taught our Direct lesson and this was the first time we have taught in front of a class. We have been working so hard on our lesson plan and going over each slide and what we were going to say and what information we wanted to the students to know. It was difficult to make it fit into that 30 minute block, but it was fun being in front of the classroom. I like being in the front of the class, but I like when the students are more involved in the lesson. That is hard to do with direct lesson with teaching three topics in one session, but It was fun. I am very excited for the next two lessons Inquiry and Cooperative learning.

         The first lesson plan was overwhelming to work on alone, luckily we had a group of people to help us develop the lesson plan along with the power point of the information.The Direct instruction lesson I believe is the hardest lesson to plan and write. I think that it was hard to figure out how to capture the students attention and how to keep it. Although, my group was the second to go I don't believe that the group did that bad. I think that we all worked together fairly well which was very helpful. I liked that we met for days before we were to present our lesson, and that we worked as a team on the finished project.

            The second and third lesson plans were rough. The team was very busy with their own personal lives, and so the actual face to face time we got with each other was limited and small. We pulled it together though, and we made it work. We knew what we wanted to do for the inquiry lesson, but it was the getting it together that was the tough part. I thought that using mystery bags or artifact bags was a great idea. The students were very excited to explore them, and I was excited to see how the lesson plan would work out. I thought that the lesson was successful in the aspect of the students learning about the Lost Colony of Roanoke, and the different theories. I thought that teaching wise there was a lot of room for improvement, but I thought that the lesson was better then the direct lesson. 

The third lesson plan Cooperative learning was a lot of fun! I thought that the students really enjoyed making their own Jamestown with each other. I thought that the students were engaged. The groups were a little rough one of the groups the students fought over parts. The students had trouble working together, and when the teacher tried to walk them through it the students calmed down a little. The students presented well, but it was clear which students were part of the planning and which students were not. I liked this type of learning the best, and I loved how hands on cooperative learning is. I think that the students will walk away with some knowledge about what makes a society and how the Jamestown society worked.

MY CHALLENGE TO YOU IS HOW TO MAKE THE DIRECT LESSON AS INTERESTING AS THE INQUIRY LESSON AND COOPERATIVE LEARNING LESSON. DIRECT LESSON IS IMPORTANT. HOW DO YOU PLAN ON ENGAGING THE STUDENTS SO THAT THEY ENJOY THIS LESSON AS MUCH AS A COOPERATIVE LEARNING LESSON?

Until Next Time

Meeting the students!

MEETING THE CLASS!

Today we met the students and we had to design an activity that would get them interested in what we would be teaching and trying to active prior knowledge about the topics we would be covering. This was a lot of fun. I enjoyed talking with each student and getting to know a little bit about each students.

This also gave us an opportunity to work with the group that we would be teaching with, and I think it was a great introduction to each other of how of our teaching styles. I thought that the group meshed well together, and that we were all on the same page about the learning outcomes of the students for the first day. We wanted to leave the students with some kind of valuable knowledge that they could use later on when we taught our cooperative lesson plan.
     I really enjoyed meeting with the students and coming up with a getting to know you activity. I thought that the students were engaged and liked our getting to know you activity. I am very excited to work with the students and teach them all about New Spain, The Lost Colony or Roanoke and about Jamestown.