Blog: Science Methods Last Blog!!

Reflection

Throughout this month, I have taught my clinical learning experience, as well as joined my robotics team at our elementary school! I am most proud of teaching my clinical learning segment. I struggled this week with the amount of workload that I have to finish before the end of the semester. To deal with this struggle, I am just doing one thing at a time until I am done. The most satisfaction was brought to me by teaching my lesson, because the students really enjoyed this and it was something that my students do not normally get to do within the normal day. For this week, I feel like I contributed well. We have not had too many class discussions for me to be a part of, but what we have I felt like I was very engaged and brought good conversations to the table. For these upcoming weeks, I can help my class by bringing encouragement to everyone. For NCTCS I learned about 4e which states that teachers need to allow students to gain problem-solving skills as well as critical thinking skills. This is something that I tried to do in my lesson and am trying to gain information on during my robotics club. I want to incorporate these into my future classroom by having the ability to make my students gain problem-solving skills as well as critical thinking skills. 

Outside Learning

For my outside learning, I looked up an article that discusses robotics teams at elementary schools.  This is something that is important to have at a school and can have the ability to really allow the students to gain problem-solving skills along with critical thinking skills. This would be a great way to add something to our school (if they do not already have it). 

Tweets

This tweet discusses an article from Edutopia that will allow you to look at 16 quick brain breaks to help your students get a break from learning and refresh their mind so they have the ability to continue to learn to the best of their ability!

This tweet discussed using an app to help students during a unit label different parts of the trees that the students made out of construction material. I think this is a great way to allow the students to get a hands-on learning activity but also have the ability to incorporate technology for learning. 

This was an event that the school robotics team hosted for all the students to have an ability to show off their robotics team and everything that they have been doing. I think this is a great way to get the entire school involved within the robotics team even though not everyone will be a part of the team. 

Current Event 

For this week, I wanted to look up an article that would really WOW students if you shared it with them. For this week I found an article that discussed mosquitoes and how they are surfing winds from Africa. This can allow the students to gain some sort of global awareness (having to know where the mosquitos are coming from) as well as gain more information about something that all my students encounter within their lives. 

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/mosquitoes-winds-africa-sahel-malaria

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Current Experiences

Throughout this past month, I had the ability to teach more lessons within my classroom. I also had the chance to start helping out with the Robotics Team on Campus! This is an amazing experience that I am able to be a part of! The students are trying to complete "missions" so they have to code a Lego car that they made and then have the ability to complete each different mission. On top of this, the students have to research and present the information that they found during their research. This is something that I thought was very interesting and important for students to be a part of! The students are using their higher level thinking and having to use the scientific method fully to continue to look at their evidence and what is working and what isn't working and then to try something different. This is directly related to NCTCS 4E which states, "Teachers help students develop critical thinking and problem-solving skills". Teachers have to allow students to be challenged to critical think and really try to gain problem-solving skills. This is something that is going to go beyond school and something that the students will take with them for their whole life.

Outside Research

For my outside research, I have a link here that will help you start a robotics team at your school if they do not already have one. This is super helpful for all of us future teachers and something that we can do to enhance our school. 

https://www.weareteachers.com/how-to-start-robotics-team/

Future classroom

In my future classroom, I want to make sure that I am going to be allowing my students to gain problem-solving skills, as well as critical thinking skills. This is something that is going to be SO important for my students once they have finished elementary school. I love that this is something that is going to affect my students for their whole life and it is something that they need to learn at a young age. If my future school does not have a robotics team, I want to try to create one and give the students the ability to use these critical thinking skills and problem-solving skills. 

Science Methods: Blog #3

Reflection

Throughout this week, I have worked on my edTPA learning segment for Science Methods. I am proud of finishing this learning segment and working with my CE to create a hands on activity that the students will be able to participate in while learning. I have struggled with formalizing what I am doing with the students into words and really explaining everything that I am supposed to within my lesson plans. To fix this struggle, I have been writing what I am going to be doing and saying throughout the lesson plans. What brought me the most satisfaction out of the month is working on the edTPA lesson and finishing this. It is a big component of this class, and I am one more step closer to finishing it! I now have to teach this learning segment. My action step to complete over the next week/month is to teach my learning segment and start working on the edTPA task 1, task 2, and task 3. This will allow me to finish this learning experience before Thanksgiving. 

Tweets

This tweet deals with how students can use identify different bacteria (candy) and then eat them! This is a fun activity that you can do around halloween with the upper grade levels.

This tweet is discussing a task that you can give students around halloween that requires the students to create the tallest and most effective scarecrow. This requires the students to brainstorm and interact together as a team to create their scarecrow. This is a good STEM activity that can also be used to teach durability and strength of materials. 

This tweet is a link to an article that discusses the edTPA helpful tips and guidance when dealing with analyzing student performance and how you can do this correctly.

Outside Research

For my outside research, I looked into teaching science effectively and principles that can be incorprated while teaching science effectively. One of my favorite from this article was discussing how you have to remove the misconceptions in order to fully teach the lesson. I think this is something that can be used not only in science, but in every other subject. Students need to get their misconceptions solved and corrected before the lesson starts.

Current Event

One current event that not many people may know about is the fact of this new robot has been created that can change its shape/body depending on the task at hand. This is something that has huge measure within the science environment. This shows that science and engineering practices are constantly changing and improving and even in our classroom, these things are going to have a huge affect on our students and our future classrooms.  In NCTCS 4d states, " Teachers integrate and utilize technology in their instruction." This is something that is going to be very crucial within our future classroom and within our science instruction. This is what I learned about the NCTCS and this can affect my future classroom becase technology is constantly changing and as teachers we have to be aware of the new technology and how to incorporate this new technology within my future classroom.

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/robot-autonomous-transform-shape-shift-modules

435 Blog Post 3

Learning Experiences 

Since the last blog, I have officially taught my edTPA learning segment and done my "mock edTPA"! I loved having the ability to have a peer reviewer and have the chance to read my partner's work and make corrections and for them to do that for me. I think that was the most beneficial part of the whole process because I got to see a point of view that I was not thinking about. The more practice I have with edTPA the more comfortable I am going to be with edTPA. I think this is so important, especially when we are going to be doing the real edTPA next semester! edTPA is all about explaining why you are doing the things that you are doing while you teach. It really makes you formulate into words what is happening within the classroom. edTPA encompasses so many NCTCS. Especially NCTCS 1, NCTCS 2, as well as NCTCS 4. All of these are about leading within the classroom, establishing a good/respectful learning environment, as well as reflecting on your teaching. These are all things that are encompassed within edTPA. 

Outside Research 

For my outside research this week, I looked up helpful edTPA hints. These hints can help us be successful while doing edTPA and doing these mock trials. I think all of these are important that could be helpful within our future classroom. 

https://www.edweek.org/tm/articles/2014/07/29/ctq_jette_edtpa.html

Future Classroom

In my future classroom, I am not going to be doing edTPA and I am not going to be focused on making a certain score at the end of the day. One thing that is true though, is that I am going to be focused on the principles of edTPA and what edTPA is addressing. For example, I am going to be aligning everything that I am planning to an assessment as well as reflecting on the work of my students. Taking data and analyzing the data to see what my students actually understood from the lesson. Make sure that I am creating a respectful learning environment for the entire class. I want to make sure that all my students feel respected and loved while they are in my classroom. I may not be fully judged every day like edTPA but I will be keeping myself to a high standard on these specific things every day. 

435 Blog Post 2

Reference Learning 

During these past couple of weeks, I have done a lot of different projects that have been very beneficial to help me understand more about my school and about my own personal teaching. One of these projects was the leadership and collaboration project. Throughout this project, I had the ability to look at my school's NC School Report Card as well as data that can be found through the DPI North Carolina website. For this project, I had to analyze this data that I found and had to create a school improvement plan based off of this data. I was able to collaborate with teachers that are on the school improvement plan team as well as upper administration throughout the school. After looking at the school improvement plan and discussing, I have decided to create a parent night that deals directly with English Language Arts. The school I am placed at struggles with reading more so than struggling with math, therefore, my parent night is going to be focused on reading. Since I am placed in fourth grade, we are going to have an EOG Prep Night dealing specifically with Reading Comprehension. I am going to have the parents learn reading comprehension strategies that can help these students during the EOG. I am going to have a pamphlet with these strategies that the parents will be able to take home with them and continue practicing these strategies with their students before the EOG. This event will take place during parent-teacher conferences and have the ability to be a "session" that the parents will be able to attend. We planned this way so that I will have a larger turn out since parents will already be there for the conferences. Planning a parent night based off of the school report card and school data is directly related to all of NCTCS 2, especially NCTCS 2e which states "Teachers work collaboratively with the families and significant adults in the lives of their students". As teachers, I am going to have to work collaboratively with families and anyone that has influence into the lives of the students. I want to make sure that I am creating a partnership that will be able to help each student prosper within education. I am super excited to actually go through with this parent night during student teaching and to continue to learn from all the teachers around me! 

Outside Learning

For outside learning, I researched a website on how to build a better parent night and how to create an event that is going to truly be successful. This website can be found at https://www.teachingforchange.org/how-to-build-a-better-parent-teacher-night

Future Classroom

In my future classroom, I want to continue to look at my school's data and report card and create parent nights that can be beneficial for all of the students within my classroom for short-term goals but as well as long-term goals. I want to make sure that I am being a leader in my classroom and fully being attentive to the needs of all my students. I want to make sure that I am working with everyone within the school to create a parent night that will be beneficial for all of my students and successfully planned and attented. 

Science Methods: September

Reflection of September

Throughout this month we have continued to learn many things! We have discussed using Cl-Ev-R within our future classroom. This is a research-based strategy that discusses how students can make a claim (Cl) and back this claim with evidence (Ev) and then use reason (R) to make sure that everything makes sense.  This strategy can be used in science, math, and English language arts. This is also a strategy that can be used throughout their lives with problem-solving. This week I struggled with starting my unit, but we were able to discuss the unit in class and discuss more of the expectations and look at an exemplary unit. This really helped me deal with this struggle and know how to plan for the future. The thing that brought me the most satisfaction this week is most likely our science fair project! We planted the seeds and just within a week, the seeds have grown so much! It may seem small and insignificant, but I have loved watching the seeds grow and watching how each day that we look at them that they get bigger and bigger! It is like they are my little babies and growing up so fast! My action steps for this upcoming week and month are to really start working on my unit and get progress done. I will work on a section and a half every week and really try to make little progress throughout the next month. I contributed this week to the class through discussion as well as being present within each class. For the science fair project, I contributed by watering the plants after each class and making sure that we were documenting the data. Next week I can contribute to the class by fully looking at the information for the week and looking at all of the classwork material and being prepared for the class. 

Tweets

This tweet above discusses how there is an incoming storm tonight within Mecklenburg County along with Cleveland County. This picture of the storm can be used to increase inquiry of weather and storms within the future classroom. You can ask the students what causes the changes in the clouds and why one side looks sunny and the other has this massive cloud. 

This tweet discussed how the students were able to do projects and how they learned more from doing the projects then they did sitting in a lecture. This made me really think about how within my future classroom I want to include performance tasks based off of GRASPS. This allows the students to really choose what they want to do for the performance task and have the ability to fully show what they have learned about the information. 

This tweet discusses how you can respond to students that are struggling. I found this to be very useful because, in my clinical, I have a lot of students that shut down when they do not understand or do not think that they can do the material. This is important to try to incorporate these into your future classroom. 

Outside Research

For my outside research this week, I found an article on Edutopia that discussing using Cl-Ev-R in the classroom and the benefits of using this strategy. I found that this was very useful because it even had videos that can be used to help teach this strategy within the classroom! 

https://www.edutopia.org/blog/science-inquiry-claim-evidence-reasoning-eric-brunsell

Scientific Thinking

An event that has recently been related to science that we have all experienced was hurricane Florence. This was a category 4/3 hurricane that affected the coast of North Carolina along with South Carolina. This can be used to promote phenomenon as well as how we can see science in the world around us. NCTCS 3D states that "Teachers make instruction relevant to students". This is more evident with the use of Cl-Ev-R as well as having an inquiry-based classroom. Science can have a huge impact on making instruction relevant to your students. 

435 Blog 1

Hey everyone! 

This month

This month has been crazy busy! I have absolutely loved being able to be in my classroom three days a week and getting involved with my students more and more with each visit. I have learned so many things already and I am so excited to keep learning throughout the semester. One big component we have done so far for 435 is work on classroom management plan of our current class that we are placed in as well as a classroom management system for our own future classroom. These projects have been so important for me to really see what is happening in school today and really process what I like and do not like. I think it is important to have a classroom management plan in a classroom because if not the class would be chaotic and the kids would be doing whatever they wanted to be doing. Classroom management plans are there to make sure that the class is organized and the students are all well behaved. NCTCS 2A states "Teachers provide an environment in which each child has a positive, nurturing relationship with caring adults". Having a classroom management plan is so crucial to creating this positive learning environment. Students need to have this learning environment to really have the ability to learn everything that they can.

Outside Learning

For my outside research for this blog, I researched more in-depth into classroom management plans. I found this Edutopia article that discusses 5 priorities for a classroom management plan.
https://www.edutopia.org/blog/5-priorities-classroom-management-ben-johnson One of the priorities that it discusses is to have a working relationship with your students. I think this is something that is SO important within a classroom. Your students are not going to listen to you if they do not have a relationship with you. The more relationships you build the closer you will be with your students.

Future Classroom

In my future classroom, I want to make sure that my classroom management plan is going to allow my students to have a positive and encouraging learning environment every single day. I want my students to feel safe and welcomed within the walls of my classroom. I want to make sure that I am providing an environment that every child can be positive and have a good experience. I want to make sure that I am going to have a good relationship with my students. I want every child to know they are loved and cared for. 

I can not wait to learn more throughout this semester. 

Science Methods: August

Science Methods

This semester I am embarking on a new journey, which is science methods! We have learned about a lot so far and we are only a little over a week in. During this first week, we learned about the NGSS; which is the Next Generation Science Standards. I had no idea that the NGSS even existed, so learning about a new set of standards on top of the NCSCOS was a little overwhelming for me honestly. I am most proud of how I continued to research and dig deep into the NGSS even though it was slightly overwhelming for me. I would also say this was my struggle throughout the week. I felt like there was so much going on and so many standards that I have to squeeze into other subjects at school, considering most schools do not have a set science time. To overcome this, I mostly just tried to relax and look at this as another tool to help me in my future. These standards are something that can help me teach the most relatable and interacting standards. I really tried to change my mindset throughout this week to think of these NGSS standards are something that can really help my teaching in the future. This week we also made ecocolumns! I loved doing this because when I was in school I never had the opportunity to make these or do any other fun hands-on activity. I think making this eco-column was the most satisfaction of the week. I think it was the most satisfying again for the fact that I never did anything like this as a child, and doing it now really shows that I could use this in my classroom one day. The action steps that I want to take next week are getting more progress on our science fair project. We have finalized what our project is going to be, and I want to really get that into words and create a shared document so we can all see the progress being made. I also want to really document what happens with my eco-column. Throughout this next week, I want to make sure that I am going to be monitoring the seeds that I planted and make sure that I am watering them correctly and documenting when they sprout and how many centimeters (if any) they grew. I want to make sure I am getting everything out of this project that I can. I think I contributed to the class very well by adding in conversations and being present throughout each class meeting. I also think everyone contributed really throughout the ecocolumn project. Each pair helped each other punch holes and cut each bottle. (This is another thing I am proud of -- nobody cut themselves today).  Next week I can help our classmates by having ideas or inputs that maybe others don't think about. Bringing in outside knowledge can really be beneficial to our class.

Outside Learning

For my outside learning this week, I looked up more information about eco-columns. This article comes from learner.org which helps with teacher resources and information. This discusses eco-columns and their purpose. It also discusses different science topics that can be introduced and explained throughout the eco-column. It goes through the curriculum that can be discussed throughout these eco-columns. This information could be great in my future classroom if I do decide to use eco-columns in my classroom. This could help me teach and use ecocolumns to the fullest.

https://www.learner.org/courses/essential/life/bottlebio/ecocol/

Tweets

Here are my three tweets from this week. The first tweet discusses how STEM can start earlier than you think. It goes through how you can do STEM in kindergarten and you can use these activities to help get kids interested and involved in learning. In the article, it discusses how doing simple activities like making cookies can help children learn about chemistry or fractions. I loved hearing about how STEM can be useful and helpful at a young age. The second tweet was retweeted from NGSS. It discusses asking questions and defining problems in science and engineering. It discusses how in both it all begins with a question. It is a very interesting read and I thought it really continued my learning about NGSS. The last tweet discusses my ecocolumn that I built in class. To make an ecocolumn you use 3 two-liter bottles and you cut them into different sections. The bottom part is more of an aquarium. In a perfect world, the eco-column is self-sustainable.

Scientific Thinking

For my outside learning this week I learned about Hurricane Maria. It is extremely sad to learn about how the death toll went from around 60 to almost 3,000 people. This can be connected to learning about weather and natural events that happen around the world. Honestly, the first thing I thought about is how you can discuss this in your future classroom. Going over safety procedure if a hurricane comes near where you are living as well as how hurricanes form and what the damage could be.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/29/us/puerto-rico-growing-death-toll/index.html

Throughout this week I learned more about the NCTCS. During this week I learned more in depth of the standard 3d which states, "Teachers make instruction relevant to students." I think this is something that is SO important in our future classroom. Throughout this week learning about ecocolumns and learning about ways to make science relevant. At least that was my biggest takeaway, that how I was taught science is not the way that my students have to teach science. I can make science relevant and engaging for all of my students. That is what I want in my future classroom, I want to make sure that all of my students think of science as something that is fun and engaging and they are learning without even knowing it.

April: Social Studies Methods

Learning Experiences

Throughout this month, I have had the ability to do multiple different things throughout the semester. This semester I was able to finish all of my individual clinicals. I finally taught my clinical for Social Studies methods and it went really well! The students really enjoyed the activity and having the chance to move around the classroom and really engage in the activity. I also finished my virtual museum. This was a really neat experience and I really enjoyed having the opportunity to fully develop a virtual museum. This took a lot of hard work but it was something that could be used in my future classroom. NCTCS 4d states that teachers integrate and utilize technology in their instruction. This virtual museum was a great way that I can incorporate technology in my future classroom. Especially if I am unable to actually visit a specific museum or have the chance to take my classroom there, I will have the ability to let them visit this location virtually. I loved doing this experience! I also was able to write a concept-based unit this semester! This was a huge task and a big challenge, but it felt so rewarding. Concept-based units are very important to remember and to focus on because they can really help the students achieve different learning experiences as well as doing a big project at the end of the unit. This gives the students multiple different opportunities to fully show what they have learned throughout the unit. 

Outside Learning 

For my outside learning and research, I found an article that discusses how concept based learning can be proactive for the students. I thought this infographic could be something that is very beneficial. 

This article fully discusses the differences between concepts and topics, as well as what concept-based learning fully is. This article also really discusses how to adapt teaching strategies for including this concept-based learning. This also shows a nice infographic that discusses how concept-based instruction will look within your specific classroom. 

The article is: https://worldview.unc.edu/files/2013/07/Getting-the-Big-Idea-Handout.pdf

Future Classroom

In my future classroom, I want to make sure that I am using concept-based instruction. This way, I am fully trying to make sure that my students are learning these broad universal concepts that will go with them throughout the rest of learning experiences. I want to make sure that I am giving my students the opportunity to demonstrate their learning through experiences and demonstration, instead of just having the students take a test. I also want to make sure that during student teaching and during my years as a teacher I am taking advantage of using virtual museums. This allows the students to use technology to learn different content, as well as see things that may be unavailable to them. I want to make sure that I am doing all of these things to fully make sure that my students are learning everything that they possibly can. 

March

Classroom Experiences

This month I have had such great classroom experiences within my clinical placement. Although it has been a short month, I really enjoyed being in the classroom with students. I really love actually seeing how students act and watching how each teacher controls their classroom. We can learn so much just by going and watching our clinical placement teachers. Throughout my time at the clinical placement, I have seen numerous things. The first one being lice, and how important tea tree hair oil is! I have also learned to always keep your hair up at schools to make sure that everything is staying clean and secure to yourself. Another thing I have seen is how to deal strange situations. Like I said, you can learn a lot of secret classroom management tips and insight just by watching our CE teachers. Lastly, I have been able to teach individual groups. I think this really emphasized to me how important this small group time actually is. This is the time for the students to really focus on their individual level and the material that they need to know. The students are grouped based off ability. This way the students are able to read material that is on their current level. This allows the teachers to really be able to focus solely on the students and their own level of understanding. NCTCS 2 states: Teachers Establish a Respectful Environment for a Diverse Population of Students. Standard 2c says teachers, treat students as individuals. I feel like this really describes these guided reading groups. I feel like it is an area that focuses on students as individuals and how we can create this respectful environment for our diverse students.  I absolutely love this now that I have been able to see the benefits of this with my own eyes! I love being able to go to these schools and gain an insight to students today. I love being able to experience the school and the atmosphere of the elementary schools! It makes me extremely excited for my future classroom. 

DC TRIP

This month, I had the amazing opportunity to be able to go to Washington D.C and be a tourist for a few days! It was a very few eventful days, and I love that I went. It was A LOT of walking and A LOT of adventures but I loved every minute of it. I loved hearing our professor yelling HERITAGE to get another school's students back to their group. I loved being able to see Barrack Obama's brand new portrait in the portrait gallery. I loved being able to go into the Smithsonian's and get a glimpse of history! My favorite Smithsonian is the Natural Science because it has the giant elephant inside and I love elephants! (Fun fact: they are a sign of good luck) I was able to go to the brand new Bible museum. This was my absolute favorite museum that I have been to. It was so interactive and so unique and different than the other museums. I highly recommend making the trip up to D.C just to see this museum! Anyway, throughout the entire trip, I was constantly thinking about how cool it would be to take a school trip to D.C one day and have the students walk around and get to experience the nation's capital. I think this would be something that could be so beneficial for students to experience. I was thinking the entire trip that I never experienced this in elementary school because I am from Texas. It is much harder to plan a trip with that many elementary students to go that far. This made me realize how I could really take advantage of using a virtual museum. We are doing one in social studies methods, but throughout the entire trip, I was really thinking how that could be so beneficial for my students. Below is a picture of everyone that went on the trip with Senator Burr! This is a great picture and I will cherish it forever. For my outside research, I found where the Smithsonian offers a virtual reality online for those who are interested. This could be something that we can all use in our future classroom one day if we are unable to take our classes to D.C. https://naturalhistory.si.edu/VT3/

Future Classroom

In my future classroom, I want to make sure that I am going to be taking control of any issues that will come up in my classroom. (Believe me, they will definitely occur). I want to make sure that I am leading by example and I am going to be the leader in the classroom.  I want to make sure that I am taking advantage of doing this guided reading groups. I want to make sure that I am going to be placing my students based on ability so I am able to focus on each individual group and that group's needs. This is something that can be very beneficial to my future classroom. I am also going to be aware of all of the virtual museum that are already online and that I could create to make sure that my future students are getting everything that they possibly can out of my class. I am so excited for my future classroom and everything that it will offer one day! 

Social Studies Methods: Blog #2

Month Two

Time is going insanely quickly and I have a feeling that it is going to keep going even quicker! February has been a great month, and I have learned so much throughout this month. We have discussed edTPA, started our experience at Washington Elementary, and got our clinical placements for the semester! I have learned so much throughout this month and I am so excited for the months to come. Next month the education department is going to D.C (SO EXCITED!!) and also we have spring and easter break! Time is going to keep flying by, and it is so crazy to think that in a year I will be student teaching! I am so excited and so ready for this journey! 

Washington Elementary

This month we started our experience at Washington Elementary! During this experience, we are able to go to this school and help out within a classroom. I am in a first-grade classroom and I love my classroom as well as my teacher! I go to the school on both Monday and Tuesday morning and I am able to really connect with the students during this experience. On Monday, I am able to lead a group during WIN (What I Need) time. During this time, I am able to lead a group through a math lesson that the teacher has planned. So far, it has been dealing with knowing what a group of ten is and knowing the difference between tens place and ones place. This has been very eye opening to be able to help those individual students that are struggling with a specific topic. For my outside learning I read an article from Vanderbilt University and Cynthia Brame  said, "The small groups are essential to this process because students are able to both be heard and to hear their peers, while in a traditional classroom setting students may spend more time listening to what the instructor says" (Brame). This shows how important this time is! On Tuesday, I am able to be a part of guided reading groups. This is another time where the students are grouped based off of ability and they are able to participate in different events. This is something that is crucial within the classroom! These students need to be able to interact and learn with students that are in the same ability as they are, this way they are reading a passage that is on the same level as everyone in the group. I love being able to see how these groups work and see how each individual student is able to do something that fits their needs. I love my experience at Washington and I am so excited to continue to learn throughout this experience. 

edTPA

During our class time this semester, we have been discussing in detail the requirements of edTPA. These conversations have been great! I love learning about the requirements that we are going to have to pass while we are student teaching. I think this is something that is SO important because we are required to do this by NC and we have to pass! I am happy to be learning and going more in-depth to each individual rubric and knowing how to get a 5 on each rubric! I think this is something that is beneficial that all incoming teachers are required to do this. I think it is important for us to formulate our thoughts into words and how to fully be able to understand why we are teaching what we are teaching. I think this deals with NCTCS 2, and I think it can go in depth to each individual substandard in NCTCS 2. I think the purpose of this is to make sure we are teaching to meet the needs of all individual students. It is important to know how to meet each and every need of the students and that I am teaching in a way that does meet this need. Each individual student is different and each individual student struggles with different skills. As a teacher, I am going to have to meet all of these individual needs within the classroom. 

Future Classroom

In my future classroom, I want to take advantage of guided reading groups and have the ability to do WIN time with my students. This is a time that each student's needs are being met and they are able to do work that is on their individual level. I also want to make sure that I am meeting the needs of all of my students. I want to make sure that every student knows that they are important and that their needs are important. I want all of my students to feel welcomed into my future classroom. During student teaching, I am going to make sure that I am aware of all of these needs so I can meet every individual need of all of my students. I am going to be aware of why I am teaching what I am teaching and have the ability to formulate that into words. I am so excited for the future and what I am going to be learning throughout the semester! 

Works Cited:

Brame, C.J. and Biel, R. (2015). Setting up and facilitating group work:
Using cooperative learning groups effectively. Retrieved [todaysdate] from http://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/setting-up-and-facilitating-group-work-using-cooperative-learning-groups-effectively/.

Social Studies Methods: January

Hey everyone! 

I haven't posted in awhile but I am now almost done with my Junior Year! I am currently taking a class called Social Studies Methods! This class mostly focuses on teaching powerful and purposeful social studies. It has been such an adventure so far during this class! We have already done so many things like an App Evaluation, Today's Learners Project, defined what a concept is, interviewed teachers and got information about social studies in their classroom, and so much more! I can not wait to see everything else that I am going to learn throughout the rest of the semester!

Concept

During class, we spent multiple days about really discussing what a concept was in social studies. I learned that how I was taught social studies (which seems really long ago when it wasn't that long) was by facts. Although this is not necessarily a bad thing, I was not taught how to take this information and apply it. This is the basis of concept based teaching. A concept is something that is very broad and can be universal. It is something that is timeless and can be transversed from place to place! When a teacher teaches by concepts, they are helping the students not only know the facts of events, people, and places; but also what to do with these facts. For example, they are taught how to analyze information and to process it and make inferences based on the facts. The students are able to get problem-solving skills and other crucial 21st century skills that we should be teaching our students. I have been reading the book called Concept-Based Curriculum and Instruction for the Thinking Classroom by H. Lynn Erickson and he states, "The conceptual mind uses facts as a tool to discern patterns, connections, and deeper, transferable understandings" (Erickson 10).  Erickson also states, "Concept-based classrooms structure learning so that students are invited to process factual material through their personal, conceptual mind. " (Erickson 98). I thought these quotes were so accurate with everything that we have learned in class. Concept-based learning does create a deeper sense of understanding because they are able to see the facts for more than just facts. The students are using different parts of their brain and are being challenged to really understand not only the facts but how to analyze those facts and be able to make decisions off of those facts. I believe this concept-based learning goes directly with NCTCS 3b and 3d. 3B states, teachers know the content appropriate to their teaching specialty and 3D states teachers make instruction relevant to students.  Obviously, I believe that teachers need to know their concepts that they are teaching, but I think this can go more in depth. I think this deals with how we are teaching these concepts. We need to know the best way to teach these concepts and so that our students will understand them. Some teachers may still use factual based teaching as their method of teaching, and I am sure the students are learning new materials. Although, I think if the teacher was teaching concepts it would be extremely more benefit for the students and for them to have the ability to really be challenged within the classroom. I also think that concept-based teaching does make it more relevant for our students. I think this is something really engages each individual student to learn more about what has happened in the past and how they can use those facts to apply it for the future. This is an infographic that Erickson created and it explains more in-depth about this concept-based instruction. 

Wisdom From Experience

During this first month, I also got the chance to interview two teachers about their experience in social studies. I interviewed a 2nd-grade teacher and a 4th-grade teacher! Both teachers have been teaching over 10+ years. The biggest thing I took away from this project was how little social studies instruction time the students are actually receiving in the classroom today. Both teachers stated that they only teach social studies two times a week and they rotate months with science. This was completely shocking to me! So for half of the months throughout the school year, the students have 0 time for social studies!! (Let that really sink in). We have discussed in all of my education classes the power of integration as a teacher, and I think that is something that is so important when it comes to social studies. Integration is key throughout elementary education! There are so many standards and simply just not enough days in the school year to teach everything. It is so crucial that we as educators are able to really integrate subjects, especially with social studies (that is not taught every day). For those students who are only receiving social studies instruction half of the year (not even every day), they need a teacher that is willing to integrate social studies into other subjects and be able to make sure that they are receiving social studies instruction. I found this great article that explained ways to incorporate social studies into a classroom, https://www.socialstudies.org/publications/socialeducation/january-february2011/an_approach_to_integrating_writing_skills_into_social_studies_classroom and I think it could be beneficial in the future! Although this was for middle or high school, I think it could easily be applied in the elementary education world if you just take it down a few levels. This was a great example of how it is possible to teach social studies to other subjects, and something that we should be striving to do on a daily basis with our students. This is directly related to NCTCS 3c, which states that teachers must recognize the interconnectedness of content areas/discipline. Again, this goes along with everything that I have said. There are simply not enough days in the year to teach everything that the students need to know. The only way to get there is through integration. 

Future Classroom

I really want to implement both integration and concept-based teaching within my future classroom. With integration, I want to really be able to focus on literacy and being able to teach every other subject (math, science, and social studies) through reading. One way to accomplish this before my student teaching is my goal for professional development this semester! I want to be able to create an online portfolio/website that is going to help me be able to incorporate literacy into my future classroom. This is going to be grade level based and subject-based so I am really making sure that I have the ability to look at this one day and be able to say "I can incorporate literacy into my 4th-grade science lesson by doing ___". I think this is a great tool that I can not wait to get started on for this semester! I think it is going to be beneficial for me in all my classes. With concept-based teaching, I am going to keep the Concept-Based Curriculum and Instruction for the Thinking Classroom with me throughout all my years of teaching. This way if I am in a school district that does not do concept-based learning I am able to use this book and try to show them how influential concept-based teaching can really be. I also will have it with me in my classroom to refer back to throughout my student teaching and future classroom so I am able to refer back to it if I have any questions about what to do during my planning for a concept based unit. I am excited to use both of these tools in my future classroom and have the ability to really be (hopefully) the best teacher I can in my classroom one day.

Thank you for reading. :)

Works Cited

Infographic on Concepts:

http://weteachchalkandslate.blogspot.com/2014/01/concept-driven-curriculum-with-lynn.html

Erickson: 

Erickson, H. L. (2007). Concept-Based Curriculum and Instruction for the Thinking Classroom. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin, A SAGE Publishing Company.