Fourth is Fabulous

The Backstory

2011-07-23T08:00:00.000-07:00

Welcome! I started this blog last year as part of a graduate school class. I intended to keep it up during student teaching but between being in a school full time for a semester plus three graduate school classes, it just didn't happen. Now, a year later I have just begun a full time teaching position in a 4th grade classroom and my goal is to document this next year through this blog, along with sharing stories and resources along the way.

After student teaching this fall, I started looking for a full time position. I had an immediate interview for a kindergarten position but ultimately I decided it was not the route for me and I continued looking. I loved first grade and although kindergarten is very close, I had realized I really like kids a bit older when they're more independent. Luckily, I had been a substitute in the district the year prior and so I was able to keep doing that. And I did - I substitute taught on a daily basis for over 6 months as I continued to look without luck. This turned out to be a pretty good decision - substitute teaching was not my favorite because of having to learn a new school and new names every day (I usually met an upwards of 100 students a week minimum) but it was good because of the great classroom management experience I got and all the people I met. My full time job was a direct result of a substitute job I did at my school.

I am very happy and thankful to be where I am. I didn't anticipate being in 4th grade but I have a great team and I'm excited about the curriculum. And I didn't anticipate having to go back to commuting but I decided it was all well worth it for the benefit of being in a great school, with great people and a lot of support as a beginning teacher.

if I'm bored, I'm sure they are

2010-09-30T19:27:00.000-07:00

Math today was not my finest. It was laborious and at times, downright boring. On top of that, my supervisor was observing me. She however, had the insight to realize (as I did) that I was not the root of the problem (she actually didn't have anything major to say about my teaching, hooray!) but the material was.

We have a good math program. I actually like it quite a bit and I think it does a good job of really getting kids to understand the math material we're teaching, not just memorizing it. However, our class is weird. We have almost half (about 10 kids) who are way beyond where we are now, but some of them (not all but a lot of that group) who don't have real understanding. They can tell you what 6+4 is but are not able to explain it. Then, I have 9 kids who are in what I call my "intervention group." They need extra help and lots of explanation. That leaves three in the middle. Our class does not have a bell curve, it's more like a bell gully. This makes planning for instruction difficult.

On top of that, we have these math routines we're supposed to do at the beginning of each class. There is merit to these routines but I have many kids who are way past them and they get bored, causing them to talk to one another and not pay attention. It takes forever and then by the time I get through the whole group instruction, we have no time left for differentiated math groups. I can't take another week of this so I talked with my cooperating teacher and came up with a plan:

1. We have snack right before math. I'm going to start on the math routines during snack with whoever finishes first. The kids really like being the "student leaders" for the routines so perhaps this will motivate them to eat more quickly. We'll do the routines as we finish snack and that will leave us able to start whole group right away.

2. Everyone participates in whole group lessons - with perhaps 1 or 2 exceptions, I think almost all the kids benefit from the whole group lessons even if they don't always think so (i.e. they don't understand as much as some of them think they do). (25 minutes)

3. We'll have 20 minutes for differentiated centers. I can divide my higher kids up into two groups, one for the middle kids and I can work with the intervention group to practice skills from whole group. We've already been doing challenge problems with the high kids but I want to add in some partner activities. They like their challenge folders and are generally very engaged when they can use them so I think I can give them instructions and let them work independently.

4. The last 15 minutes of math will be devoted to the problem of the day that we used to do during snack. I don't want to give up on this because I really like the CGI method of instruction and talking through different solutions.

We have 60-65 minutes for math so I think this gives me enough time to really get into everything. We'll see. I'm going to try it out next week and see how it goes.

in which I start teaching...

2010-09-20T14:16:00.000-07:00

I came down with my first cold of the school year this weekend. I shouldn't be surprised - when I started work as a TA, I was sick for probably at least 6 weeks straight until my immune system caught up with me. However, after that, I didn't get sick again and even survived our flu epidemic where we had a week with at least half of our kids out sick with the flu at one point or another. So, I'm hopeful my immune system will remember this and get into gear for the rest of the year. Right now, my sinuses feel like they're about to explode with the pressure.

Last week I started teaching science and social studies, alternating days. It's been going well and I even had my first official observation from my internship supervisor. That was rather nerve-wracking to start with but once I got going I almost but forgot about her being there. The kids LOVE science so it is easy to keep their attention. I'm teaching a unit on earth materials - rocks, pebbles, gravel, sand, silt and soil. It's been somewhat loud and more than a little messy but they are having fun and I feel learning a lot. I felt especially bad for our wonderful custodians on the day we were sifting rocks and gravel though - the kids had done a great job keeping most of their materials on their desk and paper plate where they were working but it was inevitable for sand and rocks to creep off and we did have one big spill. All in all not bad though.

Today's lesson was part 2 on a lesson about sand and silt. Last Thursday we explored sand and put some in a vial with water, shook it up (their favorite part - we had a discussion on how to properly shake our vials with fingers over the cap "just in case") and then they sat over the weekend to allow the sand and silt to settle and separate (alliteration, anyone?). Today, they had a chance to look at their vials and draw what they saw. We have a few more days on soil and then I'm teaching the entire unit over again to a different first grade class! The first grade teachers at my school each teach a science unit so each teacher has to know only one unit really well. I'll have to see what my thoughts are on this once I've taught it again to another class.

This week I also started teaching an elective on famous people - I have just eight (!!) students in first and second grade. We are a magnet school for gifted and talented and part of the magnet program is offering electives to students in a wide range of areas. Almost every teacher teaches an elective and all the special teachers do as well so classes range from mine, which is a social studies elective, to tap dancing, drama, gifted and talented classes, and extra-help classes in math and reading for kids who need that extra learning time. I really like the system so far and class today went great. We're learning about Neil Armstrong and tomorrow I have a bunch of video clips picked out to show them the rocket launch and first moon walk.

I started out today by talking about expectations and beginning our discussion about what it means to be famous - we listed some traits of famous people and then I asked them to name some famous people they knew of. I got a range of answers from Barack Obama & George Washington to Hannah Montana and Michael Jackson! It was a great start though and I'm excited about what I have planned. Other people on my list for us to study including Orville & Wilbur Wright, Betsy Ross, Jane Goodall and Harriet Tubman. I have some fun activities planned like during the Inventor Week (Orville & Wilbur Wright) where I'm going to get them to invent something on their own, make it, and present it to the class.

It's been fun for me to get to pretty much do whatever I want in the way of lessons too - I have to stick to the goals and objectives but beyond that, I can find and create whatever I want!

research project torture

2010-09-06T18:57:00.000-07:00

You know what's really hard? Trying to focus on an assignment for class (I still officially have three classes this semester in addition to student teaching full time, although one is only one credit and is pass/fail, the other two are for credit and are graded regularly) when my head is totally and completely in the classroom. I have a research project to do this semester and I've been writing the preliminary information. It's like torture, making us do class work while student teaching. I realize there probably isn't a better solution short of going to school another semester. I'm hoping once I get to the actual work in the classroom that the research will entail and data collection it'll be more interesting. I also realize the benefit of research in the classroom - important changes in instruction and assessment come directly from doing research and collecting data to find out what works.

I love student teaching and I'm excited to write lessons and I know the benefits of research, but right now, this research is the furthest thing from my brain (except for this past weekend when I had to force myself to write these two sections as they are due to my professor tomorrow). Also, apparently my body clock is resetting itself to getting up at 6:30 am EVERYDAY because yesterday morning, on Sunday, I woke up at that time on the dot...and subsequently got to watch the sunrise. The silver lining of this was that I spent two full hours writing before anyone else in the house was up and got most of the sections done.

I know I'm not the only one with this problem though - I mentioned this to a cohort member last week and she commiserated with me.

Can I please just be left alone to focus on what I love doing? Actually teaching? Speaking of that, I'm taking over my first subjects in less than a week!

a different world

2010-08-31T17:48:00.000-07:00

The days are starting to go by quickly already! I've been in my classroom for a week now and everyone is getting the routines and procedures down and generally, we know what we're doing. As a former Kindergarten TA, I have to say: kids grow and learn a lot over that kindergarten year! Beginning first graders know so much about how to do things in school and it's great to watch them settle into being in first grade. It's really a completely different world than kindergarten - that year of growth is massive.

It's not all been completely smooth sailing - personalities are starting to come out and we've had several class discussions in the past two days on subjects such as "how we treat living creatures we find on the playground," and "how we act when we're in art class." (in summary: don't touch or bother them and we act the same way in art that we do anywhere else. Art class is fun but not a license to forget our class rules). They're learning quickly and I'm confident that in another week or two they'll have everything down with some ongoing reminders and modeling. We have started math and handwriting and have been doing literacy activities but haven't started centers or guided reading just yet. We've also been doing beginning of the year assessments and tomorrow I will have a chance to hone my running record skills.

I start teaching my first subject (which for me will be subjects because I'll alternate science and social studies each day) in a week and a half. Eek! But I'm also excited - I'm learning a lot just by observing and assisting as needed but I'm definitely ready to get to teaching. I took home the social studies book last night to start thinking about what I want to do for my lessons and ways to take social studies beyond the textbook. For science, I'll be continuing our unit on rocks, silt and sand. This school uses science kits so I am glad that it's hands-on and we'll get a chance to get our hands dirty, literally.

Last night my sister and I were eating dinner and she asked me if I felt more confident going into the classroom now than when I started as an assistant. And I had never really thought about it that way before but the answer is a wholehearted YES. It really made me think about the massive amount I've learned during the past year in class and how much I do know about curriculum, instruction, differentiation, integration, everything. It also made (again) happy I went the route of an MAT degree and not lateral entry. When I started as a TA I didn't really know much about any of that and I learned a lot by doing and absorbing what was going on but it was like having puzzle pieces that you know go to the same puzzle, but not ones that actually fit together. There was not much that I understood from a big picture perspective and I think I would have been filling in the gaps as I taught had I done the lateral entry route instead of having a lot of it filled in now. Clearly, there will always be more to learn but I'm happy to start putting everything together in a real classroom with 23 first graders.

Two Days In

2010-08-26T18:17:00.000-07:00

After two days of school I have two words: I'm tired. Much less today than I was yesterday though, which I take as a good sign. Yesterday, the first day of school, was a whirlwind of mostly teaching "this is how we do this (or that)." It was a really good experience though and one I think is critical for establishing a good classroom atmosphere at the beginning of the school year. Our class has been wonderful so far and is picking up all of our classroom routines and procedures quickly - practice is indeed the key!

I think the biggest thing that I learned or that was reinforced was: script the first day. I think this will absolutely vital when I have my own classroom because it establishes the classroom culture and how things will run. My mentor teacher has been teaching a long time and I doubt she scripts every minute but I know she had plans A, B and C for every minute of the day yesterday.

I also had an interesting experience today: I attended a county Board of Education subcommittee meeting on economically disadvantaged students. Right now I have to write up part 1 of my semester-long research project and send it to my professor though so more on the Board of Ed tomorrow.

First Day Of School

2010-08-24T14:27:00.000-07:00

The first day of school is tomorrow. We've labeled everything, cleaned everything, put away mountains of school supplies and talked through how the first day will go. The past week has been a whirlwind of excitement along with stress and anxiety. Although I've spent the majority of my life in schools and nearly all of it being a student or working in one, this time it's different.

I really don't know what to feel right now. I'm not really nervous at the moment but I do have an underlying agitation or edge. My mind is swirling with a million different things and I'm still trying to process all of the new information, people, and expectations from the past week. I'm really just beginning to get my brain wrapped around everything. Yesterday at Meet the Teacher, I felt fairly confident - I'm used to working with parents and interacting with them and I had a great time putting faces to all the names I've been diligently writing on everything. But then a parent asked me a question - probably something pretty basic although I can't remember what it was now - and I couldn't answer it. This happened quite a bit over course of the morning and it just reminded me that it's ok to feel like I don't know a thing (even though I know more than I think right now) and feel like I have not a clue what I'm doing. If I did know everything and felt perfectly comfortable, I wouldn't need to be there!

I think that's what I'm going to remind myself of over and over this upcoming semester. I'm going to be uncomfortable, anxious, and overwhelmed at times but that's why I'm here - to learn. It'll also get easier. I know that I'm ready and really more than anything else, I'm just excited! I've worked a lot time to get to this point and I've really never felt more like this is where I'm supposed to be and what I'm supposed to be doing than right now. I think that's why I'm not actually that nervous - tomorrow I get to go be a teacher.

Happy First Day of School to all of my cohort members!

Meet the Teacher

2010-08-23T12:17:00.000-07:00

This morning I got to meet 19 of our 24 new friends! It was Meet the Teacher day at school and I was very excited to get to meet all of our new little friends I'll be working with during the next four months. I had to miss part of my own class to be there but I thought it was more than worth it to have an opportunity to meet parents and students. It was a busy, talkative two hours that totally flew by and left me even more excited to start school.

I also got to make a trip to one of my favorite stores today....STAPLES! I have always had a strange love of office supplies, even before I wanted to become a teacher. I loved making that all important trip to the office supply store after the first day of school, armed with my new supply lists, picking out brand new notebooks and covering my books in paper grocery bags. Things really have not changed that much in the past 15 years. I now have new notebooks, printer ink, printer paper, pens, pencils, post-its, labels and a few other items from my self-made supply list. I'm feeling more prepared now (from an office supply standpoint at least!) and am spending this afternoon getting myself organized and everything in order.

One more teacher workday tomorrow....the new school year starts on Wednesday!

Day 1

2010-08-17T18:30:00.000-07:00

Today was my first day of student teaching. It was fun, I met a lot of new people and my mentor teacher and I labeled, lettered and laminated everything in our classroom. It was a tiring day but it also went by really quickly and I'm even more excited about the upcoming semester.

My mentor teacher has been teaching 22 years (I think), with 10 of those being at the school I'm working in. I really love that I'm with a veteran - for me, I think this was the best possible placement both teacher-wise and school-wise, at least from what I can tell so far. She and I are friends already and I feel like our personalities, teaching styles and discipline styles match up fairly well. The school I'm placed in is a magnet elementary school that is one of the oldest schools in the area - it's located near downtown and has a very diverse student population due to its magnet status. Every time someone in education has asked where I'm placed, they always tell me what a great school it is so I feel very good about my school placement and teacher placement. It doesn't hurt that it's only 10 minutes from my house either.

Today we worked in the classroom for most of the day - I put together a mailing to our students with information about what teacher they have, a supply list and calendar. I made labels and labeled all of their books, cubbies, notebooks and folders. I put up posters, I cut out laminated stuff, I lettered name tags and anything else that needed to get done. We got a lot finished in just one day!

We got the class list and academic information cards about each student and it was fun to start to learn names. I'm eager to put faces with those names on Monday at Meet the Teacher! I'm having to miss a portion of class that morning in order to attend but I decided that it was probably the only opportunity I'll have to meet the parents of the students and I couldn't pass it up. I'll work out with my professor how to make up the missed class, which I'd rather do than miss meeting the students and parents.

All in all, it was a great day and I'm TIRED. I didn't sleep well last night with the anticipation of today and I'm looking forward to going to bed early tonight. I have class most of the day tomorrow on campus instead of being at the elementary school and I'm excited to hear about how all of my classmates' days went at their respective schools. Thursday I'm back in the classroom and we'll be finishing up classroom set up. It's going to be a fun semester.

the night before student teaching....

2010-08-16T19:44:00.000-07:00

It's 10:37 the night before my first day of student teaching and I really should be getting ready for bed. But I really want to write during this whole experience and I thought tonight would be a good place to start.

I have my clothes picked out, my lunch packed and my gym bag packed for the afternoon. I really have no idea what to expect though. A friend from my cohort had written today that she is trying to wrap her brain around student teaching and I agree - I really have no idea what will happen tomorrow. It is a teacher workday (we have a week of them + classes on campus before the kids arrive next Wednesday) and I have been corresponding with my mentor teaching so I think we'll be doing a lot of talking and classroom set up. I know I want to see the whole school and start getting a feel for the layout, where the bathrooms are, the teacher's lounge, etc and start meeting people. I want to start getting to know Barbara, my mentor teacher and her teacher assistant, who also used to be a first grade teacher herself and will be another great resource and person to learn from. And I just want to start getting myself oriented in general about what this experience is going to be like.

It does make me really thankful for the year I spent as a TA in kindergarten because I have been in a classroom full time before and this isn't going to be totally foreign. I'm definitely excited and happy it's time to begin - I know I'm going to learn a ton and it'll be busy and fun.

I did get my ID badge made today. I had been emailing and calling the HR office to do this but hadn't gotten any response so I just showed up today with a fellow cohort member who did manage to get an appointment and the man was very nice and accommodated me as a walk-in (which I was told they wouldn't do but it was worth at least going there and worst case I could've come back later). But, he was great and made it on the spot. I feel like a real student teacher with it!

First day, here I come!

Blogging so far...

2010-08-04T07:26:00.000-07:00

This week marks week #6 in the life of my blog. How's it going? Well, I really like blogging. I'd been toying with the idea of starting a blog for some time but just....hadn't. Creating this blog for my Social Studies and the Arts class gave me the motivation and topics I needed to get started.

I've kept a journal for years but it is an entirely different ball of metaphorical wax to be putting my thoughts and ideas out on the internet in a public fashion. I like finding interesting articles and considering issues in education. I want to pick post topics that are interesting first to me and then potentially to other people. And, blogging furthered my learning experiences in my class by giving me an outlet to really think deeply about the topics were were discussing and giving me the motivation to write about them in a coherent fashion. As a class, we've been creating integrated social studies units in small groups based on grade level and the blog topics have caused me to really consider the why's of what we're doing. My group's unit is on citizenship and community, written for the third grade, and this creation process has made me realize what a deep and complicated topic citizenship really is. More on that later when we finish our unit though - I'm excited about it and it deserves its own post.

I don't think there have really been any negative aspects. I enjoy writing and the writing process helps me think about topics and ideas in ways that I might not without. Sometimes the assigned topics haven't been my favorite or wouldn't be my first choice to write about initially but I have gained new perspectives and insights from writing about them and reading my fellow classmates' thoughts.

I pretty much always enjoyed social studies as a student myself - I was lucky to have teachers who took it beyond the textbook and made it come alive. As an almost-teacher learning about how to teach social studies, this is what I want to do. I'm absolutely engrossed in the idea of integrated units and project-based learning. I know that in my first few years of teaching I will definitely not be able to implement everything I have ideas about now but my goal over time is use integration as a way of creating more effective and meaningful lessons. I'm also interested in learning more about project-based learning and how I can integrate by students working together and solving real-world problems or learning about real issues and ideas.

I have really enjoyed writing the few posts so far on topics of my choice too. As I move into student teaching in two weeks, my goal is to continue this blog as a place of reflection on my student teaching experience, continued discussion on issues in education, and my ideas for lesson, activities and problem-solving in the classroom. It's not all going to be sunshine and rainbows but it should be challenging, fun, and I'm excited to get started.

Meeting Rafe Esquith

2010-08-01T10:15:00.000-07:00

Last night, a group of my fellow graduate students and I had the distinct pleasure of meeting Rafe Esquith, acclaimed fifth grade teacher in Los Angeles and author of three books, including Teach Like Your Hair's On Fire (below, image from Amazon.com), which I read a few months ago.

Rafe, as even his students call him, is truly an extraordinary teacher and a great inspiration. He brings the word dedication to a entirely new level, opening his doors at 6:30 am and often staying until after dark. His students put on full-length Shakespearean plays, take trips to Washington D.C., New York and Shakespeare festivals and learn to play musical instruments. I really don't know how he finds the time and energy to do everything he does--it's amazing. More information can be found at his class's web site: The Hobart Shakespeareans.

I begin student teaching in first grade in two weeks, at a school that is in a primarily minority neighborhood, although because of it's magnet school status it maintains a very diverse population of students. I was very excited to be able to go and hear Rafe speak so close to starting this portion of my teacher education because I know student teaching is going to be challenging. It will be fun too but I think as a new teacher it's important to hear from those who have been in the profession a long time and who have succeeded. And from the same people who have also failed. Teaching is a challenging profession but that's really one of the reasons I chose it - I want to be challenged on a daily basis. Maybe I'll regret saying that in a few years but I chose to leave my very good, stable job to go back to graduate school for teaching because after just a few years, I felt like I had stopped learning. I could do most of my job on autopilot. As a teacher, I already know that I will never be able to do that, at least not if I want my students to learn as well. I'm excited by that and also apprehensive - I don't know what to expect but I know I'm ready to take what I've been learning into the classroom.

Rafe was fun to hear speak and he graciously signed my copy of his book. I know it's going to be sitting on my shelf all the time, ready to pull out when I need a little extra dose of inspiration. He also invited everyone to come visit his classroom in Los Angeles, which I think would be an amazing experience. Maybe a road trip is in order?

Is history written by the winners?

2010-07-30T06:41:00.000-07:00

My tenth grade European history teacher was a bit of a wild card. He definitely wasn't your average history teacher and did things like make us stand on our desks just to shake things up because he was tired of us sitting in the same seats everyday. He never used a textbook that I can remember and in fact, I don't think we even had a textbook assigned for that class. He was also a fabulous history teacher and did a wonderful job of helping us, as 16-year-olds who did not usually consider much more than what was going on that weekend, to really look at history and consider not only what happened but also its implications and challenged us to see history from multiple perspectives. It was in his class that I first remembering hearing the phrase: "History is always written by the winners." It has obviously stuck with me and something I try to always consider when I'm reading or learning about history.

Think about that for a moment: "history is always written by the winners," a quote credited to Napoleon Bonaparte.

Is that true? In many cases, I think it is. It's only natural that the people who "win" would tell their side of the story and not the other. They glorify their accomplishments and say little about the people they conquered. Because they are the "winners," their accounts are the ones who typically make it into the history books and often the perspective of the other side is lost. Historians try to be objective but it is only natural and human, for our own experiences and viewpoints to make their way into what we write.

I am grateful to have had history teachers that challenged me to look at events from multiple perspectives and consider potential biases from who wrote it. To this day, I remember writing a paper on the radical nature of the American Revolution - I was arguing it was indeed a radical revolution and my history teacher disagreed with me. It was a bit scary but also incredibly liberating to be able to argue my opinion, find sources to back it up and go against the person whom I considered the authority. I'm pretty sure my 10th grade paper did not change my teacher's mind on that subject but he respected my argument and I was never again afraid to go against an established opinion.

As a teacher myself, this is what I want to do in social studies: show children that there are always multiple viewpoints of anything and by learning to view history through the lenses of many perspectives, we can better understand it. A great way to begin doing this is through literature - there are books available that take viewpoint of a different character in well-known stories. I used one of these myself this past spring in a lesson on point of view to a 5th grade class - The True Story of the Three Little Pigs (written by John Scieszka, image from Amazon.com), which is a hilarious and eye-opening account of an entirely different perspective on this classic story. Even though it is a picture book, these older students enjoyed it and had fun practicing taking the perspectives of different characters from other well-known tales.

For all my students, including those who are ESL learners, I want to present history from multiple perspectives, using varying accounts, letters, personal diaries, newspapers from different places and other sources to show the many ways different people see the same event. ESL learners especially need to see, if they have strong ties to a particular culture, the relationships between that culture and what we are studying.

This starts for all students by showing students that there are many people, many cultures and many places in our world. At first they may seem very different but its important to first show children that there are usually more similarities than differences. I would love to have a pen pal program with my class with students from another country to let them discover first hand the similarities they have with children all over the world. I think it is only from a position of understanding our similarities that we can respectfully understand our differences and see things as if we were standing in another person's shoes.

What are the questions?

2010-07-20T18:00:00.000-07:00

"If the textbook contains the answers, then what are the questions?" - Wiggins & McTighe

My social studies and the arts class is working on backward design in lesson planning. Backwards design focuses on first determining what outcomes you want from a lesson - what do you want students to know, be able to do, or understand? Then, how will you know they have reached that outcome (i.e. what assessment tool will you use?). THEN, you can start thinking about the actual lesson and how it will be structured. For me, this seems normal but perhaps that is because we have been taught from the beginning to look at objectives first and work from those back toward lessons and activities.

The above quote comes from one of our textbooks that is a resource as we learn this backward design process. First, who says textbooks have all the answers? I don't believe that - simply because textbooks, like anything else, are written by people with opinions and viewpoints. I think it is critical for teachers to find resources outside of textbooks in order to present a well-rounded set of views and information on any topic.

Second, what ARE the questions? Who gets to decide? I think the idea of there being 'essential questions' that guide learning is a great way to get at that age-old question: why do we have to learn this? I certainly remember asking my own teachers that question from time to time and I think that instruction centered around asking these questions, questions that do not necessarily have answers or that definitely have more than one answer, is a great way to answer the question of why are we learning this.

At first it may seem paradoxical to answer a question with more questions but one of the biggest motivators for learning, in my opinion, is the search for the answers. Questions that have more than one answer or that may be ultimately unanswerable, to me, fuel the fire for more learning. We naturally strive to and want to find the answers--our innate curiosity about the world drives us. The search for those answers creates relevance and helps us make connections between what we are learning in class to the reasons in the real world that we're learning about it at all.

Seeing the Big Picture through Annual Plans

2010-07-10T06:05:00.000-07:00

For a current assignment in our social studies class, we are working in groups to create an annual plan for the third grade social studies curriculum, based on the North Carolina Standard Course of Study. As we go through the process, admittedly figuring out how to do it as we go, I can see many advantages and also a few disadvantages of using annual plans in curriculum planning.

I'm a big picture person - I think in terms of wholes. I'm one of those people who gets my syllabus with all my class assignments at the beginning of the semester and plots them out on a calendar so I can see when everything is due and I use that to pace my studying and work on those assignments. I used to work in school admissions and I would do the same thing: take every important date, including events and application deadlines and we'd have a master office calendar to work from. So, annual planning appeals to me because of the way I organize myself and my work.

This shows me the many advantages of annual plans. Annual plans, used in conjunction with the course of study and pacing guides that are usually provided by school districts, will give me that big picture view of my curriculum and lesson planning. Annual plans allow you to see the pacing of your units throughout the school year and also, if you're working toward teaching in an interdisciplinary approach, allows you to see how units from various subjects overlap (or don't overlap and then you can rearrange them). Annual plans also help keep you on track so you know when you need to be covered a certain topic. Looking at the standard course of study by itself can be daunting. There are so many subjects and goals to cover that it seems like they would never fit into a school year. And that is a challenge but annual planning can help teachers see how much time they can spend on each unit area.

Annual plans also have some disadvantages. It can be easy to get caught up in the details when you're actually doing the planning and start to get concerned with individual lessons and activities. The important thing is to stay focused on the big picture and think in terms of units, not lessons. Second, I can see where an annual plan might cause anxiety if the class needs more time on a particular subject and the teacher gets behind. I think that there needs to be flexibility built into an annual plan, if possible and teachers can and should have methods to change the annual plan if, through assessment, they determine their students need more time on a unit. Flexibility is key to teaching and planning!

When designing an annual plan, why start with resources? Well, I actually think you start with objectives from the standard course of study and then find resources that will help you meet those objectives. For instance, if you're teaching a unit on heroes and leaders in folklore and real life (two goals from the NC third grade curriculum), then during annual planning it will help to go and ahead and locate some web sites, books or field trips that will help when you sit down to design the actual unit and lessons.

I am interested in learning more about annual planning and how they can help me plan my units and lessons in ways that most benefit my future students. As such a big picture oriented person, I am almost certain they will be one of my tools in my planning.

More Exercise, More Noggin

2010-07-09T13:33:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I came across this really fascinating article in the New York Times health section on the effects of exercise on the human brain. The article discusses scientific evidence that shows the brains of humans and other animals actually can produce new brain cells AND that exercise actually increases this process of neurogenesis.

Our brains are apparently full of adult stem cells, which, given the right push, can divide and differentiate into either more adult stem cells OR baby neurons. Exercise counteracts a protein called BMP that can slow this differentiation process and additionally helps the brain produce another protein (which is awesomely named Noggin) that also counteracts the brain-slowing effects of BMP. The more Noggin you have, the less of the brain-numbing protein you have and thus the more new stem cells and more baby neurons. More neurons equal improved thinking and brain "nimbleness."

The specifics of the science, while fascinating, aren't really as important to most people as the implications: exercise is good for the brain as well as the body.

To me, this is even more reason and justification for keeping sports and physical education in schools. We all need exercise to keep our brains active and healthy.

Stepping Out of the Books

2010-07-05T19:58:00.000-07:00

Social studies, history, geography, civics....for probably quite a few people, the memories that come to mind when they think of these subjects are not entirely positive. I've met more than one person who considers history just memorization of dates and civics just reading out of a textbook. Certainly I'm not expecting every child to love social studies and it be their absolute favorite subject but I do think there are some specific things that should go into every social studies lesson to make them well-planned and meaningful to students.

First, the teacher should have a solid knowledge of the subject area and and the skills and resources to answer questions as they arise. Teachers should be familiar with the resources they have available for lessons and know their state or district's curriculum standards. Like all lessons, social studies should begin with the end in mind: what should students know or be able to do at the end of this lesson or project? Then, how am I going to get them there? Social studies can be a fun, dynamic and interactive subject to teach when the knowledge, resources, and planning are in place.

Next, social studies should be integrated with other subjects. I'll probably talk about integration quite a bit because it's something I believe in so thoroughly but social studies is an especially good candidate for integration across curriculum subjects. Integration helps students make connections between what they are learning in different subjects and helps student learn to synthesize information and material from all those subjects. Well-planned lessons for social studies can integrate with the arts, such as studying art from different time periods, putting on or going to see a play that depicts an important time period or event in history or learning a traditional dance from a culture being studied. Students could tackle a real-world issue such as creating solutions for the Gulf oil spill and simultaneously practice their writing and research skills as they learn about civic involvement. Integration also happens to be a great way for teachers to keep social studies (and other important subjects such as the arts and science) in a school day.

Finally, well-planned social studies lessons should, whenever possible, involve hands-on experiences. This could mean visiting an important historical site, dressing up in traditional clothing from a studied culture, writing to a pen pal in another country or using a current event or issue as a chance for students to get personally involved in their community. The possibilities really might be endless. Hands-on learning, instead of just reading about topics in textbooks, creates a personal connection between students and what they are learning that is absolutely critical in active learning. When I think back to the experiences and lessons that I remember most, therefore the ones that where I most likely learned the most, they were hands-on. We visited Ford's Theater where President Lincoln was shot in Washington, D.C., we went to Old Salem in North Carolina and got to make bread from scratch and dip our own candles, and we wrote letters to our congress people about issues we cared about. Not every lesson can involve a field trip (although field trips are important) but there are numerous ways to bring history, geography, anthropology, civics and sociology to life, helping students step out of their textbooks and into the world.
I feel that I was lucky as a student to have teachers who made social studies come alive for me. As a future teacher myself, I look forward to planning interactive and dynamic social studies lessons that reflect history, culture, geography and people of our world. Kids are fascinated by the world around them--we need to provide them opportunities to discover it.

The benefits of the arts

2010-07-01T14:25:00.000-07:00

During school, I always loved field trips. Who didn't for the most part? I now live in the same county and city where I grew up so I have been to most major field trip sites in the area at least once over the years. Many I've been to more than once or more times than I wish to remember. Field trips were fun, we didn't have to be in our regular classroom and I probably remember more about the field trips I took during school than most other things. But the benefits of field trips are really another post in itself.

Today, for my social studies and the arts class, we got to take a field trip to the North Carolina Museum of Art. This is one of those places I've been to a bunch of times but this trip was different. The NCMA spent the last year doing a complete renovation and huge expansion. They even shut down the museum for about 8 months during the height of this process. It was reopened back at the end of April and I've been wanting to go every since so I was pretty excited about our outing.

First, it's not just a museum, it's also a park. There are outdoor sculptures, picnic areas, an amphitheater where they hold concerts and show outdoor movies, gardens, ponds, fountains - it's really expansive and gorgeous. We spent most of our time in the new building with a docent who used to be a school teacher and talked to us about how to integrate the study of visual art into the rest of the curriculum. The museum has an extensive permanent collection, including quite a few Rodin sculptures, even including a sculpture garden of his work. I'm a big fan of Rodin ever since my AP European History teacher introduced him to our class and took us to a traveling exhibit at the NCMA when I was a senior in high school. When I visited Paris a few years later I specifically included a trip to the Musee Rodin, which was established after he willed his entire collection to the country of France. I was amazed to learn that the NCMA has acquired a number of Rodin sculptures for their collection and on loan. However, Rodin is the not the main point here.

It seems that every time I take a class on a new subject, I always go: this is so important! I need to teach this a lot! And I think that's true - reading, writing, mathematics, science, health, social studies and the arts ARE all important. Integration is the key to fitting everything into the curriculum. Art can be combined with just about anything: study the geometric shapes in cubism, the history shown through paintings, learn how science and art can be connected through a study of how a pond can be both a work of art and a way to improve water quality (and real loan resource offered by the Museum to NC educators). Students can explore literature through "reader's theater" where they act out the stories they are reading or write about their reactions to a piece of visual or performing art.

Integration is something I've spent quite a bit of time thinking about because I believe that integration helps students understand the importance of what they study, not just helps teacher fit everything in to a school day or year. Integration more easily demonstrates real-world applications of just about anything because in the real world subjects are very rarely found in isolation. Yet subjects like the arts are often the first to go when budgets get cut and time gets short, especially in the era of high-stakes testing. The benefits of arts education are often indirect and not subjects in most schools where testing results matter. Art was an important subject for me in school and one that really helped me develop as a person - do we really want schools where students don't visit amazing places like the NC Museum of Art, never see a performance of Shakespeare or learn to dance? I believe that the best curriculums include the arts and I'm excited to learn more ways to integrate all of them into my lessons this summer school session.

Welcome!

2010-06-29T20:21:00.000-07:00

Welcome to my blog! I'm a pre-service elementary school teacher finishing up a master of arts in teaching. I created this blog for my social studies and the arts class but I hope to expand beyond those subject areas and write on anything in education that interests me. And hopefully I will come up with a more creative blog title too.