Blog #4

End of the Semester
I am so in shock about how fast this semester has flown by! This semester I feel like I have been able to apply so much about what I have learned from my professors in what I do with my clinical hours. I truly feel like I have been able to take responsibility for my learning and make it happen in a REAL classroom. That feeling is so great and makes me gain so much confidence about my teaching. Being able to watch my classmates grow and mature over these past three years of education classes has been absolutely priceless. I cannot put into words how proud I am of them! We have all been together through some very highs and very lows and watching them persevere as well as myself has been an experience that I will carry with me forever. My biggest accomplishment this week has just been being supportive of my friends in this major and sending positive energy in their direction every chance I get. Not everyone is lucky enough to have experiences with such a small group of girls going through similar learning experiences and I think it has been an experience that will help us thrive so much in our future classrooms. We have amazing practice working with diverse personalities and ways of thinking, as well as clinical hours and in-school opportunities that not every Elementary Education major is blessed to experience. My main focus this week has been completing my unit. It has been a little bit grueling at times but I am so happy to say I am almost ready to turn it in! What a sigh of relief! I am so excited to implement all of the learning facilitation techniques and models I have learned about in this class and I am so excited to make my classroom a place where asking questions is encouraged and inquiry and curiosity are praised!




Outside Research:

https://classroom.synonym.com/importance-teaching-science-elementary-school-5810234.html

For my outside research, I read an article about why science is so important in Elementary school. 
Elem students are naturally curious which makes science perfectly coincide with this time in their lives. Science allows students to explore their curiosity in a safe and supervised environment. To establish a varied learning experience, science is great because it allows for so many hands-on activities, which is crucial for kinesthetic learners to achieve success. A strong and stable science foundation in elementary school is important for so many reasons. The article stated,
" Science teaches children necessary skills that they can use in other areas of their lives. Kidsource.com reports, "Early experiences in science help children develop problem-solving skills and motivate them toward a lifelong interest in the natural world."

This is so great because as the teacher if we can spark interest in our students and help them build a solid foundation in science, this will serve them so much in the future. 

Another excerpt from this article that I thought was great:

"Students who study science early on are better equipped to handle scientific issues facing our world in the future. The Geological Society of America states, "Prominent issues facing us include land use and development, availability of energy and mineral resources, water resources and quality, preservation of wetlands, erosion, waste management, pollution remediation, and geological hazards." Students who are familiar with these issues through science classes may be able to solve some of these problems as adults."

When students have a strong background and foundation from the start, harder sciences later on in life will be easier for them and less daunting. Success in high school starts with good teachers in elementary school! NCTCS Standard 3 says teachers know the content they teach. This means WE also have to have a strong foundation to best serve our students!



I love this quote below also found in the article:


"Young minds are creative, innovative and full of ideas. Science nurtures these aspects of the brain. According to Dr. Eric Albone, director of the Clifton Scientific Trust, "Science is an intensely human, intensely creative, enterprise. Science dominates our lives and presents society with tremendous opportunities and tremendous challenges." If we want our students to take those opportunities and meet those challenges, we must teach them science at the elementary level and continue to do so at the secondary level."


Tweets:

For my first tweet, I found a tweet from a local teacher who created a "wonder wall" where students could write down things they are interested in. I love this because it promotes inquiry and helps the teacher keep an eye out for specific things students want to study in the future. If students are interested in what they are studying, they are so much more likely to be engaged and want to participate. This is great for NCTCS 4 because as a teacher, we need to reflect on what our students need most and also want most.

For my second tweet, I thought back to how for our current events in my clinical placement, we have been discussing articles about the wildfires in Californa. The students in this local teacher's 3rd-grade class are seen discussing a text and breaking it into parts with small groups. Small group learning works so well for this type of assignment because the students can work together and feed off of each other without the pressure of talking in front of the entire class.

For my last tweet, I found a great app that I will be adding to my technology collection. I like this tool called BookCreatorApp because it integrates technology for students in a positive and safe way but still allows them to interact with others while using it and be social. This tweet shows kids using this app to label the different parts of a tree and then label their function. This is great because they integrated technology as well as literacy and science.

Blog Post 3

The month of October absolutely flew by, especially concerning Science Methods. We have been going strong for two and a half months now, and we are rapidly approaching the final stretch of the semester. I am very proud of my group and successfully completing our science experiment. We had to work super hard together on our project because our first project failed. The thing I am most proud about this week was how my group and I worked together, communicated into late hours of the night, and supported and encouraged each other. Team environments are going to go far with us into our teaching careers. Whether we work with the teachers in our grade, teachers who teach the same subjects as us, or just an administrative staff, we will have to work with others to establish a safe and diverse learning environment, as well as facilitating learning with other teachers. This relates directly back to NCTCS Standards 1, 2 &4.  I have found a pattern in this class that every time we do an assignment or a class activity, we relate back to multiple NCTCS Teaching Standards. This is awesome because we get to practice little things for our future classroom every single day! Every class I have been in for Science Methods so far, I have learned something that I will take with me into my future classroom and apply in the future. The thing I have struggled with most this month has been spending the proper time to work on my Unit Plan. I have to admit that I have let it fall to the back burner a little because I have had so many other things to work in for this class. I will really be working in these coming weeks to go hardcore on this unit plan and finish it out fully because its due date will be here before I know it. That will be my main action plan for the month of November, as well as finalizing the science lesson that I will be teaching in my clinical placement.

• I completed a lot of outside research this week, as well as more research about some issues I am passionate about. One of these issues is called Screen Addiction or Internet Addiction. There have been many studies done lately about this topic and the information I found out really shocked me. Internet addiction is starting in children as young as toddlers (1-4 years old.) Research from the American Psychiatric Association has proposed a new diagnosis called "Internet Gaming Disorder," or "IGD." Symptoms of this can be:  signs of addictive behavior, attachment to electronic devices, spending more than 4 hours a day on a device, inability to put a time limit in use, or loss of interest in other activities. 
• Participants in this study were parents of adolescent children and they were asked a series of questions. Some of these questions were: "What age did your child get his/her first mobile device?" & "How often do you worry about your child's screen media use/ what kind do they use the most?"
• The parents then completed a questionnaire examining their child's psychosocial functioning. The results from this study concluded that children who had high scores on the questions asked (regarding lots of screen time) correlated strongly with psychological and social problems with children such as hyperactivity, social problems with other children, aggression, and defiance. 

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/media-spotlight/201711/does-your-child-have-digital-addiction


My Future Classroom:
I was glad to have done this research because for me it helped me get a picture of the amount of technology integration I will be incorporating into my future classroom.  I hope to find the healthiest balance possible in order to best serve my future students as well as fully adhering to the standards of the state I end up teaching in.


Top Tweets of the Week:





This first tweet if from DASH BC. They shared a great video about some students in the community taking action steps to better their health, get active, exercise, and get physical activity more important in the school systems. They are starting an action plan and are already taking steps toward their goal!






This tweet from MysCool Server related back to my outside research about technology. This article takes the devils to advocate perspective and talks about how when technology is used the right way, it benefits kids more than hurting them.



My last tweet is again from DASH BC and it is about 10 things parents or guardians can do to promote emotional health and well-being in their child's life. In the world we live in today, kindness and compassion are more important than ever. Those who are in roles of authority in student life are the ones who can assist them the most and make the most impact for them. This short article is about 10 easy ways that parents can do that!