Time To Pass It On

It is sad to say that this is our last class and it is now time for my last post on the semester. Throughout this course I learned a lot of valuable content that I will take with student teaching and further experiences. One aspect that I really enjoyed from this course was blogging. Blogging seems tedious and a waste of time, but it is actually the opposite. Writing every week helps you summarize what you did on that specific week and it also helps organize your thoughts. I plan on implementing this within my classroom and I hope I have enough time to do it as well. Another attribute that really helped me excel in this course was incorporating the different means of technology. Being an ITE major I knew a couple of ways to implement technology, but this class goes more in depth with the concept. I learned how to use technology through the direct, inquiry, and cooperative lesson plans. These three lesson plans were vital to learn with teaching at Bishop Dunn. Before this class began we were required to fill out a self evaluation sheet based on the concepts that were taught in this course. There were a few pieces of content that I was unfamiliar with, but I can see the growth I made throughout the course. Some of these concepts included: the different types of lessons, using some technology tools and a few other aspects. One of the first attributes that we learned in this course were the three lesson plan formats. Through this we were asked to use them within our teaching session at Bishop Dunn. It took a little while to get the idea of how to write the three lessons, but Dr. Smirnova guided us through the process. With her help and collaboration from my peers I learned how to write a well formatted lesson. Through this course we were also asked to research some philosophy of teaching. My philosophy of teaching would follow a constructivism approach. The constructivist involves students to learn by experiencing certain aspects. This would be through the inquiry method where it states hands on, minds on. Students are manipulating materials or reflecting on their experience. According to Concept of the Classroom, "Constructivist teachers encourage students to constantly assess how the activity is helping them gain understanding. By questioning themselves and their strategies, students in the constructivist classroom ideally become "expert learners" (p. 1). As mentioned before this philosophy will help students become expert learners. Relating the concept to expert learners can be correlated to the Bloom's Taxonomy Pyramid. This concept was also taught throughout the course and is meaningful for teachers to follow by. In my other ITE courses, this concept is mentioned through the issue of technology and how to implement the vocabulary of Bloom's Taxonomy within a lesson plan. Using these key terms will help you construct a better lesson plan. This theory will help students reach a higher level and will also help reach mastery level on the content. I plan on using this through teaching because it will supply a guideline for the students and myself. At the end of Science Methods I was a little more comfortable with the content and it also helped that I had a chance to look everything over. I am glad that I took this course at the end of my college career and I am happy to know that I learned a lot in this classroom. This successful course would have not been possible if it wasn't for Dr. Smirnova. She pushed me to excel and go above and beyond expectations. This outlook inspired me to be a better me. I would like to finish this last blog with a quote by Sidney Sugerman, "Teach the young people how to think, not what to think."

Below are the list of people I used to comment on their blogs:

• Dorian
• Danielle
• Melissa

Let's Trade Books

Today was an exciting day because we did a book talk and trailer. I learned a lot through this experience because everyone had different ways of approaching these two topics. Before I started to construct my project I first had to pick a book that is related to the topic I taught at Bishop Dunn. The first book I thought of was Super Worm. Super Worm is an engaging book for students because it rhymes and it touched upon the concept of consumers. I've also used this book for another class to do reciprocal teaching. The first step I took for this project was filling out the trade book format. This gave me an idea of what standards and activities that I would conduct with the students. Some of the activities I decided to do with the students is to have them create a food chain and food web with the organisms that are included within the book. This will help them learn the differences between food webs and food chains. Another activity that I would have the students design is having them create another superhero in the book. I will leave the imagination up to to the students, but it must relate to the food web and food chains because that is the main point in this book. After I designed my activities I then had to think of how I would create my book trailer. This book trailer had to be geared toward students and it should make them want to read the book. There so many tools to choose from, therefore, I decided to pick GoAnimate. I've used this tool multiple times and I enjoy making videos off of it. As soon as I opened up Go Animate all of my ideas came spilling out. When I was making this video I laughed a lot. Which means if I was laughing I can only imagine how the students would enjoy this video. After putting all the pieces together I was finally done with the video and it came out perfect. To the right of this blog I posted the final product. Please feel free to watch and enjoy the book trailer. When I was done creating everything it was time to put everything altogether. As a class we presented our projects and how we would fit them into our own classroom. My fellow teacher candidates all did it different ways which was wonderful to see because it kept everyone on their toes. A lot of peers used Animoto for their book trailer because they felt very comfortable with the tool. Everyone did an excellent job with engaging the our class and explaining how it will be implemented in their own classroom. I think this project was a great exercise for us to do because it helped us understand that their are different ways to bring in new tools in the classroom. Also, it gave us an idea of how to use trade books in our own class. It is important to use trade books because it will help students see different connections. I hope to use this technique when I start student teaching and even in the future. Until next time bloggers :)

Science In The News

For this specific topic we were asked to design a lesson around science in the news. It is important to incorporate current event in lessons because it keeps the students involved with aspects happening around them. In Social Studies Methods class, we were asked to design a lesson for a second grade classroom. For Science Method our articles were based on Astronomy and I used Newsela to these articles. Newsela is a great tool to use within the classroom because every article has a different Lexile level to accommodate students reading levels. According to the website Newsela, "Newsela is an innovative way to build reading comprehension with nonfiction that's always relevant: daily news. It's easy and amazing" (About Newsela Page). I would definitely incorporate this tool within my classroom because it will help students stay up-to-date with events and give another source of enhancing their reading skills. While looking through this wonderful site I decided to pick a few articles that are related with Astronomy. The first articles that popped up were things about space and travel. I decided to pick these topics because I haven't been hearing a lot about the travels that civilians are taking to space. We had to choose seven articles for this assignment and I tried to get them to relate to one another. I wanted to keep the articles the same because if I was teaching this topic to the classroom they have articles that they can choose from. It will help them gravitate towards whichever article looks pleasing to them. If you give student choices it will allow them to be more interested in the specific topic. This lesson can be done through the cooperative lesson or even inquiry. It depends on how the teacher wants to conduct it in her classroom. Personally, current events are excellent to do with cooperative lessons. In order for this to succeed through a cooperative lesson the students will have to read the articles on their own time. Having the students read the articles on their own time can also be seen as flipped classroom. A flipped classroom is when students are asked to complete assignments before the teacher teaches them any material. The students are learning and exploring on their own. Therefore, I would use this aspect before teaching them about this topic so they can become more diverse in the topic. After the students have read the articles it is important for the teacher to explain any misconceptions that the students had while reading. This will eliminate any confusions before starting to work with their fellow peers. Through the collaboration section, students will answer questions based on their given article. The strategy the students will be using would be analyzing. This will help the students with comprehension skills and will make them go into further depth on the topic. In order for all the students to collaborate they must use a Web 2.0 tool so that they can work on one forum. The tool I used for Social Studies Method was Linot. Linot is a forum where students can work together and post a sticky note that explains their answers. There are other web 2.0 tools out there other than this given tool. Another tool that can be used for this assignment is padlet. Padlet is just like Linot where everyone can post their thoughts on the discussion board. I would use this tool for this specific assignment. When everyone is done analyzing the questions, the students will come together and explain their answers to the whole class. This way all students are hitting the 5 PIGS through this lesson. I feel that students will benefit through this lesson and it will be engaging for them. The way I organized my articles was through Symbaloo. This will make it easier for the students to pick the articles. Therefore, below is the link to the Symbaloo page I created. Please feel free to click it and look through the articles. Until next time bloggers :)

Symbaloo Science In The News

Exploring Through The 5 E's

The 5 E's are vital in a lesson plan and in a classroom. Teachers should be aware of these 5 aspects when implementing an inquiry lesson. Let me first start off with talking about what is consisted of the 5 E's. According to Enhancing Education, "The 5 E's is an instructional model based on the constructivist approach to learning, which says that learners build or construct new ideas on top of their old ideas." When students are exploring through the 5 E's they are tapping in on their prior knowledge and using that as a "crutch" to the lesson. Wait, but what are the 5 E's? Well I'll tell you, the 5 E's include: Engage, Explore, Explain, Elaborate, and Evaluate. These 5 attributes should be included in your inquiry lesson to help the students build their knowledge. Another attribute that the 5 E's helps are cognitive skills. When going through each E, it helps the students develop a higher order of thinking according to the Bloom's Taxonomy Pyramid. All of these E's have a different aspect, but they all come together at the end. Breaking down each E is the best way to explain these different aspects. The first E that I will begin with is the Engage.
Engage section should always be the first E when implementing a lesson. This helps you make connections between what the students learned before and what they are learning now. The engage portion also introduces the problem or aspect that needs to be solved. An example of this was our group introducing the Web quest to our second graders. We gave the students a problem to solve and this helped us/them begin their lesson. Through this portion the students should be asked a question and this should get them to start thinking about the possible answers. This is where students "Become mentally engaged in the concept, processes, and skills" (Enhancing Education, 1). Also this section is important to bring in students prior knowledge on the subject, either by bringing up questions that were asked in the direct lesson or what the students should already know. After introducing all of these aspects it's time to move onto the second part of the 5 E's.Which brings us to Exploring! This section is for students to develop among themselves. Whether this is making the discoveries in a group or working alone. During this E, students are identifying and developing concepts. They do this by researching the subject and/or experimenting with the different ideas that they previously learned. The students are now taking the question that was posed in the Engage section and using that question to make new discoveries. Relating back to our fieldwork experience, students were asked to do research on their mystery explorers and they had to go through the inquiry process to complete this assignment. They had to read the first article that was supplied and make a hypothesis based on it. Through this students were asked to read through other research articles and find out more information on their mystery explorer. During this section, the students were exploring new pieces of information based on their "mystery explorers." The exploring section should be done by the students and ONLY by the students. Teachers should be there to support and observe the students learning during this section.
The next E that follow Exploring is Explain. This portion should only be done when the students have completed the Exploring portion. If students are not done with that portion this will be difficult for them to complete. Through this section, students are asked to explain their findings to the whole class or a small group. Having the students explain their findings helps them review on what they learned and might even introduce new key terms. Through the students verbalizing their findings they are also creating social skills. This section is pretty self explanatory and I think is the easiest section for the students to complete. To the right of this blog is a video that goes into depth about the 5 E's. It breaks down all the concepts in a simple language and helps people understand the importance of including these different attributes.
The second to last E is Elaborate. This section goes more into depth about the given topic that the students just researched.  During this section, the students "Expand on the concepts they have learned, make connections to other related concepts, and apply their understandings to the world around them in new ways" (NASA, 1). Through this process the students are building more knowledge on what they discovered and implementing them through this process. An example of this would be having the students write a letter to their mystery explorers. We did not have time to incorporate this in our lesson, but we included it in our lesson plan. Having the students write a letter helps them use the terms and attributes they learned in the previous section. You can see that each step relies on one another in order to complete the 5 E's.
Final Step: Evaluate! Last but not least is the evaluate section which is crucial in this learning method. According to Enhancing Education, "Evaluate is the phase that encourages learners to assess their understanding and abilities and let teachers evaluate students' understanding of key concepts and skill development" (p. 1). The last section allows the students to tie up everything they discovered and present their findings either to class or small groups. This coincides with the Explain section. Through this the students are asked to use academic language they learned and key details. If there are any confusion with any topics that the students researched this would be the time to clarify any loose ends.
Learning more about the 5 E's definitely helps me see the importance of this aspect. Without these E's our lessons would not be engaging for the students. The whole point of teaching is to help the students learn through an engaging and helpful way. When writing this blog, I came up with a bunch of ideas to use the 5 E's of learning through a Social Studies lens. I'm hoping that I can implement these ideas when I student teach. Until next time bloggers :)

Works Cited

Dunbar, B. (2012). 5Es Overview: "The 5E instructional model" Retrieved April 12, 2016, from http://www.nasa.gov/audience/foreducators/nasaeclips/5eteachingmodels/ 

The 5 E's. (n.d.). Retrieved April 12, 2016, from http://enhancinged.wgbh.org/research/eeeee.html

Mastering The Material

In order to master content one must reflect upon it. In this blog I will be talking about my fieldwork experience and go into depth on how it helped me master certain aspects. Before beginning my experience for fieldwork I was overwhelmed and didn't know where to begin my lessons. I've heard of the three different lessons, but I was unsure on how to implement them. Watching group one go made me realize the distinct difference between each lesson. During these lessons I was talking mental notes on what will benefit our group. Even at the end of group ones teaching we all had a moment to reflect upon how they did teaching. This gave all of us insight on how we should set up our lessons and implement them. A few blogs down, I gave my feedback on how group one did to mater their content. We were asked to fill out a reflection template based on how each group implemented their lessons. At first I thought this was going to be busy work and had nothing to do with the content, but it was the complete opposite. During this time, I was learning on how to think critically and even give "sound" feedback to each group. This was a learning experience for me and I enjoyed writing these reflections. In each reflection I put down aspects that I liked and how I would maybe implement some things different. The way I constructed it helped me apply my knowledge and construct a higher order of thinking. I was looking back to my recent reflections and observed how I was still unsure of the content and was confused on what to write. Skimming through the later reflections, you can see more in depth detail and a lot more emphasis on how to implement a proper lesson. Overall I think the reflections that were required helped me understand the difference between the lessons and how to implement them within a classroom. When reading about Bloom's Taxonomy I was a little skeptical on how this all connects with teaching, but it connects in a way through the students. Students are "blank slates" as they call it, but they do have some sort of prior knowledge on the different subjects. When learning new content they start at the very bottom of the pyramid and eventually build their way up to the higher order of thinking spectrum. We do this by building a foundation through the direct instruction. This is where it is teacher centered and the students are learning either by listening or writing. Listening would be on the bottom of the pyramid along with accessing prior knowledge. I like to think of this process like building stairs, in order to get to the next step you have to follow it in sequential order. The next lesson that is given would be the inquiry process. Students are applying the knowledge they just learned in the previous instruction. They are starting to build a higher order of thinking by making their own discoveries. Finally is the cooperative lesson. Cooperative is important to build students social skills and also evaluate their fellow peers on how they worked together and their overall summary on the content they learned from the inquiry lesson. Evaluation and reflection would hit the highest point on Bloom's Taxonomy. Relating this theory to the three different lessons really showed me the crucial connections between theories and designing lessons.
Another important attribute that I would like to talk about is implementing the 5 E's during the inquiry process. When designing the inquiry lesson, I was unaware that there were 5 E's that teachers must hit in order to develop this higher order of thinking. I started to realize this aspect when the first group taught their inquiry lesson. While they were teaching I was looking down at the reflection paper and comparing and contrasting on how they implemented these concepts. According to CScope, "Teachers should encourage students to explain observations and findings in their own words (5E Lesson Design: Application to CSCOPE Social Studies, page 28). The inquiry process should be a dual interaction between teachers and students. Students should have more control during this process, but the teachers are there to provide help to any students that are struggling. The 5 E's help the students discover their own findings either with a group or individually. Overall I think my fieldwork experience was successful and helped me develop more knowledge on not only how to teach well, but also how to write a well developed lesson plan. Before fieldwork I was not really sure on how to even start a lesson plan or even know how to implement it. I'm feeling very confident in what I am doing now. Below is a rubric that is based on my fieldwork experience. Feel free to look at the marks and I hope you enjoyed this blog. Until next time bloggers :)

Assessment & Instruction Reflection Rubric

Planning Everyday

Wow I can't believe we are halfway through the semester. We are about to finish up fieldwork which means it's time to stop and reflect on all of things we did. This fieldwork experience taught me a lot about lesson planning and collaboration. Collaboration was the key during this fieldwork experience.Without this key attribute groups would not be able to get any work done. This was my first time ever teaching a full classroom and I was little nervous throughout this process. Once I got up in front of the classroom it just felt natural. One thing I gained through this experience was confidence. Before this class I struggled with knowing what to say to students and being timid in the classroom.  After I taught it was a big weight off my chest, but also gave me the boost that I needed as well. Not only did I gain the confidence to teach, but I noticed my reflections towards my fellow peers increased over time too. Looking back to the first reflection and my last reflection I can see some progress in my writing and academic language.The one aspect I want to reflect on are the lesson plans. Dr. Smirnova wanted us to take our lessons plans and make a copy of the formatted one she corrected. With this new copy we had to design our own lesson based off of on our beliefs. I liked this assignment because it gave me time to really reflect on how I would want to change certain aspects. It also gave us an opportunity to look through a deeper lens undergoing the process of evaluation. The first step in this process was to make a copy of the original lesson plan and correct the changes I thought were necessary. For the direct lesson plan there was not much for me too change because I made all the changes that I thought were necessary the second time around. I tweaked a few things here and there, but nothing to drastic. When designing this lesson, I tried to think of how to incorporate technology. This was a hard process to think of something with the use of technology. One thing we used was the Smart Board for the guided practice. I really liked how we incorporated the Smart Board for this assignment and the students seemed to be engaged with the lesson. While correcting the second lesson plan I noticed a few important details that needed to be changed, but it was nothing too serious. The wording was a little jumbled and I just added in a few words to make is sound smoother. One aspect we forgot was to hyperlink the Web Quest within the lesson. This will make it easier for whoever is reading the lesson to follow along. The one aspect that I was struggling with was the objectives. I wanted to make sure the objectives were observable and measurable for us. Eventually I figured out an objective to write that correlates with our lesson plan. Our inquiry lesson was not as detailed as our direct was because the direct is more teacher centered then the inquiry. I would say all of our lesson plans were created to the best of our capabilities. I'm glad that I had a great group to work with and I look forward to being in the classroom now. Below this blog are my lesson plans that I revised based off of my perspective. I hope you enjoy reading our engaging lesson plans. Until next time bloggers :)

Direct Lesson
Inquiry Lesson

Ocean Blue Jiggy

This past week and the week before Spring Break we learned about the Jigsaw method. I had an idea of what the Jigsaw method could be, but I wasn't completely 100% sure. We were required to read a little more on this method and really break it down into pieces on what this method was about. According to Reading Rockets, "Jigsaw is a cooperative learning strategy that enables each student of a "home" group to specialize in one aspect of a topic (for example, one group studies habitats of rain forest animals, another group studies predators of rain forest animals)." In order to successfully do this students must meet up with their groups and collaborate with whatever material that they are supplied with. This is a great way to have students interact and help them with social skills that are needed to succeed. We had this opportunity to discover how this Jigsaw

method worked in our own classroom. Dr. Smirnova introduced this method to us and wanted us to complete it altogether. The first step in this lesson was to get with our fellow colleagues that were sitting next to us at the time. Second step was to discuss in our group who wanted to do which components of the cooperative lesson. We all decided on what we wanted to be because that was going to be our expert group. At this time I was confused on what was going to happen next because I was still unsure of how this was all going to work out. After we picked our expert groups we then had to meet up with the same people in our expert groups. Finally we were altogether and that's when I realized the different components on what makes up a Jigsaw method. I like to think of it as putting the pieces back together. Once we were in our expert group we collaborated on the topic that was handed to us which was Ocean and Currents. This was a topic that we were all a little unfamiliar with. Everyone in the group was responsible to look up information online and contribute their information on the PowerPoint. While they were looking up information I was beginning to started the PowerPoint. I was in charge of all the graphics and videos that were included within this lesson. My group decided to make an interactive game using Kahoot. This helped the students through a formative assessment. Kahoot is an engaging tool for students to complete through a competitive way. The point of this Jigsaw method was to work together to complete a task with your expert groups. Once completing the task it was now time to come back together and have each expert group explain their findings with all of the class. At this time we are learning while the experts are deepening their understanding of the material. Each group had a different twist on the way they presented their material. Some groups used videos to convey their messages while others used lecturing to teach their lesson. The one thing I noticed from everyone was the use of academic language and eye contact. I can see that everyone is growing and going to become excellent teachers one day. Personally I started to feel more confident and comfortable with speaking in front of the classroom. It's amazing what practice can do. Listed below is my groups Jigsaw PowerPoint. Feel free to access it whenever you want. Also towards the end of the PowerPoint there is the Kahoot game that you can access, from there you can set up an account. I highly recommend using this website in a classroom setting. This is a great way to assess students knowledge and make it into a competition. I hope you sign up and use this amazing tool in your classroom. Until next time bloggers :)

Ocean & Coasts

Bugs Bugs Bugs!

The research article that I chose was called, "What's Bugging You?" There are multiple reasons what drew me to this article. One of the main reasons was because of the colorful palette that is displayed in the front. I'm not a fan of bugs, but I know there are a lot of misconceptions when it comes to bugs. Students are always discovering new attributes when it comes to finding bugs. This article went into depth on how there are misconceptions that students need to figure out on their own. Let's break this article down into tiny pieces. The main point of this article was to show the 5 E's in the inquiry process. This is an important aspect because this helps the students hit a higher order of thinking, which relates to Bloom's Taxonomy. Through each process this teacher pre-assesses the students prior knowledge. The first aspect that she hits is having the students circle which insect best fits their perception of how insects should look. After that the teacher begins to talk about an insect-collection excursion, this is where the students are going to use the 5 E's to explore about more insects. This article breaks down the 5 E's into smaller sections to explain the main difference. First let me write down the 5 E's before discussing them. The 5 E's include: engage, explore, explain, elaborate, and evaluate. These 5 E's all have distinct attributes that are discussed within this article. The first E is engage and the teacher engaged her students by asking what is the most common insect that you know. Not only is she engaging the students, but she is also asking them to tap into their prior knowledge to answer the question. After she heard some of the students answers, she shows them a well known website that goes more into depth about insects. Before starting the lesson she makes sure that students know the concept of classifying. If students are unsure of this concept then she explains what it means. She does this by relating other objects and having the students classify distinct features. Once the students have an idea of what they will be doing she hops right into the Explore section. At first the teacher most model how to do this experiment before the students proceed on their own. The students are collecting data on the insects that they see outside. The materials are listed below that are needed for this experiment:

With these materials the students are to find different bugs that are placed within the bins and compare and contrast the bugs that are inside. The bugs will range from different sizes to having distinct features. Students will have to write down features and draw pictures based on what they see. Towards the end the students can even ask questions that relates to the content and base their answers of the question. Depending on the age you can take this a step further on writing a report about the bugs they discovered. After the explore section comes the explain phase. This is where the students are asked to go more into detail on explaining their insects. The features that make up this insect, the drawing they created, why they chose this insect. Those are some examples of what students might explain during this section. This is also a time where the teacher can ask students questions based on their observations. She can relate the questions to different content and see if the students are understanding this process. The fourth step is Elaborate and during this the students are making models of their insect. This is going to be a hands on experiment for the students to conduct. They will use the data they collected in the previous section and create a bug using different materials that are supplied within the classroom, but they must make their insect adapt to their natural settings. This would include making insects with wings, legs, long bodies, etc. Last but not least is the last E which is Evaluate. During this section the teacher evaluates the students on the content they previously just learned, also known as a formative assessment. This is an individual assessment for the students. The teacher will ask the students to write down three attributes that make up an insect. Based on the results the teacher will see if the students understood the content. It is important to do this because if the students didn't understand this assignment then they are not reaching a higher order of thinking. I like to think of the 5 E's as a process. Students have to finish one step in order to make it to the following steps to understand the material. This article is a prime example of how to follow the 5 E's. I'm glad I chose this article to analyze. I look forward to blogging more about articles I find online. Until next time bloggers :) 

Daily Changes Within An Ecosystem

Last week was an absolute rush teaching at Bishop Dunn. Now that we were out of the "hot seat" it was now time for the third to teach. The teacher candidates who were in this group included: Alyssa, Amanda, and Kelly. They were in charge of explaining the changes that are happening in the ecosystem. There lesson was a continuous of what our group taught in the previous week. Before the third group started to teach their direct lesson; they reviewed some important information that is will be needed through this lesson. Alyssa asked the class questions based on their prior knowledge and I noticed a some misconceptions during this portion. The students seemed to miss pieces of information, but they were all fixed by the end of the direct lesson. After accessing their prior knowledge, Alyssa showed the students and Animoto to give a brief introduction to what the students will be learning. I really liked how they watched the video independently the first time through and then Alyssa explained the importance of the video while them watching the second time through. This was an excellent idea because it helped the students focus on the importance of this video. The one suggestion I have for the video is to maybe tell the students to watch out for some of the vocabulary terms and ask them to name some words that they noticed in the video. After the video the transition into the development section was smooth and precise for the students. Group 3 decided

to use a fill in the blank worksheet to have the students follow along and take notes. This helped them focus on the lesson and gave them a clear outline of what to expect. All teacher candidates seemed very knowledgeable of the material and was making eye contact with all the students. Making eye

contact is an important factor because students can connect with what the teacher(s) are saying at that specific time. Another attribute that I really liked about Group 3 was making sure that they were relating the material to real situations. Alyssa did this when talking about the hereditary genes. The students began to make connections between their family traits and themselves as well. Throughout the development Amanda, Alyssa, and Kelly executed it flawlessly. They were engaging for the students and you could tell the students were soaking in all the information. The only other suggestion I had for this group was to make sure that there is not a lot of information on one slide. Putting too much information on one slide will not only send the students, the teachers as well into cognitive overload. Just be very cautious of this factor when designing a PowerPoint or displaying an visuals. Visuals should only have 7 key points or sentences because that is the number that anyone can withhold. This group transitioned into the guided practice with ease and the students seemed excited to hear what they had in  store for them. Kelly and Alyssa modeled how the guided practice will work. I liked how they modeled this process because I can see this game getting a little confusing at times. Each group had poster board that they had to hold up that displayed their answers. As a group they were asked to discuss and figure out the correct answer. This game was engaging for the students and they seemed to really enjoy the competition. The only suggestion I had on this section would be to call out different numbers to keep them on their toes. Calling out the numbers in sequential order does not really have an effect on them. Another guided practice they decided to do was playing Kahoot. Kahoot is another engaging game that allows the students to have friendly competition amongst each other. This tool helps not only the students, but the teachers as well because it is a summative assessment on what the students just learned. The students got a little out of hand during this section, but they reeled them back into the lesson. At the end of the guided practice, the students were asked to fill out an exit ticket, but there was no clear closure to the direct lesson. Overall the direct lesson went well and I was excited to see what they were going to do for their inquiry lesson.

Adaptations Investigation

The inquiry process will always be my favorite lesson because this where students are doing hands on activities. Before group three presented their inquiry process; they first reviewed what they learned on the previous day. After the review the students were presented with a Voki that was given a problem for them to solve. There task was to become a Zoologists and fill out a graphic organizer based on the research that is provided. During this section, there was no clear modeling but the students seemed to understand the task that was at hand. Alyssa, Amanda, and Kelly gave the student research articles based on the adaptations of the animals. They were asked to fill out any information they found and record it on their graphic organizer. Through this the students were following the inquiry method. It is important to have the students follow through this method because it helps them organize their thoughts and become experts on the inquiry method. When the students were done with their graphic organizer they decided on animal that fits all the criteria that they mentioned in their research. This portion was engaging for the students because they got to be creative, but there were some issues that were faced during this part. Some students were annoyed that they couldn't incorporate their ideas on the picture. There is no way of avoiding this trouble though. After the students designed their own animals it was time for each group to present their findings and animals that they created. I noticed with the first group the teacher candidates challenged them to

answer questions based on their observations. This is an important factor because it makes the students think about their research and how they implemented it. I wish that my fellow teacher candidates did this questions for every group, but they were running out of time at this point. Towards the end of this inquiry lesson the students were asked to write an letter to Lou the Zoologist about their research and discoveries. This was an excellent independent practice to wrap up all the key items that the students learned. I think this group did an amazing job with presenting the direct and inquiry lesson. I can't wait to see what the next group has in store for all of us. Until next time bloggers :)

Our Ecosystem Needs Help!

For my inquiry section, we decided to create a Web Quest. This was an excellent idea in the beginning, but then I realized how much work it was to complete the task. I had six groups in total to complete. Each group had to an organisms to search and find out what is happening to their ecosystems. Designing a Web Quest for fifth graders was less challenging compared to the second graders. The few aspects that I needed to take into consideration were reading, writing, and presenting the material. Before I started my Web Quest, I laid out exactly what I needed to do. I started to Google search some Web Quests to get an idea of what I was going to do. Then I managed to fins one Web Quest that related to the topic that I we had taught. I decided to take this web quest and add more organisms inside it to accommodate the six groups. In order to complete this Web Quest I used Google Sites to create each page. The beginning section of the Web Quest is the problem that they have to complete. This coincides with the Voki that was introduced to the class previously. This section was by far the easiest to create because it did need a lot of information. Moving on to the next few pages was

rough. I spent all day on these sections because there was so much information involved. The students in this classroom at an average reading level, therefore, it was easier to assign them the articles that were included in the Web Quest. They can pick and choose what to write down on their organizer we supplied them with. The way I designed this Web Quest correlates with the graphic organizers that were given to the students. There was a fill in the blank section for them to write their hypothesis and their conclusion. Unlike the second graders Web Quest, I decided to use less pictures and more words on the page because the students are in a higher grade and they don't need that guidance like the second graders. After reading the first article students need to stop and write their hypothesis based on the first article. Once the students are done with writing their hypothesis they can begin to look through the articles and find out what is happening to their organisms. Each article is personalized through online resources and this took up the majority of my time because I needed to find articles that were relevant to their organisms. After finding articles I made sure to hyperlink the online resources inside the Web Quest. The one factor that I had consider during this assignment is making sure the students or teacher candidates had access when presenting the information to the groups. One way I did this was just sending my fellow teacher candidates the link that is setup right to the Web Quest. There were so many important factors that I had to take into consideration. Once the Web Quest was designed I wanted to make sure everyone also had access to that specific Web Quest that I had created. It is so important to think of all the things that could go wrong throughout this experience because I spent so much time on this. Bishop Dunn was generous to lend us some iPads for the students to complete this Web Quest. Our group had to meet with one of the teachers to make sure the Web Quest worked on that portal because they use a different online tool. When we first went in there the Web Quest pulled right up, but one of the Java games did not show up, which then made me rethink to use a different tool. Meeting with the teacher helped us get rid of any minor details that I missed within this Web Quest. There was one group in particular that did not have an internet access when we taught, but we managed to print out the articles and they followed along like everyone else. We were thankful that the students were okay with using a hard copy of the articles.  Overall the students seemed to enjoy this Web Quest because we incorporated technology. Below is the link to the Web Quest that I created for the students. Until next time bloggers :)

Help Our Ecosystem

Let's Be Fair

I remember when I did my first science fair in elementary school. This was to showcase all your brilliant science ideas for the entire school. To me science fair's were not something I enjoyed because it required a lot of outside work and my parents helped me a lot. I felt like it wasn't my own work and there was no clear point of doing it. This semester we were asked by Dr. Smirnova to conduct our own project for a Science Fair at Bishop Dunn. My first thought was when do I have time to do this? As soon as I asked that question I started to have flashbacks based on my past experiences. I tried not to think of all my horrible Science Fair experiences and decided to start all over. With this being said I started to brainstorm ideas on what to do to conduct this science fair. Immediately I thought of what type of drinks stain your teeth. After I decided my topic I had to gather all the materials together. The materials that I needed to conduct this project was: hollowed eggs, drinks, cups, etc. First step was to setup the materials and start recording data based on the first day. I conducted this experiment for three day and made sure to record all the progress. During the experiment portion, I was impatient and wanted the experiment to be done. After three days I looked through my past research and saw the distinct correlation between the different drinks. Not only did I use a chart, but I also took pictures of the hollowed egg from each day. I can see how visuals and charts helps you see the different correlations from day to day. According to Lane Wilkinson, "This process of inquiry extends beyond the academic world to include instances such as evidence and data collected by groups and individuals in communities and the public at large, and the process of inquiry may also focus upon personal, professional, or societal needs" (Is Research Inquiry, p. 1). The inquiry process was being implemented while conducted my experiment. When students are doing an experiment they are going through the inquiry process and discovering new attributes. While I was doing my experiment I was finding new discoveries by visuals. I used the eggs as the visuals within my experiment. The first step in the inquiry process is to make a hypothesis based on your experiment. I thought about the different drinks would effect the egg shells and based off my prior knowledge I wrote down what I thought was going to happen. The next step in the inquiry process was to implement the experiment. During this section, I was testing my hypothesis to see if it was right. This process took a longer time then I imagined, but I managed to collect all the data that was needed to conduct this experiment. I made a chart and took pictures to collect my data to post on my poster board. Finally it was time to see if my hypothesis was right which led to the next step in the inquiry process, which is writing a conclusion. I calculated all my data and came to the conclusion that the Coke was more acidic then the other beverages that I provided. Throughout this experience my thoughts have changed on Science Fair's. Personally I think science fairs are productive if the students have time to work on them in the classroom and know the steps of inquiry. When I was in elementary school I was unaware of these steps. I knew that you had to include them on the poster board, but was confused on the reasoning. I'm glad that this class made me understand this importance of the inquiry process.
Student Work
The day of the science fair it was our turn to grade the students on how well they designed their experiment. We were all given a rubric and we were asked to judge fairly based off of their presentation skills and the design of their poster boards. I was ecstatic to see all the projects that the students implemented. The first project that caught my attention was the density of different liquids. Her poster board was neatly organized and she had a lot of visuals. In the front of her poster board there were the materials that she used to conduct the experiment. I proceeded to ask her to explain and elaborate on her chosen experiment. The main aspects I looked for while her presenting the material was eye contact and how confident she was explaining the material. This student in

particular did an amazing job presenting and explaining the different processes of the inquiry process. To me it seemed that she understood exactly what to do and reached mastery level for her science fair project. I only had time to look at a few more presentations, but most of the students that presented were confident with their material and you can clearly see they worked on their own to complete their experiment. Immediately I could tell that some students asked for help from their parents because their projects were in depth and those students were having a hard time explaining their material. I think this science fair helped the students see the different ways to execute an experiment. Overall my thoughts have changed on science fairs because I can understand the importance of learning the steps. Also the students seemed to very engaged throughout this experience. I'm glad to have experienced this for a second time and have a different outlook. I will definitely execute a science fair within my classroom if there is any time when I student teach. Until next time bloggers :)

How Finland Broke Every Rule

Recently Dr. Smirnova gave us an article in Social Studies to read about Finland's school system. Before reading this article I had an open mind on how other countries and places taught their students in a classroom setting. While reading this article, "How Finland Broke Every Rule" it was interesting to see how exactly the students learn. The first couple of paragraphs discusses what a fourth grade classroom in rural Finland looks like. William Doyle stated, "Instead of control, competition, stress, standardized testing, screen-based schools and loosened teacher qualifications, try warmth, collaboration, and highly professionalized, teacher-led encouragement and assessment." This aspect is completely different compared to the American education reformers. We require our teachers to be qualified when choosing them for the job, but not as highly qualified in Finland. Another attribute that is different is the standardized testing. Standardized testing is a big deal for New York. Students are required to either take regents and many other testing. America thinks that tests really measure the students capability of their cognitive skills, but in actuality it doesn't. Taking tests require students to memorize the material, but this doesn't help their higher order thinking skills. In Finland students are not immersed in technology as much as other places. They do have the high tech devices, but they are never really seen in the school system. There is usually just a smart board and a teacher's desktop. Comparing that scenery to our college; there are certain rooms that only have those two aspects. This can be seen in our lecture rooms with the desks facing towards the smart board. The one aspect that is different in Finland is the teacher only uses their smart board when he/she is delivering simulations of personalized teaching. This is unique characteristic that I have NEVER seen before in a school system. I'm not positive on what exactly it means, but the thing I take out of it is someone virtually teaching the students through technology. This is one aspect that I definitely am going to look into! If there is a simple way of creating the simulations, I would conduct it in my own classroom. 
The classroom management is also done a little different in Finland. I like the fact that classroom is setup for student to slouch, wiggle and giggle for the students. Just that little movement allows the students to be kinesthetic learners. This is definitely one attribute that should be added to the classroom in America. Teachers in America refrain students to move around and "do silly things" because they think it will distract the other students from learning. I like having this attribute in the classroom because students need a moment to be silly and get all of their energy out in some way. The other major difference is the atmosphere. In Finland the students are encouraged to constantly experiment with new approaches to improve learning. The students are learning by doing which hits many points on the Bloom's Taxonomy pyramid. There are so many attributes in Finland that make me wonder about the American school system. Finland seems to have terrific success rates and the students seem to be more interested in learning new things. Right on the side of this blog, I added a video which includes more information on the Finland school system. The one thing that surprised me was the dropout rate compared to the American dropout rate. They mentioned that students DO NOT dropout in Finland and if they do then it is only 5% compared to half the students in America. This video really goes into depth about the school system and what you see inside their different schools. I recommend watching this video to anyone that is interested in learning about this AMAZING school system. Until next time bloggers :) 

Strategy Game

Strategy is the most common aspect when you are teaching a classroom. It is important to hit all of these different techniques when presenting a new lesson. Dr. Smirnova provided us with a link that discussed about the different strategies. As I was reading this article I highlighted certain things that really stood out to me. Once I went through each paragraph I sat back and reflected on each material. The way I did this was by writing down notes in my Goggle Docs. This really helped me distinguish between the different strategies. The one way I will remember material is to write down each component that is important to me. So below this text I will copy down some of the notes I used to help me remember each strategy.

Instructional Strategies

1. Direct
1. Teacher Directed

2. Indirect
1. Student Centered

3. Interactive
1. Sharing amongst their peers in small groups with the entire class.
1. Examples: Brainstorming, cooperative learning groups, problem solving, role playing, debates, etc.
4. Experiential

1. Inductive, learner centered, and activity oriented

5. Independent 
1. Individuals are expected to analyze problems, reflect, make decisions and take purposeful actions

Doing these small things will help me remember each specific strategy and will help me remember the differences while I'm teaching. I managed to find pictures that correlate with the different methods to help provide examples on top of the true definition. In class today, we did not have enough time to go over the different strategies, but I am really looking forward to going more into depth about these five different strategies. It is so crucial to know these different techniques because when you are teaching a lesson it is important to know the major differences. This way it is easier to know when to use each strategy. My friend Bryanna, brought up some good points when I was talking to her about this post and I would like to clarify certain aspects. She asked me what teaching style is the easiest and hardest in my opinion. Looking at all of these teaching styles it is really hard to pinpoint the top two, but I clearly identify two. Personally the easiest teaching style for me would be Experiential because of the intentions behind it. Students are learning on their own by teaching and discovering new attributes. I am a kinesthetic learner and I think it is important to incorporate this within your classroom. Not all students learn by lecturing because some students are more visual or even auditory learners. Teachers must accommodate everyone's needs in a classroom. Experiential is the easiest for me because I am a hands on learner and in this teaching strategy students are learning by doing. This can be through role playing, field trips, experiments, etc. This also allows the students to have social interaction with their fellow peers. I think this is an important teaching strategy and definitely should be used in a classroom setting.Overall I think the hardest teaching style would be direct. Direct is teacher centered and there are no room for errors. This sets the tone for the unit plans that you will be teaching. If the students don't understand the material, how do you expect them to proceed with the lesson. This section is called "drill" for a reason. The teacher should drill the information into the students cognitive section before moving on towards anything else. Another reason why I said direct teaching style is hard because there is little student interaction. This is directly teacher centered and sometimes teacher aren't sure of ALL the students in a classroom are understanding the material. There are a few ways that teachers can check students knowledge, but does that actually reach a part in the Bloom's Taxonomy Pyramid. This will lead me right into my next blog which is going to be strictly on Bloom's Taxonomy. Keep watching my blogs and hopefully everything will eventually connect.

Class Moved To Online

I've missed blogging for a little while, but now I'm back. I wanted to take a moment and begin explaining what happened a few weeks ago! Well here I go, so a few weeks ago we had a little snow storm which caused Bishop Dunn to close. Dr. Smirnova, decided the safest way to still have class was through Adobe Connect. I've used Adobe Connect before, but it was exciting to use it all over again. I walked to the computer lab that we were originally supposed to be in and began logging on as I usually do. Dr. Smirnova began with her introduction and went right into the lesson. With Adobe Connect you can do a lot of neat aspects. She decided to project a PowerPoint in the background so we could all see it. While we were all viewing the PowerPoint she did a voiceover on what she wanted us to know. Her PowerPoint was about designing lessons for edTPA. The cover page really caught my attention because edTPA is such an important aspect to learn about for student teaching. There are five different models of teaching just like the blog below. The five types are behavioral, information processing, social interactive, experiential, and independent study. These five strategies do sound very familiar to me. Some of them were actually used below this specific blog. Moving along, the next couple of slides were discussing the "meat and cheese" of writing a lesson plan. This would include: goals and objectives. These two terms I am very familiar with, but it never hurts to brush up on aspects. The examples she used would were:

Objective Example: Given a task to work in a group of 4 and the resources on the American Revolution, the student will create a poster, following the criterial of the rubric and scoring at 3/4.

Dr. Smirnova supplied us with an outline when designing your own objective which is also very useful. The formula she gave us was: Given (a task or materials)the student will verb (from Bloom's Taxonomy) with (an expected level of performance). You have been hearing me talk about Bloom's Taxonomy so much but what really is Bloom's Taxonomy? In 1956, Benjamin Bloom collaborated with a few other colleges and designed a framework with educational goals. They broke it up into small little sections, what you might know as a pyramid. The six sections of this pyramid include: knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. Each section has a purpose to accomplish a higher order thinking. Remember is always at the bottom of the pyramid and creating is always at the top. As you can see by the pyramid to the right. There are multiple versions of this Bloom's Taxonomy pyramid, but they all correlate back to the original one. Before getting into the detail about they other pyramids let's first break down each part. 

Remembering/Knowledge

This process involved the recalling of specific material. It can be a recall in pattern, structure, or setting. I like to relate this section to the direct lesson. Throughout a direct lesson the students are recalling the information that is given to them. This is hitting the first section in Bloom's Taxonomy. It is pretty amazing to see some sort of correlation between the two.

Understanding/Comprehension

It is just the next step in the process. This refers to the type of understanding or apprehension so that the individual can make connections with the material. A good connection with this would be having the students answer check point questions based on the direct lesson. The students are understanding the material and applying their cognitive skills to answer the question. Which brings us right to applying. 

Applying/Application

This process uses the abstraction of particular and concrete situations. I know this definition doesn't really explain the attributes. Basically what the definition means is to have the individuals taking the material and using it in and out of the classroom setting. The students/individuals apply their knowledge into the "real world." 

Analyzing/Analysis

It is the breakdown the material into component parts so that the structure may be understood. The outcomes in this sections have a higher intellectual level than comprehension and application. Through this step individuals are understanding the relationship between the content and structural form of the material. 

Evaluating/Synthesis

The second to last step would be the evaluating section which is confusing because in the original Bloom's taxonomy model this would be the last, but they focus on the same attribute in this part of the pyramid. This is where individuals are able to put the pieces back together to make it into a whole. It is either done by research or unique communication. You can say during this step the inquiry process would be a good way to hit the higher order thinking. 

Creating/Evaluating

Last but not least creating! This is the ability to judge then value of material. The judgement are based off criteria that is set for the individuals. Through the teaching model the cooperative lesson plan hits this top section. This is where the students are creating their own presentation, but also giving a peer evaluation. 

Look at the Bloom's Taxonomy model, there are many attributes that carry right into teaching. Dr. Smirnova mentioned many of these attributes throughout her Adobe Connect conversation. I look forward to having more of these online meetings and learning more about Bloom's Taxonomy along the way. Until next time bloggers :)

The Beginning of A New Journey

First off I wanted to welcome everyone to my page and what a fun filled semester this is going to be. A few semesters ago, I had the pleasure to have Dr. Smirnova as my professor. Walking into Science Methods I was confident because I knew what to expect. Science has always been a huge part of my life and I look forward to taking this class to learn more exciting aspects. The first day of class was a productive day for all of us. The one characteristic that I really enjoyed was the mystery bag. This mystery bag helped us become scientist by making a hypothesis. Dr. Smirnova walked us through multiple steps in order to make an educated guess to figure out what objects were in the bag. All of us were using the inquiry method to discover what might in the bag. This really opened up my eyes to using this different method and we use this method on an everyday basis if we are unsure of something. Another activity that we did toward the end of class was draw a picture of what we thought a scientist looked like through our eyes. It was amazing to walk around the room and see the different interpretations that everyone made. One of the common traits that everyone put down was a man with a lab coat working with chemicals. Below there is a picture of what I thought a scientist looked like through my eyes. You can see that I also drew him as a man and was working with chemicals. I think this exercise was excellent to see the different stigmas that people have. This activity would be an excellent one to work with the students as well. 

The second day of class was very exciting because a few classmates presented their experience with science. Whether it be through elementary school or any grade higher. Dr. Smirnova had us write a reflection on our past experiences. Personally, this essay was fun and insightful to write because I love recalling memories of the past. Listening to most people present it was exciting to see everyone's past memories. The one aspect that I noticed is the effect on the teachers. Every classmate that presented a memory, a teacher that they loved would be linked to their experience. As an aspiring teacher it is important to follow by the characteristics that some of my fellow students mentioned. Some key characteristics that make a good teacher are:                                          1.Engaging                          

As a teacher you have to engage your students to want to learn. You can do this by making lessons hands on and making them more interactive. This can be as simple as turning to your partner and talking to them about what the teacher just discussed. There are multiple ways of making your lesson plan engaging with science. 

2. Passion for the subject

It is pretty obvious to students when a teacher is showing love towards the subject. Showing passion will help the students want to learn the material as much as you do. This can be toward any subject that a teacher will be teaching. Students can pick up on a subject that a teacher either dislikes or doesn't teach to their fullest potential. It is ALWAYS important to look over the material as well before teaching it. A teacher must be prepared and confident to teach the lesson to their students. 

3. Constructive feedback 

This can be a hard area for teachers because their is thin line that teachers cross. A good teacher will provide feedback, but not in a demeaning way to their students. Constructive feedback would include making notes on what they really liked and also what they had questions about. As a teacher you never want to "go over that line of being too critical." 

Those three characteristics are the most important to me. There are vast amount of features that teachers need to consider while teaching. This course is designed to help us think like a science teacher and also come out with more knowledge on science. I look forward to meeting everyone and spend this journey with you!