Social media is a really cool concept. It is a place to share your ideas, stories, or whatever comes to your mind that you want to share. It is basically like your own personal journal. What makes social media even better is that there are different groups and communities for just about anything. I have discovered that there is a big community on social media just for teachers. It is a place where other teachers can share their ideas and tips for teaching. I was nervous to start a blog and twitter, but I have grown to love it. It can be intimidating at first to put your self out there if you are not used to it. Over time it has become my new norm. I enjoy reaching out to other educators and reading up on their lasted blog or Twitter post. I recently started doing live chats on Twitter. It is so fun! It is cool to see people responding live and seeing the answers they come up with. Social media is a great place to connect with people who share the same passion as you. It is truly amazing to connect with so many teachers around the world all filled with great ideas. I plan on keeping my blog and Twitter to keep learner and communicating with fellow educators.

I am so close to the end of finishing my Winter semester. I cannot believe it. Some days it felt like I would never see the end, and some days I could not get time to slow down. I have learned so much over the last 10 weeks. Here is just a few thing I have learned, new ways to incorporate technology into my lessons, stimulating higher order thinking for students, creating a Twitter, and creating a blog! Learning and doing all of these thing required me to step out of my comfort zone. Whenever someone steps out of their comfort zone, it can be a scary thing, but I am glad I did. I absolutely love learning new things, especially if it helps be become a better teacher. Learning to incorporate new technology has been favorite so far. We learned about this App called Flipgrid. It is a fun and great way to assess students understanding. They also have a lot of fun with it as well! Learning how to stimulate high order thinking with my students has been a learning curve. I how importance of it, so I want to become better at it. I know it is a skill that will come with time! Creating a Twitter and a Blog has been awesome! It was a little intimidating at first, but over time I have grown to love it. I have found it to be a great place to connect with other educators and share ideas and also a place for me to share my thoughts. It has been a busy semester and I have learned so much in such a short amount of time. I plan on taking all that I have learned and taking it with me for when I become a teacher!

Last week we had winter vacation. This has been the first full week back. It felt nice to have the week off to refresh and recharge my batteries. I know the kids needed it too. The first week back from any vacation is hard, especially for 6 year olds. I found it challenging this week to keep them focused. At times it felt like they forgot all of our class rules. It was ok though! I knew to expect this and knew that it will take time to ease the students back into our routine. It just took a little extra time than normal to remind students of their expected behaviors and a little more time explaining and teaching school work. With a lot of positive reinforcement and praising, I felt like students were slowly easing back into the routine. I know next week will be another test for the few that still struggled, but time changes everything. I am excited to be back at work and to be a part of these students lives. I am ready for Monday!

I got observed for the second time today. My FPF mentioned on the first observation if I could have the teacher not be in the room, so that she does not have an urge to step in. The teacher (my SP) thought it would be a good idea if I did a small activity with the class before my lesson, so the students can get used to me teaching. The teacher left the room for a few minutes, while I did my small activity. As I was teaching the activity, the students were excellent at first, but then slowly starting calling out, coming up to me, not listening, talking when I was talking, and even one kid was flipping chairs. I could not believe how they were acting just because the teacher walked out of the room for a few minutes. They are never like that, especially the student who was flipping chairs. I started to get nervous because I knew my FPF was coming any minute to observe me and I didn’t want her to think I did not have the class under control. I just followed through with the behaviors with the appropriate consequence. I know because I am not the “classroom teacher” they think they can get away with more, but with me that is not the case. I am trying really hard to stay consistent and give clear expectations when I teach. As time goes on I am learning more effective classroom management strategies, which has been helpful. I know classroom management gets better over time, so until then I will hold high expectations for my students!

This theme would include successful and failed efforts at the resolution of conflict and the creation of cooperation between individuals, groups and organizations at the local and national level, and between groups and nations on the international stage. This theme explores such essential questions as: What is legitimate authority? Why are there conflicts in the world? How interdependent are peoples? How rules and laws made and what are the differences in their usage?

When we try and understand why there is conflict and cooperation, a good example is to think about your best friend. Surely there are reasons that you two started to get along so well in the first place. Maybe it’s because you’re both good at the same sport, or have a similar sense of humor, or even have the same sense of style or taste in music. It could be just because a teacher sat the two of you next to each other years ago, and you just hit it off. Now think about someone you don’t like so much. Maybe it’s an obnoxious person in class, or a bratty sibling, or even a politician. Again, you just didn’t decide one day to not get along or like this person. Something must have happened. We can apply these same tendencies between people to looking at countries. States can either choose to have conflict or cooperation over a variety of issues, many of which are on a much larger scale than personal relations.

I had my first observation for my Science course. I was nervous, but excited at the same time. I really enjoy constructive feedback. I want to know how I can improve my self to become a better teacher. I know that I have a long way to go, but I am ready for the journey. My lesson plan started off great and then slowly started going down hill. I knew exactly why. My lesson was about teaching second grades about the potential dangers of sugar and how to read the sugar amount on a nutrition food label. I started off with reading. I read the first passage and then I had the class take turns reading the second passage. By the second passage I knew I had lost my students. They no longer were engaged and started looking around the room and some started acting out. I noticed the time was going by a lot faster than I had thought, so I rush to get right to the experiment. I was rushed, so I did not take my time modeling for the students what I expected of them. This caused a lot of confusion and a little chaos. I definitely learned my lesson. I tried planning too much in one lesson. I really need to take my time with everything I do so the students know what I expect and they understand the concept. I now know I need to switch up how I read with my students to keep them engage. I have learned the second the students become unengaged is when they stop paying attention. I am ready to make improvements for my next lesson! I am being observed Tuesday for my Social Studies lesson. I am no longer nervous and now I am excited.

As I am approaching the half way mark through this semester I can’t feel anything other than overwhelmed. Its not a bad overwhelmed though, because I am doing what I love, teaching. What is making it difficult is trying to balance work life with school life. Go to work to do what you were hired for and then find time in between to do your student teaching, as well as meeting your clinical hours. Although its a big challenge it is all worth it. I genuinely, whole- heartedly, adored the children I work with. I love coming to work every day seeing their little faces knowing they are looking up to me as a beaming ray of hope in their lives. I love when they tell me stories, draw me pictures that say “I love you Mrs. Heath”, and when they get that light bulb moment when they learn something new. I can’t wait to become a teacher and have my own classroom. I know all of the hard work and stress from school is going to be all worth it in the end and only is going to make me a strong and better teacher. #GSC612702

Blogging has some powerful side effects, as does any form of writing. These side effects include clarity of thought, added credibility, and constructive conversation. Because of these benefits, ever teacher should blog! 

The first reason is because blogging helps clarifying your believes. Writing is not stating what you have already discovered. Writing is discovering what you believe.The process of writing and editing helps clarify your thinking. As you write, you will start with some sort of draft, where you simply dump your thoughts on paper. As you edit, your thoughts become more concrete. Doing this on a regular basis helps establish present observations and define what is needed for future action.

The second reason, it gives you credibility. Most résumés are dull. Imagine an employer reading hundreds of meaningless pieces of paper until they come across your resume. Your writing is clear, concise, and professional because you practice through blogging. On your résumé you have a website where employers see that you have been documenting observations and research in the classroom for months. You have article after article about what you have discovered. This adds credibility to your résumé and shows them that you take your work seriously.

The third reason, blogging creates conversation concerning education. Education requires collaboration between students, teachers, and parents. And yet, through the business of life, many educators and parents feel disconnected. Blogging helps resolve that enigma. You can share your blog with the parents of your students. They will learn about your struggles and victories in the classroom. Over time, they will interact with your writing. This conversation between parents and teachers is vital for successful education! Blogging also connects educators. Through research, social media, and guest posting you will learn about the resources that have helped others in the classroom. If enough people start engaging this conversation, the outcome will surely be positive change. 

The fourth reason, blogging documents your growth. When I go back and read some of my older blogs, I realize that some of my ideas were erroneous concerning the classroom.That is not a problem.Seeing my past errors is a sign of my present growth. Through blogging, you are documenting your classroom experiments, seeing your progress as a teacher, and observing areas where you need to improve.

Lastly, It reminds you of your “why”. There are going to be days when you are on fire for teaching, and there are going to be days when you hate teaching. That is the nature of any job. When I go back and read some of my old blog posts, I am reminded of how much I love teaching. I am reminded of the students’ lives who have been transformed through their education. I am reminded that I played a part in that process. Without blogging, some of those memories would be foggy at best or forgotten at worst.

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Social Studies answers the burning question ”why”? Why do people live there? Why do they speak that way? It combines the study of cultures, geography, history, economics, and government and their impact on our lives today and tomorrow! In Social Studies, we have “five strands” of Social Studies. A strand is an area of study. They are geography, history, government, culture, and economy. Each strand is combined to create the identity of a region, a nation, and a person. The strands of Social Studies form the identity of a region, nation and person but not necessarily in equal parts.

Geography: The study of people, places and the environment

Physical features: Continents, oceans, and landforms

Climate: weather over a period of time

Longitude & Latitude

Political features: countries & cities

History: A record of the past-can be a written account or an artifact

Events that changed the way people live today

People who changed society

We learn history from 2 sources:

• Primary source: document, person, or object from the actual time

• Secondary source: document, person, or object that interprets or analyzes   primary sources

Culture: The beliefs, customs, laws, art, and ways of living of a group of people.

Art & Recreation

Religion & Traditions

Language

Food, Dress, & Greetings

Government: The people and groups within a society that make laws, to make sure they carried out, and to settle disagreements about them.

Structure of the government

Type of government

Citizen participation

Personal freedom

Economics: The study of how people manage their resources by producing, exchanging, and using goods and services.

Trade barriers, money, exchange rates

Natural, Capital, and Human resources

Entrepreneurs

Economic systems: traditional, market, command, and mixed

For those who do not know about my journey. I am currently going to school to become an elementary teacher. I work in a first grade classroom as a teacher’s assistant and the other half the day I am a paraprofessional in a second grade classroom. The teacher I work with in first grade had gone on vacation this week. She left on Friday and she won’t be back until Wednesday. I was asked to sub in for her the days she was out. At first I was nervous, but then I became excited. Friday was a my first day subbing in for her. The kids were excited that I was going to be their teacher for the next couple of days. There’s something about a substitute that student’s believe they can get away with behaviors more when their teacher is not there. I work with these students every day as an assistant, and I know how they behave. I was so surprised to see a well behaved student giving me a hard time. I am not sure if it was because I was subbing or maybe this student had a bad day? Over all it was a really good experience to teach from beginning to the end. I saw a whole new perspective of what teachers go through on a daily basis. From teaching, to keeping up with the schedule, dealing with classroom management, and all the tiny things in between. It was a challenge on Friday, but I truly enjoyed teaching. I felt like I was in my element. This is what I am meant to do. I can’t wait to see those little faces come Monday morning. I hope I have another successful day of teaching.