Week 14 Student Teaching

Week 14 ...... I can't believe I just finished my 14th week of student teaching and now I am planning and getting ready to complete my very last week of student teaching.  I am full of excitement to be dome and move on to the next part of my journey but I also am saddened that I have leave.  I feel like just yesterday I was teaching my first class and now I have blinked and am right in front of the finish line; this is crazy!  Even though I have been at this for 14 weeks, I am far from an expert in anything yet and this last week was still packed full of learning moments.

We picked one of the windiest days of the spring to do Adopt-A-Highway 

Maple Syrup!
My Ag Foundations class started this project way back at the beginning of the plant science unit and this week we finally were able to see it come full circle.  I had never even tapped a tree before student teaching let alone boil the sap to make syrup but now I can say I have done it all!  We ended up having to pull our taps a few weeks ago simply because our trees were giving so much sap that we ran out of containers to store it all in.  We ended up with around 65 gallons of sap when we pulled our last tap, which is more than Mrs. Fry has had so far! 

One bucket down, many more to go! 

We started our boiling process on Monday and finally on Friday we finished up the process and ended up with a little over a gallon of syrup.  The students were part of the process the whole time.  They singed up in shifts to come down and stir the sap and keep an eye on it.  They also strained the sap before we boiled it just in case we had any bark pieces in the sap.  Each day they would come in  and ask if we had syrup yet right after they commented on how the shopped smelled of this odd sweet smell.  Now after all those weeks of collecting and all those hours of boiling, they will finally get to taste the syrup!  This was a learning experience for both students and Miss. Fisher.  I can't wait to try this out in my own classroom someday!

All that boiling gave the students a great maple syrup facial. 

Sparks Fly!
I have finally started to teach welding!  This was the unit I was the most excited and afraid to teach all at the same time.  I have not welded much prior to student teaching so I knew that I wasn't the best welder but I love to weld.  After the first day I learned how to strike an arc, I have been hooked!  This is why I was so excited to teach it to my freshman class.  I remembered being in their exact shoes, nervous that I would do something wrong but extremely excited once I ran that first, ugly bead across the steel.  However, I was still slightly afraid simply because I had never taught anyone to weld before.  I was afraid that I wouldn't explain it right, or that I would forget to tell them something important and finally that I wouldn't be able to help them since I had only done it a few times before.

Best way to practice welding is by welding; let's burn some rod!  

Turns out I didn't need to worry about any of that.  I made sure to make myself a list of steps and notes that I had to go over and broke the process down into several small steps at a time.  I was able to talk them through the process just fine and not only were they all able to strike and arc but it looks like most of them are going to have some really nice beads to turn in at the end.  We will continue to welding this upcoming week as well as learn how to set up and shut down the oxy-acetylene tanks.  I was terrified in the beginning of this all when I found out I had to teach shop classes since I never had them in high school but now I know that I LOVE teaching Ag Mechanics and shop classes!

Disclaimer: Helmets were worn at all times during photo shoot!  No student teachers were harmed in the capturing of these photos :) 

This week is going to be the hardest week of student teaching hands down because with every passing day, I will know that it is ending.  I know that I have to move on and find my perfect fit but I am dreading Friday afternoon when I have to leave them all; the students, the staff, and my cooperating teachers.  I am going to take in every second of this week, laugh the hardest, and when it's all done cry the hardest!  Here's to you Selinsgrove Ag Department, let's make my last week the best one yet!!  

Visiting Manheim Central

On Tuesday, April 3rd I had the opportunity to go visit my fellow cohort member, Miss. Angie Becker at her cooperating center of Manheim Central.  I would have loved to go visit all of the members of our cohort and see what rock star things they are doing at their programs however there were 3 big points that drew me to visiting Manheim.

1. Adult Education Program
If you are involved with agriculture education or FFA in the state of Pennsylvania it is a well known fact that Manheim Central has a very strong adult education program that teacher Deb Siebert is very passionate about.  The Young Farmers organization at Manheim is extremely strong in membership which is made of farmers and other agriculturalists in the Manheim area that come together to discuss current events in the agriculture industry, work towards certifications and brainstorm ideas of how to support other farmers and the youth leadership organization (4H and FFA) in Lancaster county.  I was curious to see the school and environment where this blooming adult education program stemmed from.

Great visualization of what Urban Encroachment is! 

2. CASE Curriculum
Selinsgrove does not teach using the CASE curriculum and it no secret that I am not completely comfortable with the curriculum which was another reason that drew me to go visit Miss. Becker.  Manheim does utilize the CAE curriculum for their EEE class that all freshman take as a science credit.  This is a really great idea to incorporate this curriculum into your program as a science credit that also doubles as a recruitment material.  They are able to get all of the freshman at the school into the Ag room and they are able to see what other classes are doing as well as hear about the opportunities of SAE and FFA.  This class is also a perfect example of how agriculture directly applies to other classes such as science.  This class teaches students about the environment, ecology and how they connect to agriculture.

3. Three Teacher Program
My home program was a single teacher program that grew to having an additional teacher who taught  ag classes a few periods of the day but for the most part I only ever knew what it was like to have one teacher.  When I was looking at schools to student teach at, I knew that I wanted to see a program that had multiple teachers and what that dynamic looks like.  Selinsgrove has two Ag teachers that I have been able to work very close with and who have a great relationship and balance to their program.  Manheim has three ag teachers!  I was curious to see what it looks like when you have that additional person.  As the saying goes, many hands make for little work, which is true.  With three Ag teachers, it does help to cut down on some of the work load and responsibilities but I wasn't sure how that balanced looked until I saw how great Mrs. Siebert, Mrs. Anderson and Mr. Werning worked together at Manheim.  They each are able to take a different pathway of the program and offer more class options for the students to take.  Mr. Werning teaches the Ag mechanic courses, Mrs. Anderson covers the animal sciences and Mrs. Siebert is the plant, environmental and ecology expert at the program.  I used to think that I wanted to be a single teacher program since that is what I had only known.  Now I see that a multi teacher program is able to provide more class options for students and splits up the work load for those teachers a little.  It was nice to see how these teachers collaborate and work together.

Injections Lab for BQA certification! 

On top of going to check out these three aspects, I was also able to see Miss. Becker feel right at home teaching some animal science and help a class of her students work towards a certification for Beef Quality Assurance.  I also did this with my students so it was really fun to see her students engage in a similar activity as mine did.  I also got a personal tour of their greenhouse and see all of the varieties of tomatoes that they will sell in the May at their Heirloom Tomato Sale.  I loved my day that I was able to spend with Miss. Becker at Manheim Central High School's Ag program.

Week 10: Student Teaching

Oh no!  We have hit week 10, that means that this is slowly coming to an end :(  I don't really want this to end.  I absolutely love my school and my students and really wish I didn't have to leave them.  I am surprised how connected and attached to these students I have become in such a short amount of time.  Most of my students have started to realize that it will soon be time for me to say my goodbyes and they ask all the time if I actually have to go; when we still have 6 weeks together.  I try to not think about it because  I know we each have to move on from this experience and find our place where we fit in the puzzle of ag ed, so I am going to make sure that we have a ball together in the last few weeks of it!

One of the last meetings I will get to be a part of :( 

Now that the I had to be all sad and sappy, I need to talk about how this week went.  This week was filled with lots of hands on learning.  The students in building construction have advanced from their wiring boxes to wiring walls.  The students thought that wiring was pretty complicated when they had to complete the circuits on their boxes but now that we have made out way to the walls, they are telling me that it is a lot easier.  They have been flying through wiring all of the duplexes and lamps together and all they have to do now is to connect it to the breaker box and test! 

Working on our walls!! 

We also had a guest speaker come into the class this week to talk about masonry.  I was able to step back for a block and let him teach them whatever he wanted about the careers and what you do as a mason, to my surprise he actually brought mortar and block for the students to actually try laying block.  They instantly thought "Oh that easy" as they watched him smear some on a block but as they started to do it themselves, realized that it is not easy at all.  This was great because some of the students realized that this is not easy but also that it was kind of fun.  It was a nice break from their electricity projects and still had a great hands on application for them.

Micro lesson on masonry.  

The Ag Foundations classes have been digging deep into the plant science unit and this week we learned about germination, pollination and propagation.  We did a really fun activity to learn about pollination where student snacked on cheese balls through out the class the only rule was that they COULD NOT wipe off or lick their fingers.  Later in the lesson I had groups of kids be each kind of pollination: wind, water, animals, insects.  So the wind group could only remove the pollen (cheese ball dust) from their anthers (fingers) by blowing on their finger tips like wind blows pollen around.  The water group dangled their fingers in cups of water, the animal group quickly brushed their fingers across a paper towel like a bird quickly brushing by a flower, and finally the insect group were rubbing their fingers on a fluffy bath towel just like a bee covered in hair rubs against the anthers.  The kids loved this activity 1. Because they got to eat and 2. it really helped them to visualize and understand how each type of pollination works.

Going on location for class today; to the greenhouse! 

The freshman also finally got to get out of the classroom this week as we went to the greenhouse for our propagation lesson.  They each were able to get their hands in the soil and cut up different plants like potatoes, petunias and garlic.  All of the students really liked this but there were a few that this really sparked their interest in plants.  They found it so cool and amazing that you can get a plant from cutting the parent plant up and sticking it in soil.  Being in a new environment however meant that I had to think through exactly what I needed to tell the students before we transitioned to the greenhouse.  I had to make sure they knew what we were going to do, what safety precautions to follow, and that we are going to respect the equipment and plants out there.  I never realized how many directions and other details I needed to include in the lesson just because we were moving locations.

Propagation lesson was a success!! 

This upcoming week is going to be packed full with SLLC at the beginning of the week, a visit from Miss Becker and a day of PSU Ag Ed work at the end of the week.

This is a terrible picture, but I ended my week by attending the 

spring band concert where 8 of my students blew my socks off

with their talents!! 

Week 9: student teaching

Week 9 of student teaching has taught me a very big lesson; you always have to be on your toes!  You never really know what could happen in a day so as a teacher you should always be on your toes and prepared to roll with the punches of the day.  This could be many different thins from exciting news, equipment malfunctions and just everyday surprises.  This week was sure to deliver!  When I started into this week, I knew we would be doing fun things in class and lots of activities but I had no idea what the week all would hold for me. Monday was a day full of electrical wiring, flower dissections and mock meetings; pretty regular day.  

Surprise!  Not exactly what you want to walk into on a Tuesday morning; water everywhere! 

Well Tuesday was sure to hold something special for us.  When Mrs. Fry and I arrived to school Tuesday morning, she opened the classroom door to an enormous puddle of water on the floor.  We quickly realized that the fish tank in the back of the classroom, that was home to our growing finger length Brook trout, had pumped about 40 gallon of water onto the floor overnight!  Thankfully not all of the water pumped out of the tank so the fish were still swimming around in about 3-4 inches of water however now all of that water now needed to be cleaned off the floor.   So Mr. Swineford, Mrs. Fry, one of our dedicated custodians, one of our tech ed teachers and myself quickly got to work to clean it up before our first class came in. With two mops, two shop vacs, and two giant fans it didn't take us too long to get it cleaned up and dry but definitely was not something we had planned to start our morning off with.  

Such a good clean up crew! 

Thursday was an exciting day for many of the members of the Selinsgrove FFA.  It was the SUN Area public speaking contest.  Mrs. Fry had been working with many of the members on their prepared speeches and our creed speaker.  My task leading up to the contest was to teach and couch the Parliamentary Procedure team.  This was the very first parli pro team that I have couched and I was very anxious the day of the contest.  I knew that they had been working hard and had came a long way since our first practice but I still knew that this was their first contest and my first time couching; wasn't sure we were completely ready to be honest.  After their presentation, they told me how terrible they did and how they knew that they were not going to do well.  Finally at the end of the day we go the results of all of the contest and the results were great!  We have two Senior Prepared speakers, two Conservation speakers, one Extemporaneous speaker and a creed speaker all qualified to go to the Regional Level.  All we had left to hear was the Parli Pro results and out of three teams, the Selinsgrove team took FIRST place!! I was so excited and proud of my students!!!

My very first Parli Pro Team!! 

The moment you learn that you just place 1st in Parli Pro! 

All of the Selinsgrove FFA Public Speaking Contestants!  

There were also many times throughout the week when students were able to surprise themselves.  I had one student who at first thought he would never be able to figure out how to do all of the wiring projects for electricity and this week he was the first of his classmates to finish them all!  Not only did his light bulb light up when we tried his 3-way switch but he face did too!  I also had a student this week who has really dug deep into our plant science unit and everyday I get to see his face when he has his Ahh - ha moments.  I curious to see what surprises this week holds for us in the classroom!

The Ag Foundations classes learned about how 

plant cells and animal cells are different this week 

and built their own models of plant cells out of 

different shaped pasta!  

Week 8: Student Teaching

Plants, Parli Pro and Pacing; that is what surrounded this week of student teaching.  This past week flew by and I mean really flew.  Seems like just yesterday was Monday and I was introducing the freshman to plant science by going out to tap trees and now we are at the end of the week where they are able to tell me the parts of the flower and building models of them; it's crazy!

The 3 Ag foundations classes as I just say have moved on from animal science and now we are diving deep into plant science.  We are collecting sap from the sugar maples out front of the school and each day a pair of students are responsible for emptying the buckets.  Once we get around 55 gallons of sap we will be taking a day to boil our sap and turn it into syrup.  This of course leads to them asking me everyday, "Do we have enough now?"  I simply ask them "Now do you think that these two buckets are 55 gallons?"

Tap that tree!  Mrs. Fry helps to show what angle 

to drill the hole at for the tap.  

It's great to see them so excited about this project and the are so interested in plants.  They had a great Ah-ha moment the other day when we were learning about the xylem and phloem of a plant.  When the realized that the phloem carried the food of the plant which is sugar, I saw 13 faces light up and say "Oh so that's the sap we are collecting, it's coming from the phloem of the tree!"  I was so super proud that they were beginning to think deeper than Oh the phloem carries food and connecting it all together!  Next week we are going to go one step further and talk about photosynthesis and how the trees and plants get that sugar in the first place.

The freshman classes aren't the only ones who are hard at work learning about plants.  I have started teaching the horticulture class as well and we are in full greenhouse production mode this week.  We spent the week transplanting seedlings like tomatoes, impatients and  herbs into trays of 6 packs and by the end of the week we had 800 petunia plugs arrive that we needed to transplant into hanging baskets.  Each of the students were definitely getting lots of hands on learning having those hands covered in soil!

Poke hole, put in plug, fill in with soil, REPEAT!  Working hard to 

get all of the petunia plugs planted.  

From Plants to Parli Pro.  My week was also packed full of parliamentary procedure which is the rules that are set forth that should be followed during a meeting.  My Ag Leadership class is going to be wrapping up their unit on Parli Pro this upcoming week.  During class we have being learning the basics of what it is and how we use but we also get to have a lot of fun by having mock meetings which gives students the chance to show what they have learned and have some friendly debate. I also have been practicing everyday this week with our Parli Pro Team. 

This team will be competing at the area contest this week and we are trying to get in as many practices as possible!  This is a new team who are new to Parli Pro but have come a long way in the short amount of time that I have been coaching them.  Several of them have already told me that they will be happy with however they place, they are just happy that they know more about Parli Pro and how to use it.  "Now I know what I can do at a meeting and how to do it properly!" was what one of my students and team members told me on Friday. 

My new up and coming Parli Pro team just getting ready to practice. 

I am glad that this has sparked an interest for them.  Parli pro can be a very intimidating thing for many students.  There's a lot of rules to remembers and you have to know exactly how you can make a motion but once you learn the basics it is actually very fun!  While teaching them about it and helping the team to practice, I can't help but think back to my days on the Parli Pro team and how much fun it was for me.  I love being about to share stories about my days of competing at the National Convention in Parli Pro and the students really love hearing about it!  

Finally this week, I have went back to my old ways and not in a good way.  The past few weeks I finally felt like I was getting better at my pacing but this week was like I took 2 giant steps backwards.  The students still learned a lot and had a lot of fun but I just wish that I would have done a better job of my pacing this week.  Part of it was that we got into a really great discussion which is always a great reason to be off track but other times I just didn't push them enough so that we could move on. 

I have learned that, it can take them a very long time to write down just a few simple sentences and I am always waiting on them to finish writing.  I don't want to give them super simple notes where they don't have to do anything, I also don't want to move on and them not have the notes they need but I have to find a way to make this go quicker because we are spending too much times just waiting on people to finish writing.  I am open to any ideas of how to make this go smoother.

The building construction students are always

working hard to complete their projects.  

This week is going to be so exciting with having the Public speaking contest and seeing how the members do at it.  I also am eager to see how much sap we will collect on Monday after the weekend and to see our plants in the greenhouse to pop up through the soil and grow bigger.  My building construction class is getting better and better each day with their wiring projects and I can tell that we will soon be putting up the walls and moving to the more advanced wirings.

Student Teaching: Week 6

This past week was an easy yet hard week all at once! This week I had to be out of class for two

Learning about types of

injections by giving 

bananas shots.  

different days which meant I needed to leave substitute teacher plans.  I figured that these would be easy to do however I learned that they are a little more complex than I had thought.  I wanted to keep my classes on track and still meet the objectives that I originally had planned.  This made me think outside the box a little to try and come up with activities that the students could do on their own.

For example, the Ag Foundations class was to be learning about the major breeds of the beef industry.  I left instructions for them to create their own flash cards with a picture of the breed on one side and then information about the breed as well as the name on the other side.  While writing out the directions for the activity, I realized how hard it is to write out instructions that are clear and concise enough for someone else to explain it.  It was easy for me to map out what the steps were in completing this task, but having to write them out made me think through how to write them so that anyone could follow what my thoughts were. 

The second day that I had to leave sub plans, I knew that both Mrs. Fry and Mr. Swineford would be coving my content.  I still had to leave detailed plans and go over with them what I wanted to occur while I was gone, but it did seem easier that they knew my teaching style and knew me a little to know how I would go through the lesson if I was there.  It was much harder leaving a lesson for someone I had never met or knowing how they teach or their background knowledge.

Selinsgrove Ag Mechanics team at the SUN area contest.  

I now know that when you aren't going to be in class, leaving sub plans can be much harder than just teaching the class myself.  You have to think through and make sure that students will actually be gaining something from the class and that it can be achieved while you are not there.  I in no way am doubting the ability of a substitute teacher.  They have a hard job too, just walking into any classroom they are assigned and having to build relationships with students continuously.  However, I do realize that as Ag Teachers we have a large knowledge base that not everyone else has a strong background in.  This being said it would be unfair to expect any one to walk into my classroom and teacher it just as I would.  That must be why it is so important for Ag teachers to find a substitute that they can use on a regular basis since they tend to miss a few days here and there.  If you have a great sub back at school who you know can get through what you have left, it eases the stress on the teacher.

Selinsgrove Small Gas Engines team, first place!  

Saying all that, this was a very fun week for me as a teacher.  We had several activities in class where I got to see students push themselves and ask some great "Why" questions.  We also had the state officers come visit all of our classes this past week.  I was able to see several students step outside their comfort zones and really step up as leaders within their classes and help their teams rise to victory in the activities the state officers had them perform.  I was also able to travel with the FFA members to the SUN area CDE day.  We had a team compete in each of the CDEs that day; milk quality and products, ag mechanics and small gas engines.  Our teams did a great job in each of their contests and it was a great feeling watching them succeed and the pride they had in the work they had done.  I rounded out the week by heading back to State College to spend some well needed, quality time with the rest of #PSUAGED18 and my Penn State Teach Ag Family!  It was great to finally get to see my cohort members and hear about their experiences in the past 6 weeks.

Selinsgrove Milk Quality and Products Team.  

Heading into week 7, I know that it is going to be a fun and exciting week as it coincides with National FFA Week!  Look for me to share out what unique and fun ways that Selinsgrove FFA celebrates the week and would love to hear how other chapters across the state are celebrating the wonderful week!  

Students getting the "Toxic Popcorn" from one bucket to the other 

without touching it or reaching in the circle.  This was just one of 

the great team building activities the State Officers did!  

Week 5: Student Teaching

And with that, I am already 1/3 of the way done with student teaching!  This makes me so sad and kind of happy all at the same time.  It saddens me to know that we are getting closer to the end of this experience and that it truly is going by so fast.  It does make me excited however, that I indeed have made it this far and now I can look back and see how much I have truly grown from that first day in the classroom to the week 5 mark; I've come so far!

Comfortable in the Classroom
I feel that I definitely am comfortable of being in the classroom and moving about the classroom.  My very first day, I stood in one place the whole time and by two I had already had enough of that and now I think I am only in the front of the classroom when I am giving directions or at the very beginning of class.  I also believe that I am much more comfortable around the students.  I am able to joke with students and nerd out about certain topics around them and they actually joke and nerd out with me.  I am starting to feel that it actually is my classroom!

Students in Ag Foundations doing an Egg Dissection lab to learn 

the parts of an egg.  

Flexibility
The first time we had a fire drill, it ended up cutting ten minutes of time out of my lesson that was planned to take up to the last second of class.  I was thinking "Oh no!  This class is going to be behind and we will have to find time to make it up somewhere!  I don't know how we are going to get back on track!"  Now I am so used to delayed schedules or class interruptions, that we just roll with the punches and I ensure the kids we will get to that next time.  I don't get worked up now when I hear that a kid needs to go down to the office or that there is going to be an assembly during first block, I can't stop if from happening so might as well just learn to work with it.

The dairy foods team practicing the off flavors of milk for their upcoming contest.  

Pacing 
I think I am finally starting to get this pacing thing down a little.  I definitely no where near close to being perfect with it yet but I am getting better for sure!  The first day of teaching I ended up taking twice as long with an activity than I had planned or that it took.  Now I block out the time for lecture and activities and make sure I stick to it that way we can get everything done and so that students aren't doing one thing for too long.

Students making their own total mixed rations

to learn about why each part is essential.  

I know that I still have a long way to go yet but I feel like these past 5 weeks has been a great period of growth for myself.  I can't wait to see what knowledge and skills I gain over the next 9 weeks!

Student Teaching Reflection: Week 4

Even though it was a short week at school due to a snow day, this week was full of accomplishes, fun activities and a few new lessons learned by students and student teacher.  I have picked up another class this week and now teaching 5 different classes.  I now have 3 sections of Ag Foundations, my 1 section of Building Construction and 1 section of Ag Leadership.  Each of these classes this week pushed me to be creative and innovative with my lesson and I have to say, I am really impressed and happy by what the lessons I did this week.

Building Construction
We have officially started electricity and that means I had to face my biggest fear of student teaching; teaching electrical theory.  I never had any physics classes in high school or was very good at chemistry, so the idea of teaching kids about how electricity flows and where it comes from really scared me.  I knew I had to do this and I knew that once I succeed, it would feel great.  That is exactly what happened!  I did my homework, taught myself about electrical theory and then went in on Tuesday to try and deliver the information to my students.  We needed to go over the basics like what are electrons, build our way up to AC/DC current and finished the day learning about types of circuits. 

Starting to build our circuits!  

Once we knew what a circuit was and the two different types, I challenged students to use the materials supplied (aluminum foil, 9v batteries, Christmas lights, paper and scotch tape) to build their own series and parallel circuits.  This turned out AWESOME! Each student successfully build their circuits and it triggered them to think further and dive deeper.  They started to think, what happens if I add more lights or another battery?  How do you make a combination circuit?  I was so proud of them!! They were so interested and wanted to learn more! I had successfully made it through the first day of electrical theory AND they were actually learning!!!

And they work!!! 

Ag Foundations
I finally was able to get to my favorite lesson for these guys so far this week too!  We have been learning about the swine industry and this week we covered the steps of piglet processing; one of which is ear notching.  So this lead to a conversation about permanent and temporary identification and then students learned how to read ear notches.  We first did some practice with a worksheet but then I wanted to put them to the test.  Each student was assigned a litter number and pig number and was given an amazing pig hat (Thanks to the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau for these great hats btw!!).

 

They had to demonstrate how to correctly notch the ears and once everyone had their ears notched and hats on, they went around the room and read 8 of their classmates ears.  At the end of the class, they turned in pig hats and a list of who's ears they read and what their notches were.  The students loved this!! I think that it really helped them to learn how to read notches and it was super fun.  They even got to show off their skills to a few guests to the classroom when the superintendent came for a quick visit.  He seemed to think it was really cool and even posted a picture of our activity on the school website!!! (Was super excited when I saw the picture on the website)  This activity did take a good bit of time so I had to make sure we had time to complete it correctly and also had to have pretty good classroom management as the students were really excited and up moving around while doing this.

"Let me read your ears" 

Made it on the school Website!!! 

Ag Leadership
I picked up this class this week and first taught on Thursday.  We are starting off with a unit on Parli Pro and I am going to try and couch a team.   This is something that I had to pull back out of the closet from a long time ago.  With this class I learned that the more that I can connect back to a story I have or something that I have done similarly, the more interested they are.  I started the class just talking about why we need parli pro and what they believed it was.  I wanted to get into the content a good bit before they knew that I had a strong background in this area.  We then watching part of the final rounds for the national contest in October.  The students seemed stunned and shocked at what it really looked like to use parli pro like this.  "We can't do that, it's way too hard."  "No one can do that, you would need to be a genius robot to do this." 

This was when I saw the perfect opportunity to help build their confidence and to connect with them on a more personal level.  I told them of how I did all that and competed in this contest at the National level in 2010.  They wanted to know more about how far did we get, how long did we practice, and so on.  I ensured them that this is something that each of them can do and will do.  Once sharing a little about the ins and outs of the contest, we dove into the chart of motions and created a life size list of things we need to learn like motions, how to debate and duties of the chair.

Life size list of what we know and what we want to know!  

This week was a packed full, short week and a super fun week.  I did have a couple tough classes mixed in the week but I talked with Mrs. Fry and Mr. Swineford and they ensured me that I am still doing a great job, just need to keep pushing through and keep my head up.  There are going to be hard or bad days but that just made me want to make sure that the next block went off with a bang.  I can't believe I am now heading into the 5th week of this crazy, amazing ride!  Check back to see how my weekend at the ACES conference goes; happy weekend everyone!!

Student Teaching: Week 3

I have officially been teaching a week!  I never thought that I would actually get to say that I have finished a week of my student teaching but it has come and gone already!  This week was crazy and hectic but I loved every second of it!! We had two unplanned fire drills and a fundraiser delivery and lots of fun filled lessons.  With this week winding down and coming to a close, I'm walking away with two big lessons learned.

1. Never Under Estimate Anything!
For my building construction class this week, we were learning about how to be safe in the shop and how to respond to emergency situations.  Part of the unit was where students learned about what injuries can happen in the shop and what should we do when an injury occurs.  We also learned some basic first aid skills with this lesson that way if students ever are working at there home or once they graduate and go into the field they will know not to panic and how to help in the situation.  We did two activities with this lesson. 

Learning how to correctly

remove "dirty" gloves.  

The first one was where students learned how to properly take off a pair of non-latex gloves.  I first demonstrated how this is to be done then students practiced a few times on their own.  After mastering the skill, students put their gloves on and I asked them to take them off one last time however this time their gloves were covered in shaving cream.  They had to coat the front and back of their gloved hands with shaving cream and then removed them correctly with out getting the shaving cream on their skin.  The second activity was learning how to bandage a cut simply using a roll of gauze.  Again I demonstrated to do this skill, then in pairs one person would play the role of in injured and the other would bandage them.  Once they showed me their correct bandaging skills, they switched roles and did it again.

How to properly

bandage a wound.  

I knew that if these activities were going to be fun for the students and also was a great way for them to learn these basic skills that are done wrong all the time.  Now this building construction class is a small class of only 10 students but they are all juniors and senior and only one is female.  The rest is teenage boys.  They have been really good for me and hoped that they could make it through the activities but part of me went into the lesson thinking that I was going to have to pull the plug.  I was just waiting for one of them to take that hand covered in shaving cream and smack one of the others or to smear it all over each other.  I also feared that they would try to tie each other up with the gauze or who knows what with it. 
However these guys did great!  They made it through the how class and were very mature but still had fun with it just like I hoped.  That's when I realized that I should never under estimate students.  They will always come out of no where and surprise you in what they know or how they can act.  I am going to make sure that I do a lot more fun activities with this class as they have proven to me that they can handle it!  Great job!!

2. One word ......PACING!
This has been my problem all along.  Even when we would do our teaching labs back on campus, I would have problems with my pacing.  I always take so much longer than I think it will take.  This week I had a super fun activity planned for the Ag Foundations class but we were unable to get to it this week because I took way to long to cover other things during class.  Thankfully we are still going to be able to do it this week so I'm not going to tell you what it is now but you can hear all about it next week :)
I have to start getting a little better at my pacing of the class.  I guess the one good thing is that I never run out of things for the students to do during class, but next week we are going to have to be one point to fit everything in and not slow the class down.  I know that this is something that can take a while to get perfect and really know how to do but I at least acknowledge that it is something that I need to keep an eye on for myself.  I feel like I have my planning down and do a great job of switching up teaching methods but I have got to get a little better at my pacing that way we are able to get to these great things I have planned!

 Going into this week, I am definitely going to work on my pacing and we ARE going to get to do this fun activity that I have had planned for weeks.  Look for my blog next week to see how week 4 went and what kind of adventures we got into at Selinsgrove!!!

Life Knowledge Reflection

On Monday, November 21st I was able to spend the day at Selinsgrove High School with Mrs. Fry and Mr. Swineford.  This was a great opportunity to get to talk with both of them about the fast approaching, spring semester that I will be spending with them but I also was able to finally get to teach a lesson to my future students!

Students working together to Save Sammy!  An activity that uses
a gummy worm, gummy ring, a cup and paper clips to promote
team work and problem solving skills. They had a lot of fun with this activity!  

 Our teaching lab task this week was to take one of the Life Knowledge lessons that National FFA offers and teach to at least one of the classes at our cooperating center.  The Life Knowledge lessons are a great guide to teach student skills that they will be able to utilize through out their life.  I liked parts of these lessons but I do feel as though they truly are a guide for lessons.  They are still high quality but they also give you the flexibility to add or subtract parts of the lesson or to adapt them to your type of teaching style. The lessons that I chose to use were both on problem solving.

Students working on a complex riddle/puzzle.  This activity was
to show students that every piece of the puzzle is crucial to the solution
just like a problem, you need to have all of the information to solve it.  

 These lessons tied in perfectly with what the class was currently learning in the class.  I taught the Ag Leadership class which is a combination of 13 students of differing grades.  They had just finished up with a unit and my lesson was the introduction to the problem solving unit.  The lesson was filled with all types of activities to get students thinking of what are the steps in solving a problem and how do we solve a problem effectively as a group.  Overall, I think the lesson went well and I personally feel that I was well received by the students, hopefully that feeling is right!  Below are some of the things that stuck out a gems from the lessons and some opportunities that I believe could have went better.

Students participating in a skit that showcased how a group might not
work well together.  They each said that they have been a part of a grou
that did not work well and had someone who didn't want to contribute.
They realized that these types of group members are only going to cause more problems.  

Gems 
*I think I did a great job of using a large variety of teaching techniques through out the lesson.  There were group activities, open discussion, a skit, and a little bit of lecturing.
*I think I was able to keep most of the students' attention and kept them on their toes.
*I had a lot of thought provoking questions.
*Classroom management was pretty good could have been a little better but for most part I think I was able to keep students under control and on task.  (Will talk further in opps about this as well)
*My pacing was very good during this lesson!  I was able to teach bell to bell, fit in my bellwork and ticket out and still cover all of the aspects of the lesson.
Opps 
*I always forget to post or write my objectives for the day!  I HAVE to remember to do this from here on out!
* I feel that I relied on my notes a little much for my liking but was told in my feedback that I did not use them excessively or make them distracting.  However, if I am going to use notes I need to stop laying them down and loosing them.     
*I needed to work on integrating technology better, especially since Selinsgrove is a one-to-one school where each student has technology readily available to them. This lesson didn't really lead itself to using technology at first glance but I should have thought of something to utilize it.  I definitely need to remember this for future lessons.
*I needed to keep all students engaged at all times.  I had one student who kind of checked out during part of the lesson and I didn't want to push my boundaries yet so I didn't push back too hard.  I should have asked questions that would have got the student engaged again.

I really do think that this lesson went well overall!  I can't wait until I get to teach this group and all the other classes at Selinsgrove here very soon.  Spending this day with the students, teaching and getting to talk more with Mrs.Fry and Mr. Swineford makes me wish I could start sooner! 

My cooperating teacher, Mrs. Valerie Fry and myself!

IBI Lesson Reflection

This week our task was to teach a lesson using inquiry based instruction.  With how much I was struggling to grasp what IBI was truly about last week, I feel like this lab did not go terrible.  I do feel that I could have done better but there is always something that we all can improve upon each week.

My lesson was about artificial insemination in cattle and how it differs from conventional breeding.  The students would be forming their own hypothesis and then testing as well as collecting data and forming a conclusion.  The experiment was that they would be constructing two reproductive tracks out of balloons, rubber bands and life saver mints.  Next they would try to pour sprinkles into one balloon and the other balloon they would pour the sprinkles down a straw that has been inserted.  Which balloon has more sprinkles that made it into the bottom?  That is the method that will result in a high conception rate as the sprinkles are bypassing trying to weave through the lifesavers and rubber bands.

I though this was a super fun lab and the students seemed to have lots of fun doing it but I still think there were some things I could have done differently or better.

Gems 

• Was a super fun, hands on lab for students 
• Thought I had good enthusiasm 
• Tried to make all of my questions opened and not just a yes/no answer like when asking who has questions instead of are there any questions

Opps 

• Should have had students label the balloons that 
• I had an example balloon made up ahead of time and I completely forgot to pull it out and show students what it was to look like when they were questioning it.  
• I need to stop using my go to filler word of UMM! I need to get better at this! 

Interesting points on my Interest Approach

This week our lab session was to demonstrate an interest approach.  I chose to do my interest approach for a lesson on the basics of livestock judging.  In livestock judging, you are usually presented with four animals that you then have judge.  This is exactly what I wanted my students to do in my interest approach but instead of showing them four animals, I gave them four oreos.  What I did was give each student 1 perfect regular Oreo, 1 regular Oreo that had half of the top cookie broken off, 1 min Oreo that had half of the top cookie broke off, and finally a regular Oreo that was only the bottom cookie.  I then asked the students to rank the cookies based on quality.  I asked them too look at the cookies and take notice if the entire cookie was there, were the cookies broken etc.  All of the students has placed the perfect Oreo first and the cookie that only had the bottom cookie last.  They two cookies in the middle though were different for each student depending on their taste.  You could truly rank these two cookies either regular over mint or mint over regular you would just need to defend it by saying that you "personally prefer one over the other because..."  That was a overview of my lesson altogether but below you will find a list of my gems and opps for the lesson.  I really like my interest approach and could find this working great in an actual class setting.  The added benefit is that at the end of the interest approach the students are free to eat the cookies!  Please feel free to leave any comments on how you think this would work in a class or if I should change anything up!! Thanks :)

Gems

• Students were engaged and interested in what we were going to do with the cookies 
• Students were able to rank the cookies as I hoped the would 
• Feel that I dealt with issues well 

Opps

• Bellwork took way too long -should have only had them do one type of species 
• Time ran out before students were able to talk about why they ranked their cookies the way they did 
•   Gave Students less time to judge the cookies