Final Thoughts on Lab

Lab this semester was not exactly as I expected. I knew from talking to previous cohorts and watching the videos during final presentations, how the basic format would be; but I didn't know how much lab could change the way I think about teaching. During our very first lab, we picked a random topic and had to teach it the following week to our peers. Looking back now, I would not teach that lesson the same way I did then, nor many of my lessons I taught throughout the semester. The changes I would make to many of my lessons are not because I didn't write them as best I could originally, but because now I know better techniques to use to teach them. Now I know more classroom management strategies, and I know what to do when I want my students to be more engaged, and less distracted.

Teaching my peers was both easy and difficult at the same time - on the one hand, they were your friends, you knew them and knew their personality, regardless of what character role-card they pulled you knew how to "manage" their behavior. It also took away some of the pressure, in labs you knew it was practice and that you weren't in charge of real students yet (at least not until our Micro-teaching and LifeKnowledge labs). However, while this did decrease some of the stress, it also made teaching a little harder, for most of our lessons our "students" needed prior knowledge or some parts of our lessons didn't make sense, this sometimes made it difficult to direct questions and explain materials.

Overall, while I learned a lot about classroom management and planning and implementing of lessons from lab, my biggest takeaway has been reflection. While I hated teaching on camera, having the ability to not only reflect on my experiences through writing our blogs, but also being able to watch and comment on not only my own teaching videos but also those of my peers, was extremely helpful. Though using the technology of ThereNow to watch, upload, and comment on videos was sometimes difficult, and keeping track of all the reflective requirements was frustrating, it was very useful and helped me pick up on things I may not have realized I was and wasn't doing while teaching, and letting me learning from what my peers were and weren't doing when they were teaching.

So while lab was sometimes frustrating, stressful, and not always the best thing to have at 8AM, I learned a lot and while being one of the first few to go through it every week sometimes felt like being a guinea pig, it was nice to go through it without the bias of hearing about anything from the cohort. I am glad that lab is over and I do feel more prepared for student teaching than I was at the beginning of the semester, though I know I still have more to learn. Here's to finishing one semester of learning and reflection and moving onto the next one.

Creativity Challenge!

During our final lab session together, we had an exercise in tapping into our creative side when developing lessons for our classroom. Each of us came prepared with a unit plan that we would be teaching in the spring and went on an adventure to the local dollar store where we were to find five items that we could use to help us deliver at least one of our lessons in our unit this spring. I chose my Intro to Ag Careers unit for my 8th graders, where I'll teach my students about some of many different careers available in the agriculture industry, so I chose five items that tie back to various careers. My plan is that during my first few lessons and throughout the unit, I would present my students with different items or pictures and my students would have to discern how they tie back to an agricultural career or sector of the industry; items including a bar of soap (dairy), dog treats (beef/veterinary), a feather boa (feathers/poultry), an artificial flower (horticulture), and a set of small plastic containers (research).

This was a fun lab that allowed us to think outside the box when planning lessons, which I know will be necessary for two main reasons. First, because utilizing creativity in our classrooms can only increase the engagement of our students, allowing us to bring more variability into our lessons. Second, because budgets will always be tight for schools and teachers, and knowing how to think outside the box to find materials for lessons and classes, can only help us stretch our budgets longer. Agriculture teachers are known to be masters of acquiring materials and equipment through donations, partnerships, and grants, but even being able to stretch it in simple ways, like knowing what materials can be found and/or made from the dollar store can help teachers, especially new teachers like myself.

Creativity, both from ourselves and allowing room for our students to be creative, can only make our classrooms, and our teaching, better. While I may not consider myself a naturally creative person, with use of social media sites such as Pinterest to help me find creative ideas, and the local discount stores to find materials, I think even I can some creativity into my classroom, and I look forward to seeing what I come up with.

"Creativity is intelligence having fun." - Albert Einstein 

Micro-Teaching @ Midd-West

As one of our last labs of the semester we got to embark on one of the scariest adventures - teaching actual students! We conducted three day micro-teaching units, where we had the same class of students for three consecutive days and had to develop a "mini-unit" of three lessons. For my micro-teaching, I was lucky enough to be paired up with Mr. David Bittner at Midd-West High School and I couldn't have gotten a better placement. Mr. Bittner matched me with his 1st period Veterinary Science Anatomy & Physiology class, where I taught a three day introduction to the muscular system transitioning from his wrap-up of the skeletal system.








Teaching this subject was a great match, as I will also be teaching a Veterinary Science course this spring during my student teaching, including a unit on anatomy and physiology. Over the course of the three days I covered voluntary versus involuntary muscles, the three muscle types (skeletal, cardiac, and smooth) and their functions, and the hardest part - the superficial muscle groups of the feline. Even with the use of videos, a "Go Get It" activity and the help of a special furry friend, figuring out how to teach this information at the right cognitive and enthusiasm level was hard and taught me quite a few things.

First, timing is everything. One of my biggest obstacles over the three days was giving enough time to all of the different parts of my lesson, while still having enough time to cover all the material and have a wrap-up at the end of each day's lesson. This was the hardest part as I always felt I was running out of time no matter how I adjusted my lessons; this taught me the second most important thing - as long as you have a plan it will all be fine. While I may have struggled with my timing, I always had my lesson fully planned out and so I always knew exactly where I was going with everything.









The third thing I learned was that enthusiasm is everything. Any struggles I felt when I was teaching the Midd-West students would have been a lot less if I had been more enthusiastic. Naturally, I am not a very enthusiastic person, and spending three days in front of real students, while on camera, in front of their teacher who I highly respect is a nerve wracking experience to say the least. While my nerves kept me from looking towards Mr. Bittner or my fellow cohort members for encouragement, I was lucky enough to previously know a couple of the students in class which made it a little easier when calling on students to answer questions or take part in an activity. I know that developing a good level of enthusiasm in the classroom is something I will continue to need to work on, but I think that as I develop a relationship with my students and become more comfortable in the classroom, this will become easier and help me move past some of the other obstacles including proper use of timing. And if nothing else I know that having a furry friend in the room can always make a classroom a little more enthusiastic.

LifeKnowledge Lesson @ Tri Valley

The last teaching lab we had was our second time teaching real students, only this time it was with our own students at our cooperating centers. Since we only taught for one lesson, during one class period it was a little less intimidating than micro-teaching, but it was with our own students, so hopefully we made a good impression before the spring. For my lab, I taught my Ag Science I students a LifeKnowledge lesson on Understanding Beliefs, Character, Integrity, and Values.

My Ag Science I class is primarily 9th graders, during the last period of the day and I taught my lesson on the Thursday before Thanksgiving break, so to say that my students were rowdy would be an understatement. Utilizing the LifeKnowledge lesson plan took some of the pre-teaching stress away, as the majority of the lesson plan was already created, but teaching my first lesson to my students in front of my cooperating teacher was still stressful. Though the students were a little antsy, and the class seemed to fly by without enough time to finish everything, the lesson went well. Handing my students that day was my first real time dealing with classroom management, and lucky for me I was able to learn the names of all 18 of my students' names within the first few minutes of class, and being able to call on my students made a clear impression on them and my cooperating teacher, nipping any possible discipline problems in the bud right away and helping to keep their focus

Having this first opportunity to get a taste of teaching some of my students at my cooperating center before the spring, was really helpful, and while I know I still have some things to learn and improve upon with planning, implementing, and timing of my lessons, I think that I have at least one technique to help with enthusiasm in the classroom - simply learning my students' names quickly. Being able to call on my students individually started to create some familiarity between my students and myself, and while I know that I won't remember all their names by spring, I know that it's a simple step I can take to make myself better in the classroom.

Interest Approaches: AEE 412 Lab #3

Enthusiasm. Engagement. Motivation. Interest.

These are all necessary ingredients in a successful classroom. There are other important ingredients - technical content, appropriate standards, organization and structure, practical assessments - there are many ingredients to a successful learning environment, but if there is a lack of enthusiasm and engagement no learning will occur.

This week our teaching labs focused on interest approaches and I don't think I've ever walked into an assignment feeling so prepared to then walk out/watch my video and feel so down. I felt really prepared before class - I was happy with my lesson plan for the start of my 8th grade introduction to agricultural careers class, it wasn't perfect but it was good for one of my first real lesson plans. Since I had written my unit plan for the class already I knew where I wanted the unit to go and how I wanted this lesson to start things off, I was going to utilize think-pair-share, having my students individually draw what they thought a person who has an agricultural career looks like, then pair up and discuss their drawings, creating a new combined drawing, which the students would then share out and we would have a class discussion on what is and is not an agricultural career. 

The right career can lead to being OUTRAGEOUSLY HAPPY!

In my head this all worked out great, the students had lots of ideas of careers, lots of questions, and were engaged in conversation, clearly interested in agricultural careers. Teaching about agricultural careers is important - we want students to pursue futures in agriculture, and for some students they may never really think about what they want to do "when they grow up" until they're getting ready to graduate high school, which for some can be too late. If we're lucky they have some idea, but it's never too early to start planting the seed in their minds of pursuing a career in agriculture. 

In reality things did not go as well. My written lesson plan was good, needed some improvements but I knew that. I did a better job of clearly providing my directions, both verbally and visually written on the board (which is surprising because I do not have good "whiteboard writing"). My timing felt good and I could see where my activity was going to lead into the rest of my lesson as I was leading it. And then it happened. I realized that when I split my students into groups I unintentionally created two very opposite groups, a group of the three "good" students and the group of three "problem" students (based on the roles we were each assigned to play). So my group of "good" students worked well together and came up with two different careers; my "problem" students completed the task but were slightly off track so they only came up with one real career. This led into our discussion but with fewer ideas to build from than planned and a student group lacking in energy, I could quickly feel myself becoming flustered - problem #1: lack of high energy activity =/= (doesn't equal) energized students.

And this leads us to problem #2: flustered teacher leads to nervousness which leads to decrease in already lacking enthusiasm. I am not a naturally enthusiastic person - I already know this. There are very few situations where I visibly show natural enthusiasm (and the percentage of those situations happening without an animal around is extremely low). However, this lack of natural enthusiasm does not work well in a classroom. Now don't mistake my lack of visible enthusiasm for lack of enjoyment - I really do love agricultural education and it's definitely a career for me and not a job (or really a lifestyle not a career). 

For a successful transfer of learning, students must be engaged in the learning process, they must be motivated to learn, they must be interested in what is occurring in the classroom - hence why we use interest approaches to engage students into what they are learning that day. However, a key part of an interest approach is the enthusiasm of the teacher, you cannot assume that students will be enthusiastic about something unless you (the teacher) are also genuinely enthusiastic about what you are teaching. You have to "hook" students into caring about what they are learning that day, they don't do it themselves.

If only it was that easy....

So after rambling about all of this, watching my video and listening to some of my peer feedback I think there are three main things I really need to focus on improving: 

#1 - Have a plan B: if your activity is not going as planned have a way you can spin it back on track (planning for both our classroom experiences and lab experiences, they might be different)

#2 - Don't let the nervousness/fluster take over: not sure how to help this other than lots of practice because like I've said before, I'm naturally terrified of being in front of people (again I know, does not make sense for this career)

#3 - The really IMPORTANT one -> Be More ENTHUSIASTIC: again I don't know how to do that without coming across as not genuine so anyone with advice please throw some my way, but I know it is a necessarily improvement

So that's it. Another week down. Ten (approximately) more to go.

May the odds be ever in our favor #PSUAgEd15

The First Day of School: AEE 412 Lab #2

The First Day of School... never thought I could be more terrified to stand in front of my peers/students than during our second lab where we would be role-playing the first day of school. Not entirely sure why that lab felt so intimidating... I felt after reviewing last week's video recording that I was getting better at controlling my nerves while in front of the group and I felt fairly good about my lesson.

During this second lab we had to act out our "first day of school," covering our classroom expectations, procedures, and consequences along with presenting a welcome activity and our objectives for the day. This lab was also where we learned that for all of our labs starting that day on we would be playing specific student roles as our peers were teaching, to practice our classroom management skills. The roles included the over-sharing student, the teacher's pet, the chatty Cathy, the whiny/complaining student, the "techie," and the "know-it-all."

Unfortunately no matter how good I feel before I take over, as soon as I reach that "teacher" role the nerves come back, something I'm still struggling to overcome... The nerves, and what they cause are what I am dreading the most about beginning student teaching.

For my class, my scenario was that this was the first day of my upperclass Veterinary Science course, where I would be starting with my introduction to veterinary science sanitation and safety unit. I felt pretty good as I greeted my students at the door, cheerily welcoming all of them to class and directing them to the bell-work directions which were written on the board, directing the students to pick a numbered piece of paper from the front table, finding their partner with the same number and then sitting together. Once all my students were in the class I repeated the bell-work directions and transitioned into my welcome activity and interest approach for the day's lesson: the numbered pieces of paper the students had chosen were scenarios related to safety in veterinary-related situations. In their groups the students talked through their scenarios, discussing why and/or how safety was a concern in the scenarios and what could be done immediately to address the safety concerns. The students then presented their decisions to the class while also introducing themselves and why they were enrolled in the class (it's an elective).

I felt pretty good about the scenario activity, all the students understood that the common theme amongst the scenarios was safety, though with only two scenarios I don't think it was too hard to pick up so I know that I will have to be careful to ramp up the creativity when I have to write enough scenarios for a full class while also being careful to not create scenarios that are too obscure.

While I felt good about the activity while it was happening I realized a few things that needed to change: 1) I do not have neat board writing so I will have to either have my directions and objectives presented on a powerpoint or I will have to give myself extra time to write on the board, and 2) unfortunately, I could also start to feel my nerves bubble up again as I was teaching and when my nerves take over I tend to talk fast and my instructions lose their clarity.

Transitioning from the interest activity, I moved into my first objective of covering what the students needed to know to be safe in my classroom before we could learn about veterinary safety - my classroom expectations, procedures, and consequences. Going over these classroom protocols was pretty straightforward but after watching some of my peers teach I think I should have had my students engage more in this process by asking them to give their thoughts/examples for my expectations instead of just telling my students what they were and then asking if they had questions. Some of my peers also had the idea of passing out contracts with these protocols that the students and their parents would have to sign, and while I do like that idea I'm not sure that I would always want to use that but if I use it for one course/grade I need to use it for all of them.

Keep Calm & Pretend It's On The Lesson Plan

Finally, after reviewing my video recording and my peers' feedback the one constant critique I need to work on is my confidence in the classroom. Like I noticed earlier in the class my nerves can quickly get the best of me, and unfortunately the part of my lesson where my confidence visibly dipped the most was when I was reviewing my consequences with my students, which is when I should be the most in control of my classroom if I don't want my students to run right over me.

Overall, I think the lesson went well but can always be improved and I think my main take-away from these teaching labs is to use them as confidence builders so that when I am in my classroom I feel confident and can take charge of my classroom. Until then I run the risk of being the teacher who is "nice" but has no "oomph" or excitement to her, when I need to be the teacher who's classroom the students can't wait to arrive to and drag their way out.




Here's to the next lab and more confidence!

Good advice for anyone. Would like to hang in classroom

Reflective Teaching Lesson: AEE 412 Lab #1

For our first teaching lab this semester we had to conduct a Reflective Teaching Lesson, or RTL, with our students (our peers) on a random topics. These topics ranged from being skill specific to being abstract concepts, and my lesson topic was the Bowline Knot. I had to teach my students (my peers) how to tie the Bowline knot and their end of class assessment was to tie the knot and I would inspect their knot to see if they had done it correctly. I had never used this knot before preparing for this class so I had to learn how to tie it before I could teach them, and also find an interesting way to teach them since it is a fairly straightforward task to complete.

I started my lesson off by using Lassie as an interest approach, telling my students that when they entered the classroom they had fallen into a well and had called Lassie to bring help. I was their help and had brought rope to pull them out, but that they needed to tie the Bowline knot into their rope  in order to make it safe to pull them out. I showed the students a picture of the knot and its steps on a powerpoint at the front of the class and tied the know with them at the front of the class. I followed up by showing a video of tieing the knots, which I narrated because we did not have audio in our classroom, and then taught my students a story about a rabbit which described how to tie the knot step-by-step. After working with the students to tie the knot several times I told them to tie it one more time without my help, and once they felt ready I would assess their knots and determine if I could pull them out of the well; and everyone passed the test.

Overall, I think the lesson went well even though I had just learned the knot and was nervous, but I don't believe I appeared nervous according to the video recording (which makes me more relaxed for the future, especially since I am teaching several courses that I have very little background and/or experience in). Even though the lesson did go well I can always improve any lesson so below are the many positives and negatives I have about my Reflective Teaching Lesson:

Positives:

• Used the story about Lassie and the well for my interest approach
• Students seemed to enjoy it and find it realistic
• Students felt it was very clear that the goal was to tie a knot
• Students liked that multiple teaching techniques were utilized
• Picture diagrams, video tutorial, hands-on demonstration, and a story 
• Students appreciated the patience and individual attention
• Students appreciated the enthusiasm and positivity
• Students appreciated the hands-on topic and approach

Negatives:

• I did not account for technology difficulties
• No audio (though I was able to narrate video)
• What if the video/internet had not worked?
• I need to be clearer with direction, talk louder and clearer
• When watching the video playback I felt that I needed to talk clearer, have all my words/sentences thought out before I spoke (nerves get to me quickly)
• To avoid this, maybe script out the lesson to counteract nerves?
• Have extra string in case of knots
• Had some extra string but if every student had needed more I would not have had enough
• Have plan for if students get the concept faster 
• Need a challenge step so the lesson doesn't go stale
• But requires me to learn more challenging knots (material)
• Account for student placement in class and ability to see teacher
• Hard for Deanna to follow along at times since she was in back of room
• Try using a larger rope that is easier for students to see
• Maybe demonstrate in a better location in classroom, maybe to side of students