Fort Cherry - 1st Day of School!

The meet and greet:

Yesterday, during my first day of school lab, I chose to meet and greet everyone at the door to introduce myself. This is definitely something that I enjoyed doing and would keep as part of my lesson plan. I feel that it is a good way to see how each student is doing and to see how there day is going before they walk into my classroom. (Mental Note! Don't forget to close the door!!)

The bellwork:

I do think I would change my bellwork. I think I would hand them notecards when they came in the room and have them write 3 things they want me to know about them on it and 1 thing they want to know about me. This way when I collect the cards I have a stack of things I now know about the students and things they may want to know about me. I can then take this knowledge and maybe incorporate it into my classroom throughout the semester. I also think that I would go over my objectives first before going into the rest of the class. 

Who is Mrs. Wright and what does she want from me:

In my classroom, I would spend a little more time talking about me and making connections with the students earlier before I talked about the classroom procedures and expectations. After this I would lead into students searching the classroom to find my expectations and procedures. (Also, I need to add that I would make sure I remembered where I hid all of the note cards, there is still one hanging out in Ferguson 214 somewhere.) I feel that this helps to get the students more involved in the class instead of me just telling them a list of do's and don'ts they have heard on their first day of school for their entire life.

The Connection:

In my full lesson plan, I have a activity planned to play a game where I can get to know a little about the students and they can know a little more about their peers. This game will help show how different we can be and how similar we can be. This game will help lead into my first unit with this class on soil. Students "ticket outs" were to think about and write down their definition of soil. I like this because it helps get them ready for the next day when we will be diving into the basics of soil science. 

Unit Plans - Weekly Investment #3

So the unit plan. I experienced writing my first unit plan this weekend (and wrote it again when I did not save and my computer froze and lost it 😒) I knew it would be challenging, but it really helped me to understand the importance of planning. Even though I thought I had given myself plenty of time, I would have liked a little more to research more, make sure I was ordering things correctly, etc.

I found a site that helped me to organize all of my thoughts a little better and condensed them in to two essential questions they suggested using:
                         1. What do I want my students to be able to do at the end of the unit?
                         2. How will I know if they will be able to do it? ("10 guidelines")
Dr. Rice re-enforced these questions in class last week as well. Every time I was not sure what to do, I asked myself these questions to help keep my thoughts from wondering and staying off task.

While I am sure my unit plan will have plenty of feedback, I hope I am on the right track!

References

10 Guidelines for Planning Units. (n.d.). Retrieved September 10, 2017, from https://www.scholastic.com/teachers/articles/teaching-content/10-guidelines-planning-units/

Making a difference with Variability

No matter what classroom you happen to be in, student always learn in various ways and have many intelligences. "Strategies for Great Teaching and Learning" says "Intelligence is the ability to resolve a genuine problem, then produce or service that adds value to oneself and others".  The book emphasizes that because of these varying intelligences, engaging-moments or e-moments are vital. E-moments will help to connect combinations of different intelligences and modalities.

I think that this hard to lose sight of for sake of our own learning strategies and like and dislikes. I believe that it is always important to re-center and put yourself in the mindset of an intelligence that is not your own. For example, if you are a great visual learner and use a lot of visuals in your classroom, but you do not like group work, remember you have students who are just the opposite and learn best from working with others.

For those reasons I think that it is important that as a teacher I need to make a proactive step to be variable in my classroom and not retroactive. I do not need to create two lesson plans, I need to make a lesson plan that is holistic. Check out this video that helps put that into perspective:

So as Todd Rose explained, we need to uphold and embrace the diversity in the classroom and remember that not everyone wears the same size shoe! It’s at this point at a teacher when you will be able to reach the most students in your classroom and be able to engage and motivate the most student. By designing classrooms that meet the needs of the so-called average student, we are not helping nearly as much as we think we are. As Rose said, the average learner is a "myth".

This topic is really scary to me, because I feel like I am not going to be prepared in less than 4 months to tackle this task. Will I be inclusive enough? Will I fall into the hole of the "average learner" perspective? I suppose those are the questions I need to be asking myself as I continue through this journey!

References

Reardon, M. & Derner, S. (2004) Strategies for great teaching. Chicago, Illinois: Zephyr Press

Todd Rose: Variability Matters. (2012, January 30). Retrieved September 04, 2017, from

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WClnVjCEVM#action=share

Variability Matters. (n.d.). Retrieved September 04, 2017, from

http://qedfoundation.org/variability-matters/

Tour Fort Cherry Agriscience and H.G. Parkinson FFA with Me

The students of Fort Cherry's Agriscience department helped me to create this video and explore their Agriculture Program, FFA, and SAE experiences!

The Passionate Organizer

There is no secret that there are many methods to teaching and ways to handle your classroom and that students will learn from many different types of educators. However, there are some types of teaching and classroom management that may be more powerful and effective than others.

No one wants to have a teacher that is disorganized, dull, and seems more un-interested in the topics they are teaching than the students that are learning them. Students want someone in front of the classroom that is organized, has clear objectives and expectations, and is passionate about the topic and the students. It's good for teachers to blend teaching methods, such as, power points, marker/chalk board, group work, questioning, etc. This is great for both the teacher and the students' sake.

According to Maryellen Weimer's article there are six keys to classroom excellence:

1. Interest and explanation - Be interested in your topic, know what the students understand, and create connections.
2. Concern and respect for students and student learning - "Good teaching has nothing to do with making things hard. It has nothing to do with frightening students. It is everything to do with benevolence and humility."
3. Appropriate assessment and feedback - Avoid assessments type that force students to memorize material and then regurgitate it for an exam.
4. Clear goals and intellectual challenge - Create high expectations for your students and make them clear to your students.
5. Independence, control and active engagement - Don't "treat all learners as if they were exactly the same" by creating projects and tasks that allow creativity and student control.
6. Learning from students -  Be willing to change and take what your students say and use it to reevaluate your teaching methods and classroom management.

It's always important to make sure you are working to reach every student and as many different learning styles as you can - while still using your own skill set. One saying that I keep running across in my classes, reading, and research is "your students don't care how much you know, until they know how much you care." I think that it is important to make sure you are constantly making connections and bonds with students to continue to build a relationship. In the Agriculture Education spectrum, I think that we also need to remember with those connections we do not just have students for 1 or 2 years typically - we hope to have them for 4 years in a high school setting. If we do not build that relationship, then we lose the students.

I am someone who has always loved school and learning, loves to be organized, and if anything, I care too much about others. I will need to work on my enthusiasm. Though, I may be really interested and excited about a topic, I do not do a very good job of outwardly expressing it (so tips are welcome!).

Photo Credit: Harry Wong, 

                                                                                                            "Unit A - The Effective Teacher"

References

Weimer, Maryellen. “Effective Teaching Strategies: Six Keys to Classroom Excellence.” Faculty Focus | Higher Ed Teaching & Learning, 20 July 2009, www.facultyfocus.com/articles/effective-teaching-strategies/effective-teaching-strategies-six-keys-to-classroom-excellence/.

Pigs, goats, and cats, oh my!

In late June, Mrs. Hoover and I were able make five Supervised Agriculture Experience (SAE) visits together. I was able to see market swine, breeding goat, and cat projects during these visits. This experience was very enriching for me as I have never worked in AET at all.

First, Mrs. Hoover and I set off for Fort Cherry High School to get some work done - mail out some thank you cards, send the chapter member list to the fair, and check on the progress of the project books we were going to see during our visits.

At the first visit we looked at three market swine projects where all three students were planning to show and sell their animal at the Washington County Fair in the middle of August. We then sat down with all three student and had them pull up their AET account to check out the progress in their project books. While all three students had worked on their books, a couple were ahead of the others - which is okay. Since we made this visit, we were able to catch up all three books to where they needed to be and fix any glitches.

After lunch, we made the visit to check on the member with the cat project. She recently graduated high school and was aspiring to be a Veterinarian Technician. Her books looked good and Mrs. Hoover talked to her about continuing her project next year so that she would eligible for locally awarded scholarship money to aid in her schooling expenses.

The last stop of the day was to check on some breeding goats. This FFA member recently completed her freshman year at Fort Cherry, but is not new to animals by any means. Actually, her family has had a farm for many generations and this is something that she has been involved in her whole life. Her goats were very well maintained and were more like dogs than shy farm animals. They did not have their computer there so that we could check her project book, but since Mrs. Hoover and I looked at them before we had left the school and hers appeared to be up to date. Mrs. Hoover told her that they would go over it when school started.

These visits helped Mrs. Hoover to see the progress the students had made, furthermore, we were able to give each student insight, tips, and other information to make improvements to their project books and awards they may be eligible for in the future.  

Minor errors, all-school assemblies, and parents - Part 3

The final section of our book led Mrs. Hoover and I to some great conversations about classroom management. The topic of Chapter 12 was “the ability to ignore”. Mrs. Hoover emphasized how important it is to ignore minor errors. This does not mean that you are ignoring your students by any means, but you are able to differentiate between giving students attention that they need and attention that they want.  On the opposite end of the spectrum, high achievers need to be handled in their own way as well. High achievers, just like the best teachers, are much harder on themselves than anyone else will be. Mrs. Hoover said these can be both her most challenging students and best students. Sometimes they are students who go above and beyond on every project or they might be more concerned with other classes than their agriculture class. She said it takes time to help the latter student realize that her class is just as important has their math class.

Another topic we talked about were school assemblies. “When the best teachers take their students to an assembly, what do they do? They sit by their students – and not just any students, but the students who are most likely to disrupt.” We discussed that many teachers have negative attitudes toward all-school assemblies, because they feel they could be doing something more productive. Mrs. Hoover described one time when she was at an assembly and she looked around and she was the only teacher there. She said while she could have been prepping for a class as other teachers skipped out to do, supervising school assemblies was part of the job. We also discussed how you can use the principal of sitting next to the worst students in your classrooms. You can always rearrange and adjust your classroom for the better. If you keep doing the same thing and getting the same results, you need to change, not the students. If the same people always pair up for partner work and don’t get work done, the teacher can make the decision to change that in the future – i.e. “randomly” selecting partners, or simply saying you must work with someone you haven’t worked with before. The goal of this is to help the students perform better.  The best teachers always keep the students’ interests in mind when making decisions in their classroom.

We also talked about how to handle belligerent parents. When a parent is arguing with you, they are in their prime. They don’t mind arguing and they want you to argue with them. When a parent is upset with their child’s performance, it is much better to let them know what the expectations are and what assignments need completed instead of arguing with the “why”. You don’t need to elaborate that Jimmy missed 3 days of classes this week, disrupted class, and was on his phone multiple times. That type of parent wants to argue with you about the “why”. Instead you can stop the argument before it starts by focusing on tasks that need completed. Mrs. Hoover explained that she has had to deal with parents in the past and when she takes this approach, she doesn’t have issues with the parent like other teachers and administrators have described.