Student Web Page Design

One of our Monday Mini-Series projects involved student’s designing their very own course website for their future. Sadie Long and Lori Wilson have been working hard the last few weeks and have fully constructed and launched their website.

In this class we are using a free website maker called Mixx. Feel Free to check out Sadie and Lori’s amazing website "Welgum to Preschool" by clicking on the fallowing link:

http://sadielong6.wix.com/preschoolgmballers

 

Jordan Krenger, Cassie Lee and Madison Miller also began constructing a website for the Exploring Teaching Class. This website is still in progress, but make sure to check is out and see the talented and creative format and content Jordan, Cassie and Madison have been working hard on by clicking on the following link:


http://jordankrenger.wix.com/exploringteaching

Student Bulletin Designs Project Two

Check out the new bulletin board designed by our students

“Dear Student” deigned by Alexis Marshall, Tristan Keck and Alex Willard is  a miniature bulletin board that reminds student’s what teachers are there for. The girls found a photo on Pinterest and reproduced their own version of this bulletin board.

 Kaylee Sherer and Ashley Collins also designed a mini bulletin board this week. “Can you find” is an interactive board designed for preschool students that teaches letter recognition. Ashley and Kaylee utilized glitter to make the word to find, “love” stand out.

 

Check out the newest door decoration designed by our students
“Fall into 1^st Grade” designed by Tyler Sonneveldt-Gragg, Caitlin Reynolds and Sabryna Anderson. This fun fall bulletin board features every student in the class’s name and shows how teachers can tie in holidays and the seasons into their classroom.

Waiting For Superman

The fate of our country won’t be decided on a battlefield, it will be determined in the classroom”

-          Waiting for Superman

 

This Thursday and Friday we began watching “Waiting for Superman” a film which focuses on the public education system in the United States. This movie appeals to the audio-visual learners according to Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligence and we are watching this firm for two main purposes.

Firstly, to demonstrate how to integrate movie viewing into curriculum and appeal to different student’s learning styles. This movie introduces students to alternative materials and resources by using a documentary feature film in the classroom.  

Watching “Waiting for Superman” enable students to identify major economic factors affecting learning and educational practice, explain the history related to learning settings and institutions, family and community involvement, and funding issues.

Students will engage in discussions and Socratic to determine how history and factors that are affecting education and determine what support and changes are needed to help teachers do their job as effectively as possible to increase student outcomes.

Foldables

Exploring Teaching Student Created Foldables

Today student's utilized a new note taking strategy called Foldables. Foldables are ways to represent information in a different format and can be used to help student organize information, provide color coding and visual representations and allow for more interactive learning.

Students used Foldables to explore history and factors that affect learning and educational practices. Students created their very own foldable over information on poverty’s and cultural and diversity’s effect on education. Students then utilized the Foldable Note strategy to present information over the resources to leave poverty, definitions of cultural competence and statistics to students of their own.

 

 

JCCC Guest Speaker

Today we were fortunate that Asiya Foster-Nelson the chair of the  Johnson County Community College Education Department was able to come in a speak to our class about the programs offered at JCCC for students wanting to become Teachers. Mrs. Foster-Nelson was able to answer many student questions and explain about the major programs offered at JCCC.

1.       Early Childhood Associate of Science- a national accredited program where students earn their associated

2.       Early Childhood Education Certificate Program- for students seeking employment in early childhood care programs

3.       Early Childhood Education apprenticeship – for students gaining on the job experiences and education

4.       2+2- transfer program- for students taking their first two years of college at JCCC (or earning their associated) then transferring to a four year university for their last two years to earn their bachelor’s degree in education

5.       JCCC-Emporia State partnership program- the new partnership which allows students to enroll through JCCC-Emporia state partnership and earn their Bachelor’s degree while taking classes on JCCC campus.

Mrs. Foster-Nelson handed out some information from the college and explained how to schedule a college visit. It’s not too early in the fall to begin thinking about college applications, scholarships and visits.

For more information make sure to contact JCCC and schedule a campus visit. Or visit their website at http://www.jccc.edu/education-early-childhood/index.html

 

A representative from Emporia State will be visiting on October 30^th to answer questions about the JCCC-Emporia State Partnership and discussing the teaching program and Emporia.

Parent Communication

Happy Friday:

Students continued working on their own class newsletter, syllabus, and welcome home letter that they will save in their portfolio and can possibly use in their own classroom one day.

Students utilized Schoology, Pinterest, Publisher, Word and Powerpoint to complete each of these assignments. Some highlights were

·         Composing text and information to be sent to “parents” in a professional matter

·         Constructing a newsletter using a template on Publisher

·         Designing documents to fit their individual tastes and design wants

·         Mastering how to format pictures within text

·         Adding boarders and design within a Word document

·         Adapting sample documents to reflect individual classrooms and teaching styles

Check Out some samples of student work below.

           

 

Communication Continued

This Thursday students perfected their “sandwiches.” The sandwich method is commonly used to deliver bad news, and involves stating a positive, the complaint/offense, offering a resolution or plan and then ending on a positive statement.

Families constructed their own complement sandwiches addressing one of their students who did not follow a class rule.  We had some very creative takes on a compliment sandwich (see below).

To gain more practices, students also drafted an email home to a parent of “Bobby Brown” handling a discipline or academic issue. Students are currently working on writing their very own class newsletter, syllabus, and welcome home letter that they will save in their portfolio and can possibly use in their own classroom one day.

Communication

One of the focuses in Exploring Teaching is communication. We have been examining how to effectively communicate with both students and parents.

Today, we discussed obstacles to communication and how to over -come them to clearly and accurately communicate with students.

Students participated in communication activities to simulate some of these communication obstacles. First, students got into pairs and assigned an “instructor” who would be in charge of giving directions and a “builder” who would be responsible for listening and following the directions given to construct a design.
Below are some pictures from this activity.

 

 

 We then adjusted the activity so “instructors” were require to direct a blindfolded student to draw a picture given to them. This was accomplished first by instructors controlling their blindfolded partner hand movements and then using only their words to assist their blindfolded partner.

Students were able to effectively give directions to their peers. We discussed how these activities are similar to teacher/student communication and came up with strategies such as checking for understanding, repetition, following students' nonverbal cues, and asking students questions that students can employ to communicate effectively as a teacher.   

Technology Tuesday

This week we have been focusing on building a professional portfolio. Students have been working hard to create business documents that teachers need when applying for a teaching position.

This is a compressive project that will be added to each student’s portfolio binder. Students created their own:

-          Letter of Inquiry

-          Cover Letter

-          Student Resume

-          Reference Form

-          Future Resume

Teachers at Gardner Edgerton High School shared their own resumes to serve as samples for students to examine and provide real world examples. Students were able to use the CTE laptops to complete their portfolio assignment and access a variety of career websites to assist them in writing these documents. 

Students also spent some time examining different types of professional behaviors including professional dress. Each student researched the different types of business dress and then created a “look book.” This includes outfits and ideas students could wear to an interview or parent teacher conferences, to a regular day at school and what they may wear on a casual Friday.

Students accomplished this by utilizing Pinterest and many company websites to look at acceptable business clothes and estimate the cost of putting together a teaching wardrobe.

Student Bulletin Designs



Check out the new bulletin board designed by our students
“Toucan Sam Can” designed by Sam Trompter, Sierra Coen, and Jacklyn McCombs This interactive bulletin board allows students to write accomplishments of things they “can do” and put them on the conversation bubble.

Check out the newest door decoration designed by our students
“Welgum to Pre-K” designed by Sadie Long and Lori Wilson. Lori and Sadie both want to teach Pre-Kindergarten after they graduate.



Class Picture

Check out our latest class picture!

People In This Classroom

Our 2013 Exploring Teaching class of 2013:

One of our class bulletin boards allows students to use conversation sticky notes to express what they are feeling/thinking that day.

 

As a class student’s helped select nick names for each other. The Class Roster with nick- names is listed below.
      Sabryna Anderson- "Clark"
      Erikson Byrd- "Chirp"
      Sierra Coen- "Corn dog coen"
      Ashley Collins- "AC"
      Shelby Fairchild- "Po"
      Casey Haas- "KC"
      Catie Hansen-"Kit-Cat"
      Erika Jaremko- "Dipsy"
      Tristan Keck- "Twerk Master Daddy"
      Jordan Krenger-"Jo-Jo"
      Cassie Lee- "cas-inator"
      Sadie Long-"Long John"
      Stefani Maness-"Tinky-Winky"
      Alexis Marshall-"Lex"
      Jacklyn McCombs-"Jacky Chan"
      Madison Miller-"Bubbles"
      Caitlyn Reynolds-"Tulip"
      Kaylee Sherer-"KayKay"
      Tyler Sonneveldt-Gragg- "Relyt"
      Sam Trompeter- "Samster"
      Alex Willard- "Laa-Laa"
      Kaitlyn Williams- "Kaity Jo"
      Lori Wilson-"Lola"

An activity we did on the first few days of school was to create a "finger-print tree." Each student dipped their thumb print in paint and created the leaves of our teaching tree. This tree will hang in room 301 for years to come.