Post 9

As a teacher you want students to understand what your trying to teach them. You have this picture in your head of what you want the outcome to be, but sometimes it doesn't always turn out that way. In order to make it work it's best to give background to the lesson, such as teaching the lesson in a way that interrelates with prior knowledge. It's hard to learn anything new when you have no prior knowledge of it. The new information will just sound like a language you don't understand. 

A way to start off a lesson would be to take it step by step, slowly, especially if it is a challenging lesson. Make sure the students ask a lot of questions and you as a teacher give a lot of detail. 

Also as a teacher you will need to be patient with students who are having a hard time understanding. It creates more pressure on the students having a hard time seeing that the teacher is getting frustrated with him or her. Take the student aside and try to work one on one and see what it is they are having a hard time with. It could be a language barrier, learning disability, etc. There are always ways to make it work for students, so don't give up on them. 

Post 8

I really enjoyed doing the traveling story today. I thought it was very creative and fun. It's great to see what others contribute to your story to make it more interesting. My story was about a girl getting drunk the night before her final exam and how she became crazy like a monkey in class, got slapped by Dr. Harris and was never seen again!


Doing a traveling story in the classroom can be a great way to get students excited about writing.With a traveling story, students are able to practice creativity and organization.  It also gets their creative juices flowing. You can do traveling stories about a certain topic the students are working on at the time, or you can have the students come up with some funny stories. The outcomes of these stories will be endless.

Post 7

Assessment is a way of knowing where your students stand in a particular content field. Assessing helps a teacher know where to begin a lesson and at what level to begin it at. It also identifies which students are succeeding in the content and which students are struggling. There are two kinds of assessment; formal and informal. Formal testing consists of standardized tests such as the TAKS and SATs. Informal testing is also known as authentic assessment which consists of teacher observations, portfolios, written assignments, etc. 


A way I would assess in Physical Education is by observation. If I were doing a lesson on motor skills such as jumping, hopping, skipping and galloping, I would want to make sure the students were doing the movements correctly. I can't give them a written test about it. The only to make sure they know is to see them doing the movements and observe them. 


Another way I could assess is by competition. For example, when learning about the food pyramid I would have the students play in a game involving scooters. The game consists of students separating into groups of six. Each group will have one scooter and have a large blank pyramid. In the center of the gym will be an "island" consisting of different pictures of foods such as, apples, broccoli, bread, nuts, eggs etc. At my command, one person from each group will move on their scooter to the center of the gym and grab an item. They will then return to their group and work together to see where on the food pyramid the item belongs. The first group to complete their pyramid wins. From this I would be able to see what the class knows as a whole compared to individually. 


Finally another way to assess is by having the students do a self evaluation every nine weeks to kind of think about how they feel they are doing in P.E. The students will evaluate how they think they are doing in class and how they are applying being physically active and eating right at home. Some students will be honest and say they are not doing well, while some will say they are doing good. Reading the evaluations will help me as a teacher to better see which students need a little extra push and which students need more expansion on staying active and eating right. 

Post 6

There are many different types of writing styles out there, including informative and persuasive. Informative writing contains facts and data. It is written for those who want to learn something new because they want to, or even because they have to. For example, a short essay on America's current obesity problems.  Persuasive writing can also contain facts and data, but is written to convince the reader to side with the writer's argument. For example, an essay on why it is important to vote. Both of these writing styles are necessary to learn because it helps a writer to organize ideas, support their statements and keep the reader intrigued. 


A way to teach informative writing in the classroom is to have the students work in groups of 3-4 and create a brochure for a particular audience with a specific purpose. For example, a brochure directed at new students taking the bus, or a brochure for a family who is getting their first pet. The teacher will come up with the different audience types and the groups will choose randomly. There will be related books, articles in the classroom for the groups to conduct research. Once the brochures are completed, the groups will present to the class. The students not presenting will have to guess what the presenting groups target audience was. 


To teach persuasive writing in the classroom, students will have to gather information to support their reason for going for or against a certain topic. The students will draw a line on a piece of paper with an X on each end. One side will be labeled "Yes" and the other "No". The teacher will then come up with a topic. For example, should students have cells phones with them at all times. Depending on the students stance on the topic, they will mark on the line where it is they stand on the issue. If they are undecided they will mark somewhere in the middle. The students will then be separated by what they chose. "Yes" students on one corner and "No" students on the other. Students who marked undecided will take turns visiting each group to hear both sides. The students in their groups will come up with points that support their agreement or disagreement. Once done, 3 or 4 students from each group will come to the front of the class and face each other. One student will say a point that supports their stance, while the student facing directly across will refutes the opposing side and give a point that supports their stance. This will go on for awhile, until all points have been made. 


There are many other activities that can help students to learn more about informative and persuasive writing. Although writing can be thought of as boring, it is up to the teacher to make it interesting and fun. Not all writing has to be done alone, on computer, on paper with a pen or pencil. It can be colorful, creative and expressed in many ways. 

Post 5

Writing is a process!! No, but seriously it is. In order to have a good paper you need to do it in steps to make sure the reader understands what your writing about. Plus, you also want to keep the reader entertained so that they stay interested in your writing. 


There are 5 steps in the writing process:
1. Prewriting
2. Drafting
3. Revising
4. Editing
5 Publishing


Prewriting is putting your ideas down on paper. For example, making a list, creating a web or doing research.
Drafting is taking your ideas and writing the 1st draft of the paper, whether it is on paper or on the computer.
Revising is making changes to words and sentences. For example, adding or erasing ideas, and elaborating.
Editing is making grammatical changes. For example, adding or erasing punctuation and correcting grammar. 
Publishing is the final draft of the paper. You can print out the paper and put it in a binder or you can laminate it so that the paper does not get thrown away. You can do anything you want that shows you are proud of the hard work you put into writing a great paper. 

Post 4

A good reader to me is someone who can read something and be able to comprehend what they just finished reading. As for me being a good reader, I think I can agree with that. Although I do read fast, I always tend to go back to re-read to make sure I understand. I also try to relate what I read to everyday situations in order to make the reading interesting.


For students to become better readers, they will need to have better knowledge of other subject areas, such as Math, Science, etc. Since I will be teaching Physical Education, I will teach students the basics of most sports. This will help them if they were ever to read something concerning athletics, such as a book or an article in the paper. Hopefully with a better understanding of athletics, the students will become interested in reading books including the subject, or even better want to try out and play the sport for themselves. 

Post 3

When I become a Physical Education teacher, playing games will be a must in my gym. One reason for that is because playing games is the way we get our lessons across. We can't have students come in, take out paper and a pencil and learn on the gym floor. We will be playing games about motor skills, cooperation, sports and I will even integrate P.E to other subjects such as English, Science and Math. Another reason is because I want P.E to be fun and memorable, but also a class where students will be motivated to want to be more active in their lives. Just last week on the internet I saw an article about what people remembered most from P.E when they were in elementary school. Reading that reminded me of when I was in elementary school and when we played with the parachute, played dodge ball (even though we can't play that now) and learned how to throw a football. That is exactly how I want my P.E class to be. I want my students to grow up and go back and remember all the fun things we did, just like I did.