Reflection 10:What have you learned in this class? What is your most valuable experience?

This semester has been very hectic for me. I was experiencing quite a few personal problems and I am still very proud of the work I have completed thus far. In my journey of becoming a teacher I know I will come across many hard things in my path and one of those is school. I am a very good student, when I put my mind to it, but if not I become very lazy. This class is one of those classes that you have to, pardon my French, and work your butt off! But yet I know this class is going to help me in my future career as hard as it has been. I have learned so much in this class that it is incredible. I would always see my middle school teachers with lesson plans and never thought much of it but man I didn’t know how much work has to be put into it. Lesson plans are by far the most time consuming yet most reliable and helpful skill in teaching. Once you master creating lesson plans, it will come as a breeze and in the long run you will thank yourself for it. I have also learned how to create digital stories which are quite fun actually. I am the type of computer geek and all of my friends call me when they need help with their computers so me learning how to create a digital story was very entertaining and rewarding. I love taking pictures so once I can create my own digital story that is not for school I think I am going to have about 100 slides. Another thing I have learned in this class is writing reflections. No other teacher, that I have ever had, has made me do reflections. I guess it makes me feel kind of important that my teacher actually cares what we think. With all of the typing for this class I also think that my typing has become faster! This reflection for instance I think It’s only taken me 10 minuets when usually it would have taken me 15. I have also learned how to elaborate my power points more and not just by adding more pictures but by the content I place in it. I have also learned how to make study handouts and I not going to lie, those are a pain but they are actually quite useful. I don’t think I will be doing them for other classes because it is too time consuming but it is defiantly something that is good to know. I would have to say that my most valuable experience thus far would have to be just taking the course. I have been a bit shady and confused on weather or not I really want to be a teacher but this class has cleared out a lot of that nonsense for me. I just hope that with the few semesters I have left that I can complete my AA with my major in Elementary Teaching.

Reflection 9: What have you learned about the use of technology in the process of instructional delivery?

Through this class I have learned quite a few good processes that will help me when I succeed in becoming a teacher. Through the process of instructional delivery I have learned that today’s technology can be applied to almost anything. One of the most important things to know how to do when you become a teacher is how to make a lesson plan. Not only should you know how to make a lesson plan but you should know how to follow it and place details into it. When you have a well written and detailed lesson plan you will use your class time very effectively. I have learned to make a lesson plan using a basic lesson plan format and each lesson plan should be for the different type of lesson theory you are most comfortable with and the one which suits your needs best. I have also learned how to create a Digital Story. Stories have been around for many years since the beginning of time and they have slowly expanded our brains to see and hear the way stories are told. Most basic stories are books, movies or spoken stories; a digital story is a story that includes all basic stories. Digital stories include spoken words, pictures and images, music and have a theme. I have learned how to do a digital story step by step and it is actually quote simple. You must first choose the images you want shown, then you record yourself telling the story you want told that go with your images. Lastly, you choose the appropriate music to be in the background of the story. During the time I was in this class I have also done several power points. Power points are very good for presentations but they also can be used as a helpful studding tool. Many people don’t have good handwriting and get bored by studying just by reading so a power point can be very useful in the fact that it can help you study in a more efficient way. I used to place a lot of pictures and make my power points very entertaining but I have learned that it is not as much as the things you add to it as much as the content that is important. I have also had the chance to do study handouts. Study handouts are very useful because, just as power points, you can print these out and study straight from them. If you are not a great painter, you can add images to your handout that might help you remember certain topics you need to study. This class has helped me tremendously in learning new technological things that will help me in my journey as a teacher.

Asili Night extra credit reflection

The Asili Night of loving spirit(s) and powerful love was a great night that exceeded my expectations. When I read the flyer it said “An evening of Poetry and Music” but I didn’t expect the actual vibe that was present. The evening began with Doc and his band, they played some blues and jazz and the man on the flute played so beautifully. The man on the bass guitar was really good along with all the band members. It moved on to Professor McNair reading a few poems and ending with one of his lovely poems. His poem was so great and it was about love and sensuality and I just loved the poem. Kiki Sanchez and his band were really good playing Latin beats. The drum man was the one that impressed me the most because that is something that you have to play with your hands and you have to constantly hit the drum and he kept making the beats with his hands and it sounded so awesome. The night continued with a poem by Donna Soley and the poem was so well written, I could picture everything she was saying while she said it. We heard a bit more music from both bands and then the most explosive performance of the night was Prince. He was an African dancer and he was so- wow, words cannot describe. At first I was a bit scared because he was swallowing paper that was lit up in fire and he kept doing this until he ran out. Then he lit a torch on fire and turned it off with his hands! Kiki Sanchez and his band were playing the drums and the bongo and it was so moving and it went so perfectly with Prince’s performance. He put the torch in his mouth and back out, he left me with such a strong reaction. Afterward we heard a short story by Geoffrey Philip and the story was so good I couldn’t believe he wrote it, it was so well detailed. Next came Shamele Akua AdomaJenkins and she recited a poem but with emotions, it felt like one of those cafes they have in New York that after the person performs instead of clapping you snap. Both of her poems were really good and the emotions that she added into them were really good. Doc and his band played the Michael Jackson song called “Billie Jean” and they were really good, everyone was singing along and tapping their feet to the song. Oh! They also did a song by Barry White and they even imitated Barry White’s voice! Unfortunately, I couldn’t stay all the way to the end because I had to pick up my sister at the movies because her car is in the shop, but I had an amazing time and I am so glad I was able to experience this night.

Reflection 8: What is your educational philosophy?

As humans, we are bound to have different opinions and different approaches to a lot of things. I for one want to be a teacher and teachers all have their own perspectives and like teaching a certain way, this ties in to everyone’s own educational philosophy. There are 6 main educational philosophies: essentialism, perennialism, progressivism, existentialism, reconstructionism, and critical pedagogy. My educational philosophy is much entwined into all the different major philosophies. I agree with many aspects of some philosophies and disagree with some other aspects. Essentialism is based on the older methods of teaching and sticking to the basics which are teaching the main topics such as math reading and science. I like this method because I believe that all students should have at least some common knowledge over these main topics, but at the same time I think our current school system depends too much on this. Perennialism is almost like essentialism except that this method tries to brand students with the older methods of teaching, for example, in science they make sure that the child not only knows the facts of evolution but also understand the reasoning behind it. I don’t agree much with this philosophy because as I’ve said I think students should only be taught about common knowledge in these areas. Progressivism acknowledges that everyone has their own individual thinking but it goes deep into science. Science is a very important topic but I think that there are more important topics that should be taught such as ethics. Existentialism let’s each person think for themselves what they believe is right and wrong and it says that we all have free will to categorize things as we see fit. This is a good philosophy because I believe that everyone has free will and should use it to their extent but I also believe that in order to know right from wrong, one ust be taught what the world understanding is. In reconstructionism people want to change the existing culture on the flaws to what they think would be best. I agree with this philosophy in the sense that take the enviornment for example, if we realize we are causing pollution we can change our ways and go green but at the same time, reconstrucionists are more into forcing this onto students rather than the students being willing to cooperate. Last but not least is critical pedagogy; this is the students power to want to learn and problem solve and think critically. I completely 100% agree with this philosophy because I believe that all students should have the mentality and ability to critically problem solve. My philosophy might be a bit mixed up but I know that I want to be a good teacher and I know I will succeed.

Reflection 7: What is Digital Story?

Storytelling has been around for decades, since the world first began. The first stories were told by the cavemen; they would draw in their caves animals and draw themselves hunting and all the different weapons they created and the different animals that existed at that time. Storytelling then progressed to word of mouth; where a story would be told and then passed on to some one else, then someone else and so on. We now live in the year 2010 and storytelling has some a long way. The most modern art of storytelling is a digital story. Digital storytelling uses images such as pictures, music or singing, speaking using voice or talking just like a narrator giving personal experiences, naming characters and situations and details. Digital storytelling does not only refer to movies or TV shows, but more mainly a story told from the use of technology. The tools of digital technology are usually used to change voices and can make the story more interesting or funny or manipulate the voice with the technology as you wish it. There are different programs that you can use to do digital stories such as flash media player, Photoshop lets you distort and create images how you want them to look, and a very popular and easy program is Windows Movie maker. PowerPoint is a very useful tool not only for presentations and such but it can also help you tell stories. Many people don’t want everything to be digital so they can create there story in PowerPoint and be the narrator in person. Do you remember those old really big video cameras? Well as technology moves on, we no longer use tapes from those video cameras, everything is now transferred to DVD’s. There are programs that let you convert your tape home movies into DVD or you can easily go to a digital store and they can do it for you. Once your video is in a DVD you can use digital programs to use your video as a digital story. You can stop the video when you want it and you can add images or voice, you can even do a new recording and place it right after the shot you showed and speak about it. This is a great method of making your own digital story. Through digital storytelling you can story tell through visual aspects and although original storytelling was through word of mouth and drawings, you are now combining the two with special effects that can help you make a digital story all your own.

Reflection 6: What is a telecollaborative lesson?

Among all of the activities a teacher can give to her students, Telecollaborative learning is a very useful activity. Telecollaborative learning is a technique used for students working alongside other students, in groups. The trick is that it’s not the typical group work inside the same classroom or even school; it is group work with students from another state or country. Telecollaborative learning has become a popular technique and is used during many different school subjects and for different reasons. Let’s say you are a teacher of a French class and you want your students to not only practice with each other but also practice with other students of the same age that really know how to speak French. A great activity for this would be pen- pals with actual French students. Just as we have foreign language in schools in America, there are also foreign language classes being taught in other parts of the world such as France. With today’s technology you can surf the web and find a teacher in France that may want her students to have pen pals as well with Americas so they can speak to them in English. This is a perfect way for not only the students to practice with someone that is an expert in their language, but it also helps the student gain knowledge from other country’s through someone’s perspective that actually lives there instead of from the media. Telecollaborative learning also helps students gain communication skills with students who might not be just like them and helps them expand their minds and helps them appreciate what they have. It is always important for the student to feel safe in their environment and telecollaborative learning does just that- it makes the students appreciate how safe they are and how much worse things can be if comparing them to others. It allows students to not take for granted what they have- and this goes for all students from every part of the world. This is an especially good activity for students that are in middle school because middle school students are usually closed off and like to hide their unhappiness. Middle school is the time that students really start figuring out who they are and what type of person they want to be, so exposing them to this activity would help them open their eyes to the outside world beyond their walls and expand their minds.

Reflection 5: What is cooperative/ collaborative learning?

There are all different types of students, some shy some loud and some are just plain friendly; no matter the type of person, it is always good to place students in groups so that they can socially communicate with others. Group work is especially good for shy children because it helps them interact with others and it helps them make friends. Working in groups is an essential part in the learning process because the child learns to be open minded and helps get their ideas and tie them in with what the group thinks, this is called collaborative learning. Collaborative learning can be in groups with students in the same class, in other schools, maybe even in other countries and over the internet. When it comes to cooperative learning children work together in smaller groups on a specific activity. Each student is responsible for their work and although they are working in groups they have to “cooperate” with the other group members as a whole. Cooperative groups work together in the same room and all students have to stay on top of each other to make sure the others are working as they should. When students are in smaller skills they can share their strengths and weaknesses with others and can get feedback from their other team members. In cooperative groups children also fight or find conflicts with other students. These conflicts can include one of the team members not working as they should or having someone forget something that the whole group needed. Usually conflicts can be taken care of but sometimes a teacher’s intervention is necessary. In order for cooperative learning to occur the students need to work together but be clear and have to know exactly what they need to do. Another thing kids need in order to work in a cooperative environment is that the groups must be smaller than in collaborative environments so that all the children can work and donate time and effort to the project; you also want the student to have a say of their opinions and if the group is too big then the student may feel threatened to give their thoughts and ideas in front of too many people. Lastly, it is important for the student to feel safe in the environment but challenged as well. As a teacher you should always walk around the room and keep an eye out for any help the groups might need because when working in groups it is also possible to find some kids talking about other things rather than the activity that was given.