Confidence

         It has taken me some time trying to decide what question I would like to research. I have noticed that many of the questions tend to overlap or interrelate with other questions. I have chosen a question that I find ties in many aspects of other questions. I decided to research the question of "How do we become confident in teaching?" There are many things that are involved in helping a teacher develop confidence within themselves. I have decided to break up my research into different sections including knowledge base, differentiation, application, presence, and morals. I feel that each of these topics have grave importance in helping a teacher become confident in his/her teaching.
         A teacher must possess the right knowledge and be versatile with what they can teach. Having a thorough understanding of the subject you teach and being able to have the knowledge in order to answer the questions asked in class will make you a confident teacher. Having the necessary tools and knowledge to differentiate is another powerful tool to have as a teacher. You will become more confident in yourself if you are readily available to address each and every students needs in your classroom. Next, it is crucial to be able to help your students apply the knowledge they have absorbed in the real world. A teacher must have ways in which they can help students access things they have learned and be able to use them in a constructive and productive way. Assisting your students in accessing their learned knowledge will give you the confidence as a teacher that you can help students achieve the goals they have for themselves outside of the classroom. The way you present yourself to your class is an another important tool that has potential in boosting your confidence in teaching. Presenting yourself in a positive manner will help your students respect you on a higher level. Lastly, taking your morals into consideration when building upon your confidence can be very beneficial. Bias is a word that a teacher should never have in their vocabulary regarding their students. A bias teacher can never teach effectively because in the back of their mind they have a perception that is skewing the way they should be teaching or treating someone. To be a confident teacher, it is important to learn how to be unbiased and treat everyone equally.
        After laying out the foundation for my research question, I have decided to begin my research on how we can become knowledgeable about the subject we are going to be teaching. I began my research on google. I sifted through many different websites but I stumbled upon one in particular that I really liked. The title of the site is The National Science Resources Center.

(http://www.nsrconline.org/curriculum_resources/teacher_resources.html)

This site provides curriculum, publications, professional development, and other services that lead to the improvement of a teacher's knowledge of science. This site has many links that direct you in the right direction with whatever you are wanting to learn about whether it be about the rainforest or an educational blog you may want to follow. Overall this website is extremely useful for obtaining necessary knowledge that you need to have while teaching.

Current, Interesting, Outstanding

I have chosen to find resources that will help me keep my science classroom knowledge in science as current as possible. At first Google, I find thousands upon thousands of potential sites that may or may not be informative. I think I need to modify my search. I may get better at this but right now, I'm going to make some rules for myself:

1) The sources I find will have to be as current as 2009.

2) The source needs to be interesting to me, something I will enjoy checking in on and reading

3) The source must be good enough to be described by me as outstanding.

4) The sources can be good resources about what to teach, or supplemental materials for class, but also should be about how to teach science in the current classroom, how good teachers are achieving success

I'm not sure if this list will be specific enough yet, but hopefully by looking at enough sites, asking enough teachers of all ages and subjects in science, and needling my science geek friends I will be able to find a great list of resources.

Two great websites after searching for a few days now are:

PBS Teachers ( http://www.pbs.org/teachers/ ) This site has lessons for all ages, the lessons are comprehensive, they include national standards, inquiry-based projects, Socratic scripts for teachers and numerous materials and references. I don't usually go straight to television, but I believe PBS tries to be current, accurate and forthright.

Smithsonian Education (http://www.smithsonianeducation.org/educators/index.html ) Another comprehensive site, this one includes a link to your own state's standards. The lessons I looked at had online interactives and visuals that were outstanding. One lesson included beautiful actual-sized printable detailed images of prehistoric leaves, about as close to concrete as a student can get without holding the actual 3-D fossils in their hands. There are hundreds of lessons on here for all levels. Again, I believe the Smithsonian gets an outstanding for factual integrity. The online site is engaging on many levels.

I am off to interview some teachers next...

Appealing to differences in information acquisition...

As I have been contemplating a focus question for these blog posts, I have realized that I am having a difficult time narrowing down my thoughts to one question, as everything seems so interrelated.  However, one of my main concerns as a future teacher is, how can I effectively communicate science curriculum to all of the diverse learners in my classroom?  Is there a universal "best" method for teaching science? 

If I back up a little, I am almost forced to reflect on all of the literature and studies that have been presented to me in other education classes regarding the effectiveness of teaching through Howard Gardner's "multiple intelligences."  In a nutshell, after taking several self-assessments and so on, I learned that I am a certain type of learner, and that in my future classroom my students will be one of these types of 7 (or is it 8?) learners.  At first, all this information was like a shining light from above...no wonder why I hated chemistry so much...I am not a "logical" learner...my teacher should have given me a different assignment where I could have written or drawn what I learned.  Everything seemed to make sense until I started thinking about my own classroom.  How am I possibly going to be able to reach every different type of learner in such a short span of time?

Professor Kruse has provided us with a couple articles on the concept of learning theories, which allude to the fact that as individuals we all learn in the same way (basically, our brains all function in the same manner), but the way that we acquire said information is different depending on our background knowledge and past experiences.  Instead of focusing on all these different learning "styles" that I mentioned above, we should recognize the differences in how students acquire information.  I love the idea of this...but as a future teacher, I am left a little confused and yearning for some sort of answer (or at least more of an explanation).  How am I not going to let my own background knowledge and preferences for acquiring information interfere with giving my students the most effective science education that they deserve?  Usually when I have questions like this for myself, I like to think in a more global and historical perspective...what is working (effectively) in other countries (or even in other schools throughout the U.S.) and what has worked in the past, or what has not and has created these "new" shifts in science education?

Since I have been at Drake, I have completed 80+ hours in practicum experiences, but have yet to see a science lesson in action.  For those of you that have, what types of instruction have you seen? What effective methods have you seen...or ineffective?  And, what do you think about different learning styles? 

The infiltration of technology in K-12 classrooms

Think back to your classroom learning experiences when you were a student in K-12 schools. What type of teaching tools sticks out in your mind? Those of you that may be of the baby boomer generation might say chalkboards with the occasional overhead projector. Possibly for your science you might say a microscope with knobs adjusting magnification and focus. My generation (28 yr old) has memories of marker boards, overhead projectors and TVs with VCRs either on carts or mounted on the wall. Our science classes had, yes, the hand microscope, but we also saw a few other electronic gadgets like a pH meter (not litmus paper!) as well as the graphing calculator. So that brings us to today’s generation. Students that are in the K-12 classroom right now have a wealth of new supplementary learning mediums. For instance, SMART boards are now common in classrooms, ceiling mounted projectors with DVD players have replaced the TVs with VCRs on carts, and various media like the internet have expanded student resources. Moreover higher technological devices are used in chemistry and physics labs.

Throughout my posts I intend to take a look at some of these pieces of technology as well as how to integrate them into a science classroom. I’ll also try to evaluate how important the inclusion of the technology is in a classroom. Does it really position a student to learn more? Everyone in this Science Methods course has a solid educational background and probably most of us haven’t had all the technology that students encompass today.

The below video is a nice short (2-min) video clip of how technology is infiltrating the schools.

Effective field trip strategies for elementary science classes

I researched some effective field trip to do for elementary science classes. Most of these can do done with different ages and ability levels (the teacher may have to adjust the content accompanied with it) and these work great for ELLs. Some suggestions I found were:
the zoo

• a wildlife sanctuary
• a local park or wooded area
• an aquatic center
• a museum
• the library
• a national or state park
• around the school

I also researched some safety tips for taking a fieldtrip. I found a few that seemed important for all field trips at all ages:

• Explicitly discuss field trip behavior rules with your students beforehand
• Give your students a learning task ahead of time (keep them on task)
• Choose parent volunteers/chaperones wisely!
• Make sure you have all necessary medications
• Arrive at school early on field trip days
• Give your chaperones the tools they need to succeed
• Be proactive and think ahead when dealing with challenging students
• Count all day
• Do a "debriefing" with students when you return to the classroom
• Write "thank-you" notes after the field trip- chaperones and hosts

I think field trips can be a lot of fun! I remember going on field trips when I was in school and looking forward to going to the pumpkin patch, a local museum, the zoo, etc. And field trips can provide a source of realia and knowledge that cannot be acquired through a textbook. However, teachers need to make sure that they are prepared for them.. Although they aren't going to be teaching in the classroom that day, they need to keep certain things in mind. First of all, teachers are always teaching; although students are having fun on a field trip, they should still be learning content and this trip should tie into the standards. In addition, a well thought-out and prepared field trip will run much more smooth. The chaperones and teacher will have an easier time controlling the students and staying on task.

http://k6educators.about.com/library/weekly/aa040101b.htm

http://k6educators.about.com/od/classroomorganization/a/fieldtrips.htm

How do I keep my students engaged in a topic they don't care about?

I started to try to find 'tips' on how to engage students by doing a Google search engine, it was amazing the plethora of knowledge I could find on just tips alone. Most came to the consensus that students need to be moving around, manipulating the information physically and mentally. Items such as reading, taking notes and lecturing are all passive learning activities which not only bore students (no surprise) but also affects classroom management as once students are bored, some start to misbehave.

For younger students I saw a lot of mention for mobile activities, putting important events in sequence by using strip cards, retelling sections of a short story, using artifacts and scavenger hunts. Some of these activities could be modified for middle school ages, but I didn't see a lot of suggestions for older students (high school).

When dealing with elementary science, I found a few suggestions that look like they may be interesting and a worthwhile attempt, or things we already know based on our classroom readings; i.e. Collecting their own data. Other examples are Weekly science problems where class begins with a problem that students must answer related current concepts being studied. I saw suggestions for interactive science websites, webquests, using tradebooks, hands-on and minds-on (Hands on activities with critical thinking) and using multimedia presentations.

Lindsay's Intro

My name is Lindsay and I attend Drake University working toward my Master of Science in Teaching degree (elementary education) with a Reading endorsement.  I received my B.A. in Dance and Communication Studies from the University of Iowa in 2006.  I'm very excited to student teach in the Spring and hopefully get a job in the Des Moines area the following year.   I'm getting married this coming June and have a energetic dog named Benson.

I am very inspired by William's story and think our team was named after him because of his perseverance, which is something that teachers should have.  William continued down his path to create electricity even though most people around him thought he was crazy.  He believed in himself, committed and the result was astounding.  I think that teaching is similar. We want our students to learn the nature of Science and all content for that matter, instead of memorizing terms and following laid out procedures.  Teaching this way is hard and some people may think it's crazy, but I believe with perseverance and commitment students will learn more.