Blog Post #6

In the first two videos with Anthony Project Based Learning Part 1 and  Project Based Learning Part 2I got a deeper knowledge of how PBL works. It is not just a project you do with your kids after teaching a lesson to see if they understood what you taught them. It is a new way of learning that incorporates the ACCRS and gives students a way of learning by doing something instead of just sitting and listening to the teacher lecture all day. For example, Anthony talked about a project he did with his 3rd graders where he told them about a current event at the time; which was about women getting to fight in open combat. He and his class discussed this event and talked about if they thought this was ok or not. Then, he had each of his students to write a letter to their congressman stating their opinion and backed their opinion up with historical facts on whether they thought it was right to allow women to fight in open combat. The students then read the letters and chose 8 of them to send off. This one project interested the students and brought history to life for them. It also met the needs of the ACCRS reading, writing and history standards. Anthony stated at the beginning of part one of his video that he is always changing the way he teaches PBL, and I think that is so important for teachers to learn because once we become teachers, we are going to want to teach the same way for years. However, with technology changing so rapidly and the way students learn is constantly changing, we as teachers need to be diligent at trying to teach students in new ways, using new technology instead of sticking to the old traditional ways we were taught. In part 2 of Anthony’s video he talks about how much time teaching takes up, especially the first year. I have personally seen this with my sister-in-law. She and her family were living at my house her first year teaching. Before that time, I thought teaching was just an 8:00-3:00 easy job. However, she would go into work early, stay late, and then come home and work some more. She was constantly thinking and planning activities for her students. The longer she has worked the easier it has gotten, but she still puts more than 8 hours every day into her students. I have seen the dedication that Anthony was talking about. Just like he said, you must learn what to prioritize and what to not worry so much about. I think this is going to be the hardest thing for me to do when I become a teacher. I want to do whatever I can to impact my students and give them the best education I can, but I always over stress myself about the little things and having to take on everything at once. I think knowing ahead of time that it will take a lot of work and I will have to prioritize everything will help me be more prepared for my first year teaching.


icurio
The next video I watched of Anthony’s is where he was talking about icurio. This is an online database/search engine where students must have a login to use and they can search for educational websites and videos that meet the ACCRS and other state standards without having to go through all the non-educational sites that you would normally have to filter through otherwise. Another feature it has is that it allows students and teachers to save and organize, through folders, things they find valuable. In today’s world, being virtually organized is becoming more and more popular and this teaches children at a young age how to organize their work. Lastly, icurio has a feature called historical figures where students can search for particular criteria. Anthony gives the example that if you want something on the civil war you would search 1960s, African American male. My favorite feature is that it saves your work. So, if your students are working on a project and it’s time for lunch or PE the students do not have to worry about saving their work. It also has a feature that will read the text to you. This could be good for students with learning disabilities that need a little help with reading.

Discovery Ed
In this video Anthony tells us that this educational tool is great for children to learn by watching videos. He gives the example that if your students are learning about plants they can research through Discovery Education about different flowers and watch videos of experts explaining the particular flower they are researching. There is only so much a teacher knows about a subject and this gives the children the opportunity to research and learn more in depth about a particular subject.

Anthony- Strange trips for teachers
Dr Strange and Anthony are talking about the 5 key things any new teacher needs to know. 1. A teacher needs to be willing to learn themselves- there will always be something new for you to learn. And if you are not eager to learn, the students will see that, and then they will not be as eager to learn. Students copy their teachers and want to be like them. So in order for your students to be willing to learn you need to show them that you are too.
2. Teaching is hard work but let it be fun- teaching is not an easy job. You will put in more work than just the 8:00-3:00 you get paid for. If you don’t enjoy learning new ways to learn and new ways to teach then you will be miserable. Teaching must become your hobby just as Anthony says.
3. Teachers must be flexible- things always happen that you cannot control. Learn to be ok with the unexpected and role with the flow. If you don’t, you will be one miserable teacher because almost everyday there will be something that happens that you cannot control.
4.Get kids engaged- Students learn better when they are actively doing stuff. It’s easier to learn something by doing it yourself instead of watching others teach you.
5. Reflect- Students need to be able to reflect on their own work. They need to look at their work and decide what they could do better and change the next time on their work or project.

Use Tech Don't Teach It

Something that I found very interesting that Anthony talks about in this video is that you shouldn’t teach technology. It is not something you teach children like you would reading or math. You slowly incorporate technology into the student’s projects and assignments. You wouldn’t just all at once have them do something that requires a lot of technology, but in each project add a little more technology into it. Also, you let them use one tool at a time. Let them master, for example, imovie and then move on to another tool they can use. Each week use a different tool so that they can learn all different types of tools and also go back some and work with the tools they used in the past to help them remember them.

Additional Thoughts On Lessons
In this video I learned that a lesson is four layers thick. The first layer has to fit into your year. Are you going to be able to cover all the content of that lesson in one year? The second layer is that it has to fit into your unit. Is your lesson organized in a way that it builds on to each other within the unit instead of expecting the kids to learn the whole material in one day? The third layer is by the week. Once you have organized your lesson into a unit, you need to figure out how you are going to teach the lesson each day within a week. After each week what will your kids know? The fourth layer- is that it has to fit into a daily plan. What and how are you going to teach students daily so that they will learn what you have planned? Then, how will you test them so that you know where to begin the next day? How will you keep on track with your weekly lessons, and then your unit lessons, and finally your yearly lessons? I think it is important that you look at what they need to know by the end of the year, and then break down each level of the yearly lesson into units, and then from the unit lesson, to the weekly lessons, then to the daily lessons, so that students are not so over loaded with information at one time that they will never remember, but instead the standards they need to meet yearly are spread out evenly through out the year to give students the time to understand and comprehend the information.


All of these videos have taught me a lot of how I need to teach, what I need to teach, and how hard this job is going to be. I know I will never know everything there is to know about teaching because it is always changing, but after watching these videos I feel as if I have a good foundation of learning how to teach.