Last Semester

With the first 2 weeks of my last semester here at Cortland already almost done, i cant believe that i am in my last semester here. My time here has flown by, even though i am ready to be out of here and student teaching i know there is more that i still need to learn but it is going to take time.
TA'ing for 255 again this semester should be enjoyable, the students already are picking up what we want them to learn, they just need to get use to being in front of a camera. I remember being in 255, i didn't talk for the first 2 weeks i was quiet and reserved, but once i came out of my shell i shocked everyone. Hopefully this last semester will be as enjoyable as my last 3 semesters here, and i am swear i am going to try and keep this updated..

Throughout the semester I was asked to volunteer my time, and work on my teaching skill to help out the community. I was asked to do only ten hours but i accumulated a lot more than that. Every Sunday for an hour i would go to the pool with Melissa and we would work with the CAST program, this program is designed to teach children with disabilities how to swim. Melissa and I worked together with one girl who was bind, since i am allergic to the chlorine Melissa would get into the pool with her and it was easier for me to explain what to do while Melissa moved her arm in the motion i was explaining. Also this semester as being a member of APEM, we held numerous events that were for children. I participated in our Teen nights held at the YMCA in Cortland, it was a fun filled night for teens we played DDR, knockout, wii and many other games with the teens. All the teens enjoyed themselves and even us students had a lot of fun. I also was involved in a teacher workshop held at Cornell University, I was there to teach other teachers how you can involve technology into physical education. I was nervous to be teaching actual teachers but once i got talking about the games and how they work in the PE setting i felt confident because i know the topic well. It was nice to see other teachers so open to learning for a student.

How we have grown

ADHD Moving For A Reason

For my final project in class I was asked to look at children with ADHD and read about studies that have taken place with these children and how moving and multi-media games affect them. In the first article I read based on this topic talked about how children with ADHD move around and fidget when they are asked to concentrate or perform a mental task. The impulses in their brain are so strong that in order to retain or attempt to retain the information the brain send off impulses that cause the body to move. Children with ADHD have trouble retaining information especially when it comes to multi-step directions as well as remembering orders. If the student isn't being harmful or disruptive let them be. You can compare the students movements to that of an adult in a meeting that is being dragged on too long and they are moving to keep themselves from being bored or falling asleep, or to when an adult taps a pen or even their foot when trying to accomplish a task that is taking too long.

Everywhere we look now a days we see children playing video games. They are everywhere, we even see them in the classrooms today. A study was done with children who had ADHD to see if playing DDR would help with their ability to retain information and work on their short term memory. In the beginning of the study the children were given a Test and were given it again at the end of the study. During the study all background distraction were turned off and the back light was dimmed so that there were no outside distractions. The study found that the majority of students who came to the most sessions and worked with the DDR did better on the test. Their short term memory was increased since they had been working on watching the arrows and knowing where to put their feet on the board. Who would have through that a game would help increase short term memory. I know when participating in a lesson on DDR I was lost at times and had to look at my feet to see and then look quickly back at the screen to see what was next.

When it comes to children with ADHD I think that it is a good idea that everyone has a little bit of knowledge to deal with students who have ADHD so when in the classroom we are prepared to make adjustments for these students. Why should a student suffer because of something they cant control. Maybe now with the studies that have been done more things for will come out to help teachers and parents deal with and use to help children with ADHD learn to concentrate and help control the impulses that go on in their brain that cause the movements and not being able to focus.

Final part 1

PART B:
We were given a website and may links that followed and were asked questions based on what we read and saw in the videos that were up. The web sit is from Canada, it is located in North America. The country the website is from is also Canada. If I were asked to locate Canada on the map I would be able to do so. After watching the video i think that the topic is interesting, and how they have found correlations between physical activity and learning. Going into physical education its nice to see that people are stating to realize that having an active lifestyle is beneficial to everyone not only for heath reasons but for young children and even adolescent children to help develop their minds. The PE teacher was not involved in the experiment due to the fact that all the physical activity took place in the classroom, with the teacher. The children did twenty minutes of cardio, before they started their lesson. The outcomes of the study was that 15 min or more break from the classroom will better the students grades, due to that fact that they were stimulating their bran's and keeping the impulses continuous throughout the day which aloud they to say focuses when it came time to learning. The outcomes are similar to the NYS standards as well as different from them. They are similar in the fact that they want every student to be active and learn a healthy lifestyle but they don't look at the students skill levels, and if they are competent in a specific skill and base that on what activities are performed. The teachers do not look as much in to the cognitive and affective goal and objectives as PE teachers do.

PART C:



WEB SITES:
http://www.cbc.ca/national/blog/special_feature/brain_gains/

http://www.cbc.ca/video/popup.html?http://www.cbc.ca/mrl3/8752/news/features/leishman-brain090422.wmv

http://www.cbc.ca/national/blog/special_feature/brain_gains/city_park_school_results.html

http://www.cbc.ca/national/blog/special_feature/brain_gains/recess_on_behaviour.html

http://www.cbc.ca/national/blog/special_feature/brain_gains/deskercise.html

MY Lesson Plan and Activity Progression

Dancing like the stars

When we started out the semester, i was extremely nervous to be in front of a class teaching them a new skill. As the semester progressed i started to feel more and more comfortable being up in front teaching everyone. The first time i taught, i thought it was a disaster, i forgot a majority of the things that i needed to say/remind the students what to do. Now after just finishing my last teaching lab for the semester i am much more confident in myself as well as my teaching ability. There are still many areas that i can improve on but with time everything will come together. For my last lab i was assigned to teach Dance. I chose a dance that i learn when i was taking a dance class last semester, its a fun little dance that keeps you on your toes. The majority of the students picked up the dance right away, but some didn't get it but i had to work with them a little more. This lesson ran really smoothly, everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, and even though i was feeling under the weather no one could tell, which is a good thing. When looking at the video, at 10 min 50 seconds, you can see that from the other side of the gym i walked over to a group of students that i saw adding a step to the dance that i liked, and went over to them to tell them what a great job they were doing and to have the rest of the class watch them. If this were the beginning of the semester i would have never seen them from the opposite side of the gym, because i wouldn't have been looking for them i would have been focused on the students just on that side. But now i have learned that i have to watch the entire gym no matter where i am in the lesson.

You Decide What To Do

The first time I taught little rice bags, I thought It was going to be pretty difficult to get the class excited about playing the game of jacks, but after I got through the lesson I felt a lot better. When it came time to reteach the lesson but add on to it, it was difficult to figure out that would be interesting for the class to do. then I came up with the idea of adding a physical aspect to it, so I had the class try and do a jumping jack or a push up or I even let them make something up to do while trying to get another bag. This turned out to be a success and the time seemed to fly by. It was easier to let the students choose what they wanted to do rather then tell them what they had to do. You could see the everyone did what they knew they were good at and some even excelled and even surprised me with what they decided to do. Some one did a front roll, other tried to play the game together. The lesson went really well and I was even able to handle one of the students who told me that she didn't want to play the activity anymore at the end of class by telling her she could choose what we did next class since the unit was over.