First Week Frenzy

This week has been so hectic! On Monday, Cleveland County Schools started back. I am so happy that I was able to be there and meet my students. I am so excited to have a class of 21 young minds ready to learn. It was an interesting experience to be in the classroom on the first day. I haven't been a part of that since I was in elementary school. It was chaotic, hectic, and a lot of fun! On the first day of school, one big thing that I saw from the entire faculty and staff was that they had all established a respectful environment for diverse students. My CE as well as everyone in the school really demonstrated standard 2 of the NCTCS in that they created a positive and nurturing environment for their students. I look forward to being in a community that does that.

One thing that was a struggle this week was trying to stay on task. Being at the school all day long on Monday was exhausting and it was so hard to come back home and then keep up with all of my schoolwork. However, I know that this is something that I must get used to when I am in the classroom everyday.

In class this week, we created ecocolums. Over the next few weeks, we are going to be observing this ecocolum and the small ecosystem that we have created. We have been talking about phenomena this week and this is a great way to experience some naturally occurring events. Simple experiments like the one that we began in class today can really help students understand the naturally occurring events that happen in nature such as photosynthesis and the life cycle. I know that in my classroom in the future, I would love to include many different hands-on activities to help my students understand the science that occurs around them on a daily basis. I did some outside research on the NGSS and using phenomena in science and found a great blog post from Alissa Berg. In it she lists the six steps that educators can take to include engaging phenomena study in science units. The link to the blog post is at the bottom.

In groups this week, we began talking about our science fair project. I'm excited for what my group is beginning to do and I look forward to continuing to work with them. Overall, I think we have all contributed really well to our decision making this week as we begin to create our project.

One current event that is happening this week is Hurricane Harvey. This has affected many people in Texas and as the weather changes, it is even beginning to affect us here in North Carolina. In class today, we were unable to do everything we had planned due to the rain that the tropical storm is bringing. Weather is something that occurs everyday and sometimes it does affect your lesson planning. However, as teachers we can use that phenomena to create an engaging and exciting lesson for our students!

Top Tweets:

My first tweet this week is an infographic that includes critical thinking questions. It is important to have critical thinkers in our classrooms and especially in our science classes. This image gives teachers some very basic questions to ask our students, but they are questions that require our students to begin thinking critically about the subjects they are studying.

My second tweet this week is something that I believe is very important. Like we have mentioned in class, some our students were born in 2012. It is absolutely essential that our schools be 21st century schools and this image provides a lot of information on how to ensure that our students are being taught in the most relevant ways for them.

My final tweet this week was on positive school culture. Like I mentioned above, it was so amazing to see how all of the faculty and staff at WES created a positive environment for all of the students on the first day of school. I believe that a positive school culture is essential to get students excited for learning and ready to be at school every day.

https://www.teachingchannel.org/blog/ausl/2015/04/15/6-steps-to-coming-up-with-an-engaging-phenomenon-to-anchor-your-next-ngss-unit/