Community Outreach

In order to fulfill a community outreach requirement for my Education 260 class, I participated in the NAEYC Week of the Young Child that took place at the OARDC in Wooster.

At this event I was able to walk around the area and experience the activities that were set up by the area preschools. I think that this experience was great because I was able to observe, and even participate in, many different activities that I could incorporate into the classroom. I was able to see children painting with household items, experiencing several different sensory activities with bowls of grains and beans, and blowing bubbles, to name a few. I think that the two most interesting experiences I had were when I was able to touch and play with “fake snow” and when I was able to look through a fun recipe book. The fake snow was used in a sensory table much like sand, but was a lot easier to clean up. This white stuff actually felt like the real thing, it was amazing and the kids seemed to love it. The recipe book contained pictures and recipes so that parents or teachers could make “fun” snacks for their children. There were all kinds of ways that people had thought to manipulate food in order to makes faces or animal bodies. I hope that I will be able to find a book like this again and use some of the ideas it presented.

The other half of this experience involved me sitting at an area where children came up us and experimented with playing musical instruments. I think that this was a lot of fun because in addition to the individualized time I was spending with children, I was also able to meet and interact with several parents. Overall, I think this was a very worthwhile experience.

I believe that experiences such as these allow teachers, parents, students, and community members to engage in meaningful interactions. While the students may not necessarily gain anything from visiting this type of site for an hour, I believe the connections that are made between the other constituencies present will be able to carry over for weeks and years in the future.

Week 8

I find it hard to believe that my field experience is over. The weather this week was again nice and we spent a lot of time outdoors. The children seemed to again to enjoy their time outside running and playing.
Within the classroom, I wrapped up my experience with a small group lesson on outer space. They had been learning about different planets everyday, and I helped expand their knowledge of the planet Mercury. I worked with about one or two children at a time. During this lesson, we covered a small circle with glue and sprinkled dust onto this tiny planet. We discussed the “warm” and “cold” sides of the planet and how these temperatures vary with night and day. We also talked about how the planet has craters, much like the moon, and is covered in dust. In addition to learning about Mercury, we made a space scene where we used vocabulary words, such as rocket ship and astronaut. We added these pictures to our dark sky and were able to add stars of different colors, such as red, blue, brown, yellow, and white. We also reviewed which start were “warm” and which were “cold.” I think that this lesson went well and the children seemed to enjoy it. The children did a very good job remembering the differences between the stars.

Field: 7 hours
Support: 1 hour

Week 7

This week my teacher was back, and I was able to get back into a normal routine. Since the weather was so nice out this week we were able to play outside on the playground while we waited for the busses. I enjoyed this time with the children away from the boundaries of the traditional classroom. One thing that I observed and need to keep in mind is that the outside is not necessarily as “child proof” as your classroom, and there are all kinds of new things that children can get in to. We have several children who love to put things in their mouths. While we discourage this inside the classroom, generally the items they place in thier mouths are fairly safe. The items outside (rubber pieces from the playground) are not as safe for the children.
I was also able to lead a small group activity this week. I worked with two or three students at a time and we created patterns with pond animal cards I had prepared. This activity worked better with some groups than it did for others. I had several students that were very distracted, which caused those lessons to be less successful. I started the activity by going over what animal each picture represented (duck, dragonfly, beaver, fish, frog, and turtle) with the students. They had learned these animals earlier in the week. I then created a pattern with the students and we repeated the characters out loud (ex: duck, frog, duck frog). We then thought about what would come next. Finally, the students were able to make their own pattern. The non-verbal students who participated in this activity were able to point to the cards to make their choices known. This is an activity that I definately see myself repeating, and can be done with any classroom theme.

Field Hours: 7
Support Hours: 2

Weeks 4-6

Over Spring Break, I was able to visit the preschool in the morning, when actual lessons were being taught, as opposed to the afternoon classes that I normally visit. This was beneficial to me for several reasons. Firstly, I was able to see the students awake and fully ready to learn, which is so different from the sleepy preschoolers I am used to working with. Secondly, I was able to observe their classroom teacher through circle time and daily lessons. In addition to daily lessons by the classroom teacher, the M-W-F class had gym, music, and group speech each once a week. The T-Th class also had group speech once a week. I think that being able to witness this allowed me to think about planning in the classroom more than I ever had before. Most of the classrooms that I have been in during my field experiences at The College of Wooster have not had “specials” while I was visiting their rooms. This was a new and valuable experience for me not only in the planning aspect, but also in seeing how the students react to different teachers in the building.

During the time I was in field for the mornings, I was able to teach two lessons. The first was about Easter Eggs and the letter E, while the second was a lesson on graphing where we we graphed the classes favorite colors of the rainbow. I have attached both lesson plans to this entry in order to further explain these lessons. Below are two pictures in order to offer a visual representation of the work that I completed with my students.

Easter Egg Lesson Plan

Graphing Our Favorite Colors Lesson Plan

Through both of these lessons, I was able to use some sign language with the students that I had learned through watching my cooperating teacher. The signs we used were for the letter “E” and for the colors of the rainbow: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple. This is something I have never done before and I think added greatly to my lesson. Some children in the class are entirely non-verbal and while they usually do not use signs to communicate, they are being taught them in hopes that they will develop these skills.

Since we have been back from break, I have had one additional week in the field classroom. Things are back to the usual schedule now, where I visit the class during nap time, I help the students with puzzles and any unfinished morning work, prepare supplies for my cooperating teacher, and help the students get ready to go home. This week, we had a substitute in the class, because our classroom teacher was away for the week. Again, this was a new experience for me. It was interesting to see how the students reacted to a new teacher in the room. Although I had met this substitute before, I could tell that the students were trying to get away with more than is normally permissible. The teacher did not seem phased by this behavior, and kept the children in line, but because of the relaxed nature of our afternoons, they were still clearly acting out. I think that it is a valuable experience in that I have seen how students act with substitutes, in case I ever find myself in that situation.

On a different note, I’ll be teaching lessons again next week, I’m excited.

Field Hours: 25

Support Hours: 3

SMARTboard lesson

Sara Warden and I partnered to teach a lesson on the Digestive System using the SMART interactive whiteboard.

Digestive System Lesson Plan

The Digestive System

Week 3

This week in the field was quite different for me. I actually did not spend any time in my assigned classroom. I instead was working with third graders at both Cornerstone and Kean Elementary Schools for my I.S.
I am looking at the effects of technology in the early childhood mathematics classroom, especially the use of interactive whiteboards. For my study, I have split the third graders into three experimental groups in order to teach them a lesson on angle measurement. The first group is taught following the typical Everyday Math model, the second is taught solely using the SMART interactive whiteboard, and the third group is taught using a combination approach, incorporating the previous two methods. I am giving the students pre- and post-tests to measure their improvements.
The lessons went fairly well this week. Setting up the technology piece at Cornerstone was quite a task, I must admit. The SMART boards currently in place at both of these schools are somewhat small front projection boards. This means that you need a projector set up in order to have the image show up on the screen. This does not take away from the interactive nature of the board, but it does create a few more cords, all of which the students have to step over.
All in all, the week was a success, and I am glad to have this huge piece of my I.S. completed. Now, I need to finish analyzing the test scores in order to draw necessary conclusions.
I’m excited for what the future holds as far as technology in the classroom is concerned. Although these particular boards are not ideal, a lot can be done with them. I spoke with several of the Kean third graders informally about their use of the SMART board in their classroom, and they really do enjoy using it. They told me they use it for their morning work, math, science, editing, and various other activities. They also told me, with excitement, that “you can make the board talk!”
I think that with more and more teacher experience with these boards (and other forms of technology), they will have a greater role in the classroom environment, and produce great educational results.

Field Hours: 0

Support Hours: 1

Week 2

My time in the field this second week was very limited. I actually had snow days Monday through Wednesday, so Thursday was my only time with the children. On Thursday however, more than half of the class was absent, so I was able to spend time with only four children in which we watched part of a video.

I thought that adding a link with information regarding my school and their program might be beneficial since I do not have much to talk about for this week:

Ida Sue Preschool

I am looking forward to the coming weeks in the field because Miss Amy has told me of several topics we are going to cover. Since the children missed their valentine parties and such, they will be doing more with that and also starting to learn about the food pyramid. In preparation for my teaching of a lesson, I will be able to observe Miss Amy teach something to her class. I am excited for this opportunity which will be different from my experience in her room so far.

Field Hours: 2

Support Hours: 1

Field Week 1

This semester I am placed in Miss Amy’s Ida Sue preschool at the Gault Family Learning Center. When I arrive at my placement daily, the children are midway through their nap time. This nap period lasts for the first forty-five minutes that I am there. The next forty-five minutes, following nap time, is an opportunity for the children to engage in free-play. On Monday and Wednesday when I am there for an addition half hour, I help the children get their coats on and we make our way to one of the lobbys in order to wait for the busses.
While I am not able to observe much in the form of formal instruction during this time, I am being given the opportunity to work with a diverse group of children. I have not had much experience with disabilities outside of Wooster’s Teaching Children with Special Needs class, so I do see this experience being a beneficial one. This class also has several typically developing children in it, so I am also able to see the children’s interactions with eachother.
The children that I have met and interacted with so far have been so wonderful. They are already forming strong connections with me, wanting my help with a game or puzzle, or wanting me to help them with their coats. There is one girl who specifically wanted to sit on my lap when we had a visitor come to read a story.
I did not have the opportunity to do very much this week, outside of helping the children with the tasks I have mentioned above, but I do have an artifact from the field to share. This artifact is the number boards and pegs that I showed in class on Friday. I believe that there are many examples of how this artifact could be used in an instructional basis. Some suggestions for topics that could utilize this artifact are: counting, sorting, addition, subtraction, multiplication, and word problems.

Field Hours: 7
Support Hours: 1

Professional Organization Search and Review

Professional Organization Search and Review

This paper is a review of 3 professional organization’s websites.

The organizations I reviewed were:

• The Association for Science Teacher Education

  • http://theaste.org/

• National Council of Teachers of Mathematics

  • http://www.nctm.org/

• The Ohio Council for the Social Studies

  • http://www.ocss.org/