Project 1: Observations in Structured Environment

I have been receiving most of my observation hours at the Children's Center. This is a wonderful place to observe because the curriculum is very play-based. Bonnie has an awesome system that is very organized and works well for the students. During the circle times, the teacher usually starts the lesson with a brief opening on the topic they will be discussing and then she leads into a story. Most of the time the stories deal with the topic, but sometime the books are read just for entertainment. After the story, Miss sarah always does a follow-up activity that reinforces the topic of the week. The circle time usually last anywhere from 15 to 25 minutes. At this time of the year, the students are able to sit longer, but anything longer then 25 will loose their attention. The students are then released for free time play. There are many stations that are set up for the students to explore. I have noticed that the Children's Center has an abundance of manipulatives that are available to the students. When I observed there two weeks ago, I decided to observe just one students for 15 minutes. During this time, the student did not stay in one station for more then two minutes at a time. Until he came to the station where he wanted to learn how to tie his shoes. He was there for 8 minutes.

That is a long time for a student to stay at a station when their are so many other options to choose from. I am amazed every time I go to the children's center because they always have something new and exciting for the kids to do. I want to get more exposure to this type of curriculum so I'm going to try and get a job there this summer. Hopefully I'll be able too!!!

I actually didn't get over to Aldo yet, but I was able to sit in on a lesson at Webster Elementary. I did my sophomore block placement there and stayed in touch with the teacher. This school has a completely different philosophy then the children's center. Comparing Webster to the children's center, it is fair to say that the classroom I observed was way more Teacher directed and student directed. As Bonnie puts it, the teacher was more concerned with the product rather then the process. Similar to the children's center the teacher opened with a story and had a brief discussion with her students. Then they continued to do an art project, but the teacher explained the process step-by-step. This limited the student's creativity for they tried to make their project look just like Mrs. Fay's. These students weren't using their imagination to come up with a design that help them make connections to the lesson. After the art project was done, they moved onto the next subject. There was no other manipulatives used to help process and expand the concept that they were learning. This was the major difference I noticed between these two schools.

class movie

I thought that the movie in class today brought up so good points about today's society. Children, especially in suburban areas, are spending way too much time indoors. I can remember growing up and always being outside with the cousins. We would go down to the woods and build forts, makes new trails, look for animals, and just explore. So many children in this time period are being sheltered from those experiences. There are truly being disconnected from nature and missing out on great opportunities to learn about the environment. Just from watching the movie and seeing the difference between the children from Beaver island and the children from the main land was amazing. There was such a difference in the way they presented themselves. The children from the island really learned the importance of valuing life and all it has to offer. While the children from the main land desired to be attached to material possessions. It's crazy to think that people can live such different lives and not live that from apart from one another.

picocrickets

I have learned a lot of information by using the picocrickets. I have learned that I still have a long way on learning how to incorporate and use technology in my classroom someday. The thing I enjoyed most about the picocrickets was creating a ''man'' and being able to decorate it. I liked that our class could be creative and come up with anything that they want to design. I did become very frustrated when it came time to turn to the computers. Our group struggled with making the software work, which didn't help the level of frustration.

If I had the option to use the picocrickets in my classroom in the near future, I would have to receive training. I would not feel comfortable going into a classroom and introducing this technology to young children. I feel as though they would have to many questions that I wouldn't be able to answer. So, if I was trained in using the picocrickets, I'm sure I would have different feelings towards them.

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