Danielle's ECMP 355 Blog

When I began taking my university mathematics courses, I began to recognize what is known as clustering in my personal beliefs. In other words, when I started my first Calculus course in my first year of university I came to the realization that I was not a very strong math student. Instead I was a mediocre math student who had to work her butt of in order to pass the course — which I did! In high school my memorization skills produced me with high math marks, and because it is nearly impossible to memorize with the vast amount of material which is taught in a first year Calculus course and one must return to his/her prior knowledge to help him/her apply new theorems, Calculus did not come as easy as I thought it would. I began to make myself believe that I was a poor math student. As I took more and more math courses this view of myself never changed. Regardless of how everyone else around me did on exams, I still felt as though I should have been better than I was and would find myself comparing my marks to those of students whose marks were near the top of the class. It was not until this summer when I was viewing my transcript online that I noticed that my university-level math marks were all above the class average except for one course. From time to time I still feel as though I am not as smart as others around me and that I am the only student who gets lost during some lectures, but I know this is not true. As I get closer to my math education colleagues, I feel more comfortable expressing my feelings of confusion and frustration about some course material, and find that most of them feel the same. It is relieving to be able to work together with my colleagues to figure out some difficult areas of the high level math courses that we are required to take (Abstract Algebra for example). By working with others, it has given me the opportunity to realize that I am not the only one who struggles in some classes and I am not a weak math student because some concepts exist that I have trouble understanding. I have finally been able to take a step back and see the learning process — a process which includes getting confused, working your way out of that confusion, and making mistakes in the process. I never was a weak math student; instead my experiences twisted my beliefs to make me think I was.

My experiences as a math student are not exactly what I would describe to be ideal; my experiences are not horrible, but now that I have started training to become a math educator, I can reflect on what ideal student experiences should look like. My classes (as a student) were very teacher-directed with the students acting as passive learners, and if your learning style did not match up with the teaching style, you were set up for a long, hard road or for failure. Math is more than just adding and subtracting terms and numbers — it is a world of its own. It has its own language — it has its own alphabet and grammar. Teachers must view it from this perspective in order to understand why students struggle. Math is important to learn because it exists all around us and is used in daily tasks — shopping, selling, building, cooking, driving, and more! If someone does not understand math, he/she may struggle with these simple daily tasks.

It is important that teachers of any subject express their passion for that subject through their teaching. By showing excitement and trying to pass those feelings on to one’s students, a math teacher will be making an attempt to introduce math as a positive aspect of not only school, but also daily life! It is sad to say, but often times math is seen as a boring and difficult, but necessary course. When I look back on my own math experiences, I picture the classroom environment which I was in. As I took higher math classes (Math A30, B30, and C30) the number of students dropped, making the environment feel more empty. When I think about areas that I used to struggle with, my body feels colder. How can we as teachers expect our students to learn when they feel alone (empty) and cold? When portrayed like this, math is not a welcoming subject area. There is one high school math teacher of mine who really stands out to me, and this is mostly because of his patience and sense of humour. When I picture myself in this classroom, I feel warm and remember the sun shining through the windows while we worked on our assignments. This teacher did teach me in the afternoon, so the sun would literally shine through the windows, but the class I described above (empty and cold) also took place in the afternoon. I truly believe that my current memories and perceptions of those classrooms is a reflection of my feelings when I was learning in them. As a pre-service teacher, it is my goal to create a warm and sunny environment for every student who walks through my classroom door. I realize that it will take experience and hard work in order to attain that goal, but is that not the point of a goal? No goal is ever easy in life; that is the point in striving for it and working towards it; that is why when we achieve it the feeling is so great!

Image from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cdnphoto/3425050480/sizes/s/

Now that all of my classes are slowly coming to an end, I’m finding a bit more free time. I spend almost all of this free time studying, but I don’t think it is enough. I’m afraid that the amount of studying that I am putting in won’t pay off in the end. I’m unsure of what areas to focus on in each subject. It is nearly impossible to remember  all of the material covered throughout the semester. I’m doing alright in all of my classes, but I’m afriad of failing one or more finals. I’ve never been in a situation where I had to worry about passing or failing an exam, but now the pressure is on. How can we study all of the material covered in all five of our classes all at the same time? I’ve found myself concentrating on my ECS (Education Core Studies) test that I have to write sometime this week, but in doing this I’ve neglected the studying I have to do for the KHS190 final I write on December 11, which is more important (the KHS is actually a final, where the ECS is just a test). How do we find time to study evenly for each of these classes? I’m just wondering if anyone else is as overwhelmed as I am with finals. Is there any advice anyone could offer on how to organize myself better?

Image from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/44742789@N05/4112599769/sizes/o/

Now that all of my plans are set and the outline is made, it is time for me to start recording videos on the Social30 curriculum. I imagine this will be pretty time consuming, as I will have to not only record my speaking, but I will also have to retrieve and add visuals to use in the videos. I have two videos to do before I begin to import them into Google Earth. Once the videos are made, I believe the rest of the project will be smooth sailing! Hopefully I’m right! I will find pictures and write out the dialogue tonight and I will begin recording tomorrow after my field placement.

Image from: http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=google%20earth&w=all&s=int

Well it seems like things in all of my classrooms are slowing down. The blog posts are beginning to slow down, and there aren’t as many new ones for me to comment on anymore. A few students blog over the weekend, but not very many.The editting I was doing on student work in Chris Dittman’s classroom has slowed down also. I haven’t recieved student work in two weeks. It’s not necessarily a bad thing that these mentorships have slowed down, because it has given me a chance to start studying for my tests and finals, which are approaching extremely fast!! I’ve had a really good experience with these mentorships and I’m happy with how they have gone so far.

Image from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/pshab/498122926/sizes/s/

This week’s assignment was to find out what our digital footprint looked like. In order to do this, I typed my full name into Google for my first search. Believe it or not, I actually had quite a few results come back that had something to do with me! The first time I did this, I didn’t actually think there would be any results, especially since I did this once in grade twelve and only had one result — my Facebook profile.

I was pretty happy with all of the results that came up under my name. The first one was my Facebook profile, which I try to keep pretty clean and recent. I don’t believe I have any pictures or comments which portray a negative image to my character. My Twitter profile also appeared, which I’m perfectly fine about.

Other results reflected my academic career. One of these results came from a newpaper article regarding a career workshop I attended in grade 12 called Thrive in the Hive. I took this workshop when I was planning on going into the field of Business, before I decided on Education. In this result I talk about how much I liked the workshop and how I thought it would apply to my future studies and career. I think this is a positive point when someone looks at my digital footprint. It shows that I am ambitious and eager to learn new things.

Image from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/extraketchup/622612084/sizes/s/

The third result was one that reflected the work I do with one of my mentors in this class. It explains how I am helping with Mr. Dittman’s classroom in Calgary. Once again, I really like this result. It shows my ambition (for a second time) and my involvement with students throughout my university career. It reflects my passion to help others succeed in their learning. Several comments which I left on my peer’s ECMP blogs also appeared.

Overall, I’m happy with my digital footprint. I couldn’t find any negative aricle about myself. The comments I have left on other students’ blogs show that I’m pretty easy going and ready to question things I don’t understand, and also I’m willing to give my opinion when it is asked for. Even the fact that I can use a computer in more ways than checking e-mail and using a search engine is a very good point when future employers search my name. It shows that I have experience with computers and that I would be willing to use them in my classroom! The only thing I might change would be the quality of my blogs. Sometimes I don’t blog about really important things. It’s just usually what I’m thinking about at the time.. which can be completely random sometimes! I should reflect on how relevant my posts are to my life and my learning before I post them.

This week I unfortunately had to miss Wednesday’s class. However I did manage to catch up by watching the recording on Thursday. It was a really interesting class and I learned lots from it. It’s a shame I had to miss it.

Anyways, after listening to these three presenters, I was inspired. We’ve seen how much technology could be used in a classroom to enhance learning, but these teachers went out of the box (in my opinion). They came up with ideas that I would have never thought of on my own.

The first presenter, Darren Kuropatwa, discussed the use of scribe posts in his classroom. He explains that “his students write the textbooks”. In other words, one students is chosen to give a summary of what was learned in class, and also how to do it. For example, if the students learned how to long division one day, the student in charge of the summary would have to post all of the steps to long division on the class blog, along with an explanation of how it is done. After this student has finished their day, they choose another student to do the summary for the next day. Darren does not interfere with this summary, but will provide feedback whether it’s praising a child for their clear and detailed explanation, or if it’s encouraging students to go into more depth while explaining. Other students are also welcome to provide feedback on the post.

Technology in the Classroom. Image from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/catholicsun/443767232/sizes/s/

Kathy Cassidy, a grade one teacher in Moose Jaw, described the various ways that she has been able to corporate technology into her classroom. In the beginning I wasn’t too sure how beneficial technology could be to grade ones, but now Kathy has me sold! She has a class webpage which uses pictures in place of words in order for the students to understand. The students also have their own blogs, in which they type out their own story, and Ms. Cassidy retypes it for them underneath for the purpose of clarifying what the student is telling his or her audience. She also has a wiki which develops more every year. Students from all around the world can look at this wiki and add their own input. These grade one students can now learn about different cultural traditions and holidays from around the world. Also, when this young class was covering a topic about rocks, Ms. Cassidy contacted a geologist who agreed to Skype with her class. Ms. Cassidy’s students were given the opportunity to ask their questions to someone who specialized in that specific field. Technology has been very beneficial to her first grade students!

The third and final speaker was Clarence Fisher, a grade seven and eight teacher from Snowlake. He has made a logo for his classroom, and uses it to help the students identify whether a certain webpage is related to their class or not. If the logo is on it, the site relates to their classroom. Clarence also has a wiki which is never cleared out. His students can edit and build on it year after year. Each year his students have the benefit of learning from the students before them. They are also given the chance to expand the present ideas on the wiki, and make positive changes to them.

Like I mention, I was very suprised on how much technology was being incorporated into classrooms, as I never had much of an opportunity to be on the student side of this spectrum. I believe that as teachers, we must learn how to relate to our students in a way that they know. The vast majority of children are up-to-date on the latest technology and understand how it works. The use of technology gives teachers a chance to move through the curriculum at a much faster pace in a way that is more exciting to the students!

My plans have changed slightly. Originally I had planned on doing this project alone, but now I have partnered up with Joseph, but we’re still going with my original idea. We are almost done all of our research and plan to start creating short videos on the Social30 Curriculum on Wednesday. After all of the videos are complete, we will put them into Google Earth and create a tour. We’ve already figured out how to import a video onto Google Earth, so we just need to create the videos now. So far everything is going according to plan and I’m hoping to be finished pretty soon!

Image by: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nineinchnails/2610205036/sizes/m/

The plans for my third mentorship with Mr. Dittman were finally set in motion last week! I received an e-mail with a student’s work and I was to edit it, by using Microsoft Office Word, in order to help the student write his good copy. I was given several grammar aspects to focus on while editting, and e-mailed the work back to the teacher. I really enjoyed doing this because the stories were personal ones from this student’s life. It felt like I was getting to know this young boy. I can already tell that I’m going to enjoy working in this classroom!

Image by: http://www.flickr.com/photos/courosa/2248644717/sizes/s/

As for my other two mentorships, I’ve been commenting on the student blogs once a week, as that’s all that I seem to have time for. It is extremely time consuming! I comment on the blogs of all of Mrs. Smith’s students, and they blog several times per week. Ms. Wilson’s class doesn’t blog quite as often, and originally I was only asked to comment on the blogs of three of the students. I felt like I wasn’t doing enough in Ms. Wilson’s class, so I e-mailed her, asking if I was doing okay. Her response said everything was going according to plan, but if I had enough time I could also comment on the blogs of the other students.

I’ve really enjoyed working in these classrooms. I’ve learned a lot from them, even by just reading thier blogs! I think everything is going well!

Main Characters in NEW MOON by ABRKent(♥’s Robbie) on Polyvore.com

So I’m sure most of the guys will skip right past this post, but I have a feeling that the girls are more apt to take a look! If you haven’t read the books, but plan on it, I wouldn’t recommend reading this.. just in case!

I went to see the second movie from the Twilight Saga on Saturday, and I loved it! It was kind of a last minute decision to go, as I had planned on going in December when the craze had calmed down a little bit, but when my best friend asked me to go with him, I had to say yes! We got our tickets with absolutely no problem, but we also went about an hour early. The Galaxy Cinemas in Moose Jaw, my hometown, had this movie playing in two theatres for every time showtime on its opening weekend. This was a great idea, because it was extremely popular. Both theatres were sold out about half an hour before showtime!

As I mentioned above, I loved this movie! I had read the book prior to this, and knew what to expect. One thing that suprised me though, was that when I read the book, I was completely for the Bella-Edward relationship, even though Bella and Jacob formed a very close friendship. After watching the movie, I was shocked. I couldn’t figure out if I wanted Edward and Bella to be together anymore! I think I was cheering more for Bella and Jacob! This frustrates me because I can’t make up my mind on the matter! What could change my opinion so much? Is it the acting of the three main characters and watching the on screen romance between Bella and Jacob? Has anyone else seen the movie? Has your opinion changed at all, or is it constant throughout? Did you like the movie?