Internship 1

9/10/14 & 9/11/14

This was my first full day of internship with the 8th grade cooking class. My teacher had a lab planned making biscuits and gravy. She started off class by introducing me to all the students as "Ms. Greenstreet." After my introduction, she went over the basic safety skills of the kitchen and the overall management of the kitchen. I admired the way that she kept the instructions to a minimum and depended on the students to look at the recipe page. She told me that they are old enough to know how to follow the instructions and work together without any problems. They started cooking around 15 minutes into class. The kids got to pick who was in their kitchen but I found it interesting how they didn’t assign each other jobs. When I was in middle school and took culinary in my high school class, each person was given a specific duty to complete. I liked this way of organization better because the students are dependent on each other to get the recipe done successfully. I was able to walk around the room while all of the students were cooking and observe their behavior as they worked together. This class was particularly loud and more obnoxious than my previous class last year. After they got done cooking, the students did the dishes and my teacher checked them to make sure that they were cleaned thoroughly and it wouldn’t become a health hazard for the students that would be cooking in the future classes. Although this is more work for the teacher, I think this is a valuable resource that all FACS teachers should do because it would be less work in the long run. After the whole lab was finished, the students were given free time and my teacher allowed them to go outside. I thought this was a fun way to end the hour and relax after the stress of the lab. I had the same schedule on 9/11/14 as I did on my first day because the students were testing and so they did block scheduling.

9/9/14

Today was my first day of duty and I went to Sunrise Point Elementary school. I worked lunch duty talking to students about their day and allowing them to go get seconds when they raise their hands. My favorite part of duty is seeing all of the kids that I know from babysitting and other little kids in my neighborhood. They think it's so fun when they get to see their babysitter at school!

District: Blue Valley

School: Harmony Middle

Class: FACS

Teacher: Janice Rodgers

9/15/14

Today, my teacher started the Pretzel unit by going over a PowerPoint with the class. It gave background information on the differences between a quick bread and yeast bread. The students were able to learn how to use yeast while cooking to prepare for their lab. She used a really cool analogy when explaining how yeast works. She said that the yeast is "asleep" until you give it food (sugar) and moisture (warm water). The yeast then eats the food and becomes "awake" and is able to start absorbing the water. She walked around with the bowl at the beginning when the yeast was still asleep, and then she walked around again around 10 minutes later after the yeast was "awake" and it had taken a new appearance. The students listened pretty well to the PowerPoint presentation and I think that the experiment with the yeast made them understand more what yeast was and how it worked.

9/16/14

Today, my teacher demonstrated the pretzel recipe. She taught them how to combine all the ingredients and in the correct order. She gave them helpful hints so that when they had to do it on their own tomorrow, they would be prepared. I was surprised when she called up one of her students to help her form the pretzels after she finished the dough. I'm not sure why she chose that particular student, but it definitely got the students interested because they thought it was funny watching one of their peers. Today I sat in the back of the room, and throughout the hour, there were four boys in particular that couldn't seem to stay focused on the lesson. Two sat in the back of the room with me, while the other two were in the front. They kept looking at each other and laughing. I noticed this maybe because I had a better view, but my teacher either didn't notice or seemed to ignore the problem. Whenever she does notice the class digressing from the lesson, she uses the "strike" method. The class gets three strikes as a whole and if they continue to mess around after that, they aren't allowed to do the lab they have been preparing for. Something like this I don't see working at the high school level, but here, all of the kids seem to settle down pretty fast after she gives them a strike.

9/18/14

Today, the students went over the results from a previous test. The attention span of all the students was very little because they had a football game after school. Many of the kids had a hard time staying quiet and in their seats. The teacher calmed them down with the strike method again. It seems to work very well because they all stayed quiet after she said something. One of the things I have noticed within the last couple of days was the personality of the students. You can tell you is shy and who wants the center of attention, and who gets aggitated easily. It's good to know the behavior of each student because then you will know how to inteact with them in and outside of the classroom.

9/22/14

Today, I put the finishing touches on my Pretzel Lesson Plan before class started. I also went over my microwave lesson plan with my teacher so I would be prepared to do it tomorrow.

During class, the teacher did a meatball demonstration on the microwave to eximplify the point that microwaves can be used to prepare dishes instead of just heating up food. The lesson got over early and she had the kids read the microwave chapter in the book to prepare them for my lesson. I thought this was a good filler for the amount of time we had left.

9/23/14

Today was the day that I did my first full lesson plan in class. I made a powerpoint using previos materials my teacher gave me, and I also used the information from the book. The students filled out a guide sheet as I went through so they could save it in their notes and use it as future test prep. After the powerpoint, we played a jeopardy game. Instead of spliting into teams, eahc student got a chance to answer a question and if they were correct, they got a piece of candy. I let them use their notes while we played, but that is one thing I will change next time because it was too easy for them. They all really enjoyed that and my teacher even commented that she should start playing more jeopardy games in class so she could get more participation. Overall, 8th grade is still very obnoxious. I feel like I babied them too much and they are capable of much more material than I made them learn.

9/24/14

Today, everyone in the morning and afternoon teacher education class took a field trip to KU. We went to the College of Education and used their TeachLIVE resource. It's an interactive system that allows us as future teachers to practice our communication with students. In the TeachLIVE lab, practicing teachers walk into a simulated middle-school classroom where the room is real but the students are digital avatars. The virtual students are controlled by real trainers and are made to act like typical (or atypical) pre-teens, depending on the objectives of the experience. Each student’s personality is based upon those typically encountered in a middle school classroom. There are 5 students: CJ, Ed, Sean, Maria, and Kevin. CJ sits in the middle back, she is very sassy and doesn't listen to the teachers instructions. The most beneficial way to get her to pay attention would have to be allowing her to use her phone or a computer. She is an independent learner that prefers to do research on her own terms. Ed sits in the front left, he usually pays very good attention and gets into class discussion when he is asked. He is very into sports, so giving him free range project that allows him to involve sports would be very beneficial to his learning. He also likes group work because he likes to bring the "team" aspect of sports into the classroom. Sean sits in the front right, he is known as the teachers pet because he always wants to be the leader of the conversations. We also found out that he is bullied and this affects his personality in the classroom. The best kind of lesson plan for him would be a lecture because he says he likes to have collaboration with the teacher. He doesn't prefer group work, and wants to have a role model that can lead him through the lesson. Maria sits in the back left, she is very quiet and prefers not to talk in class. You have to ask her direct questions in order to get an effective response. The most effective lesson plan for her would be something she could do on her own. Give her the instructions and she will finish it without question and in a timely manner. Kevin sits in the back right, he is very interactive and likes to talk to CJ. He is also into videos and music, so a good lesson plan would be allowing him to make a presentation using those skills. Group work would be effective only if the teacher was interactive in the work and made sure that the students don't get off topic. Overall, all of the students had different personalities which led to a variety of learing styles that are required to be included in the lesson plan.

9/29/14

Today, I went to duty at Sunrise Point Elementary before internship. The lunchroom moms encouraged me to walk around and talk to the kids, which I haven’t done yet this year. It was good to learn some of the student’s names and hopefully they will feel more comfortable talking to be in the future.

During internship today, I shadowed an 8th grade boy. His next class after cooking was Speech and Drama. They were doing presentations about what their biggest pet peeve was. The boy had already presented the day before, but some of his classmates went and they were really fun to watch. They all got really into it and didn't even look at their script because the teacher encourages them to speak from their heart. When I was in middle school, our speech and drama teacher was very loud and obnoxious. I found it strange because their teacher for speech and drama was very quiet and low-key, which I didn't expect. It's clear that the exploratory class numbers result in the teacher’s personality.

9/30/14

Today, the all of the middle schools had early release, so I didn't have any kids. Instead I attended a FACS meeting with all of the middle school FACS teachers at Lakewood Middle School. I will never be the same after attending that meeting. It was so funny to watch how teachers interacted with each other outside of school. The youngest and newest teacher, whom was actually from Lakewood, led the meeting. She was teaching all of the older teachers about some technology for them to use in the classroom. While I was there, she shared b.socrative.com. I have actually used this website in my Gov class, so I already knew how to do everything and I could help the teachers when they fell behind. Watching all of the older teachers try to figure out how to use the app was hysterical. They had to have exact step by step instructions on what to do, and many of them still asked questions throughout the whole presentation. It is so strange to see how I have been affected by technology. You could put almost any app in front of me and I would figure out how to use it almost immediately, but most of these teachers couldn't even figure out how to find the web address.

10/1/14

Today, each kitchen was cooking different types of rice in their kitchen. They got to pick between fried rice, mexican rice, and risotto. I like how my teacher chose not to do a demonstration, because it required the students to read the directions thoroughly and work as a team. The 8th hour class is also starting to talk to me more voluntarily, which is a milestone I never thought I would reach! My teacher asked me to observe the cooking for one class and during the next class, do research on a video she could show her 8th grade tomorrow on grains. I found a channel made by 3 guys who are farmers in Salina, Kansas. One of the videos was on harvesting wheat and the other was a parody to a song that would get the students interested in the topic. I thought these two videos together would make a short and effective lesson plan.

http://youtu.be/wmhg1qyhvvs

10/6/14

Today, each of my classes were making pasta. Each kicthen got to pick a different kind that their group liked the best as a whole. I thought this was a lot more effective than making each kitchen cook the same thing because this way all of the students got to see all of the different types of pasta that can be made. I thought it was so funny how all of the kids walked around and kept asking the other groups what kind of pasta they made because it looked "so good!" The other half of the class, my teacher wanted me to start working on a lesson plan for next week. She gave me a guide to go off of, but mostly, I had free range to do whatever I wanted. This lesson plan is on Mise en Place. I found a short video that I will show to the kids prior to the lesson so they can get background on what it is. The video is below:

10/7/14

Today, we presented at the Greenbush Technology conference for teachers all around Kansas. The slides consisted of a variety of acitivities that you can do in the classroom that involve technology. As we presented, I noticed that many teachers took notes and wrote down all of the resources we gave them. I was very happy that we didn't have any technical difficulties, and the presentation went almost as smooth as possible. the only thing I wish to have improved on is making eye contact with some of the teachers, although, my presentation skills have improved since last year.

10/8/14

Today I was back in the classroom with my teacher and she scheduled for me to have a meeting with the vice principal. These are the questions I asked him:

1. What qualities do you look for in prospective teachers?

Enjoy being with kids
Passion for content
Collaboration- willingness to work with other people

2. What do you look for technology wise in prospective teachers?

Create new learning opportunities
Wouldn't hire a teacher solely off of their use of technology in the classroom

3. What do you look for when you go into the classroom to observe current teachers?

Distinct initatives
Teacher engagement
What are the kids doing?
Variety of teaching techniques used over time
General instruction

Overall, my discussion with the vice principal was very helpful. I also told him how I was interested in teaching in an inner city school and he said he had taught in KCK for a year and told me about his experience. He offered me connections to some of the schools that he knows other administrators at for other future projects I may complete at CAPS.

10/13/14

Today, the students watched a video for the introduction to their dairy unit. In my opinion, it was a very boring approch to a unit that has so many other possibilites. If I were the teacher, I would have assigned each kitchen a different type of dairy product and had them do research on it, and create a presentation on what they learned. She could have allowed two days for research/creation of the presentaion, and another day for the students to actually make their dairy product in class. Then the next day could have been presenting. This would have been a much more interesting and effective way to teach the kids about all of the different kids of dairy products their are.

10/15/14

Today, I did my last lesson plan in Ms. Rodgers room. I created a short powerpoint over the french cooking term Mise en Place, which means "to put in place." A copy of my lesson plan is attached to the picture below. This was my last day of internship with Ms. Rodgers 8th grade FACS class. It wasn't anything special and they didn't seem to mind that I was leaving.

10/17/14

My teacher thought that Wednesday was my last day, so I came back to CAPS for Thursday and Friday. On Friday, Sandy Magyar came to CAPS to talk to me about her education classes at Pittsburg State University. She told me that her classes were a lot easier than expected and campus life was really fun. It was very beneficial for me to hear her talk about college from personal experience and to have a mentor for senior year and how to prepare myself for college.