Friday, January 25, 2013

Blog Post #2

Did You Know?

After watching Dr. Strange's version of  the "Did You Know" video, I was not entirely surprised by the facts that were presented. China's level and emphasis on education surpasses the United States by far and many countries other than China have schools that require students to learn a second language, usually English, in order to graduate. There is approximately 18 million English-speaking Chinese with an additional 300 million who are learning to speak English.

The fact about the 25% of  India's population with the highest IQ scores outnumbering the entire population of the United States was fascinating, but at the same time, their 25% is like our entire population considering there are approximately 1 billion people living in India verses our 313,914,040 (2012 census).  It's frightening how far behind the United Sates appears to be educationally compared the countries like China and India.

What does that say about our educators in America? Why aren't our students achieving the same educational level as students over seas? I hope to find the answers as I continue my journey to be an educator.


Mr. Winkle Wakes

I find it very sad that our schools are not being updated as often as they should be. Offices all around the country are updates regularly and school systems around the country are lacking sufficient funding to operate properly. People constantly want to push for better resources for our kids, but no one really seems to want to fork out the cash to do so. I know there are many organization dedicated to help with school funding, but it doesn't seem to be enough.

Students need to be engaged in learning instead of just sitting and listening to a teacher talk all day. That's boring. If they were engaged in an activity on a smart board, iPad or computer, I believe they would retain the information more efficiently.

Importance of Creativity

"All children have talents, but we squander them. Ruthlessly." - Sir Ken Robinson

Creativity is vital to the education of children. Our society is so concerned with either being right or wrong that we trample over the idea that maybe sometimes there is no right or wrong answer. Naturally, children are not afraid of being wrong but as they grow up through the educational systems, they are constantly being fed that being wrong or making a mistake is the worst possible thing to do. But, how will a child ever learn if they do not make mistakes?

Intelligence comes in all shapes and sizes. Just because one does not excel in math or science doesn't mean that they are not intelligent. Our society makes the arts seem unimportant or unnecessary to our children being successful, but that couldn't be further from the truth. Children need to be able to creatively express themselves, but instead, they are told to leave the arts alone because it won't get them anywhere in life. I was told that when I was in elementary and secondary school. I was terrible at math, but I excelled in singing and theatre and my dream was to be on Broadway or be a music educator. However, I was heavily discouraged by people who told me I would never be able to have a well paying job or go very far in life.

Creativity is not only useful in the arts. Creativity should be incorporated into the main subjects in school. Let the children make up a song about addition. Draw or paint the life cycle of a flower. . Act out different event in history. The possibilities are endless!

Instead of stifling creativity, it needs to be encouraged in our educational systems.


Pintrest

I. Love. Pintrest.
I had a pintrest account before this class and even had an education board. I recently started dividing up the board into specific subjects like math, science, social studies and grammar. I found an awesome board by TearchVision and they had TONS of amazing ideas from printables, to lesson plan ideas and much more.

I think pintrest is an amazing site that will be extrmemly helpful in education. There's access to teacher blogs, free resources and an infinite amount of ideas to use in a classroom. I definitely plan on using pintrest once I become a teacher


Thursday, January 17, 2013

Blog Post #1

About Me  

Hello! My name is Brittney Patrick, I was born and raised in the boondocks of Eight Mile, Alabama, and I am future elementary teacher. I  have been attending the University of South Alabama since the summer of 2009, three days after I graduated high school. I am still a sophomore because I have changed my major five times. Yep, you read right. Five times. I originally started out in pharmacology because my daddy wanted me too. From there, I went from general bio-medical studies, to nursing, then secondary education, and finally, elementary education. Huge difference, right? Not completely. I've always known that I want to work with children since I was a child. I just didn't know exactly how I wanted to go about it, but after working at  my church's child development center for four years (and the fact that I hate needles), it just made sense to me to become a teacher.


So then, a little more about me. I am the youngest of three girls. I was the "uh-oh baby".  Both of my sisters are in their 40's and I am 22 years old.  I have two older nephews, a younger niece and five great-nieces and nephews. I still live with my parents since I'm attending classes at South. I originally wanted to attend Auburn University (war eagle), but was too scared to leave home. I am engaged to the most amazing man, Jon Gers ( pronounced "Grrz"), and will be getting married this May. My hobbies include photography, collecting wine glasses and music boxes, exercising and music. Fishing has always been a big part of my life as well. 

 My first true passion is to live like and tell the world of Jesus Christ. I am a sinner saved by grace and there is nothing that could ever change my belief that God is absolutely real. He has done too much in my life for me to ever deny His presence. If it was not for Him finding me in the mess I was in, I would be six feet under somewhere. My second passion is children. I could have to worst day in the world, but the moment I walk into my classroom in the afternoons all my problems vanish. I want to adopt in the future and have a big family. I want to impact and help mold the next generations positively.

My Future Classroom:

As far as what methods I would use and emphasize in my future classroom, I'm not entirely sure. I plan on learning and applying different techniques as I learn and work to be come an educator. I think I would like to use a lot of hands-on and interactive learning because getting up in front of a bunch of kids and just lecturing doesn't cut it in my opinion. I want to make learning fun and I want my future students to truly enjoy their time in my classroom. I love colorful, lively classrooms, but not over stimulating. I would love to be able to use a smart board while lecturing and have a separate white or chalk board to write daily assignments on. I want my students to feel like they are safe and secure in the classroom environment to express themselves and be curious and learn. If I had the choice, I would like to teach k-4, second or third grade. 

Paul Paush on Time Management: 

I love how he talked about different ways to manage stress and procrastination. As Americans, we are terrible at time management. What stuck out the most to me is when Dr. Paul said, "people are more worried about doing something 'right' instead of doing the right thing. It's better to do the right things adequately than do the wrong things beautifully ". I found this video extremely helpful, considering I had a problem with time management.