Daily Blog June 29

One of the most important things I learned today was ways to teach safe behaviors to students.  The first part of class taught me about the GLE's for different grade levels and how they are directed towards covering the learning of safe behaviors.  The two micro-teaching lessons both gave specific ways in which teachers can talk to students about safe behaviors.  I now have to examples ofteaching safe behaviors to students through these lessons.  I of course still want to know, what are other lesson examples of teaching students about safe behaviors.  How would the two lessons, taught today, need to be modified and adjusted for different grade levels?

Daily Blog June 28

The most important thing I learned today was how to improve upon the lesson we created for 5th graders and heart-rate.  I learned that we need to pay more attention to the terminology and academic language we use.  The experience and feedback reminded me that it is important to spend more time defining, discussing and making sure students understand terms such as: heart rate, base heart rate, maximum heart rate, etc.  In the future I will spend more time making sure new terms are understood before moving on.  I do wonder though, what is the best way to assess that students understand new terms before moving on?  How do you make sure that all students grasp and understand new terminologies?

Daily Blog June 23

The most important thing I learned in class today was how to read and understand the layout and set up of the EALR's and the GLE's.  Though we had looked at them a little last quarter, today's class made them much more clear and easier for me to work with.  I learned what each of the numbers for the GLE's represent.  For example, with GLE 4.1.2, the 4 represents which EALR is being applied, the 1 represents the component and the 2 represents the GLE.  Before today's class I did not know what those numbers represented. Reading the specific standards for 5th grade health made me realise how many different topics can be taught within the health realm and also made me wonder how many teachers actually hit all these standards with their students.  In all the service learning experiences I had in the past two years, in elementary classrooms, I never witnessed health being taught.  Are teachers actually teaching health in K-6 classrooms?  Is most of it only taught in P.E.? 

Daily Blog June 22

          Today in class I learned what a concept map is and how to construct one.  I also learned  a lot about the details of what can and should be taught in health education.  When we first started brainstorming on our own about what should be taught in health education I could only think of two main topics...nutrition and physical education.  As we discussed our ideas, as a group, I realised how much more is involved in health education and what it means to be healthy.  While I was already aware of the further components of health ed., initially I had a very narrow view of what is involved.  Talking more about the details of what it means to be healthy and the issues we will teach our students about health and being healthy, makes me more excited to teach it to my future students.