It's All New to ME!

The first week of class was dominated by Mother Nature and her snow storms which started us off in class via Webinar. It was a difficult start, for me, being that it was my first class, in my first semester, of the Master’s program. There was a lot of information being passed out and a lot of questions being asked. 

We choose our "groups" online during class. Group 1, my group, consists of three colleagues from class whom I will be working with to create two separate lesson plans. The Direct and Inquiry lessons, we will be presenting to our After School Science Program students next week. Once we finished online class this evening, I set aside a few hours in order to read through the course Syllabus and navigate eClass as much as I could, and start reading the assigned chapters. 

The MSMC portal is yet another system that is new to me and the eClass was chock full of information. At times, I found myself getting lost on other links but I could eventually find my way back, continuing to review and familiarize myself with places I could reference in the future.

I’m both excited and nervous about the fieldwork and beginning to write lesson plans. As I mentioned, this is my first class in the Education Department and I’ve never had the experience of writing a lesson before. So…I guess I’m jumping in with both feet and I’m attempting to learn as much as I can as quickly as I can.

And, I do not like the eText, therefore, I ordered the loose-leaf version of our textbook this week. 

This week, our group met for the first time order to get organized, and to start planning and preparing our lessons. With only one of us having previous Education experience (not me), I feel like we're at least off to a running start in having met rather quickly.

I created my Slide this week, along with my Blog and Google Form for the About Me. I have never used any of these formats or programs before. It’s certainly been a quick learning curve and I’m feeling a little frazzled.

For the "Digital Me" project, I used GoogleForms to develop a quiz with information about myself for my colleagues to learn more about me. It was fascinating to see/hear their guesses and their preconceptions about me! I enjoyed viewing my colleague's projects and find out more about them as well. It gave me ideas for the many different ways I will be able to reach out to my students in the future to get to know them each year. Using some questionnaire will provide insight into how my students think, how they learn, their perceptions of the different subjects, their likes and dislikes, and so much more.

I’m looking forward to actually meeting everyone in class next week and getting a better grasp on the material and the semester ahead.

Good luck everyone!

About Scientific Me!

My earliest recollections of science are the memories of class trips to explore nature and the outdoors, trips to our local planetarium, summer camp, and the aquarium. My experience and education were an important part of life. One of my favorite places to visit was the planetarium. We were fortunate to have a planetarium in our school district attached to the high school.

I vividly remember going to the planetarium and how it was so exciting to see the lights go down as if the moon were rising until there was complete darkness. Then you would quietly listen to the voice of the instructor as he started to explain what was appearing overhead. The sky still amazes me! During the summer, I like to sit outside on dark starry nights with my children and tell what constellations I still remember. When working on my Associate’s Degree, I took Astronomy as my lab requirement to extend the knowledge I had already acquired.

My second favorite place to visit was the Museum of Natural History. I loved the exhibits on fossils, dinosaurs, and at one point they had the traveling exhibit on the history of evolution. I can still recall visually the display and the stages in which they believed the man to have evolved over time.

In both junior high and high school, I was far from the best of science students. Looking back, I believe it was a lack of hands-on experience and what seemed to be learning the material for the sake of memorization and test-taking. I remember always feeling like I had to study and cram information rather than for the experience of learning and enjoying the material. 

While I don’t feel, I was always successful in science throughout my teen years; my college experience has been much more active. Last semester I was fortunate to take an Earth Science course, while it wasn’t hands on, I enjoyed the information in the curriculum, and I was able to use my life experience in analyzing data. Part of the reason is that I’m older and feel I can appreciate the information in the courses I choose to take versus a class that is required. And Earth Science, in particular, was interesting to me because it’s all around us every day. I am also fortunate to have two children who love to learn, explore and travel. So, now I get to learn certain aspects all over again.

To me, the definition of science is the study of living and non-living objects through experiment and observation. My experience with science has made me want to continue exploring and learning. It has taught me never to stop re-evaluating the past and looking to the future.
       

My goal as a teacher is to make learning fun. I believe interactive learning not only makes learning more fun but helps children retain the information when they can be involved in discovery learning. I hope that by offering my students a positive, interactive experience, they will want to become lifelong learners.