Part of my job as a special educator has always been to advocate for my students, but to also educate those who are not in my room about what my students really are capable of doing. Reading the article "Social and Emotional Learning: Taking a Stand for What You Believe In," I started thinking back to what I stand for as a teacher of students with special needs.

Three years ago I took over the girls' varsity soccer program as head coach. Knowing that very few of my soccer players were actually going to play soccer beyond their high school years, I thought that my job wasn't just to coach these girls, but to also make them better people in general. So last year, I had my girls go to a group home for young ladies with special needs. There, the girls played games, ate a BBQ and hung out with the ladies that lived there. They got a good idea that just because someone has a special need, does not mean they are not human, that they do have feelings and they love to laugh and have a good time as much as they do. Then this year, my team went and played soccer with young children who have various special needs. The girls jumped right in and had a great time. When my players were out there, they asked questions about the kids with special needs and had lots of questions about what it meant to be "autistic" or have "down syndrome." I loved it because the girls really wanted to know about the kids and really wanted to make sure each kid had fun, no matter how "withdrawn" some of the kids actually were. They took the time to get to understand several of the kids and built a friendship! Now when they see my students on campus, they are more willing to chat with my students and to make an effort to invite my students to come hang out with them too.

The article discusses the idea of schools implementing a curriculum that also focuses on the social and emotional needs of students. I agree that this should become part of what students learn about throughout their high school. I do my part for the 20 ladies that play on my soccer team each year, but it would be great to see a larger number of students learn these lessons.

Replacing Text Books with Laptops???

Looking on Edutopia, I came across the question, "Should laptops replace textbooks?" My first thought was instantly no, textbooks are definitely needed in the classroom. Then I read what others' opinions were and started really thinking about what laptops can bring that textbooks can't, along with why are textbooks still needed too. Textbooks have many benefits especially in an era where students are reading less than they used to and libraries are frequented very rarely. Computers are great and any information that you need can be at your finger tips within seconds. The bad thing about computers if that students can easily be distracted away from the work they are supposed to be doing and be playing games, or looking up information that is not on topic. I am also concerned with the amount of time that kids already spend on computers and in front of the TV already, let along adding it at school too. Computers can be useful but we really would have to crack down on how they are being used and that could take away from the time we actually teach.

My Classroom is more like Home

Granted, my world of teaching is very different than many other classrooms. First of all, my room is split into two seperate rooms. One of the rooms is an apartment. Then there is a classroom part, which is not used nearly as much as the apartment but we still use it. When it came to decorating, obviously the apartment was going to look like a home where people lived but my classroom, that was another story.

Thinking back to my college classes, I remember one of my classmates, who was getting her emergency certification in Special Education, stating that her students hated to go home on the weekends. The students would say that the best part of the weekend was Monday morning when they got to come back to school. With this in my head, I started thinking about how I wanted my classroom to look and how I wanted it to make my students feel. Bulletin boards with cute designs and student work was always neat to see in elementary classes, but dealing with high school students who do very little paperwork, I was stumped! So I thought back to what my classmate had said, students hated to go home on the weekends and realized that I wanted my classroom to be a home, a good and happy home where students took pride in it but also felt that it was welcoming. So this year, when I moved to my third classroom, I had a clean slate and could do what I always wanted to do. I set out to make my classroom that place where my students wanted to be.

The first week of school, I worked with all 9 of my special needs students to paint the walls. Granted, I did a great deal of the painting, but each one of my students still had some place on the wall that they had each painted. Then I hung art work that was inspirational rather than something you would hear from a teacher. I wrote my kids a positive letter on a large piece of poster board, framed it and made sure it was located somewhere where they could see it often. I made my room that place that my students wanted to be.

I strongly believe that my students feel welcome in my classroom and they see it as their second home...maybe as their first home for some...but I do believe that my room is a place they enjoy. They made it their room, but they also see the sayings on the walls that are there to encourage them and make them feel loved.

My room may not be the same as the teacher's room in the article "How Classroom Environment Can Ignite Learning and Cultivate Caring" but my room does have the same sort of throught put into it.

http://www.edutopia.org/stw-career-technical-education-student-success-david-garibaldi-video?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+EdutopiaNewContent+%28Edutopia%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

The Impact We Make as Teachers

As teachers, there are plenty of nights we go home completely warn out. We are frustrated at times because our students have not performed as we expected them to and or our lesson did not go as planned. We feel upset when our test scores are not as good as our colleague's and we lose sight at the reason we really are teachers. Lately, I have come home wondering what I was ever thinking when I decided I wanted to become a teacher. I am tired of my supervisor, tired of the politics involved in teaching, tired of the work load that never seems to lighten up, tired of the paperwork and tired of the meetings. Then I come across something that makes me realize how the small things I do in my classroom every day, have more of an impact on some lives than I will ever realize. I happened to watch a movie clip on Edutopia that made this all click. A simple teacher, made a simple comment to a student, that turned his life into something amazing. Little do I know, this may be going on in my classroom each day but it will not be until many years to come that this impact may be seen...and I may never even know it. I want to believe that I am not just there to teach students how to live in life. I hope that I am there teaching them something that will help them be successful in life and think back to learning in my classroom. When my days are tough, like they have been, I just need to take that moment to think of why I am really here...to change a life...maybe not now, but definitely in the future!

http://www.edutopia.org/stw-career-technical-education-student-success-david-garibaldi-video?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+EdutopiaNewContent+%28Edutopia%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

Keeping the Kids Entertained

Though there are times I definitely dislike my job, for instance when I have to wrestle with a student for 20 minutes to keep him from running in front of cars or when I have to take a 20 something year old to the restroom and do a change. Then there are times when I love my job; when I get to go to In N Out Burger for lunch, cook food items that I particularly love or just play a board game with my students. I have to admit, from what I see standing in front of my classroom, I have never had students who were extremely bored with what I was teaching, but then again, most of the time my students are up and moving around and do not have the opportunity for boredom to set in because we move from one thing to the other quickly. However, I have always wondered what I would do in my class if students started yawning or completely ignoring what I was teaching them. So, when I saw an article entitled "Ten Simple Strategies for Re-engaging Students" by Andrew Marcinek, I had to read on. My first thought as I was reading though, how does this person have all this time to go home every night and just spend hours and hours doing school work. I personally believe in a balance and if my life is consumed by my job, then I am doing something wrong. I have to take care of myself first before I can be a good teacher...but that is just how I feel. Anyways...then the teacher thought of doing a class wiki page. Now, before this class, I had no clue what I wiki was. Now, I can see how wonderful it can be and very useful. So he wrote up some rules for his students, which were not the boring old rules that state what you must do. Instead he made them interesting and funny. Step 9 "Eat a Sandwich." He started to go into an explanation of how a sandwich is like an essay but then cut it short and said, "Just make a sandwich and eat it." I like his rules. We are all tired of having rules all of the time so he kept them light and it made me laugh! However, the biggest learning lesson that I got out of this article was the final sentences: "Set a course for learning and be prepared for rough seas. Create a practical alternative or adaptation that blends elements of what we have been doing and what we would like to do better. The connections will follow." The one thing I have learned from teaching is that I can plan something great, but those rough waters do come in and throw the boat completely off course. I am fortunate that my curriculum allows for fun interactions and fun times with my students so that they do not have the chance to get bored, but I know that I will have to have a back up plan if my teaching position changes.

Source:
Marcinek, Andrew. "Ten Simple Strategies for Re-Engaging Students." Edutopia. 11-21-10. Retrieved 11-21-10.

Many Ill. juniors not ready for college

According to this article, "8 out of 10 public high school juniors in Illinois aren't considered ready for college classes in all subjects." (Chicago Tribune, 2010) This was based off of ACT scores of students. This statistic did not shock me. I have been very concerned with the education that students are receiving over the past several years, heck, even the education that I once received. Growing up, my mother would correct my essays or papers I had to turn in and she would also comment on the punctuation problems that she would see. I remember hearing her ask "What are your teachers teaching you at school these days?" Still, to this day, my grammar and punctuation are not the best, but I have to admit it is better than the students I encounter today. I am not talking about my special education students because that is a whole different story, but I am talking about the girls I coach in soccer. I have the girls fill out a survey each season about what they are expecting to get out of being part of the team and what they would like to get from their coaches. Reading over their answers, I am shocked by the number of errors I see. Now, I only see the English errors so I cannot comment about all subject matters, but I am just shocked at what we are really teaching students. How are they going to be able to write essays when they get into their English 101 class? I feel as though education has gotten watered down over the years and though we are pushing for students to take more math, science and English classes, the content that is being taught is not nearly as high of a caliber as it used to be. High expectations are not followed through with and with teachers being more worried about students passing the classes to make them look good, teachers are letting things slide and not holding their students accountable for actually learning the material. I think that expectations need to be brought up again and maybe a step back needs to take place in pushing for students to take more classes.

I also think that there needs to be a class that really prepares students for life outside of their home. I have had many peer tutors come into my classroom throughout the past 3 years who have had no clue on how to do laundry, cook or even clean. Yes, English, science and math are important, but I am seeing many students not even make it through one year in college because they were never prepared for life outside the walls of their parent's home. Education needs to go back in time and continue with the classes that taught life skills and then build from there.

Are new Teachers more effective than Veteran Teachers?

While looking through articles on Edutopia.com I ran across this poll topic that I find interesting: Are new teachers more effective than veteran teachers?

Obviously, being that I am a "new" teacher, I want to say that I am definitely better than my fellow teachers who have been working longer. However, I have only been at one school, worked with the same teachers for 4 years, and well, I cannot compare myself to a really "new" teacher because I am the youngest at my school. But this does get me thinking about what I do in my classroom compared to another teacher who I worked with last year.

I do feel that younger teachers are very eager to try lots of new things and have the energy to bring a great deal of interesting aspects into the classroom. For instance, during my first year as a community based teacher, only my second year of ever being a teacher, I took on the task of applying for a grant to build a kitchen. Not only did I receive the grant but I was in charge of designing the kitchen, shopping for everything and then also managing the maintenance guys who installed everything. Phew...was it ever a great deal of work but I was excited for the opportunity it would bring to my classroom. That same year, I also started a full functioning cafe that ran two times that year. We cooked a full Thanksgiving meal and then served it up just like a restaurant. This was the first time this has ever been done at my school. I also started using the city transportation system for all community outings instead of a school bus. This saved the district money, but caused me more stress than anything. If I compare what I did to the teacher who has been teacher the other community based classroom for the past 10 years, I really out did her. She would even comment, "Jenny, you are making me have to work harder!" She feared if we did cuts, she would lose her job because I out performed her.

Though I had the energy to do these things, she definitely beats me in the knowledge and experiences that she has. If I had a problem, I would go to her and ask for her help in handling the situation. With special education, not everything is cut and dry or can be found in a book. She was my book of help which was important for me.

So can I say that I, as a newer teacher, am more effective than a veteran teacher? No, I don't think I can fully say that. Can I say that I have grand ideas and am willing to put in all that effort and time to make some great experiences for my kids? Yes, I can. But in the end, I think new and old teachers both have lots to offer the world of education and students benefit from the old just as much as they benefit from the new.

Gay Educator says Wedding Listing Cost her Job

This very short article talks about a teacher who was fired from her job at a catholic school after her wedding listing ran in the newspaper. She was offered another position, the details of that position were not listed, but school officials did offer her another position.

Oddly, this article appears during a week I was just discussing this topic with my friends during lunch. One teacher had said, "Please do not call teachers sexual orientation out because it could cost them their jobs!" People were in shock and could not believe what they were hearing; teachers could be fired due to their sexual orientation. I followed up with "I knew Michigan was a state that this could happen but I had no clue Arizona was also." I may not have my facts completely straight with Michigan anymore, as this was a few years ago that I had heard Michigan did not have a law that would prevent situations where people could be fired simply because they were gay. I will never forget a few things that got me thinking. The first, I had a professor who was very open about her relationship with her girlfriend and said that she could be fired if the college decided they did not want her due to her being openly gay. I was shocked but didn't fully believe her. And then a few months later, a commercial ran that had a women pulling out a picture frame of either her wife or girlfriend and she stated that she was going to be honest if people asked her who the picture was of, even if it meant she would lose her job. My dad was in the room and I asked him how that could not be considered discrimination. He did not have an answer for me other than the state has no laws to protect people from being fired based off of sexual orientation. I remember just being blown away.

No flash forward at least 4 years to this teacher friend bringing this up in the lunch room. Not that I was happy to hear this was a true thing, but I had thought I was the only person who knew about this lack of protection or better yet, I thought I was just dreaming about this stuff. Phew...someone else knew!

My feelings on the issue...it makes me sad that because of who someone sleeps with they can lose their job. It is none of my business or anyone elses' business what goes on in a bedroom. We all have personally lives for a reason and as long as what we do does not interfere with the teachings in a classroom, than a teacher should really be entitled to do as he/she pleases. There are far worse things that we should be concerned about than who a teacher is sleeping with. I feel horrible for this teacher and only wish that as this one door closes, another great one does.

Technology a Blessing, a Curse for Remote Island

I won't deny that the reason I started reading this article was because it was about Beaver Island, Michigan. Though I live in Phoenix, my heart continues to be in Michigan but the economy and my dream job keep me here. Anyways...this article brought back some memories of my grandma. The article talks about how technology is startig to be more available to people on Beaver Island, a little remote island located in Northern Michigan. The article talks about a 70 year old grandmother throughout it mentioning how her and some others have been able to use a wide screen TV to communicate with others who have either had or currently have cancer. This touched my heart because I can remember when my grandma from a small farming community in the "Thumb" finally got email and started emailing me. It was great that at her old age, I think she was about 70, she was willing to learn about new technology and implement it into her life. It also allowed her to read about her grandkids in the newspaper for sports. Sometimes I want to kick myself in the butt because I am not always willing to give new technology a try when I really should. Here was my grandma trying new stuff and yet I am in my 20's and not willing. Ugh!

The article also talks about how the school system has tried their best to make technology part of the education process that the students receive on the island. The article states that over the past decade, the school system has encouraged students who are college bond to take online classes and some have even taken online college courses. This brings up the topic we had to write a wiki about this week. This remote island is able to give students a good education by providing online courses for students so they can be equal with others entering college that had those classes available to them at their high schools.

I enjoyed reading this article and actually thought maybe Beaver Island is for me. Since I am horrible with technology and use very little of it in my life, I figured I could hide from it by moving to the island!

Irvine, Martha. "Technology a Blessing, a Curse for Remote Island." abscnews.com. 11-7-10 Retrieved on 11-7-10. Retrieved from http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wirestory?id=12081861&page=1

How to Help Students Use Social Media Effectively

It wasn't till recently that I started posting a great deal of "status updates" on Facebook and I have never been a blogger until I started this masters program but I have paid a great deal of attention to what others blog about or what their "status updates" are. Frequently, I find myself editing what others write and question their education...mostly because I went to the same school as they did. I started reading the article "How to Help Students Use Social Media Effectively" and realized that this is a problem out there more than just with some of the people I graduated from high school with. I do agree with the author's point that we as educators do want to have our students have an audiance and be heard but we also want their message to be heard and not have others focus on the grammer errors. Teachers do need to continue to hold their students to high expectations with grammer even if they are using the Internet. I also think that students need to understand that everyone out there can read what they post. It is important to yes, express your feelings, but also to add substance or new knowledge so people learn from what you are posting.

Reference:
Marcinek, Andrew. "How to Help Students Use Social Media Effectively." edutopia. 10-19-10 Retrieved on 11-7-10. http://www.edutopia.org/blogs/how-to-help-students-use-social-media-effectively?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+EdutopiaNewContent+%28Edutopia%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

The Answer to Education Might be Found in Sports!

Being an athlete has definitely helped me out in many aspects of my life but I never thought that it could really be helping me be the teacher that I am today. I started reading the article "Achieving and Celebrating Academic Milestones: Pomp and Circumstance or High Fives and Dogpiles" by Edutopia and had to give myself a pat on the back. The article gives many reasons why education should look at team sports for a role model. For instance, teamwork is necessary for a team to win and the same can go true to education. When a teacher and student work together as a team and not in opposition, the student will learn a great deal more. Setting high goals and expecting students to achieve those is another way that sports can be the role model for education.

The pat on the back I gave myself was due to my reflection on my teaching methods or philosophy of education. Being a young teacher, especially when I came into my current teaching position being the youngest teacher by 10 years, I had a lot to prove but I was not willing to water down my expectations for my students. My students may be of special needs but in the real world, the bottom line is, can they get the job done that has been asked of them at work? (My job is to prepare them for the work world.) When my students do something wrong, I give them the same consequences that I would give a regular education student. I expect the same work ethic from them. Now granted, they may not be as quick, and I know that, but I still expect them to do a good job.

I will never forget, during my third year of teaching, a teacher approached me about my student being extremely disruptive in his class. I asked him what he would do if that student were "regular ed" and he stated he would write him up and actually he would have been removed from the class by now. I came back with, "So why haven't you done that for my student?" His response, "I should have never told you." Too many teachers "baby" special needs students and don't have high expectations for them and that is why so many of them never reach their full potential. I set high goals for my students, work with them as I push them to achieve those high goals and then show them how proud I really am of them! Maybe this stems from my background in being an athlete myself and a coach now. Who knows?!?! But I will agree with this article. Education can really learn from sports!

http://www.edutopia.org/blog/teamwork-dedication-commitment-education-reform-ken-ellis?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+EdutopiaNewContent+%28Edutopia%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

Facebook Quiz Screens for Autism

Wow, this week might just be my lucky week of finding some very interesting articles. So on Readwriteweb.com I came across an article that caught me completely off guard. The article title is "From Borat's Cousin, A Facebook quiz That Actually Screens for Autism" by Curt Hopkins (2010.) Though the article touches on how you know what is legit and reliable, the article does go on to state that the test is "helpful in determining who May have an autism spectrum disorder." The author talked to several sources about how they verify a source and the article makes mention of Lemondrop.com. So I clicked on Lemondrop.com and a write up about this Facebook Quiz was there with several sources cited, such as Dr. Bob Sears, author of "The Autism Book: What Every Parent Needs to Know About Early Detection, Treatment, Recovery and Prevention." I continued to click on links and see that this is a reliable source from what I can see.

I do not have a clue on what to think of online quizzes. Personally, I have only taken online quizzes for pure enjoyment and not to take them seriously. Being a special education teacher, I would say that if I just attempted to interact with a person, I would be able to judge if they were autistic or special way better than any quiz on a computer. Most people have a warped idea of how they really are so if a person is just asked a bunch of questions, they can easily throw the quiz one way or the other.

There are many people out there who trust these quizzes and cause themselves a great deal of stress because of the "results" they get from them. I think online quizzes should only be used for entertainment and should not be taken serious; maybe a little "Warning" should be placed by the quizzes so people wise up and realize that a doctor is who they really need to see if they are concerned that they have autism. However, I will continue to use these quizzes to make me laugh in the meantime!

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/from_borats_cousin_a_facebook_quiz_that_actually_s.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+readwriteweb+%28ReadWriteWeb%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

A Dating Class in High School

I could not resist reading the article "The importance of having a dating ettiquete class in High School" by Edgar Arold. At first, I as thinking, this really some sort of joke but as I read the article, I started to agree with many of the points that he had to make. Arold makes some great points, the first being "Courting and traditional dating as lost a lot of its meaning and even thought the times are always changing, there will always be a need for dating etiquette" (Arold). He also mentions that the class should teach abstinence. This really touches home with me because this year, I have three girls who will not be returning to my high school soccer program due to pregnancy. I can not speak for the whole world when I talk about teen pregnancy but I say from my experiences down in Arizona, it is scary to see how many teens are pregnant. Sports were supposed to keep students out of trouble and occupy their time so that things like pregnancy would not happen but sadly, I have 3 out of 35 girls in my program that are pregnant. Arizona is a state that does not teach sex education classes and I think that it is a total shame to students that such a law exists. However, if a dating class could be incoporated into the curriculum, abstinence could be taught and I hope a few less pregnancies would be occuring.

I will always think that it is important to teach reading, writing and math but I think we let our young students down when we do not offer classes that will impact their social lives daily. With fewer parents playing a "parent" role in their childrens' lives, I am seeing a greater need for teachers to teach about daily skills (money, manners, hygiene, friendships) and this dating class might just be a great option to help our teens out in the world of dating.

Being single at my ripe old age of 28, I have gone on many dates and seen many men who have no clue what to do and some men that are right on par with how a women should be treated on a date. But at the same time, I, myself have no clue really how to date the correct way. I wish I could take this class so dating would be easier....any maybe more fun too!


Arold, Edgar. "The importance of having a dating etiquette class in high school." Helium. Retrieved on 11-6-10. http://www.helium.com/items/1985757-dating-etiquette