Our Own Classroom culture and Standards!

EDUC 350
In class this week we discussed our own class culture and our mission for this class. It was very fun to talk about this with my classmates. In the end we came up with this semesters mission, " In EDUC 350 we will become better educators through immersing ourselves in diverse populations to better meet the needs of our students by creating a sense of community inside and outside the classroom." I think our mission for this class is awesome. Our mission as educators should always be to try to be better teachers for our students. We did a pretty good job on this mission statement. Being able to fully comprehend different types of diversity will give us a way to deal with different situations we might face inside our classroom. We also came up with a list of goals to achieve this semester some of which are; To get a good grade, to create and build a class culture; to be more confident and learn how to embrace all cultures; learn how to deal with hard situations; learn how to get to know your students as individuals; learn how to differentiate lessons based on circumstances; be aware of biases and keep them from affecting instruction. One of the goals that stuck out to me was the one about knowing our individuals because that ties in with NCTCS Standard 2c which states "Teachers treat students as individuals". This is something that we should take more into account so that our students don't feel like we are generalizing them. This week we also talked about how we should discuss diversity in class. We learned that we are the ones in our classroom that set the culture. Which to me was a little surprising because that is a lot of responsibility. 

EDUC 410
In class this week we talked about standards and how to use our particular subject standard and combine it with other subject standard. When our professor gave us the assignment I thought it was going to be very easy but it was more difficult to get all the standards to correlate on one specific topic. We also had a seminar about why standards are important. We all had pretty much the same opinion on the standards. They are a guiding light on what we should be teaching our students. For my outside research I found a website that talks about why standards are important and how they help us stay on track with the content we will need to be teaching.
https://www.greatschools.org/gk/articles/why-are-standards-important/

This week was full of information and I will take it all into my future classroom so that my students success is ensured. Being able to bond with my students as individuals will make them want to learn more and they might even like me enough to not give me a hard time (you know middle school kids). Having those standards there for me to have as a guideline will help me but also help my students understand why I am teaching them a certain topic. I am excited to learn so much more. I know that I will have to keep improving every skill I learn because every child is not the same and what works for some will not work for others.

First Day of Classes!

 What is Culture?
The first day of class was pretty great. I am excited to learn about different cultures. I know that I will have to get out of my comfort zone to be able to talk about subjects that can be a little sensitive to some people. We haven't gotten to the actual discussion of cultures but we did talk about what culture means. It was difficult to come up with a solid definition because there are so many things involved with culture. I thought culture was this one thing that everyone knew exactly what it was but there is so much more to it then just being from a certain place or region. You can develop your culture from the people you befriend and are close to, the values and morals that your family taught you and so many more. 

How Will this Help with My Future Classroom?
Learning about culture and how it affects people will give me an upper hand when it comes to making sure my students' are successful. When I was doing my outside research I encountered a website that talked about how knowing and understanding your students' culture could help you "incorporate examples of multiracial material" in your curriculum so that your students' feel included. This topic is related to the NCTCS Standard 2 because understanding the culture of the students' will help me establish a good environment for a diverse group of students'. I will be able to make sure that there is no discrimination within the classroom by helping the students' also understand other cultures and how to be respectful of them. 

Outside Research Link
If you would like to check out more information about how being aware of culture could impact and benefit the classroom here is the website I found interesting:
http://www.nssa.us/journals/2007-29-1/2007-29-1-09.htm

Education 410
Today was the first class for Education 410 and we learned a little about what integration is. Integration is connecting an activity to different subjects to make it easier to comprehend. Of course the definition of this will become more clear as we go through the semester. We played baby blob and it was very fun and I had never done that in any class before. The purpose of this activity was to help us communicate as a team. We talked about what the course would look like this semester and what we should expect to get out of the course. Integration is something that as teachers we need to do to help our students' comprehend things better. This is related to the NCTCS Standard 4 which mentions teachers facilitate learning. By integrating different lessons to one activity the students' will be able to make certain connections to the activity making it easier to learn new subjects. Just being able to do this I will help my future students' succeed in subjects they might not be strong in. 

I am excited to see what else I can learn from these 2 courses and can't wait to be able to apply my learning to my future classroom