Proud Moment

This week my proudest moment would have to have been my "mock safety scene". My Intro classes are learning how to identify safety hazards in the workplace. Once the students completed the classroom instructions they were given a scavenger hunt form to find lab/workplace safety violations discussed in class. The students were very excited once they entered into the lab area and they worked cooperatively to find the hazards. As I watched the students hunt for hazards, I observed their dialogue and how well they applied the instruction to the actual scenes. It was refreshing to see how many hazards they were able to find on their own and how they processed the information they received in class. This was a proud moment for me because it reinforced the value of hands-on learning for students.

What do I feel proudest of this week????

This week in my Introduction class we were going over team work. I took my students outside and did two or three team work activities. One activity is where without talking, the students had to put themselves in order by their birthday. The second activity was the knot game. The knot game is where you break them up into groups of 10 or 12, while holding hands they cannot let go and un-twist themselves (there's a little more to it....). I decided to let one group talk, one group not talk at all, and one group assign one person to talk. The kids loved it. By the end of the activity, I had two administrators observing me :) We sat in the grass afterwards and discussed what took place and why. It was fun being outside and the students realized that leaders do emerge and teamwork is essential :)

Lesson taught

This week was a good one. I had gotten this little electronic microscope this summer for the students to be able to see hair texture and density. In the past all I had were pics in black and white that doesn't really give you a true judgement or understanding. Well this year I whipped out this little microscope and what a difference the students all wanted to participate in that activity. Where as in the past they would just sit around and say what ever it just wasn't as real to them. It is amazing just how much more they are willing to do when it is such a hands on part even if it is a Science lesson at the same time getting a Cosmetology lesson. I am so glad I spent the money on that little piece of equipment.

Lesson Taught

Last week we wrapped up the Safety chapter. I chose to do a review a little different, with a round robin situation. Where they would go to different stations and complete a different task in relation to something in that chapter (i.e.- setting up a ladder, bring out different PPEs, show how to extingush a fire). They loved it! They wanted to do it more than once. It was better than sitting in a desk studying notes.

A Good Lesson

Last week, I thought of an engaging lesson to get the students' attention. It was a lesson covering a circular saw. I usually show a video, made in the 80's, that covers the tool, but this time I decided to ditch the old flannel dude video and do it myself. I have to admit, the videos save me time and aallow me the only time in my day to check and respond to emails. I taught the lesson in the lab area starting with the basics. The students showed interest when they demonstrated the saw's use. I then added more of the lesson of different obstacles and angles. They seemed more interested that day. The next lesson, I showed a video, and some of the students said they'd much rather hear me talk and show a demonstration. I don't know if it was the old flannel shirt, the beard, or just my good lesson.

Most Proudest

The past few weeks I have been doing a lot of reviewing, attempting to bring my Nursing Essential students up to par ( mostly seniors). The students lost their teacher in early March and had a Sub for the remainder of the semester. Therefore, they appear to be lacking on many of the skills taught in the second pathway called Applications in Therapuetic Services. In the past weeks the students have made strides wih demonstrations and check off, but this past week it appears that the light bulb is on. They are becoming more engaged, they are asking each other about how the topics relates to the standards. I hope that they truly mean it or if they are just marking me by repeating what I ask them often enough. It has been a bite of a struggle trying to get them were they should be, but I am very proude of their accomplishments. They will be ready for Nursing Intership next semester. In the next few weeks of lesson planning I will utilize more group activities

proudest eaching moment

Lately I seem to have this proudest moment every week! I worked all last year producing a morning tv show for the students. the year before, the morning show was an embarrassment to the students and to the school. i implemented a new show and did ALL the editing myself last year.

This year my wife suggested that I let the students edit the show...and WOW they took the show to a new level. I spent the next day after the show aired reading the kudos from the administration!!!!

Now, I can hear the students argue among themselves to make the show even better!!! I am soooooo proud of their accomplishments that I can hardly speak. they love it when I just tell them to stop and bask in the glory for a moment and then get their butts back to work!!!

They are striving to make it the best it can be!!!!

a lesson taught that went well (Tell me what you see)

The unit we are on now is audio/sound. in an effort to get my students to understand the importance of audio and sound in their video production, I have this interactive game called tell me what you see! the only thing is...the is NO VIDEO...only sound!

I play various sounds and various pieces of music and they have to tell me what they see in their heads. They write on a sheet of paper the things that they see from hearing the sounds.

I love this lesson probably more than anything because they actually have to think about what they hear..so they tend to listen harder for little nuances in the music or the sound effect.

I also go into another lesson called tell me what you HEAR...only there is no AUDIO..no SOUND...and the students have to tell me the sounds they "hear" from watching the video

A lesson taught this week

About a week ago I realized that my second level students had yet to fully understand the purpose and use of the GPS standards. So I decided to give each of the 14 students in that class a standard. Each student was given a rubric and asked to create a poster based on the given learning goal. Students have turned in their posters. Unfortunately I was out 2.5 days last week. So we will learn the info that each student has to share on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Thus far students have taken a greater sense of ownership in the unit. One student made the comment " I get it, this is how you know what to teach us". Sure I want them to understand the content within the standards. However, It's sometimes feels like they're never going to get it because they think its just busy work. I think showing them that my lessons are bigger than our little classroom will helps them meet the expectations of the outside world, which they so desperately want to be apart of.

Learning Together

This past week my Nursing Essentials class has been studying the different types of elder abuse. For this particular lesson I decided to divide the students up into groups of 4. Each group was assigned one of the abuse types presented in the lesson. The groups were given instructions to research an abuse type by finding a recent case using the Internet. Each group had to give 3 specific examples of the abuse reported and 2 interventions that could help to prevent the abuse from occurring again. During the presentations, each student would be responsible for completing their study guide while each group presented their examples to the entire class. I think this particular assignment was very positive for the entire class. The groups did a very good job with distributing the assigned task to everyone in the group and each group was able to learn the various types of abuse in an interactive format. I noticed that some of my students who normally sat back and watched were put in a position to participate. I really like the Learning Together Strategy and I will continue to use it with other lessons.

Back In TIme

This week the students worked in groups to go back in time researching the history of health care. The students worked in groups, making timeline posters depicting significant strides in health care. Many chose to do traditional time lines but I had one group, all who play instruments, decided to make their timeline in the shape of a guitar. Once the group found a point of interest they really got excited about their project.
Along with the timeline the students had a "Who, what and when am I" fact sheet to complete as a group which was used to reinforce the information from the timeline. Overall, instead of me doing a history lecture, the students were able to see how health care has evolved and how many of the advances and discoveries are still being used today.
On Monday each group will present a time period, making a human timeline. The finale, a gallery tour will provide a fun way for the students to view the creativity of their classmates and learn how to give positive feedback to others. Students initially complained about doing the time lines but once they begin working they actually enjoyed the project and learned, too.

Lesson Learned

This week, we learned about disaster preparedness and emergency codes utilized in the hospital. My methods of instruction were a brief lecture on the importance of having a disaster plan and why healthcare professionals need to know their role when a disaster strikes. The students were then divided into 8 groups of 3 based on the color shirt they were wearing (example, Code Red=red shirts). Each group had to produce a poster regarding their assigned code to include pictures.

The kicker was that before the groups provided an oral presentation, they had to communicate their emergency code using non-verbal communication! They couldn't proceed with the presentation until someone guessed the code. It was hilarious! The students had to complete a quiz over the emergency codes presented and they did really well. They stated that the non-verbal communication method helped them to remember more than the posters! So, I learned a more effective and fun method of providing instruction.

Lesson Taught Well 9/20 - Ethics/Patient Rights

This week I taught a lesson on ethics and started with a sponge that asked the students to write 6 -8 sentences related to their parents dying wishes and/or desires. The students started muttering almost immediately about the fact they do not think about dying and they do not talk about it. “Who wants to think about dying” was one of the statements. (I felt I had made a terrible mistake with that sponge!) I challenged them to create the sentences based on the small pieces of information they remembered about someone in their family, or that was said in someone else’s family to get them started. I circled the room, read their sponges and highlighted words related to wishes and desires. I thought this class was not going to work; however, as I had the student call out the words underlined in their sponges (i.e. pain free, peace, and family getting along) the students were able to transition into the parts of a living will and the importance of healthcare workers respecting the dying wishes of others.

I had a student who was emotional because of recent deaths in her family. (I had to provide personal comfort…this class was a bomb!…my thought). We were able to work through the process that this class is more about living well, dying with dignity and having all family members feel good about the decisions they make and having no regrets/no guilt. The students asked questions and we decided as a group to make it a homework assignment to ask their parents using an example copy. Death and dying is always a hard topic even with adults. However, because of the laws governing patient’s rights, the question “do you have a living will or durable power of attorney?” is asked when a person is admitted to the hospital and many people have stated , in my experience, “you must think I’m going to die”. I had a visitor in class during this session and she shared that because of a certain situation in her life, she has a durable power of attorney in place. The visitor in my class stated she “loved the class” and felt I had helped the students understand the reasons for a living will on their level and made it something important to do while everyone is feeling well and in good health.

Lesson taught 9/20

This week I introduced a lesson in communication. Communication in healthcare is essential and I wanted to emphasize to the students how important it is to understand what is expected of them when they are on the job. I also gave them real life examples of what could happen to patients if proper procedures were not followed. The point of the lecture was to let the students know if they were not clear about instructions while on a job, in the class or home to always ask questions. I started off by showing them illusions. The purpose was to show students that things are not always as they appear. I compared that to communication. Oftentimes what we communicate is not received the way it was intended. or it is misunderstood. I went online and pulled up a site with illusions and the entire class participated. They tried to guess about certain pictures if they were real, tried to locate pictures in pictures etc. They student were so excited. There was full participation and I was able to demonstrate the importance of communication in a fun way.

Small Group Dynamics (The Story of the Tates)

I implemented groups last week in my Computing In The Modern World classes. Great timing, since we also began discussing the same topic in our class. This week I planned to discuss group dynamics both positive and negative traits, then give a small assignment.

I used the story of Tate Family to get my point across. I explained to the class that a family is a small group and by studying the Tate's we could get a good insight on how group members interact.

I explain the father whose name was Dick Tate(Dictate). He was overbearing and always wanted to be in control. The oldest child, their daughter Hesa (Hesitate), always had good insight and good information to add, but never spoke up. The Tate's also had a set of twins name Ira and Aga (Irritate and Agitate). Ira never showed interest in what the family was doing and refused to participate. Aga on the other hand, lived to get on everyone's nerves, often sabotaging the family's efforts. There was also the mom Facila (facilitate), who had the skill to reign in Dick, give Hesa the confidence to speak up and get the twins under control. (of course I drag the story out, gave examples and made it very entertaining)

The students enjoy the story and immediately begin to identify with the characters, calling out which best describes them or their group members. I then gave out a simple group project and upon completing the project I ask the groups to identify the personalities in their group and discuss ways to deal with potential problems. It was definitely a success!

Chemical Process

I recently taught a lesson on the chemical process of permanent wave. Students first viewed a power point on the chemical reaction, which takes place during the waving process. Next they divided up into groups of two. The students then had to take turns doing a consultation on one another. Their objective was to make sure the hair and scalp were healthy enough to tolerate a permanent wave. After this activity each student was instructed to look through a current magazine and choose a picture of one hairstyle. The students had to establish what type of perm and determine the size rod used to produce the style in the photo. Each student had to present his or her findings to the class. They made some very interesting presentations. My students enjoyed the lesson of consultation and role–play very much.

Bones, bones and more bones

Last week I started the skeletal system with my 2nd level class. I was looking for a way to review with the students. I created 5 stations for the students to rotate through with different activities at each. They had 15 minutes at each station before rotating. The stations were: labeling a skeleton using tape; labeling bones on each other using tape; coloring bones on a worksheet; using play dough to shape bones and practice the cut lines, quadrant lines, and regions; and playing a match game with our skeletal vocabulary. The kids loved it! The biggest challenge was keeping the noise level down because they were excited about the change of pace. I will use this method again with a different chapter later on and change out the activities. I will probably make the groups smaller to keep noise down even though I will have to make another station. The students said that it was a great review and even though it took time to create and set up, I think it was fun and helped as a review for our test. :)

Follow the leader

Recently I taught a lesson to my class about communication skills. We talk about different ways to communicate. After a short lecture about non verbal communication, which my students thought was totally impossible. The only way they can see communicating non verbally was of course you know, texting. Well after the lecture we played a game called "follow the leader." It is a game where the groups stays in the classroom and one person who is called the guesser, is called outside of the room. While the guesser is outside the door, the group picks a leader. The objective is for the group to follow the leader, and to keep the guesser from figuring out who the leader is. So the leader has to communicate with the group non verbally without getting caught by the guesser. Every time the leader makes a move the rest of the group has to follow suit. The students were so excited about the game, my principle came in the class and the students explained to him the object of the game. They told him that they were communicating non verbally. He was so impressed he mentioned it in a faculty meeting, and stated that it was differentiating. He called it "follow the leader", cosmetology style...Who knew!!;-)

Lesson

This week please comment about a lesson that you taught that went well. What was the topic? How did you choose to teach it? How did your students react?

The past week, I have only been in the classroom one day. I attended a workshop on Monday and Tuesday, and Thursday and Friday I attended the Skills USA conference.

I guess the only assignment I can truly speak about is the teaching assignment I gave to my 2ND level students. They had to outline Chapter 1 on the textbook, and create a lesson from the chapter. They were instructed to create a PowerPoint presentation and a test.

A little background on this class, it's only 7 students, the class was changed after the third week of school. This particular class was third level class(Forensics) with students whom never taken the other perquisite classes. So, once the class was changed to the correct level, 2ND year(LCRP), I lost about 5 students.

The students are excited because I advised that not only will they be teaching me, but also the other Law and Justice teacher's intro class. This appeared to make them excited. It gives the student the opportunity to not only read the textbook, but act as the teacher.

They present either today or tomorrow.

Open Mic

Of course, I am going to write of my difficulties so far. The main one is the administration office "dumping" disciplinary problem students in my class. I had 3 students put in my class the 4th week of school that must have been kicked out of other classes. I've had one kicked out of my class so far for dangerous behavior in the lab. I just don't trust everyone in the lab to where I can allow them do group projects. I have to be able to watch everyone. The one's that don't take it seriously are given bookwork, and told that it is their grade for the day. I find their worksheets crumbled up in the trash because these kids simply don't care about their grade. It's sad. I don't have time to think of something for them to do. It's always unexpected when I have to kick some one out of my lab. I wish I could get a student aid to help me next semester. Another thing is the use of tools, I have to closely monitor every tool to see if it stays in the classroom. That's just a few concerns...