Do Not Let Them Get The Best Of You

Cardio Fun

Its time to get that body moving!! For our last Lab of the semester, I taught cardio activities. I felt very confident in what I was about to teach. I have been playing sports all my life so I felt like I knew a thing or two about cardio fitness. We had three teachers going on that day and I was the last to teach. I build my lesson around aspect of muscular strength. In my lesson, I had the class doing different kinds of pushups, situps and a bit of carido exercises. First thing, I had the students do a quick warm up so that nobody would pull a muscle. When I was doing the warm up, I was going over what we would be doing today in class just so that everybody was on the same page. When I was doing that, I should have turned down the music at the time because I wanted to have everybody hear what the directions were. Instead, I had to shout to the class what we would be doing. Pushups are a hard exercise to do. So I tried different activities dealing with pushups so that nobody would get bored and tired. I had them doing a normal pushup on the ground, then having them switch to the board. From there, we did a lot of different variations of pushups. One arm on the ground while the other one on the board, two arms on the board, feet on the board, clap pushups and one arm pushups. Everybody was doing very well. They kept right up and they were into it. Going into this lesson I felt very confident on what was going on. I knew my time limits on each activity so I did not have to worry about the time. I also thought that the music helped a lot. That gave them a little motivation to keep on going. Some things that I need to improve on is that I need to get more involved in the class. Students see the teacher doing the activity,then the students will want to join in. I thought that I needed to give back a little bit more feedback to the students and give them a little bit more motivation. I also need to improve on my visual aids. I did not even use them when I was teaching. I had Ricky demonstrate a pushup for the class and that is when I should have pinpointed on what he was doing right.If I were to teach this again, I would improve on my visual aids, volume of the music and to get more involved with the lesson. Overall, I had a great time teaching this lesson! The students were well involved and were having a good time. That is what I like to see!!

Don't Give Up Don't Ever Give Up

Look Me In The Eyes

10 hours

I had the privilege of working with great students at St. Mary's this semester! I went just about every Monday from 3-5 pm, working with the kids. We played some different games, sang a few songs, had snacks with them, and overall just had a great time. We also had the privilege of going in the morning to St. Mary's and observing what actually takes place in the classroom setting. We got the kids for an after school program and now we had a chance to see what they actually did during the day. How they start off they day, what they are learning. When I went in on a Tuesday morning, they were learning how to correctly spell their names on a sheet of paper. This experience I had working with my classmates and the students from St. Mary's, is an experience I will not forget.

How Much Can You Take?

Do we fear success because the possibility of failure?

KUBB!!!

Today we are going back in time! For this teaching assignment, we were to teach a sport or activity from a different country. My teacher partner, Kevin, and I thought that Kubb would be a great idea to teach. This time when I taught, I felt a little more comfortable. I felt like I knew the information and it was fun teaching a new sport to the class. The hardest part for me was finding an instant activity to go along with Kubb but we could not find one. So we decided to come up with Halloween tag. After the tag game was over, I got right into the introduction of Kubb. Went into the history and how it came about being popular not just in Sweden, but all over the world. What helped me a lot during this lesson was my visual aid. As you can see, I was referring to my poster, going over the history of the sport and the cues to throwing the Kubb. When I was demonstrating on how to throw the Kubb, I should have used a real ring, instead of doing it without one. The students were a bit confused at what I was asking them on how to throw it.During the class I should have gave more feedback to the class. Telling the students what I liked and what they can improve on. In matter of fact, there were some problems during the class that some students were just sliding the ring on the ground. If I had shown them while I was demonstrating, that would not have happened.

This is a collection of some of my experiences at St. Mary's.

5 Alive flying high at St. Mary's

It was another great day at St. Mary's! Today, we got to work the pre-k students. They were awesome to work with. All of them were great to us and we had a great time working with them. At first we started out in the pre- K rooms. I got to play with play dough with the kids. We were making all different shapes and sizes of different animals. The students were making some delicious apple pie soup. It was very tasty! We spent about a hour inside and then we went outside for a bit. We were playing hide and seek with the kids and they loved it! They had some really good hiding spots also and they were quick! After we went back inside, we into the gym had set up a little maze for them. They had a great time with that!

5 Alive back at St. Mary's!

A week later after superhero day, kids were still talking about it! When we got there, we went with the kindergarten kids. First, we went downstairs to the cafeteria and had some snacks and played a few games. When we were done having some snacks, we went outside on the playground. The kids taught me a new game called Lava Tag. Nick, member of our group, was it and he had to stay on the playground while the kids and I had to stay away from the playground or else he would tag us and then we would be the lava. Kids had a ball playing this game. When we went back inside, we all learned a new dance, thriller. We all got into a big circle and all of us did the thriller dance! It was great seeing everybody having a good time!

BATMAN!!!

The superhero's theme was great for the kids at St. Marys! They loved it! We played an awesome game in which it was called Batman tag. There were four batman and two jokers. The kids who were batman had a ball and if the other kids got tagged by the joker, then they could throw the ball at the kids who were tagged and then they could be untagged. All of them had a great time playing this game. After we played in the gym, we went outside on the playground and also had a good time. We were playing tag with the kids and they loved it!

The new game of Dodgeball?

Could there be a way to make dodgeball part of your lesson in physical education classes? If you stop and think about it dodgeball is one of the worst games to be played. A lot of students are just standing around, talking, hiding from the ball, and students could even get hurt in this game. But what happens if we modify it so that this game can be fun and enjoyable to all students? In dodgeball, you do not want to get with the ball. Therefore you are always moving around, dodging, running, diving, and jumping. These skills sound like the skills you need in all the sports you play! Make a safety statement so that there will be less accidents likely to occur. Tell the students to only throw the ball below the waist and not to go for the head or upper body. Mix up the game a little bit. Don't just have two sides of the court and have students throw the ball back and forth at each other. Get them into teams and have a game of capture the flag with dodgeballs. Get the students moving and get them more involved into the game.

Can you live in that moment?

201 St. Mary's

I had a great time at St. Mary's, working with the kids. I am lucky enough to be able to work kindergartner's through sixth graders. I am learning a lot about the kids and what they like and how they react to different things. The kids love it when we come to them with some games and they get right involved with it. They had a good time with the activity, endless bucket. They all had to perform different tasks that were in the bucket. Some of them had trouble with it but they tried to complete it. I am looking forward to working with the students from Cortland and the student's at St. Mary's.

Ultimate Frisbee

This time when I taught I felt more comfortable. I got the topic early so that I could research it a little bit so I knew what I could teach about it. I still feel like I need to talk louder to the class and get more involved.If the teacher gets involved in the activity then the students will follow. If the the teacher is not excited on what they are going to teach, then the students will not even pay attention. They will be off doing their own thing. What I thought I did well on is that I asked a question to the class and all of them raised their hands so I knew they were ready for the lesson. As soon as I asked that question and they raised their hands, I knew they were paying attention so I thought I did a good job at drawing them into the lesson.It is a great idea to give a good hook because that is what helps the students pay attention to what is going on. They will want to participate in the lesson (see feedback analysis). What I did not do so well this time around is that I did not go over too many cues with them before we started.Cues are a big part to the lesson. This is what helps the students remember on how to throw a Frisbee or dribbling a basketball. I should have said some cues so they would know better (see verbal transcript). Another thing that I thought I did well on is that I felt more enthusiastic with the lesson. That also helped draw the students in.

I need to talk louder and explain things better. I should also try to keep the students in front of me and not have my back turned toward them. I thought I did a better job at giving feedback this time than I did in my first lesson. I should also include on what they did good at or what they need to work on. I also thought that I should be more active with the class. I feel like I did well with my time management throughout the class period. I should also smile more when I teach and get more into the topic.

Basketball passing

I thought that I needed to be more active with the class. I would make my classes so that kids would want to come back and learn. Make them go through all the steps on how to make a basketball pass. Make a little competition out of the activity. I would work with them as much as I need to in order for them to get the right fundamentals down. I thought I was too serious teaching. Needed to smile more and enjoy it. I thought my voice was good. I did not have to repeat any of my directions. I need to improve in talking to the students. Walking around and seeing what they are doing and how well they are doing it. I did not give too much feedback.