Reflection of Social Studies Methods

I can't believe how fast this semester flew by, its so bittersweet to be done with all of my methods courses and such an awarding feeling! Throughout the course of this semester I have reflected on my experiences in our Social Studies Methods course. I wrote a blog post just about every week expressing my feelings towards something we learned or writing about overwhelming, incredible experiences; like fieldwork. I also reflected on projects I created like the artifact bag, current events, and PIGS! I highly enjoyed writing my blog posts as it really forced me to dig deep into important social studies concepts that I can implement into my future teaching. I can now look back at the posts I wrote in the beginning of the semester to see how much I have improved and learned since then. I can even look back in a year or two from now and see a much greater improvement, which is very exciting! 

I chose the title "Shannon's Exploration Through Social Studies" because social studies is truly an exploration and I knew I was going to be exploring a lot about the subject. I was right because I learned so much about not only social studies, but TEACHING it good, which is so important to me right now as I am studying to be a teacher. Through exploring social studies, I have learned how to create different types of effective lesson plans, taught a class for the second time, implement these lesson plans into that class, learned a lot about EDTPA that will help me tremendously as I student teach next year, learned about numerous ways to integrate technology into a classroom and was introduced to a variety of different digital tools to use in a classroom one day. The list goes on and on, but I have learned so much from this course that I will take with me into my future teaching career that will help me create success among all of my students. I enjoyed exploring through science so much this semester and I cannot wait to explore science in my own classroom on day!

Mock Interview

Today in class I had an awesome experience by participating in a mock interview put on by our very own principals of Dr. Smirnovas class! One person from each field work group was nominated to be the principal and create questions to ask our class, as if it was a real interview. We were required to dress up for class and take this seriously and come prepared. This was a great way to promote authentic learning, as we did not just take a final exam, we did something that we will be doing in the real world and will benefit us tremendously. This is why Dr. Smirnova is the best, because she actually prepares us for the real world and what is coming for us! After the principals were done going around to each group, they used a rubric and graded who they thought brought the best to the table. The principals went in the hall to talk about who they thought should get the job out of each groups, and the winner were announced at the end. 

This was a great experience as a whole and was great practice for future job interviews, especially in the field of education. Administrators will expect the applicants to be knowledgable in all different areas of lessons and educational practices, and be familiar with professional terms and use them fluently. This was perfect practice for that and some of these questions could one day be asked to us during a real interview. I am so grateful for this experience because it truly showed my strengths and weaknesses in the interview process of becoming a teacher! 

Current Events

Teaching current events in a classroom is very important in today's society. We are so focused on technology, social media, our phones, etc. that we forget to open a newspaper or article and see what is going on in the world. Reminding students that knowing what's going on in the world around them, and implementing that into the classroom is extremely beneficial to their lives. Using current events give social studies teachers countless opportunities to make the curriculum relevant to students everyday lives!

Incorporating current events into the curriculum helps students in various ways including building language, vocabulary, reading comprehension, problem solving etc. It is so important for students to understand the importance of people, events, and issues in the news today. There are also numerous types of lessons you can implement into the curriculum using current events including students creating their own newspaper involving an issue in the world today, or something that intrigues them. This involves using pictures, write ups, research, interviews, etc. Furthermore, this could lead students to building communication skills among their peers, parents, teachers, etc.

Teaching current events provides countless opportunities for cooperative learning, classroom debates and discussions, and writing prompts that could follow. Using current events in the classroom can have a great impact on our students and help them improve tremendously.

Hug the Earth!

Today we got to pass around the Earth! We started off the class by thinking about ways we can teach students to save the Earth and inform them about all of the problems today involving the Earth. We were instructed to throw around a little Earth and hug the Earth when it come to us. When it was our turn and we were holding the Earth, we had to elaborate on how we could teach about geography, weather/climate, and ways to help the Earth. I went first and said what first came to my mind, which was taking my students on a mini field trip the local beach, or local park and have them clean up the area and help them realize how important it is to recycle, and how trashing our environment is slowly destroying it. Making the experience as interactive and visual as possible is essential when teaching students about the Earth, and social studies in general. A great way to teach geography is having students choose a place they are interested in, and research about it and eventually present their findings. A great tool for this is thing link, especially the 3D resource where students could choose their own country and teach the class about it through a virtual field fieldtrip!