A little more than a year ago I decided that I wanted to begin blogging about what I was learning during my education degree and a few days later I officially launched my first ever blog! One year later I am still blogging regularly and can officially say that I accomplished my 2012 New Year’s Resolution (I don’t think I’ve ever accomplished one before). I saw a lot of people posting their blog stats in their New Year’s posts so I thought it might be interesting to share some of mine. Here are some stats that I feel… Read More
Connecting, Reflecting & Creating: Why We Blog
I have exciting news I want to share! A fellow student teacher, Tyler L, and myself will be presenting our very own Professional Development sessions!! Tyler and myself are both avid bloggers and we have actually spent some time this year sharing our experience with first year Faculty of Education students in their “ICT in Education” class. After some consultation with a professor we began working on our own Professional Development session on how blogging can benefit educators. What resulted was, Connecting, Reflecting & Creating: Why We Blog. “From being used as a reflective… Read More
Resources to Start Off Your Week 43: First Nations Resources Cont.
Last week I posted about five awesome First Nations resources that can be used in our classrooms and I am so excited about the traffic it received! To keep this topic going, I thought that this week I could share an actual project that I completed with my Grade 11 World Issues. As you know, our unit consisted of four sub-topics:– Ethno-diversity– World View– Effects of Assimilation– Indigenous Rights For our World View topic we looked at a variety of themes including religion, emotions, values, ethics, and relationship with the environment. Since there is only 9 students… Read More
Canadian History Class
On Friday I shared what was going on in my World Issues class and now it is time to find out what has been happening in Canadian History. I didn’t mean to take so long to make this post but I had many pictures that featured students and I wanted to be sure on our division’s picture release policy before I posted anything. This was the title screen of my PowerPoint I used as part of our learning! The entire unit that I started has been focusing on “British Colonial Rule” following the fall of New… Read More
World Issues Class
I can’t believe it is Friday already! Student teaching has been ALL consuming and I am trying so hard to make a good impression and provide meaningful learning opportunities for my students. I want to share all of the things I have been doing with my two main classes so I am dividing this into two separate posts… First, World Issues! My Grade 11 World Issues class only has 9 students so I really wanted to try my hand at working in options that were inquiry-based that allowed the students to have more control of their… Read More
Fab Five 2012 Conference
Winnipeg Conference Poster: Our conference dates were different! This week I spent Thursday evening and all of Friday at The Fab 5 conference put on by the Manitoba Teachers’ Society. This conference is designed for teachers in their first five years of teaching (including student teachers) and it is one that I attended last year as well! The sessions cover everything from general classroom management information and curriculum specifics to personal management and special area groups. By far one of the best parts about this conference is the attendants, presenters and organizers! I feel so fortunate to have had… Read More
Whole Brain Teaching Wednesday! Integrating Aboriginal Perspectives into Curricula
One of the classes that I am taking this year for my education degree is Teaching of Aboriginal Studies, which I’ve posted about previously over the past few weeks. (For my followers who are from other countries, this course has actually been a Provincially-mandated requirement for all educators in Manitoba since 2008.) Today we discussed Understanding the Integration of Aboriginal Perspectives through Theory and I was especially intrigued by our highlight of the traditional Aboriginal view of education. As I will be entering the workforce (fingers crossed) within the year this discussion really encouraged me to examine specific aspects… Read More
Resources to Start Off Your Week 36
This week I found a really neat resource thanks to a fellow student teacher as well as a great science resource that is developed for the Manitoba Curriculum! As always, I will be adding these to my lists of resources on my Fav Websites page. 1 ) Sporcle– Sporcle is an online database of fun quizzes and trivia games on a multitude of different subjects. There are many educational quizzes that could be a great in-class activity to put up on the SMART Board, an activity for those students who are done early or even be used… Read More
Science Course Outline
The following is a theoretical course outline developed for my Science Methods class. It is designed around the Senior 1 (Grade 9) Manitoba curriculum. Available on Google Docs: https://docs.google.com/open?id=0Bwf6KR9URrBaeGFVWEpTTHlvTWc Some things I tried to incorporate while creating this outline: – “Backwards by Design” planning – Assessment breakdown that follows the new MB Provincial Report Cards – Incorporating information that speaks to views similar to those in the division I am student teaching in – Creating a culture of respect in the classroom This is the first course outline I’ve created so I would love feedback! ** It is important… Read More
Wab Kinew
It takes a specific set of skills in order to be an effective public speaker. I’m not talking about the teacher who stands in front of their classroom kind of public speaker, although that takes some skills as well! I’m talking about the kind of public speaker who can stand in front of a diverse group of people, deliver a powerful message on what can be a controversial subject area and have the audience hanging off their every word. This is exactly the type of public speaker Wab Kinew is. Last night my fiance and I were lucky… Read More