Ending another semester...

What have I learned?

Over the past couple months I have learned a great deal about integrating the curriculum.  Curriculum integration definitely seems to be the way to go for the students to get the most out of what we want them to learn. 

One specific thing that I learned about was authentic experiences.  These experiences are important in teaching our children.  Life will always be full of problem solving and offering real life investigations (in school) will help in ones life.  The more real or genuine experiences can be, the more we learn.  Authentic experiences should be available in all subject areas. 

Another specific thing I learned about was the difference of topics, themes, concepts, and big ideas in teaching social studies.  After understanding this way of organization it was easy to pick out a theme for our integrated unit.  We focused on Time, Continuity, and Change in looking at the past, present, and future of transportation.  I enjoyed reading about some different strategies in chapter 4 of Schell and Fisher.  Some of them I already do but I also read about some that I might want to try with my next years group.

Even though this summer session has felt a bit rushed at times, I am coming out of it a better teacher.  I am more educated on how to use integration in my classroom.  I have many strategies and information that I get to take with me.  A lot of that will come from the teachings and readings, but I also gained a lot of knowledge from my classmates.   It is great to hear someone else’s ideas.  I wasn’t sure about blogging in the beginning, but through learning it and working with it weekly I think it is a good opportunity.  It is a great way for us to express ourselves and learn from many others

Assessment Practices

Assessment is an important tool in teaching.  However I think there is a right way to do it and a wrong way to do it.  I think we do more assessing then we might realize over the course of a day or week.  Assessment doesn't always have to be paper and pencil.  Sometimes we can learn a lot from our students just by observing them and/or their work.  I find that I tend to do a lot of informal assessment when I am working with students in stations, small group, one on one, reviewing their homework/classwork.  Through observation I am realizing what I might need to go back and reteach.  I think that I need to do more on record keeping and keep anecdotal notes about what I am observing during my informal assessment.  We keep student portfolios on each student while they are at our school.  Their portfolio keeps their state/district assessments from Prek-3rd grade.  These can be a great resource as they travel from grade to grade with the child.  As we have been working on our unit, we have decided to utilize a rubric for one of our assessments of one of our lessons.  I have gotten more ideas on how to incorporate assessment with my group as we complete our unit from our readings this week.

"Me" Portfolios

I enjoyed reading pages 198-203 of Daniels and Bizar (2005) about the “Me” portfolios.   As I read I thought about creating time capsules.  I have never done them with students but I did do one myself when I was in middle school.  At the beginning of each year I always feel the need to introduce myself and allow the students to get to know me as a person, before they know me as their teacher.  I have a poster titled “Who’s the Teacher?”  I have included various pictures of my favorite things, my family, my favorite colors, my favorite animal, etc.  This past year I used an activity at the beginning of the year to get to know the students.  They have a circle map in which they create about themselves.  They draw about 4 pictures of things they like or that represent them.  I also help them list important people in their lives.  This is a great sharing opportunity and a way for us to get to know each other.  These activities/times of sharing allow us to begin to create our school family and care for each other’s ideas. 

Task 1 – Teaching Social Studies: A Literacy Based Approach by Emily Schell & Douglas Fisher

Chapter 4 in Teaching Social Studies: A Literacy Based Approach by Emily Schell & Douglas Fisher gave a lot of good ideas to remember as my group and I prepare to create our integrated unit on Historic Murfreesboro. 

At this time my group has planned our integrated unit on Historic Murfreesboro to be centered on grade 1 and transportation.

Reading the whole section on the author’s discussion of topics, themes, concepts, and big ideas made a lot of sense on the way to organize social studies information to teach.  Topics are mostly stand alone, clear and direct, facts provided with a focus on people, places, and/or events.  Themes are a way to integrate in all subject areas and expands from the topic teaching providing a way to incorporate multiple examples contained under one theme.  Concepts include facts and ideas focused solely on social studies in an abstract way.  Big ideas are usually stated as a statement and planning is done through a focus on standards and objectives, and stresses an importance beyond the areas of study to other subjects.

Some of the ideas I really liked and may try to include in our unit are:

-Timelines – Where students compare long ago to now and record different transportation used and the time frame of when it was used. 

-Simulations – Students could explore/pretend different ways to get around a long time ago compared to now (such as horse and carriage and/or boats where you had to row)

-Read Aloud/Book talks – We had discussed reading a few books that relate to Amelia Earhart or the Wright Brothers.  We could incorporate having a book talk after reading these books. 

Task 2 - Integrating Language Arts & Social Studies by Melber & Hunter

After reading Unit II in Integrating Language Arts and Social Studies by Leah M. Melber and Alyce Hunter I found a great activity that I could modify for use in my classroom.  I chose ‘Strategy 7’ on pages 48-54, titled “Developing Map Skills.” 

To develop map skills in my classroom I would first explore different kinds of maps with the students.  These various maps can include (but not limited to) town, state, country, world maps; road maps; and theme park maps.  Different sources could be used to explore these maps such as books, the Internet, Google Earth, and the globe.  We would also discuss the importance of using maps and how they can help you explore places around you or help you get from one place to another.  We would explore our school and create a map of our school.  We would decide what symbols to use to represent different places within our school.  We would create this together.  Students could also then be asked to make a map of their home. 

I have actually taught maps in the past.  Some of the ideas I listed above are things I have done with my students.  The students always seem interested to explore different maps and try to locate where they live on the map.  We refer to maps several times through the year to locate a specific place we are learning about.  We also have a story that creates a map to show the journey on a farm and what is seen.    

Task 3 - Arts Integration Lesson

North Carolina Museum of Arts

Grade 4

Art/Social Studies/Language arts/Science

Works of Art referenced:

            1.  John Beerman  Three Trees, Two Clouds, 1990

             http://ncmoa.org/artnc/object.php?themeid=5&objectid=41

            2.  Claude Howell   Ocracoke Harbor, 1964

            http://ncmoa.org/artnc/artifact.php?artifactid=55

3.  Elizabeth Matheson   North Wilkesboro, North Carolina, 1982, 1982

http://ncmoa.org/artnc/artifact.php?artifactid=56

This lesson will be using three different works of art to show the landforms specifically for NC.  Each picture shows an example of the coastal plain, piedmont, and mountains.  As a class we will discuss the differences shown in each art piece.  We will have three read alouds and each one would represent one of the landforms.  For example we would read a book that takes place at the beach, in the mountains and in the city.  We would complete a circle map after reading each book telling about the story and the landform it represented.  Students could also be an artist and create their own masterpiece showing one of the three landforms in a drawing of painting.  We would use a map of North Carolina and segment it into three parts.  Each student would be responsible for drawing on the map ways to show the separate landforms in NC.  Students could also have an ongoing project to do a shoebox diorama of one of the landforms.   A way to tie in science would be to discuss the plants and animals seen in the different parts of NC.   We could also take virtual tours at museums on the Internet and look at other works of art to decide what landforms were created in a particular piece of art.