I chose to read about the influenza epidemic of 1918. I chose this topic for two reasons: one because I didn't know too much about it, and two I wanted to see if I could spot some similarities with the swine flu that we are familiar with currently. I learned that this flu killed more people than were casualties in WWI, a fact that seems almost incomprehensible. I gained some insight as to what some common symptoms were, how people were instructed to protect themselves, who were the most infected victims, and how it effected everyday people's lives. I think that the use of primary resources is highly valuable because it provides a personal testimony and an insider's observation as to how life struggled to continue. This helps you use these types of resources critically and allows the reader to understand and see what reality was like living with the influenza epidemic of 1918. In the classroom the use of primary resources allows an opportunity of open discussion, and also a great opportunity to take advantage of these resources via technology. In addition, I see few similarities of how this influenza and the swine flu stirred world-wide concern, but fortunately the swine flu was not an epidemic.
NEA
The student groups that are most at risk for experiencing achievement gaps are American Indians/Alaskan Native, Hispanics, Blacks, and the Asians/Pacific Islanders.
After reading "Becoming a Culturally Competent Educator" I feel that the three ares that would fit my teaching style are collaborating with other schools about this subject, the idea and action of a culturally competent school assessment, and the involvement of family, and minority community of these diverse student groups. The reason why I chose these three areas is because the first one expresses how I like the idea of using each other as a resource for ideas and practices in order to benefit from each other. Secondly, I like the idea of a culturally competent school assessment, but at the same time I believe this a very sensitive and critically thought out matter. I think that this type of teaching style brings about group effort and analysis of the current system to achieve a common goal for all children. Lastly, I really like the idea of involving minority communities, family, and ethnically based groups to become culturally competent because I believe that is what culture is, is that it is community based. There are a lot of creative ways to take advantage of educational opportunities that work with communities like these that can ensure a dynamic cultural environment for the child.
Stop Cyberbullying
My score for the cyberbullying test was a five. They labeled me as a "cyber saint". I remembered doing a few of those things back in high school just for laughs between my closest friends, and I'm thankful it didn't turn into an ugly habit. Something that I learned from reading the area for the teachers was that not all cyberbullys are the same, nor have the same intentions. I also learned that although there is potential for a lot of cyberbullying in the youth, there are the undercover teen and tween angles that help advocate and bring to surface current cyberbullying schemes. Based on what I have read from Parry Aftab, I believe what can help me in the classroom is the take home message of informing and educating the youth about cyberbullying. I agree that parents need to be equally educated, but I also agree with Aftab in that the youth will have a greater understanding if you can talk to them about this at their level. I think that too often adults assume that their child knows best, and or may instill too much trust in their child as they use the computer. In the classroom it would be a great way to intertwine a lesson plan that informs and educates the child while maintaining real-life situations about cyberbullying.
Kathy Schrock's Guide for Educators
One area that I read about was under the category "World Info & Languages". I searched it and found "Bilingual education resources". Under that I was linked to a sight called "Especially Español". This is a great resource guide with great ideas for lesson plans that are very interactive and also technology intertwined at many grade levels. One of the areas that I focused on in this sight was this thing called Webespañol. I could see myself using something like this in the classroom because I would like for my future students to use technology to help themselves and their peer interaction as well. It was a really fun sight to explore and I would include things that are language based from this sight. It is also a great resource for me to read about news in other Spanish speaking countries as well.
A second sight that I visited under "Teacher Helpers" was learning how to use digital video and camera in the classroom. What was great about these sights that I found was that they were broken down to lower grade levels. I could benefit from something like this in the classroom because with this kind of interactive technology I can plan lessons that are more personalized while still meeting their goals.
Multiple Intelligences
My top three intelligences are 1) intra personal, 2) a three-way tie between verbal-linguistic. bodily-kinesthetic, and musical. My third intelligence, according to this site, is naturalistic.
Something that I learned from watching the video by Linda Darling Hammond was social and emotional intelligence. I really liked how she said that this type of skill is very complex and is related to not only helping the students, but with educators and other adults. She mentioned that her opinion of the best educators are those who posses a balance of this socail and emotional intelligence. This is important because one can easily relate to all sorts of people in unpredictable situations, and challenges in the learning environment.
Teaching Tolerance Lesson Plan
The grade that I chose was the early levels and the subject that I chose was all categories. The activity that I chose was "Day of the Dead activity". Basically this site took the image of the butterfly to create lesson plans that catered to biology, immigration, art, and the like. I could use something like this in the classroom by taking an image/symbol and create ways that they would pertain to many other subject areas. Personally, for Day of the Dead I would use the human body instead of a butterfly. I would incorporate biology with some light anatomy and physiology, a poem that would be dedicated to a deceased or loved one to incorporate language arts just to name a few.
Ed Change and Diversity
One of the two questions that I found interesting was what percentage of gay, lesbian, bisexual and gender high school students report that their students "never" or "rarely" respond to homophobic remarks made to other students according to a national study by GLSEN? I found this an interesting question because I feel that many educators are not comfortable with this subject and was interested in how many people would handle a situation like this. Another question that I found interesting was "based on a 2007 report from the Economic Public Policy Institute, the annual earnings of the average full-time U.S worker is equal to" question. This interested me because based on today's economy the numbers were not surprisingly interesting.
Netiquette
My score on this quiz was a 90%. The only one that I got wrong was the question about a flame. Now I know that a flame is a public insult posted online.
I believe that it is important to teach students about netiquette is because no one should assume that everyone understands the consequences of their actions. This way, everyone can be brought down to the basics and hope for the best (-:
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