Piaget Matters Too!

On Monday and Tuesday of this week, we read our "Barrier Books" to the class. We shared each of the stories with the class since we didn't get to hear them before we read them to Mrs. Vaughn's class. Also on Monday, we had a former Teacher Cadet and a current Teaching Fellow, Madison Kane, come and talk to us about the Teaching Fellows program and gave us a chance to ask any questions we had. This gave us an opportunity to learn more about Teaching Fellows and how it applies to college and scholarships. On Wednesday, we did a lesson on Jean Piaget and cognitive development. We were told to bring in a childhood toy, and we talked about what stage of cognitive development each toy was from and how the toys affected our playing style. 

On Thursday of this week, we met at Walmart on Woodruff Road. We were given a "shopping list" and were told to find certain toys that corresponded with a specific stage of cognitive development. I think that the majority of us had more fun playing with the toys as opposed to trying to complete our assignment.

On Friday we hung up our "You Matter" posters for the teachers we adopted, and gave out our "pot" notes.

October 13-15 2014

Monday October 13,2014 and Tuesday October 14, 2014
                      Today we worked on our big books for Mrs. Vaughns Kindergarten class. We glued, colored, cut, and designed until the bell rang.


Wednesday October 15, 2014
                       Today we went to Mrs. Vaughns classroom and participated in the morning routine of the kids. Then we read our big books to the little children. Afterwards we had a faculty meeting and we decided who got which kid.

October 6-10, 2014

On Monday October 6, Mrs. Vaughn came and talked to our class about her kindergarteners and described each other their personalities. Mr. Spinks also came and told us what was expected of us Teacher Cadets when we visit the students. One of the things he told us is to be caring toward the children because we never know how their home life is.
On Tuesday October 7, we had a senior meeting so we unfortunately did not get to do anything in class. Wednesday, Thursday and Friday we worked on our Big Barrier Books that we are going to read to Mrs. Vaughn's class.

I HOPE everyone had a great week (September 29 - October 2)

Monday September 29, 2014

On Monday some of the teacher cadets went to Hope Academy to continue our special ed observations. I was in a class of kids where every child had a disability. Unlike an inclusion class, which is a class of kids who have nothing wrong mixed with a few kids who do have a disability, every child in that class needed special attention. It was really neat to see how to teacher was able to handle all of that responsibility. She was very understanding with the students. Something that I thought was very interesting was their point system. Every time the students followed directions, listened, participated, etc. the teacher would award them a point but every time they did something bad she would deduct a point. Of course they had more points for doing good things then they did for the bad because all kids tend to react more to positive reinforcement. I'm so glad I got the opportunity to go to Hope because I realized that it would be so hard for me to not get frustrated or to be so patient like the teacher was. She was very well composed and really knew what she was doing.

Tuesday September 30, 2014

Tuesday we continued special ed observations. Most of the class went to an elementary school or to Hope but a few of us stayed behind; including myself. Those who stayed behind continued to work on our You Matter posters for the teachers we adopted. Today I also volunteered at GEARS after school and it was amazing. The kids loved it there and I was so happy to help out.

Wednesday October 1, 2014

Today was Disability Day. Upon arriving to school the room was set up into several different stations. The stations were supposed to simulate what it would be like to have a certain disability. Some of the stations included mouth writing, sign language, and blindness. The station that I liked the most was the one where we had to listen to the CD and write down what the teacher was saying. It was so hard because I couldn't hear anything! That really put into perspective what it was like to have muffled hearing. Sometime in the spring we will be simulating these same stations for elementary school kids so It was neat to get to experience them so we know what it will be like for the kids.

 

 

Thursday October 2, 2014

 

 

On the final day of the week for myself we continued to work on our You Matter posters for our special teachers. We will begin to hang them next week. Some of the teachers have even begun to ask if they will be receiving posters! How awesome! Our hard work really pays off in the end. 

 

 

"The best way to learn is to do; the worst way to teach is to talk."

Paul Halmos