Learning Event 8

Its funny to think about the future even at twenty years old. I could have said whatever I wanted when I was ten years old, but I doubt it would be even close to who I am today. By the way, it was a professional athlete.(I’m not in case you were wondering.) I don’t like to make five or ten year predictions because its like having a perfect bracket for the NCAA tournament. It just is not going to happen. However, I have a scholarship obligation that requires me to teach in the state of South Carolina for four years after I graduate college. Upon graduating I will apply to the worst schools in South Carolina and hopefully land a job. I want to work in the worst schools because no one else wants to and expectations probably aren’t the highest there. However, that does not mean I won’t expect the best out of myself everyday when I go to teach.  While I’m teaching, I would like to use my summers to go on vacations. I want to eventually hit six of the seven continents and see as many countries as I can. I believe the best way to teach is through experience. I would also like to coach soccer while I am teaching. I am a huge soccer fan, and I loved having good coaches growing up. I’m hoping my coaching career might bring me some state championships or other awards. I want to try to hit all of the continents before I get married. Marriage and starting a family really put a damper on individual goals. Plus the more women I meet, the more I can choose from to be mine. The most important part of where I am going is the classroom. I am like a drop in a puddle, I create ripples. I’m not a sit around and let the system fail child after child kind of person. Forgive me for not being humble but I am going to find a solution to the education problem in America. I’m going to make sure that all of my students go to college. I’m going to wake up everyday and make sure that my students know there is a light at the end of the tunnel. I want them to know that it does not matter what else happens in life, if they put all their time, energy, and willpower into education, they can make it and be whoever they want to be. I love it when people ask where I am going. I’m going to make a difference.

Learning Event 7

Moving from my hometown to Charleston was a bit of a change because even though I live in a city, it is a lot more spread out. I think the best way to describe the sounds of my home is to tell what sounds are missing in Charleston. In this city, there is always hustle and bustle. People getting to work and going to school. It sometimes seems like this place is in constant motion. Greenville is a bit slower. We still have hustle and bustle, but its at a more laid back pace. Things their don’t have to be at break-neck speed and you don’t have to dodge as many cars. Plus, it definitely smells a bit better in Greenville without the horses and salted air. Another sound I miss in Charleston is the sound of mountains. Of course we have the scenic water areas, but there are no mountains that you can stand on that make you feel like the king of the world. There aren’t many (if any) hiking trails in downtown Charleston. The ability to be out in nature and experience all it has to offer is key in being a human and sometimes de-stressing. There is something about being in the mountains and being away from the constant machine that is the city that calms and comforts the soul. Sometimes its not the sounds we hear that remind us of home, sometimes its the sounds we miss hearing the most.

Learning Event #6

It seems everyday we get lost in the big picture and forget to stop and smell the roses for a bit. There are two things I keep within my ten foot circle all the time. One of those things is headphones. I use headphones to hear the mundane. Recently, I’ve been trying to listen to more music. It blocks out the sound of nature, but it doesn’t block the rhythm of life. I think music through headphones actually gives you a new rhythm. I love walking to class and listening to music because its a distraction from the elements. I think I would get a lot warmer if all I thought about was how hot it was outside. However, music allows me to escape and feel the beat in every step I take. Headphones provide a mundane distraction to the nuances of nature that aren’t necessarily bad, but can get predictable at times. Another thing I keep around me at all times is family. I don’t mean the biological people that I have some sort of DNA relationship with. I mean the people that I care for just as much as they care for me. I like to say that I don’t have any friends all I have is family, and I keep my family close. I try to keep my circle small so that I know everyone has earned their place. It is neither a distraction or an attraction to the mundane. Family simply takes the guesswork out of life. I don’t have to ask the questions some people have to with their biological family. This part of the mundane is the miracle in itself. 

Learning Event 5: A Turning Point

I wonder how long it took my peers to come up with their turning points or narrow all of them down to the most important. The story goes like this. When we were kids, my mother was teaching us the values of saving money and being thrifty. The traditional method of doing this when I was a kid was the piggy bank. I guess kids use apple pay now or something.  Anyways, my mom explained to us, my brother and me, at a very early age that because teachers are heavily underpaid, she would not have enough money to pay for us both to go to college. Funny thing is its true, she makes like 40k and a year at

Charleston is 20k; multiply by two because I’m a twin, and all my mom has to do is not exist for a year. So our mom came up with the brilliant idea: to save our money for college. She went out and bought quite a large piggy bank and we started to fill it. Whenever we came across cash it would automatically go into the piggy bank to save for college. This was the drill for almost two years. The pig got pretty full, so as kids we were proud of our accomplishment. One day, we came home from being out on errands to find the piggy bank was gone. We had been robbed. It was definitely a setback for my mom, no adult likes to loose a piggy bank full of cash. She was sad and told us to be on the lookout if any of our friends looked suspicious. However, the loss of this piggy bank hit me in a different way. I didn’t feel sadness, I mean of course I cried, I was like 6. It lit a fire in me. From that day to the end of high school, my entire life has been about getting to college for free. Dr. Radakovic would hate me for this but it was certainly a guess and check situation. At first, I thought I was going to play college soccer, which then tumbled into taking a free year at the local community college, to ultimately me earning a free ride to the College of Charleston. I’m not gonna lie, it was some shit. I made sacrifices others didn’t have to. I was up early and asleep late, but there wasn’t going to be anything in between me and my dream. It’s kind of weird to make such a heavy decision at such a young age, but that was hands down the turning point in my life that got me where I am today. The funny thing is I would give it all up in second if it meant that the people I left behind to get to this point could make it here with me. 

Learning Event 4: The Shape of My Story

My story is shaped by an unlimited amount of events that got me where I am today. I don’t believe my story is special by any means or needs  to stand out and be recognized. I feel fortunate to have grown up in the circumstances I did as a kid. A lot of people take for granted where they start out in life. They fail to see where the starting lined is skewed towards one group of people and away from another group. If I could give my life a shape it would probably be a pentagon. It seems like when I get going on a path all the sudden it switches directions. However, the pentagon is an accomplished shape, I mean after all it has one of the most important buildings in America modeled after it, and everyday houses take its form. In terms of events that got me to where I am, to be honest, I got where I am by getting in trouble. Throughout my childhood, I have been in and out of trouble whether it was the principles office or the  law.  Its funny, because I feel like you can’t judge your own life because its obviously a biased opinion, so to shape my story, I use the opinions of those closest to me. My roommate said something to me one day when we were drinking “sweet tea”. He was like,”Royce, man you are one driven person.” If I could sum up my ambitions at this point in my life, they would fall into two categories.  The first one is to experience the world. How can I teach students everything they need to know in life if I haven’t learned everything that life entails? I need to soak up every challenge life throws at me and learn from that event. By learning from my mistakes, I can show kids the right steps to take to ensure their success. The other category my ambitions fall in is that I want to make sure every kid I teach knows that no matter what situation they may be in, education can be their way out. I’m an example of this kind of success. Being able to go to college for free is the crowning achievement in my life. I want my students to understand that through hard work and the willingness to give more effort than their peers they can go wherever they want to. You could call it freedom. To some this may seem like an impossible goal, like a never ending  highway. However, that’s kind of what I like about it, only the best apply to make the drive.

Working Collaboratively

Team work skills is one of the main aspects a company looks at in a potential employees profile. There is a big demand now-a-days for people to be able to work collaboratively. Most experience working
collaboratively happens in school. Students work collaboratively on power points, presentations, and even peer lessons. So, the question is how can teachers facilitate collaboration? One way this can be accomplished is purely in the way the room is structured. By putting desks in groups instead of rows a teacher’s can encourage students to work together instead of individually. With the desks in groups, students will naturally be inclined to ask questions of their peers. Another way teachers can encourage collaboration is assigning projects that need more than one participant. An example of this is a presentation. Whether using power point or some other software such as prezi, by assigning a group presentation, you require the students work together to make a final product. From the simplest presentation on photosynthesis, to the most complex presentation on Apple’s fourth quarter earnings, assigning a presentation requires students to somehow have contact. Of course, we have all seen presentations where the students didn’t work together. Those usually turn out to be disasters.  The final way  teachers can facilitate collaboration is assigning a multi-step project. For example, if the project is a research paper on crabs there are certain steps students have to follow to produce an acceptable product. For research, you have the students work together in order to speed up the process. By collaborating, the students will only include the most important information. In addition, giving multiple students the opportunity to work on one research paper allows them to focus on one part of the paper and do it really well. Sometimes it is hard for a child to put in consistent effort throughout a very long assignment. For multiple reasons the child gets distracted and more often than not puts out a flawed product. By delegating the work to group members, students can learn from their peers and put the most effort into their specific part of the assignment. Working in collaboration with others is one of the most highly sought after skills by employers. As teachers, it is our job to prepare our students to work in the world. By rearranging the classroom, assigning presentations or multi-step projects, teachers can foster the collaborative skills kids need later in life.

Learning Event 3: The Shape of a Story

The shape of the story defines its flow and its message. The story I decided to look at is Green Eggs and Ham. Everyone is familiar with this classic Dr. Seuss novel. However, some may not be aware of the subtle theme in the story. Green Eggs and Ham is all about trying new things. When you think about food with green stuff on it, it doesn’t necessarily sound appetizing. In fact, most people won’t eat anything with green on it. Dr. Seuss uses green eggs as an example of something people aren’t normally comfortable with. Throughout the story, Dr. Seuss is trying to get his friend Sam to try these green eggs and ham, but he keeps avoiding him. As the story goes on, Dr. Seuss introduces other factors that might distract him from the fact that the food is green. He asks if Sam would eat the food in a box, or next to a fox. Dr. Seuss also offers the options of eating on a boat or with a goat. Still he refuses to eat the food Dr. Seuss has prepared. Finally, after pages of begging, Sam finally gives in and tries the weird looking food. To his surprise, the food actually tastes good and he likes it. Sam goes on to tell Dr. Seuss that he would eat the green eggs and ham with all the suggestions the doctor mentioned previously. If you’ve ever heard the phrase “don’t judge a book by its cover” you can somewhat understand the message Dr. Seuss is trying to get across. He is trying to get Sam to try the green eggs and ham before he round-about writes them off as gross. Part of growing up is experiencing new things. Children are naturally curious, and they are going to get into new situations. What they learn out of those situations is what defines their character later on in life. Kids are also going to be naturally apprehensive to situations they aren’t comfortable with. As teachers, it is our duty to facilitate new growth through foreign experiences. An example might be a trip to the local aquarium. Many children will be apprehensive about sticking their hands in the water to touch stingrays or crustaceans. We have to encourage those students who might not want to to try it out. This new experience gives the child a new type of learning and exposure to sea life. Another example is helping students conquer their fear of heights. By taking students on a field trip to the local ropes course, they have the opportunity to overcome their fears. Challenging a student to learn through new experiences allows them to break down some of their pre-existing fears. This facilitates new heights of learning, producing a more well-rounded individual.

Multimodal Tutorial on Kahoot

Step One: Go to getkahoot.com. Then sign up for a free account.  

 

Step two: Get a free account.

 

Step three: Once you have created an account, your screen will look like this. To start a new Kahoot! click on the New K! tab in the top left hand corner. 

 

Step four:Make your questions.

 

Step five: Adjust the settings.

 

Step six: Add some Multi-media 

 

Step seven: Play your Kahoot!

Step eight: To play your Kahoot! your students have to go to Kahoot.it and enter the game-specific pin. 

Technology Use in the Classroom

Now more than ever, teacher’s are encouraged to use technology and media as a part of their lesson plans and overall classroom flow. Throughout the early 21st century we’ve seen smart boards and the like replace traditional methods of teaching. As much as I may not see the light, I must play the devil here and advocate for the decrease of technology in the classroom. I believe there are more down sides to using technology than their are upsides. However, this does not mean the internet is all bad and cannot be minimally used. One way technology can help me in the classroom is through the use of a website called Kahoot. Kahoot is a website that allows you to create fun learning games that get kids excited while assessing their progress. Kahoot also lets you share individual or group results in a community. Kahoot replaces paper and pencil assessments that can be time consuming when it comes to results. In addition, by sharing results in the community, I can spark competition between the students to see who can get the highest scores. If students have a visual representation of how they match up with another student it can influence positive learning and a hunger for more knowledge. However, for me, Kahoot will never replace what the same activity on white board can do. With Kahoot, the text is just on the screen, allowing kids to just chose an answer instead of synthesizing the information for themselves. However, with the white board, the student has to write the question down and examine all the components. This practice will allow me to see students work step by step, which when it comes to math, is imperative.

https://getkahoot.com/how-it-works

Another way I can use technology as a text in the classroom is through a site called iCivics. iCivics is an interactive website that allows students to see what it would be like to hold certain social positions. The site boasts plenty of games such as running for the presidency, making laws, and what is covered under the Bill of Rights. iCivics gives me an online tool to teach civic duty while mixing in how our government got started in the first place. iCivics also allows me to teach morals along with knowledge. It gives me a platform to explain what a good law is and what a bad law is, why we have laws, and how important it is to follow them. iCivics gives me the opportunity to diversify the way I teach civic responsibility.

https://www.icivics.org/games

These are just two ways I can use technology as a text in the classroom. I believe the most important way I can use technology in the classroom is expediting information. Answering a students off the wall question is easier with a google search than a library search.

 

Where I’ve Been…

I first learned the definition of culture from my government and econ teacher. Mr. Ingles explained to us that culture was learned behavior. Writing about the behaviors I’ve learned over the years is difficult because summing up that many events in three hundred words is impossible. However, the best place to start is probably where I am from. I am from Greenville, SC. Its one of the bigger cities in South Carolina and is located in the upstate near the Blue Ridge Mountains. I mention the Blue Ridge Mountains because most Greenvillians know all the secret spots across the beautifal mountain range. We even have a place that is literally titled “Pretty Place.” From secret waterfalls, to a rock the Indians beleived the gods ate off of, one thing Greenville has is natural beauty.

Another thing Greenville is known for is being part of the imfamous “Bible Belt.” I think it’s only appropraite to describe it as my old baptist preacher said, “There is a church on every corner. No, there is a church in between the  churches on every corner.” As unbelievealbe as it seems, this is actually pretty accurate, and defines the way people in Greenville go about their lives. I was raised in both the Southern Baptist church and the Episcopal church. Both places provided me with tremendous opportunities including a church basketball championship, lifelong friends, and even a job. Church gave me a tight knit community that I could go to when I was in need of advice or help. In addition, it allowed me to be active in my community and help those in need. I remember many a Sunday in service at the local Soup Kitchen. The most important thing church gave me was a family. Even though we aren’t related, we all share a common bond. Sometimes, this bond was stronger than my traditional family. Church is just one of the many places ive been that has impacted my culture.

Even though church had such a big impact on my life, I no longer go because of other priorities and experiences. However, I look forward to rejoining my old church in the future.