Educational Organizations

The teaching profession is one of the most organized occupations in the country. This is due to the unifying organizations of (NEA 3 million members) National Education Association and the (AFT 1 million members) American Federation of Teachers. Both of these organizations help protect teachers with tenure, they also work to improve work conditions and salaries of those same teachers. The system works through a collaboration of all teachers that have a representative to voice the opinion of the teachers needs. It is up to you as to what organization you would like to join each has there different benefits. The NEA offers free legal services, and training opportunities on issues from technology to academic freedom. The NEA also elects pro-education candidates that promotes legislation beneficial to teachers and students. (www.nea.org). On the other hand you have the AFT which supports education reform. The AFT supported national standards of teachers, charter schools induction programs that enable new teachers to work with master teachers. The AFT is very similar to the NEA except it is on a smaller more localized scale. Both of these organizations provide literature "education week and teacher Magazine"these journals keep teachers informed about their agencies and up to date on their teaching world. For aspiring teachers you can find out useful information at WWW.inspiringteacher.com this is a great way to network with teachers who can help with any of the early teaching troubles you may have. If i had to choose today i would go with the AFT because it is a smaller scale and it looks out for the development of aspiring teachers through their mastery programs.

Poolside Portfolio Showcase

Today I attended the Portfolio showcase held by the upperclassmen of SUNY Cortland's Physical Education program. This gave me an opportunity to view other Phys.Ed students portfolio's, it was a great tool for sparking ideas for my own In my Ped 201 class we have started our professional portfolio, this will track my progress through the Physical education teacher program. The portfolio will be a collection of artifacts that highlight my teaching competencies and to demonstrate my readiness to teach. After I complete my student teaching i will be able to use my portfolio in a job interview to highlight my skills and abilities to be a physical educator.

New generation of positive gaming

Today I was fortunate enough to be invited to a workshop about this new gaming system that promotes a healthy alternative to gaming. It is called Idance, going into this I had a little knowledge about the system, but all i really thought it was a modified version of Dance Dance Revolution. Boy was I wrong this program truly is the future of gaming. First of all you can play up to 32 players at once, that is a whole class in most instances . Everyone can be on the same skill level this works best when you have a class of beginners or you can modify each individual mats difficulty level as the Idancer becomes more confident. In having this many players play at once you are almost guaranteed to have positive competition among the students because after every song you get a detailed description of your steps. After every song it provides a graph analysis, where you stand in comparison to the rest of the class, how many combos in a row and other features that can help to make students more physically fit. From the teaching aspects of the system you can control all features of the game from one remote. If a group of students is having trouble and are stuck between two levels a instructor can go ahead and add bells, bumps, or claps at every note to stimulate the auditory sensory rather than just the visual sense. This is a great tool that helps the students drastically. There is more; to get the whole class involved you can join all the mats together to form a square and everyone can play in unison as well as switch mats in a circular rotation it really is fun to watch as well as be apart of. The possibilities are endless with the system and I am looking forward to gaining more knowledge about the future of gaming.

A light snow fall brings christmas spirit to St. Mary's

This week's lab concluded our experience at St. Mary's elementary school. The theme of the day was Christmas in order to get the the kids in the spirit of the holidays we made a game up that had the children be Santa's helpers because santa's had become sick. So he needed the kids help. Half the kids were elves and the others were reindeer who pulled the elves from house to house dropping off presents for Santa. As they dropped of presents they had to do different activities. The kids loved pulling each other around on the scooters, as well as bringing lots of cookies to santa to get him better. After the kids made it to all of the house they had to go tell santa all bout their journeys and what movements they had to make in order to make it to the next house. They kids enjoyed talking about their different travels and sharing with each other. Most of all they enjoyed helping Santa out when he needed them. This lab was our last time with the St.Mary's kids, I have learned alot from these kids and i am thankful for having the opportunity to teach them as well as learn from them.

A feast for St. Mary's

Today in lab we started out in the cafeteria playing board games; the two most popular were the roll out checkers and the connect four. Luckily I was fortunate enough to play against Justin who was about nine years old. According to Justin he had never lost in a game of checkers. To my surprise he was pretty good i had begun to think he hadn't ever lost until i found out that he has some small variation in his way of playing checkers. As soon as we stopped playing by Justin's rules and started playing by the right rules Justin had begin to show his weaknesses, Justin wasn't very happy at first but then he realized that it was only fair to play by the right rules. After we cleaned up the board games we went upstairs where we played a game that focused on accuracy and control of a soccer ball. We set up targets all around the gym, the targets were all components of what goes into a thanksgiving dinner. Once a pair hit a target they then acquired food. The teams that hit a food item then told one of us and we put it on the table for it to be eaten. The kids liked the game a lot it involved everyone at all times and it got everyone in the mood for thanksgiving dinner which was right around the corner.

St Mary's presents the Big Top Circus

Get your popcorn ready because the circus was in town at St. Mary's school. The circus mainly consisted of clowns and the parachute games but overall the children had a great time. A good majority of the class dressed up and acted the part, which was of coarse circus circus. There are so many advantages when you act out the theme, it engages the young students so much more they are intrigued and want to know if that your real hair or if you really wear these funny clothes. Its a great way to get the children comfortable and ready to have fun. Even though the older kids may not seem that interested in you but they are; there probably laughing at you which isn't a bad thing it's just another way to engage the student even if its at your own expense. In the activities of the day we worked on the overhand thrown and the catch and all of the proper techniques that go along with them. My group paired up with the Gym rats and observed the children these were the kindergartners and the 1st graders. There development of the manipulation of the round objects were in the elementary stage but the throwing and catching of the spheres were not as developed. Throws were very erratic and uncontrolled. At this age it is best for children to develop the proper techniques and then the accuracy and finesse will follow over time.

Harvest Fest at St. Marys

The third lab of our St. Mary's experience brought us into the end of October, this was the perfect time for a fall harvest festival, this was the theme of the day. We continued our observations of the children's locomotor skills development in their play and interactions in the gym and in the play ground. This week Activities R' Us were assigned to the pre-k children, I was assigned to come help with the Pre-k in the morning last tuesday. I was amazed how many of the children remembered me, my buddy paul who I must of read 5 books to came and found me as soon as he saw me, he couldn't wait to start playing with me and the other college kids. The pre-k student's are very self sufficient in terms of keeping themselves entertained this is due to their elaborate imaginations. In order to interact with the children you must delve into the imaginary world that they are playing in, such as that the wood chips are lava and you cannot step on them. These kids get so excited when you play the same games that they play, they are amazed that an older person would want to play the same games as them. When we brought the kids inside we set up a Harvest collection the children had to perform the locomotor skills in order to acquire the harvest items. We also added a tunnel for some reason the Pre-k children love going through the fabric tunnel. Next week we have been assigned to organizing one of the equipment rooms, this should be fun and a chance to see how to inquire all the items of the PE department.