Leahy March 1

Leahy was a performance of 5 highly skilled professional musicians, who just so happened to be bothers and sisters. There are more but only 5 could make this Center Stage Series performance. They performed some traditional and recent Irish Trad music. It was amazing to see the skill each person on that stage and how they used it to collaborate and make music together. Sometimes, when you get musicians who are all very good at what they do, you get control problems. But with these guys, their spotlight was when they were jamming out to each and every song in their own unique way. It is true that these 5 relatives were doing a lot of moving and lining up melodies and rhythmic counter melodies, sometimes while dancing, but it wasn't their job... at least not in the traditional sense. We don't usually associate work or our job with fun. Which brings us to that nagging question, What do you want to be when you grow up? Do you be the Doctor who hates their job but drives a different color Beamer to work every day, or do you drive the rusting car to your job that you enjoy more than anything else. It is easy to forget why we are even coming to school, what with parents and family trying to mold us into the model citizen and trying to make a living. I think it is especially important for educators to never forget why they go into to education. Money is obviously not the reason. If you don't love those kids, and have clear goals and standards for your classroom then you might as well work at McDonald's (no offense to anyone who works there). Education is one of the most important part of people's life, not only do you learn valuable information that will affect your future profession, but you learn social skills that will help shape what kind of person you will become. Those performers of Leahy may not be driving the most fancy cars, or living in the most luxurious houses, but they sure do enjoy their job. Which is more important, and is that the best answer for not only yourself, but for the people affected by your job?

BSU Talent Show Feb. 16

I attended the BSU Talent show. It's aim was to bring awareness to what is going on in Darfur. I think this is one of the best ways to bring awareness to something like this. Getting people together to share talent, memories and laughs. A rotation of speakers would go up in between acts and give information about the history, current events, and what can be done about the situation in Darfur. There were so many people there for a Friday night... and I thought it was great that people could come together and be able to talk about issues that are going on in the world. With all our technology and media, I'm really happy to see them utilized concern for the well being of other human beings as a reason to get together. Our society can sometimes seem very anti-social and there is a popular trend to use robots to do what was previously done by other people i.e. Wal-Mart self check out, Arby's has a self order touch screen in some locations. I think the value of interpersonal communication is super important, and can be taught in schools by creating mock situations and making students think outside the box to solve these global problems. This is how the BSU Talent show connected with our social Luther bubble and sociology, and in turn relating to the skill I want to use as a teacher.

Does the internet and technology offer promise and hope for education or learning or does it just create additional problems? What do you see as the promise and what do you see as the problems?

Technology can be a HUGE advantage in the classroom. It allows the teacher to use an almost unlimited number or resources and references to whatever subject. Personally I am a visual learner and seeing things from different perspectives or forms can help me to better understand and retain information (which is effective learning). Students are also given the opportunity to interact with the content, which is a great way to teach (i think). When students can contribute and use different sources like this, it can help enhance the students learning. Technology in the classroom becomes a problem when it is the center of the entire lesson.
I don't think teachers should rely on the internet to be the main source of the lesson. When students don't have those resources at home, the adjustment to the internet could cause them to have to play catch-up. And when students are only given idea's from the internet then maybe their learning can be restricted. I think it is extremely important to have that personal interaction with another human being. If students become so involved with technology maybe they would loose some communication skills they would normally learn having to use the chalk board or a hand made project with markers and drawings etc...

Technology can be a wonderful tool in the classroom. When a teacher uses technology in the classroom the students can interact with ideas from all around the world. But if those ideas don't stimulate original ideas and experiences with other human beings then they are loosing critical communications/people skills that will help them be socially accepted in our society.

Stance on Education

I don't know if this is controversial or not... but here it goes.

I don't think there should be any form of standardized testing in schools. I think there should be an outline of things to expect students to learn, but I don't think a test is the best way to find out what a student learns. The teacher and student should have a better communication line that they have now. I think if a student can mimic some of the information, tell why its relevant, explain how it can be improved, tell if it is the best way to accomplish a goal, and give other possible examples of the information, then the students understands its application to the subject. Tests make things feel scary. Students can get anxious and end up doing worse, which can affect their self-esteem. I am all for trying to educate students, its kind of the point of schooling; I believe we can come up with a better way than standardized testing. As long as a student understands the material and its function then that should be enough. This has nothing to do with other school work, such as homework/projects and other learning exercises. We should not expect students from such diverse backgrounds, including race, ethnicity, financial standings and so on, to learn the same way.


Possible argument:
Being able to interpret the information doesn't satisfy a students measurement of knowledge. A student who can critically analyze one thing does not mean the student will understand multiple variations of the same scenario. It would take too much time to cover more topics and be this critical about everything. That is why we need to revise the school systems, make some cuts in unimportant subjects (such as fine arts) and focus on the big picture. How else can we critically analyze whether or not a student can retain a potpourri of knowledge? Testing allows teachers to get an effective measurement on how much the student understands the subject being tested. There is no better way than to set high standards and push for all students, to measure up to those standards.

Why do we teach?

Why do we Teach?

We teach because without passing on knowledge we can end up in the dark ages because of stupid people who get too much power, and everyone else is too stupid to stop them and follows (jk... but seriously). Basically we teach because we want our kids and future generations to grow up with a better education. We want the future to be more conscious about their actions and its correlation with the world.


What is the difference between school "work" and student "learning?"

You can program a computer to do work... but it will never learn anything about itself or how to apply it or the skills to other areas. School "work" may sometimes be seen as an excuse for teachers to keep students busy, or to asses how much material they've learned... and how well they know it. Students can "learn" from school work. With proper instruction and guidelines, students can learn how to apply skills, lessons or mistakes into their outlook of the world. For example: In school we learn history. We learn about events that have shaped world events. In the U.S. Civil Rights is a must in every classroom. Students learn about the oppression and things that happened to blacks. Now a computer can repeat dates, events, names and changes in legislation. But a student (i hope so at least), through school "work" can asses the situation and learn more about how he/she feels about racism etc... A student uses school "work" to apply it to lessons for how they live their professional or social life.


What makes for Good Teaching?

There are too many things that go onto the good teaching to list that I could never make a complete list. But... I think a good teacher first off needs to know the material... and love it. Without a passion for teaching, no matter how much a teacher knows the material, the students will probably walk away with a mediocre experience. A teacher needs to adapt their teaching methods for different students. They need to be able to use many different sources, such as technology/books and be able to use primary references, or close to it. Always question yourself and ask how you can improve. Above all, I think a major skill which is lacking in today's schools, is teaching life skills. Its great if a kid can recite an entire Shakespeare play, but the important thing is the lesson learned. The ideal teacher tries to create an overall better human being, the teacher should help the student function in our society. Some teacher lose sight of this, and give the grade and have a nice day. But students remember and love the teachers who make that connection (whatever that may be) and who really want to be in the classroom.