Thursday, December 16, 2010

Daily Burn

1. What do your impressions of using Daily Burn? Do you currently use another form of online exercise and nutrition tracker? If so what is it and which features do you like better? If not, why not and will you consider staying apart of our Rockstar Group? Be sure to include your screen shots (at least 3) that you took and cropped.

I really like using Daily Burn, I feel that it is very effective and a good tool for people to use in order to keep track of their nutrition, fitness, and daily activities. I use a similar program on my phone which is directed more closely to weight lifting. I like Daily Burn better, in that it covers all areas of physical fitness rather than one single area. I would most defiantly consider remaining part of the rockstar group and continue with using this program. I would like to get a form of this as an application for my phone.



2. How would you use this website to accomplish our Recommended Regent’s Level for LS #1B? What
modifications would you use to establish a group or individual’s goals?
This website could be used to accomplish our Recommended Regent’s Level for LS #1B in many ways. Students could be assigned to follow their nutrition, fitness, and activity throughout the semester or year and keep track of their goals and accomplishments. Also this is a great tool to be used for assessment of students.





3. What electronic tool could you see as being useful for capturing data and reporting for the Recommended Regent’s Level for LS #1A? Describe how this tool might work in a High School Setting. If you plan to use Excel, or Google Forms, be sure to include a sample that can tried out online.
The electronic tools of Excel, Google Forms, or PowerPoint could be used for capturing data and reporting for the Recommended Regent’s Level for LS #1A. In a High School setting students could have an assignment given to them at the beginning of the year to record and asses their goals and nutrition for the entire year. This is a good way to open students’ eyes to what they are taking into their body as well as how much they are burning. The Picasa program can be used to take screenshots of good examples of nutrition or when each student reaches their goal, these screenshots can then be another form of assessment of improvement. It can also be a good motivational factor.


Rob Flannigan's Final - Part 1

http://www.cbc.ca/thenational/indepthanalysis/story/2009/10/06/national-braingains.html




1.) The website is from Toronto ON, Canada. There are two schools mentioned in the documentary. One is located in Southern Saskatoon, Canada and the other school is in Naperville, Chicago, USA


2. While watching this news clip from CBC news, I learned many new ways to get my future students involved whether it be mentally or physically. From these studies performed at the high school level, we learned that not only does working out produce physical results, but in this case, very high mental results. This particular school was in a tough position to start due to the amount of kids that attended due to behavior and concentration problems. Allison Cameron, a math teacher at Naperville High School, adapted a program from a middle school that scored first in math in the world and fourth in science due to their push for making physical fitness a must for all children in these schools. The impressive thing about this teacher was her ability to incorporate math and exercise to gain positive results across the board. Considering over half of her students had attention disorders, Allison used exercise as a way to let the students release energy and ultimately to help them focus on their normal everyday school work. During the interview with this determined math teacher, she even mentioned how certain students were able to come off their medicine and resort to physical fitness as their cure. Seeing the changes made by the students throughout the video is very inspiring in many ways. This "Brain Gain" program should and could be developed in all schools across the country making room for physical activity due to the positive results we have seen so far. The main problem many teachers face throughout their days or lessons is the lack of focus or desire to learn. Encouraging these students to exercise before their lesson allowed for a longer attention span and less chatter or fidgeting during her lesson. I once was told that exercising stimulates the brain as well as improves strength and condition and this high school program is living proof.

3. I believe the Physical Educators of this school were not involved because they are most likely the old fashion teachers who work by the phrase of "rolling out the balls". This type of environment usually includes a poor participation rate due to the lack of interest by the students and a lack of preparation and determination by the teacher. As discussed in the video, these types of teachers are not giving every student the opportunity to grow physically and mentally unlike their math class where they get both sides of the equation. Allison is a outstanding teacher who went out of her way to research different methods and used her will to obtain the proper equipment and time management to complete her program. I believe, without even seeing the P.E. teacher, that Allison Cameron has had a much stronger impact on her students in the exercise field then their "gym" class teachers. It is unfortunate that many schools are stuck in this old fashion theory that physical education is not as important and most of this is due to the poor effort made by physical educators around the country. As we saw from this video, it took students from the bottom of the pile and brought them to the top by including a healthy physical lifestyle. The other reason the P.E. teacher may not have been involved is due to the inability to include all their students to participate, whether it meant making adaptations or challenges for these once troubled students.

4. The main point I can take away from this video is that every student needs to be accounted for and by doing this we can potentially create a successful class or school rather than the low percentage of students who usually excel in a physical education setting. It was mind blowing to hear that some of these students, who were in 9th grade, could barely read or write before entering this school. Not only was this a challenge for them but as well as the teachers such as Allison Cameron. The typical P.E. classroom has about 20% participating and the rest standing around or giving their input once a class. This is unfortunate because as we have seen, exercise can be a great way to keep the attention of students and can develop growth mentally in many ways. For this high school, students with bad attitudes and even worse grades were forced to accept this teacher's style of teaching which included the treadmill and other dynamic exercises. Although many of them did not think this could possibly benefit them in any way, within a short period of time these students were coming to class for the sole reason of getting fit and making positive changes. As stated earlier, even the students who sit on the sideline waiting for class to be over, need to be accounted for and made responsible for improving their skills mentally and physically. This program was also great because it was not based off typical sports where some students dominate leaving the rest up for embarrassment. There was one student who started drinking and using drugs at a very young age and could barely read or write before entering this school. During the clip we see outstanding physical and emotional progress mostly due to the math teacher's way of arousing the student's interest. This is very typical in many schools in my area where some kids flourish and others fall off due to family problems or medical issues such as ADHD which many of these students face as well. Overall I think this clip has shown me the importance of getting every child active even if they have the reputation to be the "outcast". Even though these children faced many personal problems, they pursued what their own goals and became much more attentive in their classroom setting. As a P.E. teacher this would greatly benefit my classroom if we could obtain 100% participation but would also help other teachers who may normally deal with behavioral problems which can be decreased to a program similar to Naperville High School's. This program is closely related to our NYS PE standards in many ways. Teaching these children how to be physically competent and use different motor skills when needed such as the treadmill they use or their daily exercise routines. Standard 2 was discussed when they improved child behavior and attention span which helps them academically as well as physically. Students were also asked to use heart rate monitors and to obtain a certain heart rate making them aware of technology and the importance of it in their everyday lives. Our NYS PE standards are specific and require teachers to cover all areas of living healthy lifestyles. This high school we have learned about has taken their standards and made a great example of how it can work if done properly. I hope one day I can also make a change in student's lives as well as helping the school's academic progress.

5. BDNF is discussed during this video and is a vital part of learning. Each time our brain takes in new information, the BDNF helps create new neurons and tries to sustain the old ones. Dr. Ratey explain this BDNF as a fertilizer for different parts of the brain. In order for your BNDF to increase, one must participate in aerobic activities for a certain amount of time. This extreme exercising releases nerve growth factors which then act as the fertilizer. Dr. Ratey also referred to this chemical as "Miracle Grow" for our brain considering it helps preserve cells, build cells, and helps make these cells stronger. Different workouts that could release this chemical include running, jumping, and any other sustained aerobic movement. One book that is mentioned during this clip is called "Spark" by Dr. Ratey who is interviewed throughout this video. Another book which could be used to learn more about the effects of exercising and the growth of the brain is called "The Kinesthetic Classroom” by Traci Lengel and Mike Kuczala.

Part C

1. There are many different activity categories for Learning Standard #1A that students can be proficient or competent in according to the B-9 form which include categories such as team passing activities, net/wall activities, target activities, striking fielding activities, aquatics, dance and aesthetic, outdoor, personal performance, and fitness activities. I believe, due to the list of options, students should be competent in 6 categories and proficient in 3 across 3 different categories by time the senior class graduates. Due to the amount of time given and the basic requirements that should be met by teachers, there should be a 100% success rate when assessing the students. With help by proper instruction and feedback, throughout the four years they have, students should have mastered certain skills and for the other skills, they must have a clear understanding of what is being asked even if they are not completely able to perform the tasks. Due to the time given for practice, students can successfully meet the NYS requirements with practice and comprehension.

2. For NYS Learning Standard #1B, 90% of the students should be competent in creating personal fitness programs and should have made their own by the time they are seniors in high school. These students need to understand the importance of creating daily routines and program in order to stay physically fit which includes workout plans, nutrition plans, and need to monitor themselves such as heart-rate and progress made. Seeing these results can build confidence and being competent in making a fitness program can help keep them on track as well as tracking their strengths and weaknesses.

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Lab D - Ice Skating: The Perfect Date


For our last 255 lab, I was chose to teach the ice skating unit.  When I first saw this lesson up on the board, I immediately paniced.  Since I haven't been on the ice in about 5 years, this made a ton of doubt through my mind.  The next thing that gave me a headache was trying to incorporate technology in to this lesson.  I then realized that this is what teaching is all about; getting a lesson thrown at you and running with it in order to keep your boss happy as well as keeping your students involved.  This lesson took by far the most preparation compared to our other labs.  With a bunch of help from our T.A.'s and Professor Yang I got a little inspiration on how to make this lesson really flow.  Since ice skating can be considered a lifelong activity compared to a sport, I used a life theme in "dating" and hoped to get a few laughs along the way.  Each time I went to rehearse this lesson, I owuld constantly have new ideas pop in my head making it more interesting but more confusing as well.  Due to skill level and confidence, I had to make sure this lesson was appropriate for everyone because like myself, some students may not had the experience and practice as others. 

To start this lesson, I used my progressions sheet to figure out what skill I wanted to start with.  Since ice skating isn't everyone's strong point, I started with the basic steps of pushing, gliding, stopping and turning.  But before I could do any of these main skills, I taught the class how to properly fall and get back up for safety reasons and to limit the embarrassment as much as possible.  To start class, I used a congo line going around the gym with everyone "connected at the hip".  I thought this would be a lot of fun with the music and teamwork but it seemed as if the string skaters kept pulling away from the group.  I also had to really consider the safety concerns with this lesson because if one person fell they could have made a pile-up collision which could of been dangerous.  After the warm up we went back over to the boards where I had my visual aid set up.  This is when I mainly got into my skit about the students future date coming up and how we were going to prepare for it.  I saw a few laughs and smiles so this was a first indicator that I was on the right track.  We then partnered up and started going through our skating drills and on the way back, I gave each group the option to link arms or hands to incorporate teamwork and communication.  For some students, such as Ben, assisstance was needed so he choose to go both ways with his strong skating partner.  While the students were practicing, I did notice that my feedback was not completely as loud and clear as I would have liked.  This, along with a few butchered words, were the few things during my lesson I feel i could have improved on. 

One major factor in this lesson that was building stress was incorporating technology.  Professor Yang gave me the great idea to use heart rate monitors which sounds as complicated as it is.  After a few hours playing with the program and monitors in the lab, I got the hang of it and all this technology talk started to sound a lot less like a foreign language.  I was really excited to use these HR monitors because no one, up to this point, used anything technology advanced to this degree.  Even though some students may not of fully understood the reason for these, I believe they enjoyed being able to look up at the screen and to see how hard they were working.  Preparing for this lesson included signing out a TV, borrowing monitors, renting out the ice time, obtaining helmets and setting up the music to make the ice rink complete. 

Overall I had tons of challenges preparing for the ice skating lesson but by the end it all paid off.  I never thought I would chose a theme as I did but sometimes in teaching its about being creative and appealing to the students.  I feel I grabbed their attention from the beginning and hopefully kept it till the end.  Even if I missed a cue or two or forgot to give feedback here or there, I saw a ton of smiles and heard laughing from all the groups which is the best reward I can recieve.  I now know how to handle a challenege such as this when its thrown at me in the real world.  Thanks to our T.A.'s and Professor Yang for helping me through this because without a few ideas here and there I may have went a completely different direction with this and I couldn't have asked for this lesson to go any better.

Here are my attachments for all to see:
Task Progressions
Feedback Analysis
Content Development
Time Coding
Assessment
Lesson Plan

Monday, November 8, 2010

Lab C


I had a ton of fun teaching the Cuban Salsa for Lab C and I hope the rest of you feel the same way.  Even though my lesson didn't get to the full dance, I saw lots of improvement from the first step to the last.  The teaching approach was completely different this time because it was based on dancing and the specific steps.  Everyone got warmed up by gathering in a circle and showing off their favorite dance move.  Hopefully, this also gave some students some confidence due to dancing solo in front of a whole class.  We then started from simply clapping the tempo (quick, quick, slow ; uno, dos , tres) to putting the full rock step, side step and cross step all together to perform a short dance routine.  During the lesson I noticed some of the students were really engaged by the dancing but others seemed to care less which will be comparable to a real life physical education classroom one day.  A thought I had after the lesson was to switch the two rows so everyone would have a chance to be the leaders or examples.  I also found it difficult to give the perfect angle for my demonstartions because in order to have identical stpes to the students, I had to turn my back to them.  This allows for horseplay or distractions while my back is turned.  I also had a difficult time giving feedback because most of the steps were done as a whole group while following my step by step instructions.  If i had more time, I could have walked around to give feedback and advice.  these are areas in which I will work on to perfect for our upcoming Lab D. 

Overall, I felt this was a good International Lesson because dancing is a life-long activity in which people can easily learn and have a whole new outlook on occasions such as weddings and formal dances.  Working with a partner on this lab also spiced things up a little bit.  The beneficial part was being able to bounce ideas off one another and Ben did a great job following up my lesson.  The difficult tasks were combining the lessons and incorporating all of the aspects on the C-9 form.  We were also one of the last groups to perform so we were able to take in feedback from other groups and use it to our advantage.  Even though I missed a few parts that I practiced over and over, I still managed to have a lot of fun teaching it and I felt the class did as well.  Like I always say, my mission is for the students to learn while having fun at the same time.

Time Coding Form
Verbal Transcript
Feedback Analysis

Lab B2

After teaching "the Pull" for Lab B2, I noticed a few things I need to work on but I was more focused on the areas where I could see noticable improvement from my last teaching lab.  Not only was I told by Professor Yang that my voice was stronger, I could also notice during the lesson that my confidence while teacher most defenitley had a strong impact on my voice clarity in general.  During this lesson, I also wanted to concentrate more on giving all types of feedback to the students in which I did but not to the extent which i would have liked.  Practice does really make perfect because the more different groups I practiced in front of, the more confident I was going up there in front of the class.  There was one point during the lesson when I turned my back to half of the class while giving instructions which is a big concern especially working outside with lots of other noise distractions.  During my explanation of the drill, I used two students as examples which help me point of step by step each cue for the pull.  This allowed other students to see it in action as well as allowing for a better understanding of the cues such as becoming outlet passes and the different catching techniques used.  I was pleased with my overall performance even though there was a few errors which will be corrected for next lab.  I walked out of class with a positive attitude, thanks to the positive feedback I recieved from Professor Yang as well as all of the T.A's.  I hope everyone had fun during the lesson because that is one of my main concerns while teaching; whether or not the students have fun while learning will determine my own personal success.. Below you can check out my time managment by looking at my Time Coding Form as well as my Feedback and Verbal Transcripts.


Time Coding Form
Feedback
Verbal Transcript

Sunday, October 3, 2010

Lab B1



After teaching Lab B1, I now have a better understanding of my strengths and weaknesses while teaching a lesson.  In the future I will have to manage my time better considering last time I included too much information and this time around not enough information.  It was also difficult for me because I felt as if my instructions were being repeated over and over in the demonstrations before.  I noticed that the level of my understanding of the drill affected the enthusiasm and confidence I had in teaching the lesson.  There are many areas I will need to improve in for my next lesson but im glad I have the oppurtunity to see my errors first hand through our YouTube channel.  Time Coding Form

Sunday, September 19, 2010


After getting a second shot on the main stage I'm having mixed feelings about my performance.  Although I did notice significant improvements in my confidence and my preparation, there were other fields in which I definitely could have covered better.  One area I felt I did a poor job in was my feedback which was caused by my lack of time management.  Since I went overboard on the explanation and had little time for activity, this gave me less of a chance to give feedback and assess my own performance.  This, in my teaching years, can be very crucial and I'm glad we have these practice runs to clear up any faults before my career.  During the lesson I used different types of cues such as "the string attached from the knee to the elbow" and the "cooking jar reach" pertaining to the follow through after a shot.  Little things such as cues can really help grab the attention of the students and can also allow for them to have an easier way to remember specific steps of a skill.  After evaluating the C9 form I noticed that I did use a hook that caught the attention but after watching my video I can see improvements needed in my enthusiasm and confidence when using a hook that should really grab their interest.  It was also hard for me to use intra-task variation because of the lack of time I had to go over my activity.  This can be easily fixed as it will be for my next teaching lab.  I thoroughly enjoy being able to go back and grade myself through the YouTube videos and I believe it gives great benefits for any individual who needs to build their way up to becoming a professional.  Overall my teaching experience may not have went exactly how I wanted but that’s why we practice and keep working towards improvement!
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Friday, September 10, 2010

Chapter 1 Summary

After reading chapter one here are some of my repsonses to the Check Your Understanding section:

1.  The idea that teaching as a goal-oriented activity depends on the educator to strive for each individual or class goal based on different variations including age, size, and ability.  The main goal is to develop physically educated and active lifestyles for children of all variations rather then just the typical athletic type.  The curriculum is based on a set of state and national standards for each physical educator that needs to teach and establish certain goals in order to be successful.  The more results one would see from their work would usually make them set the bar even higher the next time around for constant improvement. 

4.  The process which a tecaher choose to choose their style of teaching can be crucial because it depends on many different variables.  This can depend on the teacher and their ultimate goal or the personality which can be shown in the work field.  This as well as the type of students can have a big factor on the style of teaching tey use and how they expect to relay the content that needs to be learned. The more creative or uniue one can be, the more positive and creative feedback they will see.  The style of teaching also depends on the different areas that need to be covered such as different areas of exercising and how to obtain multiple goals during one demonstartion.  It may be difficult to do this depending on time and accessibility and this is where the issue of choosing a right technique becomes very important. 

5.  The movement task-student response unit is extremely important because this will initiate the start of your class.  These tasks can be used as progressions in order to achieve the proper skills and technique to correctly teach the lesson.  An instructor should be able to see a future drill or idea based off their movement task activity.  The point of these activities is to warm the students up for their future drills or game situations but to also prepare them mentally for their next step.  The movement task-student response is crucial to make building blocks for the children to learn step by step what they need to accomplish but to also get their cognitive skills to match their motor skills. 

Thursday, September 2, 2010

First Day of Class

In our first day of EDU 255, we were put under the pressure of teaching a skill our first day.  This was a true test because no one was expecting this and it made us get the rust out from over the summer.  I know that first class will be looked back at towards the end of the semester and I will hopefully see drastic results.  I can see this course is going to help me grow to be a better educator.