Bringing Classroom Learning Beyond the Four Walls

     What I discovered this week will change the teacher I become. I had always known that bringing outside information and resources into the classroom was a good idea and that getting children outside of the classroom enhanced their learning, but intertwining the two is a new skill. For the last inquiry lesson, the teacher candidates are bringing the students learning into real life by linking their inquiry process to the research being done at Norrie Point, NY. This linking of bringing learning outside of the classroom and bringing outside resources into the classroom has brought teaching and learning to life. I am so excited to teach this lesson and I really hope the students are as into it as I am.
     I had always been a fan of creating thematic units to connect learning and engage students fully into the subjects and the individual lessons. This type of learning helps all different types of learners to thrive in the classroom. I had never really thought of bringing in a professional or even having the students create a professional work that is published on a state website. This type of connection brings the work that the students are doing into a new dimension. This idea could be generalized to other lessons as well. In science especially, every subject has a profession or specialty that accompanies it. By bringing those professionals in, it facilitates learning; by having the students create work for those professionals, it encourages students to produce professional work.
     I have never been a fan of worksheets, busy work, or teaching just to fill a time slot. Everything that is taught should have purpose and meaning. By creating an audience larger than just the teacher and having the students work serve a purpose, it puts meaning behind the teaching and the learning; it puts a driving force and rational behind the effort students put in.
     This philosophy for teaching relates back to our first class. We had a discussion on what we remembered from science classes growing up and all of our memories were of projects we made or experiments we interacted with. By having the students make projects and interact with the professional world, we are creating life long learning. These types of experiences are ones students will remember.
     Trying to put the way I feel into words sounds cheesy any way I phrase it but I am truly excited and in love with this lesson and our last two lessons on the model ponds! Making lessons like this is exhausting and it takes a lot more effort than a normal lesson would but it is so rewarding. I can still remember the teachers I had who taught lessons like this which reassures me that if I put in the work to teach lessons like this then I will be remembered and appreciated as well. Students give you their best work and their smartest sides when you give them the same from yourself. If I do not light the spark the students will never bother to kindle the fire.