Goodbye! Adios! Ciao! Sayonara!

     Reflecting on this class seems nearly impossible due to the magnitude and volume of experience, knowledge, insight, and personal growth there has been. I came into this class as a student who was studying to be an educator and now by the end I feel as if I have been pushed to actualize my full potential, I seized initiatives, and am able to leave this course feeling like I am an educator capable of running whole-class lessons and planning for meaningful experiences. I have grown in my education, abilities, skill set, and knowledge through this course, meeting all course objectives along the way, but I have also grown personally equally as much. I had no idea what was in me or what level I could work and function at until, through this course, I was pushed to go there and realize my potential as an individual, teachers, student, and worker. 

      Dr. Smirnova began the semester hoping we would be able to see ourselves as scientists through this course and then realize that in life, all people are really scientific. Out of all of the course objectives and expectations achieved throughout the semester, the following were the most significant for me: 

•  "Be able to engage elementary school students in their own learning by providing meaningful science experiences for them, facilitating their explorations in the classroom, and helping them seek answers to their own questions" 

• "Learn how to plan for meaningful science experiences that are aligned with the guidelines in the National Science Education Standards (NSES), the National Educational Technology Standards (NETS), including the New York State K-4 and 5-6 Science Core Curriculums" 

• "Integrate technology into all facets of the process of becoming a science learner and a good science teacher" 

• "Appreciate the importance of understanding and interacting with nature as a way of protecting the planet for years to come."

This leaves me with professional growth. This class has taught me how to give and take constructive criticism, which was a first in my educational career, and opened up many resources for me professionally. This class was not focused around our learning inside of the walls but rather focused around activities that we could all use in our classrooms, use to get job, use on interviews, use for our students, etc. This class was all practically applicable to our futures and taught us how to work in teams, collaborate, and take/give professional feedback. While this was painful at the beginning, by the end it was a welcomed way to improve. This class brought me connections to Smart Board Training, Kappa Delta Pi, a Leadership Conference, CELL conference, Cultural Expo, and also facilitated in getting my name professionally in a newspaper.
I now leave this course confident in my teaching abilities, philosophies, constructs, methods, and modalities. I understand how to teach through constructivism principles and how to create hands-on, minds-on experiences which cement learning for students due to it being them creating their own knowledge. I feel comfortable running a whole-class lesson and I also feel confident in writing full lesson plans. This class was exactly what I needed to take my education, professional career, and personal achievement to the next step. I am thankful for the opportunity to participate with such an outstanding professor and colleagues.

The following are the names of my colleagues whose blogs are the ones I commented on. Their names are hyperlinks to their blog post and my comment. Below that is the link to two of my blog posts which have been commented on by peers. 

Jack Reilly, 

Alyssa, 

Amanda

Veronica, This post is very essential and really great all together! I like the idea you had produced for your project. This project looks like it had included much thought and testing to prove your theory. I like that you included a great amount of details as well as pulling details from articles to back your thought up. You can tell you put a lot of time and effort into your project. Great job overall, I enjoyed reading! on Music and Memory: Friends or Foes?

Alyssa

on 5/5/16

Great post, Veronica! I thought your idea of how you came up with your project was so interesting and very original. I found your results shocking; I would have probably put the same hypothesis as you did, because I cannot study with music playing as well. Your project definitely taught me something new. I also like that you incorporated research articles into your study. It sounds like you had a great experience participating in your first science fair. My only wish is if you could have explained the procedure of your project a little bit clearer, because I was slightly confused. Overall, I really liked reading your blog! on Music and Memory: Friends or Foes?

Stephanie Cretella

on 4/27/16

Physically Fascinating: Physical Science in Review

     Before this section in class and in the textbook I would have said that when I think of physical science I think of density, gravity, kinesthetic energy, potential, etc. I am not even sure I had a clear idea of what physical science really encompassed. However, now I have a much better idea and will summarize my thoughts and learning about physical science below.

     Physical science, as I learned, is what we can hold responsible for all health and medical breakthroughs that occur to keep us and our families alive each day. Physical science also affects our daily life in the form of technology. I never would have guessed that technology would fall under the same category that I previously thought was just physical objects and their relations. Another idea relating to physical science I had not recalled was the chemical changes in matter and their irreversibility, for example, when red meat cooks to be brown the chemical composition has changed and the meat cannot now be uncooked. While I realize now this is what I was thinking of when describing concepts I remembered, I did not list that basically elements, compounds, and mixtures are what comprise the matter and physical essences we are discussing.
     While these are aspects of physical science I did not realize, I did realize the importance of matter in physical science. Matter, mass, and energy were in fact some of the original ideas listed in the introduction that came to mind when I first saw physical science on the chapter title. Reading deeper into these general ideas I had were sections on solid, liquid, and gaseous matter, as well as kinesthetic energy which was one idea I did associate with physical science from the beginning.
     The chapters go in depth on laws of motion, atoms, molecular compositions, and examples such as flight. Energy was heavily discussed as well in its forms of electrical, light, sound, friction and heat energy. In reflection of all of this reading and summarizing, I realize that physical science is literally all of life being that it includes atoms, and maybe this is why I was unable to define clearly before what physical science really is. This will be an idea I discuss in my future teaching so students understand better than I understood about physical science. I also, now that I know truly what it is, realize that I love physical science and I can recall many experiments in chemistry, biology, and elementary science classes having to do with matter, reactions, chemical change in food, and laws of motion. I was glad I was able to read and reflect on thee concepts to keep my knowledge current and focused on modalities of teaching science in the future. I also plan to use the idea of discovery centers in conjunction with physical science in the future.