Between a new semester starting, teaching at the Middle School and High School and having a FFA Creed Speaking contest after school I was all over the place just like the soil particles in the jar.
This week I picked up 9th grade Introduction to Agricultural Science, 7th grade Agricultural Science and 8th grade Agricultural Science.
9th grade was a brand new class of students and the first day of the semester. We are starting with a professional skills unit. This past week we set up class expectations and procedures as well as started diving into what is agriculture and how can this connect to my life after class.
7th grade is doing a soil science unit. I had conducted a lab with the students on soil texture. I learned a lot about managing a class of 22 students while doing a lab.
8th grade is doing an animal science unit. We started talking about how we use animals in our lives. We talked about meat and animal skins/furs and milk coming from animals to help us in our lives.
Wait Time: I need to be mindful of taking pauses. Pauses to allow student to pull up the schoology assignment to read along with me. Pauses to allow students to think before I call on someone. Pauses to allow students to digest information before I move on to the next slide for notes. These pauses are critical to the students education and as a teacher I need to be more mindful of when I pause.
What is your method for cleaning up a lab? What do they do if they are finish cleaning early?
What Did I Teach?
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| 7th Grade Soils Lab |
9th grade was a brand new class of students and the first day of the semester. We are starting with a professional skills unit. This past week we set up class expectations and procedures as well as started diving into what is agriculture and how can this connect to my life after class.
7th grade is doing a soil science unit. I had conducted a lab with the students on soil texture. I learned a lot about managing a class of 22 students while doing a lab.
8th grade is doing an animal science unit. We started talking about how we use animals in our lives. We talked about meat and animal skins/furs and milk coming from animals to help us in our lives.
How Can I Improve?Clarity: When we think of effective teaching the acronym BECOV comes to mind. I am lacking in the clarity at times of what I am asking students to do. This is different for each grade level. At the middle school at time I explain things really detailed but, I do not show them where on the worksheet to fill out the information. This should be brought up on the board for them to easily grasp what I am saying. At the high school this looks different. This means making sure what I am saying matches the assignment on Schoology or that the questions I am asking make sense.
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| 9th Grader's response to "what is agriculture?" |
Questions?What is your method of taking attendance? I was very slow at this and it gave students time to be off task at the start of the class.
What is your method for cleaning up a lab? What do they do if they are finish cleaning early?
Hi Amanda,
ReplyDeleteWe always took attendance electronically. While I was doing this, I had some type of bell ringer or do now on the board for the students to be working on. It could range from getting certain materials out and ready, opening up an activity on GoogleClassroom, or a question/task to complete. This helped keep them engaged while I was taking attendance.
Cleaning up from labs can be challenging. Using a timer to signal when it is time to stop working and clean up helps a lot. You can also assign students to complete certain tasks/jobs as part of the clean-up process. This makes them take ownership of their lab space and equipment.
Finishing early happens. Always have a plan B and C and D etc. for when this happens. You can have the students use the time to update SAE record books, work on essential questions, or play a review game to sum up the day's activities. Try not to let this valuable time go to waste and always have a plan for how you can have the students use it for a productive purpose.