Science Methods Blog 2

     This month in Science Methods, we have learned about the acronym CLEVR. This stands for CLaim, EVidence, and Reasoning. Throughout our science methods class, we have learned how to implement this strategy in not only science, but other subject areas as well. CLEVR is a strategy that teaches students to make a claim, find evidence for that claim, and then determine their reasoning for why their claim is accurate. Although this fits very nicely with science, you could easily integrate this strategy into language arts, math, and even social studies. Additionally, CLEVR is not something that should be used once in a science lesson and thrown out. This is a strategy that must be cultivated over an extended period of time with your students. Especially in younger grades, students will not automatically be able to utilize this strategy. According to edutopia, "The CER [CLEVR] format of writing explanations is not a trivial thing for your students. You will need to explicitly introduce and model it for them. They will need support throughout the year as they get better at writing explanations" (link at bottom). The CLEVR strategy connects directly to the NCTCS, specifically standard 4c, which states that "Teachers use a variety of instructional methods." CLEVR is a strategy that may help many students gain a much better understanding of their learning by giving them the opportunity to defend their thinking on their own. This is definitely an instructional method that I plan to use in my future classroom in order to help my students truly understand why the things they think and believe are true.
     This past month I have been the most satisfied by my ability to keep track of all my assignments so far! Although this seems like a trivial thing to be satisfied by, I am feeling very overwhelmed at times by the assignments from EDUC 435 and science methods combined. Therefore, I am very satisfied by my ability to complete and turn in all my assignments os far and keep track of everything.
     This past month in science methods we have mostly been working on our science fair projects! I am very proud of my groups work on our science fair project, and I feel as if we are going to learn a lot from our experiment. One of the struggles myself and my group have faced throughout this project is the lack of ability to move forward with our project due to the fact that we must wait on the plants to grow quite a bit before we truly begin the experimentation.
     As far as class contributions, I feel as if we have all supported each other very well. We are all a team, and we help each other through each education class every semester. We cheer each other on and help each other when it is needed. I personally feel that I have reached out to people that I have not been in many education classes with more this week. In the coming weeks, I feel I could contribute to my class more by discussing edTPA with my classmates in order to gain an even better understanding of the edTPA process.

Current Event: This past month I learned a lot about hurricane Florence! This was definitely a scientific phenomenon, and North Carolina was hit a lot harder in multiple areas than is normally expected when hurricanes occur. This connected very easily to science methods, as we have been talking about scientific phenomena quite a bit.

Tweets:
  
I really loved this tweet because it perfectly fit into what we have been talking about in science methods. This tweet explains how to use phenomena to drive instruction, and takes you through a process of finding a main phenomenon, letting that break into smaller phenomena questions, testing the questions and ideas we have about the phenomena, and then creating a reasoning for the phenomena. This process seems very similar to the CLEVR process we have learned about.



I liked this tweet because it relates to younger grades and shows how they can learn from discoveries they make as they are "playing." If we give students the opportunity to explore different things that relate to science instruction, they will likely have a natural curiosity about what they are doing, and can gain new knowledge from their own intrinsic motivation.


I liked this tweet because it reinforces the idea that teachers must always learn! Professional development doesn't have to only look one certain way. As we have clearly learned through the education department, even twitter can be a form of professional development.

https://www.edutopia.org/blog/science-inquiry-claim-evidence-reasoning-eric-brunsell 

Beginning EDUC 435

     Beginning this semester in education 435 has been extremely exciting, but also extremely busy! I have absolutely loved getting to spend so much time in the classroom this semester. My clinical educator has truly opened her classroom to me, and she has made it clear to the class that I am an equal to her in her classroom. Therefore, I have truly felt like this classroom and all of the students are mine. This experience has already taught me so much more about being a teacher, and I am excited to see how much more I learn.
     I have learned a lot about behavior management as I have observed and participated in the classroom this semester. We have one child that is on a behavior plan, which has been quite the learning experience. My teacher has let me be an active part of the trial and error involved with creating a plan that works for this child, and I have learned a lot through this experience.
     One of the most impactful things I have learned about this semester so far is classroom management. This is something that has been difficult for me to learn in the past without having experience in a real classroom, so this semester has allowed me to finally begin learning about how to truly manage a classroom. I was also able to learn every aspect of my clinical educators classroom management plan through an assignment we have completed in education 435. One aspect of my clinical educators classroom management plan that I have learned a lot from is her contact with parents. Mrs. Lewis makes absolutely sure that the families of each of her students are involved in their students learning, and keeps them informed about everything that happens. This connects directly with standard 2e, which states that "Teachers work collaboratively with the families and significant adults in the lives of their students."
     Through my learning in my placement, outside research, and EDUC 435 class, I know that in my future classroom, my communication with parents must include as much good news about their students as bad news. According to the reading rockets website, "schools that communicate bad news about student performance more often than recognizing students' excellence will discourage parent involvement by making parents feel they cannot effectively help their children." It is important to me, as an educator, to help the families of my students feel like their student is capable and for me to communicate the ways the family can help in a positive way. 


http://www.readingrockets.org/article/building-parent-teacher-relationships