10,507 Push Ups!

In Friday's class it was finally my turn to teach my peers! For my hook I used the world record of push ups which was 10,507 by Minoru Yoshida from Japan in 1980. I used that as my hook because for my task I had to teach the Push Up Jump in our jump roping lesson. I thought it was a difficult task at the start but as I practiced everyday and got better at it I felt more comfortable teaching it to my peers. In the beginning I was a little nervous but as time went on it became easier and easier. The only thing I felt I was weak on was my closing. I seemed to forget everything that I had planned on saying and just ended the lesson abruptly rather then leaving the kids with something exciting so that they would look forward to the next class.

When I was watching the video of myself teaching I felt really awkward but after I watched it a few times I was able to really look at my mistakes and what I can fix for Lab C and D. I forgot to add a demonstration of common faults with the task and I also didn't make it clear what I expected the students to learn from the lesson that I was teaching them. A few things that I feel that I did well were my demonstrations because I not only did it correctly which I was nervous about messing up but I showed it from another angle and I also did it in slow motion so the students could see it step by step. I also used scaffolding by making up a previous unit of track and field and asked the students to remember back to it and show me the sprint starts. 

TA Observer Checklist
Time Coding Form
Verbal Coding Form

Will You Be My Valentine?

For Lab 2 at St. Mary's it was chaotic to say the least. My group was assigned to be Special Projects but the class before lab we were assigned the gym group as well so we had to do the opening game and also the closing game and closing dance. We were prepared and everything until Jordan and I were at St. Mary's waiting for our other two group members who in fact had both the games that we had planned on doing but we found out that neither of them were coming. Jordan and I had to come up with a few games to play and fast!

For the opening game we made a variation to Temple Tag and instead of when the kids getting tagged and forming a temple, they would form a heart with there arms since the theme of the day was Valentine's Day. Once the kids were warmed up I incorporated the gallop, hop and run into the game by changing up how they could move around the gym.

When it was time for snack time we went down to the cafeteria with the kids where they had there snacks and then played board games and legos for a while. I had just as much fun playing with the legos and the kids I think. I was surprised at some of the kids imagination and skill with the legos. They built some complex things and had stories behind what they were building.

When we went back to the gym Jordan and I had to come up with a closing game and a closing dance. I came up with a closing game which involved the students getting into a circle and everyone putting there right shoes in the center and dancing around in a circle to the music until the music stopped in which case everyone had to run to the center, retrieve there own shoe, put it on and sit down when they have completed the task. Once everyone was done I stopped the stopwatch and it took us 49 seconds so I challenged the kids to beat there time which they were extremely excited to do. We got 30 seconds the second time and all the kids were so happy with themselves.

For the closing dance, Jordan chose the to do the Hokey Pokey which worked well with the kids. Most of the kids enjoyed all the games that we played today and it went a lot better then the previous lab where the kids were insanely out of control! To end the day we did a cheer with the kids and said our goodbyes. I can't wait for the next time we go to St. Mary's!

Lab 2 Write Up

Day 10

For Wednesday's class the first group of students were set to teach there jump roping tasks and it went great! I learned a lot by watching them teach and decided to use some of the ideas that they used in my own teaching lab. After every student taught we got into a circle and discussed what the student did right and what they could work on for next time.

I am going to be teaching next class and feel a lot more comfortable now that I saw my peers teach their jump roping tasks. I am stoked to see if my peers can learn to do my task or not!!

Day 9

At the start of class today we played the game Shotgun again and picked different partners then we had last class. For the first round my partner was David and we had to do the demonstrations which was difficult for us because neither one of us were really that good at the task that was chosen which was hugging yourself jump rope trick. We had a few minutes to practice and I was finally able to do it alright so when it came time to demonstrate the task, I performed it correctly and David showed how you aren’t supposed to perform it.

Professor Yang then had us switch partners once again with someone we hadn’t done it with. In this round Lesley and I were assigned signal for attention. For the signal of attention we had the entire class face towards us and told them that the signal would be Stephanie and Trisha’s voices (they had come up with the task).

After we played Shotgun for a while we received jump ropes and had some time to practice our Lab B task that we are going to begin teaching next class. I finally was able to do my task of the push up jump rope and I am looking forward to teaching it to the class.

Day 8

Last class we were given which tasks we were going to be teaching the class. I received tasks 71/72 and was able to choose one of them. I chose task 71 which is the Push Up Jump Rope. Throughout the class we practiced what we were going to teach and I came to the conclusion that my task has a high level of difficulty which means if I am having trouble doing the task then my students more than likely will have difficulty.

I came up with a few progressions that would make the task a little bit easier for the students and would allow them to progress at there own pace rather then having them try and perform such a difficult task right away such as starting in the track and field starting position for sprinting to slowly moving both feet back until you are in a full push up position.

At the end of class we played a game classed "Shotgun" which incorporated the entire class first getting a partner and then receiving a task to perform to simulate an entire lesson. My partner was Brenden and we were appointed the closing statement of the lesson which was hula hooping.

One Minute Skit

Instead of going to St. Mary's today for lab we stayed at the school and went over exactly what we were going to be doing the following week. It went very well and all the games that we had planned seem like they are going to be fun to teach and even play with the kids at St. Mary's next week.

The best part about the lab today was at the end when we went into our groups and had to come up with a song to lip sing to and come up with our own little dance routine for one minute. My group is Jordan, Joe, Lesley (our TA) and I. For the song I went through my entire iPod to find the best song ever, Thousand Miles by Vanessa Carlton. We had so much fun coming up with our dance moves that it was extremely hard not to sing along with the music. Today was a blast!

Day 7

Today in class we used jump ropes again and were told to get into groups of 3 and practice a routine that would have everyone moving and jumping around at the same time to the beat of the song that was playing. After a while Professor Yang called everyone in and started to talk about the video we had watched last class and how they worked together so well in the video. He sent us back out in the gym but this time we had to find a new group to jump rope with and had to incorporate some of the skills we saw in the video into our new routine with our new group. My group was Lesley, Stephanie and I and we were able to come up with a pretty nice routine in such a short amount of time.

We ended class in the classroom where we went over the lesson plans more and also talked about psychomotor objectives which included a situation ("not like jersey shore" -Professor Yang), a task and criteria. We also got our tasks for Lab B1 which I am looking forward to.