Mama Mindy's Week 8 of Classes: In a Blink of an Eye

Hi friends!

This week's re-cap:

This semester I am taking 13 credit hours, which doesn't sound like a lot...but I am actually taking 5 courses.

Elementary Music (2 hours). Learned about stick notation and guidelines for compositions. Next week there is no class.

Homework:  Finish up my Song Resource Collection (due 10/21)

Advanced Instructional Technology (3 hours).  Learned about snag-it, power teaching, and three different ways to present: pechakucha (20 slides in 20 seconds), Powtoon, and Prezi.  For next class (in two weeks) we have to have our bookmarks made for five subject areas and a presentation of our choice (I chose Prezi) and I am actually finished with the technology assignments. :)

Math for Elementary Ed & Middle School Teachers I (3 hours). Exam #2 was a total bummer.  Within the first 30 minutes, she realized that one of the questions was taking up way too much time as it was "showing repeated subtraction" as a method for solving division. I believe after an hour and a half she told us to turn in our exams and only two people had actually finished the test.  I had a whole page left (front and back--argh!).  She is a pastor's wife and will be fair since the test did not go according to plan...she really did not expect it to take as long as it did...but it did...and I would have liked to have been given the chance to finish my exam. After the exam, we still had a new section to cover...and it was integers...I get the right answers...but I still am failing to get the concept...me thinks I will be seeing my instructor early next week to fix this problem.

Homework left: One section of homework (book only) and Common Core

Field & Lab Biology (3 hours).  This week we turned in our "kid friendly" graphs...I did mine using black construction paper, Halloween stickers, and white colored pencil.  It turned out real cute and I am keeping the graph for a later date (usually I let the instructors have things...but I liked this one too much). We turned in our outline and take home activities for the Water Festival and discussed exactly when we were to show up and what was expected of us.  We show up at 8am (no later than 8:30am and stay until around 3pm...all classes we are teaching will last 20-25 minutes).  I always worry about the day when these events occur...but they usually go fine and better than expected.  We also "drew" for our animal presentation...I got the roundworm.  I did not realize that worms were animals...but apparently they are...and that is the one I will have two weeks (or rather one when you read my homework left) for preparing a PowerPoint Presentation and handout.  My presentation needs to be around six minutes in length.   We also did a drawing of our mushroom print, our fungus farms, and finished up our bacteria study.  Turns out the bottom of our shoes are the place were bacteria go to have fun. :)

Homework left as of today: Prepare, prepare, prepare for Water Festival on Tuesday!! (I will think about the Animal Presentation after the Water Festival has come to a close!!)

Elementary Art (2 hours).  This week we were to do a project involving the math subject area.  I did mine on Reflection, Translation, and Rotation (I have attached it below).  I used "Toby" as my model for the pictures.  I think it turned out rather well.  Also, we read about how to create and evaluate art objectives and also how to integrate the three domains: cognitive, affective, and psychomotor (Bloom's Taxonomy).

So...next week is "Fall Break" for Butler and Emporia classes but I will be "teaching" at the Water Festival on Tuesday  and Elementary Math I will still meet (hopefully I don't have a sobbing fit when I get my score on my unfinished exam back)...and I still have an art project due as well as another few chapters of reading and writing.

Half the semester is over...it went in a blink of an eye. :)

Much Love,
Mama Mindy :)