Reflection

A lot of things that Monica said during this webinar really resonated with me. As an early childhood major, we talk a lot about taking note of your students' interests and using those interests to tailor your lessons. When Monica talked about honoring student curiosity, it reminded me a lot of that. A huge take away from this webinar for me was that the best thing you can do to get your students involved is to make their learning interactive and toy get them engaged in whatever it is that they are learning about. 

I thought this webinar was very helpful to me because I often look for a fun app first, instead of looking for something that would actually aid in learning. The tips that Monica gave are very easy to use and do in the classroom. I love the idea of using iMovie or any other movie making app, to have the students create something to show what they learned. I think creating a movie is a more fun way to demonstrate learning than writing a paper or book report. She also mentioned another app called Today's Meet. I would like to use this in my future classroom to simulate a Twitter Chat for my students. My students are going to be so ahead in the game technology wise, that bringing something like this into the classroom will allow us to participate in something similar to a real would expereince. This app is also really great to make sure every student is participating, it keeps them accountable, and it gives them all a chance to make a contribution to the class discussion. Using these types of apps can also give the students who may struggle with getting their thoughts down on paper a chance to show what they know in a different way: movie, picture, online discussion, etc. I learned easy and useful ways to make my classroom a tech-sort-of class, to a teach-savvy class!

This webinar was great to listen to because it very much relates to what I am learning in a class this year. A teacher who teaches you children is responsible for many things but it is very important to make children feel safe and model behaviors and attitudes for them. There will be many students that come into in my classroom and it is important for me not to have any bias toward any race. If I were an individual who had biases I would have an uncomfortable environment for children because eventually biases show through actions. Children are very impressionable at a young age, which makes it necessary to model how to treat others. I feel passionate about showing children we should accept everyone because differences make us all special. Today in society differences are judged rather than praised. I will be able to take this webinar and show my future students we all play a part in society and does not matter if we are black, white, yellow, or red. We can work together as a whole and I want my classroom to be a community where we can discuss differences and share unique things about ourselves. This webinar helps me realize how impressionable children are and it is important to bring up heavy topics such as race because many times it will go undiscussed and children can learn wrong ways of how to treat others. 

This webinar was really interesting and a lot of things discussed really resonated with me. As mentioned in the title of the webinar, curiosity is such an important thing within a classroom. My goal within my future classroom is to continually foster a sense of curiosity and wonder amongst each and every one of my students. I want to probe students to be asking questions and being inquisitive of the things that they are learning. I believe curiosity can develop a students motivation for learning and urge them to be more successful. Another way of fostering this curiosity within my classroom community is giving my students opportunities to be independent and room to explore things without confining them to certain texts or topics. I want to heavily emphasize class discussion and cultivate active learning through sharing ideas, thoughts, and questions.