"Wise Teachers Make Learning A Joy"
-Chinese Proverb
-Chinese Proverb
Assignments for this week:
For this week read the introduction and through page 11 of the text.
Please reflect on any ahas or main points on this weeks readings.
Share what you are already doing in your classrooms or daily lives that foster a "Fun-damental" Attitude.
After going over the Pop Quiz on pages 10 and 11 reflect on your personal results.
Click on comments to add your thoughts, feelings and ideas
5 comments:
I was surprised by Loomans' and Kolberg's statement that, "The average college graduate has had approximately two hundred teachers, and yet most can't name three teachers who fit the above description." This statement is so true for me. In gradeschool, my strongest year academically was third grade. I had Mrs. Stack, a teacher whom to this day, I try to model my teaching style after. She read to us the very funny Ramona series, and laughed with us daily. My most vivid memory of Mrs. Stack is when we experienced our first snowfall of the year and she came out to recess to join us. She started a game of slide tag and spent most of the game laughing so hard she could hardly move. I wish that all of my teachers had such a "fun-damental" attitude.
I try to share that same attitude in my K5 classroom. We dance daily. How can you feel stressed after moving to "The Cool Bear Hunt" or "Tootie Ta?" I also try to do special magical and fun activities as often as possible. Last week, we made green eggs and ham to celebrate Dr. Seuss' birthday. I asked each student to bring in a "green egg." When I cracked the eggs and they were all yellow, we tried to brainstorm how we were going to make them green. We decided to mix the eggs very fast and cross our fingers. I was able to secretly slip the green food dye into the eggs and as they turned hues, my students errupted with amazment.
I did not do as well on the quiz as I wanted to. Though I do many postive and fun things in my classroom, I still feel pretty burnt out by the size of my class and lack of aide time.
Like Holly, I was surprised about their statement that, "The average college graduate has had approximately two hundred teachers, and yet most can't name three teachers who fit the above description." It seems so sad that we can't name more teachers from our educational career who are this way. I hope that future teachers will be able to say a larger number of teachers than three fit the description.
The quote by Maria Montessori, "True learning always takes place in a spirt of joy and abandoment." gave me an aha moment. When we are having fun and enjoying something we really do seem to learn better. Recently I was reading Dr. Seuss's Diffendoofer Day with my daughter. To me that story is an example of how important fun, laughter, and enjoyment are to the learning process.
My family likes to have fun and some of the things that we do as a family to keep a fundamental attitude is to tell jokes at the dinner table, read funny stories, and just be silly together. We try to make games out of things that might otherwise be boring. For instance, grocery shopping with 4 kids can sometimes be a challenge so we play the alphabet game where they have to work together to find all the letters of the alphabet before we finish in that aisle. It makes a time that used to be frustrating a fun time together.
I felt I did pretty well on the quiz. Currently, I teach a preschool class one day a week so I don't encounter some of the other outside factors that might influence or affect responses. I enjoyed taking the quiz.
The most interesting point when reading the chapter, "Becoming a Laughing Teacher," was the story regarding two teachers who team-taught a 7th grade social studies class and how they each viewed the disruptive class so differently. My "aha" of this situation was that I would have been the "high-spirited" teacher in this situation. I always like to students full of "talk and energy" during a lesson. I always told myself that when I became that frustrated and unhappy teacher that it was time to get out the teaching world. The students deserve to have teachers who are more like the high-spirited teacher in this situation. The learning that comes from having teachers like this is so much greater and retention soars!
I try to have fun in my daily life with both my staff members and my family (husband and children). For example, I have given those "singing" Hallmark cards to my staff members when their birthdays come around or even when they need a little "pick me up!" It's easier to foster the "Fun-damental" attitude in my family life because my two toddler children (ages 4 and 1). We play games such as Elefun and Hungry, Hungry Hippo which just bring tears and laughter to all! My two children also beg for me to put on music at nighttime so they can dance. Watching and dancing with them make it an easy way to bring laughter into our household as well.
After going over the Pop Quiz in the text, I was glad to see that I scored high. I do think I have a laughing teaching/leading style. I hope that is why so many students still keep in contact me to this day even though I am currently not teaching now but in the business world! Keep laughing!
I'm really enjoying The Laughing Classroom. Under the heading "Education is too important to be taken seriously" it talks about two seventh-grade social studies teachers and how they looked at children. We have all had too many teachers like the first, who are just not turned-on to teaching. The second teacher was right-on when they said wow how high-spirted and full of energy the students were. Teaching shouldn't be a quiet, sit in your seat type of learning. It needs to be a jump up, get involved, have a little fun type. This to me is what education is all about. Is the glass half empty or half full? How we approach our students I believe sets up their learning for their whole lives. If learning is fun, you continue to learn, but if it's not well you know what happens.
The pop quiz I did ok on but my question is: How could you mark many on the right side? They were just so negative. YUCK! Teaching I believe is a positive experience.
I loved the heading "Education is too important to be taken seriously!" It reminds me of a fridge magnet I saw recently that said, "Never take life serious, no one gets out alive any way." When I read about how few teachers in our educational past were "fun teachers" I realized how true that was. I can remember many that I admired but I can't remember save one that was a kid at heart. Many made me laugh but I don't remember any that made teaching laughter a priority. I plan to incorporate more playfulness, jokes, and physical humor in my classes so that when my students are in their college years or after, they will remember me when they are trying to think of fun teachers.
I took the tests but the questions on the right really upset me. I can't imagine feeling like that and I felt they were poisonous. I prefer to focus on the positive and try to keep moving forward.
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