Journal 4

Pick one of the social challenges and give as many ideas as you can for how a teacher could address its effects in his or her classroom.

Journal Reflection 4

Cyber bullying

Cyber bullying is the use of technology to harass and belittle a person. Cyber bullying is a major area of concern in schools.  All students are faced with this at some point in their lives. There are students who are being targeted by fellow classmates through text messages, emails, or websites.  Nowadays the majority of students have a cell phone or access to the internet.  There are students that get targeted for a majority of reasons.  Some of the reasons they get bullied include, religion, ethnicity, the way they look, who their family is, among countless other reasons.     Students end up not wanting to go to school because they are afraid of their bullies.  This will prevent them from getting a good education in the classroom setting.  There are other more severe consequences to bullying such as, suicide.  This could be easily prevented.  I believe that schools should be implementing anti-bullying campaigns so that the students are aware of the dangers of cyber bullying and pick up on any signs that someone might be going through it. Administration and teachers should also have a huge role in addressing this issue Another thing that they should do is show videos on the effects of cyber bullying and show real cases and what they outcomes were.  This will hopefully deter students to become the bullies.   They need to be aware of the signs that this might be happening to a student and get them help right away.  They need to make the students feel like they can trust them.  Consequences to these actions should also be published in the code of conduct.  The teachers should not tolerate any bullying in their classrooms because that would just make the bully think that his/her actions are perfectly alright and he/she will not have any consequences to their actions.

Journal 3

Which area of Howard Gardner's multiple intelligences do you feel is your area of strength? Explain why, and give an example.

Journal 3

The Gardener intelligence that is my area of strength would have to be the Musical intelligence.  I have always been musically inclined.  My parents used to play music to my mom’s belly, so I’ve been exposed to music since before I was born.  When I was little I used to sing and dance for my family in the living room.  When I was in middle school I started playing the piano and the saxophone.  I played the saxophone until my junior year in high school.  I stopped playing the piano about a year after I started because I had too many activities I was involved in.  In high school I was in the school choir and I received numerous awards at competitions. My directors were surprised that I had never had any vocal training and I could match numerous pitches and I could pick out specific pitches in melodies. Music was also very helpful in regards to my education. Music also helped me to remember information that I needed to memorize and learn in school.  I used to think of songs that I knew and created new lyrics for them using my notes.  This helped me remember the information a bit easier during the exams.  I did this throughout my school years.  I believe music has had a very important impact on my life and it has helped me be successful.

Journal Reflection 2

Name one common practice in schools that you would like to change, and describe how you would change it.

Journal Reflection #2

       Standardized tests are a disservice to our students today. This is the major practice I would change. They do not let teachers teach freely and teach material that is relevant to everyday life.  They are expected to teach to the test. This narrows down the curriculum to only material that is being covered on those tests.  This does not let the students expand their creativity and learn by doing fun activities and projects because there is no time left for that.  Teachers have to stick to mostly worksheets to get the students prepared for those exams.  My wife is a Science teacher and she comes home and tells me about how stressful it is to teach when you have the pressure of producing great tests scores from the standardized test, TAKS.  Teachers have lost their jobs over their scores being low, but I don’t think this is at all fair for them.  They have a whole year to teach a very long list of objectives of which only certain ones would be chosen for the exam.  Another thing to take into consideration is that those exams do not accurately measure someone’s capacity to teach.  Some students are extremely bright but are horrible test takers; making them not do as well as they might be expected to do.  Others are great test takers and they score very high.  This doesn’t really measure how much a student has learned.  Overall, I believe that they should do away with the standardized tests and let teachers and students enjoy school again.

BIO

My name is Jeff Barker and this is currently my second full semester at UTB/TSC. My identification number is 0363801. I am studieng to be a special education teacher. I grew up in North Texas and  it was a bit of cultural shock when I moved down here to the valley.  I went from an English speaking town to a biligual town.   I had a hard time adjusting at first, but I have my lovely wife, who is an 8th grade Science teacher from Los Fresnos, to help me out with the culture and the language. I have also had to adjust to school after 6 years in the Army as well as a tour in Iraq.  I really enjoy being down here.  I love living so close to the ocean because I love taking my wife fishing.  I also enjoy hunting and just going shooting in general.  I am looking forward to a very rewarding career as a teacher in the valley.

Chapter 1 Reflection

       Chapter 1 was really a confirmation of why I would like to become a teacher. My motives to become a teacher comes from a camp counselor job I had back in the summers from 04-08 and I loved it. It was a special needs camp and ever since the first day I had my campers I knew I was going to be a teacher. The extrinsic rewards for me are great like status, salary, and schedule. The intrinsic reward for me is greater than the other, from having that social service to feel like i'm making a difference in a child's life and having support from other teachers.