Here's a slideshow of photos of myself teaching!

Last Day at St. Mary's

We finished up our last day at St. Mary's this week and it is very bittersweet for me. I am looking forward to the summer but going to St. Mary's and interacting with the students there every week was a great experience. The students were very open to us and most of them were willing to do anything we asked them to do. In our class we did parachute games and this is always a favorite for the students especially the younger ones. The picture I added here is the entire class participating in a certain  game with the parachute. I really am thankful for the opportunity that I had in this class to go over to St. Mary's every week and interact with these students and it really made me understand why I want to be a physical educator in the future. It wasn't all easy but I learned from any mistakes I may have had and I am a better teacher because of it and I will use it going forward. I just want to thank Professor Yang, everyone in the class, our TA's, and St. Mary's for a great semester.

It's Coming to an End

Today I was in the special projects group so we had to do a project around the school instead of having a group and being with the students the whole time. As a result my group didn't really get to interact with the students a lot but I still learned from the small interactions I did have. I had the ending game for all the students to play and they got really quite when I called them over which was very surprising to me but it was very nice that these students are so intent on listening to me. We only have next Monday left at St. Mary's and I am actually kind of sad that it is coming to an end already because I love going there and working with these kids. I learn more and more about how these students interact and how to become a better teacher myself every time I am at St. Mary's. The picture I added here is a picture of myself instructing the students on what we are going to be doing. I like this picture because it shows how intently everyone is listening to me. St. Mary's has been great to me so far and has been a great learning experience. I can't wait to go back next week and see whats in store for us!



Check out my write up for Lab 5!

Hyper dashing through school

There are plenty of physical education teachers what just simply roll the ball out but how do the students expect  to increase their skills this way? What if there is a way to combine what the students are trying to learn in the classroom with what they do in phys ed class? Well honestly there is a way to change mostly every game up in order to help them in both areas. Take the game hyper dash which is an interactive game that is enjoyable for the students. What the game consists of is holding the hyper dash in one hand and have 5 differently colored plate shaped objects on the floor. The gaming system has different game modes which include it calling out colors and numbers. This is a great an interactive way for the students to learn their colors and numbers. You can also alter the game so they have to add or subtract numbers together and therefore they are doing math and they don't even realize it. You have to spread the plate things around a little bit in order to extend the game and really make the students work for it.

Music Video-Workout Remix

Check Out Nate, Dave, and mine music video to the song workout. With our own twist on it

Throwing With St. Mary's

Lab 4 at St. Mary's had my group participating as the gym group. I was actually way less nervous going into this lab then any other one. This is mainly because I now know what I am doing and I feel much more confident in the games that I had picked out for the students to play. Nate played the games Oscar's garbage can that had the students throwing the balls into the makeshift trash can. I was Oscar and was in the "trash can" retrieving balls for the students. The students loved the game and we had to pull them away from the game they loved it so much. This just shows how much they loved this game and how much better our class as a whole has got at picking out the games and explaining them to the students.

Check out my Lab 4 write up

Boston Madness

Boston has been quite the trip so far and its only Wednesday! Tuesday morning a group of us started the convention off with the exergames. This was where a group of us split up and showed actual P.E. teachers what technology they can use in their classes for their students. The list of various games included, just dance, a different version of dance dance revolution (called idance) in which each student gets a mat, and an interactive kickboxing game. These are just three of the many different stations that we had set up but by far the most interesting was the interactive kickboxing. I have personally never seen anything like it and what it essential had was a screen with different motions and the player would have to kick or punch a certian part of the mat in the direction that it said to. I attached a picture of the kickboxing game in action so everyone can have a better understanding in to what it looked like. The exhibit was a great success and the turn out was great    and everyone worked hard to make it the best yet! That same Tuesday night, there was a huge fire in the nearby hotel and it cut out the power of most of the area in which we are staying in. This caused the Wednesday of the convention to be canceled entirely. What a first two days at Boston can't wait to see what the remainder of the week has in store for us. 

St. Mary's Part 3

Going into lab 3 I was really excited because I was working with the older students at St. Mary's and it was just a complete change from last time when I was working with the pre-k group. I was excited going into the day that's for sure. I started by going down into the cafeteria and played checkers, legos, and various other games with the students. I had some nice conversations with the students about sports and what our favorite sports teams are. This however was short lived and when we got up to the gym the students didn't want to play my game at all. Not a single person, they just wanted to play basketball. In their defense, I don't think I did this best job of explaining the games and that is my fault. We finally, got to play other games with them, but they did not like my type of game. The students told me that they love tag and we ended up playing various different tag games before finally, doing the song and dance that Nate had set out for the students to do. The picture I added in the upper right is a picture of me interacting with a few of the students in the cafeteria. This was the high point for me during class because the students were interacting with me and I think everyone was enjoying it at this point. I was disappointed at first that they didn't want to play my game but I am not anymore. In reality, this is a learning experience for and I now know that I have to work harder to find a game that these students are going to like. My group has the gym group next class and I can't wait to get back to St. Mary's and come up with a great game that they the students want to play and will still benefit greatly from it!



  Check out my write up from: Lab 3

The Great Debate

I first of all want to say that every group sticks in sports, lifetime skills, and the skills advocate group did a great job representing their category. The debate started off and each group got to state their case. I do know that a few groups got cut short in what they wanted to say but that’s because of time issues but I still feel like everyone got their points across to their best ability. After each group stated their main points there was another time in which we would ask each group questions about their group and how they were going to answer certain situations that may occur under their system. My group was the skills advocates and we all had a heated debate all around and there were plenty of good points that were brought up. We finally made a final statements and then we waited for the board of ed group to make a decision and they came to the conclusion that both the skills advocates and the lifetime pe groups would share the program and would have to work together to build one big program. The debate went over well and many of us tweeted in updates and there was a live stream that was uploaded on our class website so that other people could follow along the great debate. In my personal opinion, I felt the debate went over well and my group of the skills advocates did a great job with the power point and putting together a great argument so that we were in the best position to win over the board. The picture I uploaded here is our group working together to come up with rebuttal questions to ask the other groups. Overall, great job by every group and I was very happy how my group worked together as team to truly have a great debate!

Hall of Shame games

I was very surprised to see some of my old favorite games in the Hall of Shame. Admittingly at first, I was a little annoyed that some of my games of the past are being regarded so poorly. After reading the reasoning behind the madness of these games being elected into the hall I now have a new and open mind about these games. The hall of shame went into lengthy discussions on why each game was in there. These games should all be in their for the right reasons such as games that use humans as targets, games that have the students line up, and the games that have elimination in them so that only the strong in that area will survive. One game in particular that is in the hall that I think can be altered and potentially taking out of is tag. Tag is in the hall because of the fact that it is an elimination game and tag in particular is a game where the stronger of the class go after and gang up on the inferior students of the class. However,  I do believe that a game like tag can be altered in a way so that it can support all students and not involve elimination in some ways. You can vary tag and make it a game such a hospital tag where everyone is "it" but after you are tagged twice you simple do something like 10 jumping jacks and you can come back in. This way there is not one person being singled out as being "it" and there is technically no elimination. A game like hospital tag is only one way it can be varied and there are several others but that isn't the point. The point is that a game like tag, dodge ball, or any other game can be varied in a way to meet all requirements. I do believe that these games that are presented as is should be in the hall of shame, but on the other hand I also believe that any game can be varied in such a way that no game should have to put itself in the low aspect of being in the hall of shame. Overall, I do believe that dodge ball is not a game that we should be playing in a physical education environment, but with the right variations in place any game including a form of dodge ball can be played and be an effective game and help not just the stronger and more athletically gifted students but all students.

Healthy New Years Resolution Video

Check out the Video that Nate and I made to show everyone how we are using technology to stay healthy, fit, and active this new year.

Valentines day with Pre K

I was really nervous going to this day mainly because I really didn't know what to expect. I knew going in that my group was in the Pre-K group and me and my group struggled to come up with games that would be simple enough that the students would be able to complete them and would not struggle with their complexity. I had a blast playing and doing various activities with these students. Each week I becoming more and more convinced that I want to be a physical educator and I even am more willing to work with elementary students than I was before. The picture I added to right is a picture of me instructing the Pre-K students in the gym before we started an activity. I like the fact that you can see the side of one students face so everyone can see that the students were actually listening to me for a couple of minutes. I really enjoyed Lab 2 with the students and it just made me more excited for Lab 3.

Lab 2 write up

Reflections on Penn State and Syracuse

By now mostly everyone may know about the two major child sex abuse scandals that have occurred at two major colleges, both of these occurred on the east coast. First, the story of Jerry Sandusky at Penn State came out and then soon after allegations came out on a coach at Syracuse University’s coach Bernie Fine. At Penn State Jerry Sandusky is being accused of molesting children in the showers after hosting a charity program on the Penn State campus. These boys were about 10-12 years old and the story was essentially covered up by some Penn State officials for many years until the boys spoke out now many years later.  The situation just disgusts me that this was allowed to go on in the showers of a major university like this and that no one stepped up and said anything to authorities outside of the University. Based on the story that was released to the media I man saw Sandusky in action and reported it to the superiors in the school but did not call authorities outside; no one did. As a result of no one calling the school president, athletic director, and legendary coach Joe Paterno were all let go from the school. Sandusky’s lawyer stated that Jerry was just showing these under privileged boys how to use soap in the shower which I personally believe is a joke that he would have his well respected lawyer say that. There is no way around the fact that Sandusky is guilty, but the question is could this have been prevented? Of course it could have and the officials of Penn State should have been looking into Sandusky but they didn’t do anything they let him do whatever he wanted because he used to coach there. This could have been prevented and I now know this based on the training we received last week in class that we simply just have to call a hotline if we are even suspicious of anyone. The case of Bernie Fine at Syracuse is a little bit different in that Fine did not perform his sexual abuse at the school and under the schools facilities. Also, there is no accusing of anyone associated with the school knowing what Bernie Fine was doing to these ball boys for the team. Either way Fine was abusing these boys in the basement of his own home and no one was really suspicious of him. I feel that a red flag should have been up when Fine was bringing these boys back to his house and maybe someone should have looked into it, but no one did and these boys were sexual abused. No matter what way you look at a sexual abuse situation they can be prevented in one way or another. As a future educator I know what signs to look for so I can report something or just talk to a student to see if anything is actually going on because the things that Jerry Sandusky and Bernie Fine did to these boys shouldn’t happen to anyone.

Lab 1

When walking into and thinking about going into St. Mary's school I honestly had no idea what to except. I have worked with children plenty of times in various programs and coaching various teams but I was still nervous and had no idea what was going on at first. At first, we were just sitting around and watching the kids participate in various different games. Finally, we started to participate and I started having a great time. I soon realized why I had chose this major and I was having a great time and I had the biggest smile on my face. We then walked around and started talking to different children as they were doing various activities from playing with legos, to coloring, or even just playing with magnet numbers. The ages ranged anywhere from pre k all the way to 5th grade. Just interacting and talking with the various different children was an experience in its own but I think one class just reinforced my decision to be a physical educator because I love working with children.

Lab 1

Affective Growth

Affective growth is the same thing as social-emotional development. In essence, affective growth is learning that increases the ability to act, interact, and react effectively with people and themselves. Physical activity impacts affective growth in several different ways. First, experiences that involve movement play an important role in how children view themselves and others. Affective growth also includes self concept. Being good at sports and various different physical activities contributes to a child's positive self concept, but it is not the way that a self concept is established. Self concept is basically how someone views themselves. It can be in a physical, cognitive, or social setting. Some of the components of self concept are belonging, perceived competence, worthiness, acceptance of self, uniqueness, virtue. As a child they usual have an extremely good or extremely bad self concept. Positive Socialization is another aspect of affective growth. This, unlike self concept, is all about how one interacts within a group. Physical activity or participating in a team setting helps this idea out a great deal. Some components of positive socialization include group affiliation, attitude formation, character education, and moral growth.

Learning Through the Physical

Learning through the physical is an important concept when teaching young children. The basic idea of learning through the physical or movement is based on the fact that physical education, when used effectively can positively influence the cognitive and social-emotional development of a child. This is obviously an extremly crucial aspect for the growth and development of a child. Not only would learning through physical education help a child learn basic motor skills, it will also improve other import aspects like the cognitive and social-emotional. Knowing that learning through the physical can do all these things for a child shouldn't physical education be one of the most important aspect for a child's development. There are programs in school that are very beneficial to one aspect but if a program, like physical education works on multiple it should been seen as very important.

First Class

Had our first class on Wednesday and Professor Yang talked about what our class is going to be about and how we are going to be going to St. Mary's to do an after school program there. I have never blogged before but there are a few different blogs I read about my favorite sports teams so it probably won't be too bad to get use to writing on here. I am personally looking forward to finishing my career here at Cortland and becoming an educator. I really enjoy working with children and I really want to make a positive influence on as many of their lives as possible.

First Post

Just made my blog and blogging for the first time to activate it. Had a great winter break and I am really looking forward to taking this class and getting started in the actual major!