Blog Post #1

ABOUT ME


Hello. My name is Taylor Rounsaville. I’m twenty-one years old, and I live in Lucedale, MS. I live with my parents and younger sister. Mobile is the closest university to my home, and that’s why I decided to attend school here. I’m a junior at USA, but this is my first semester as an education major. For the past two and a half years I have been a BMD major with the plans of attending med school. The fall semester of this year was really difficult for me, and after much prayer, I decided medical school is not where God wanted me. I am always with children because I’m very involved in my church preschool ministry, and I found myself happy only when I was around the kids. I prayed about it and knew God wanted me to work with children in some way, and although its only one week into the semester, I find myself not feeling as burdened to go to class as I have been. I’m really excited to be able to work with children because so many of the kids in my community aren’t shown the love and attention they need. They also don’t have good role models. I’ve been told by numerous parents that teachers have a huge influence on children, and I want to be a Godly influence in their lives.

I don’t really have that many major interests besides the fact that I love to read. I could spend all day reading if I could. I love suspense and psychological thriller novels. I cannot stand love stories. I love the Harry Potter series and my new favorite author is Gillian Flynn. One thing I’m really good at is coming up with ideas of things to do with children to get them involved and ways to decorated things. I’m hoping both of those things will benefit me when I’m in the teaching field. Those skills are being put to the test now because I recently got a job as a preschool teacher at my church for seven 2 year olds, and I couldn’t be more excited!


FUTURE CLASSROOM

When I begin teaching, I would prefer to teach kindergarten, but in the end I will take whatever grade is offered to me. I will be the teacher who doesn’t put up with nonsense-if I tell someone to do something I mean do it. I want to be a teacher that stands by my word and is faithful in carrying out punishments and rewards. I want to build a trust with my students so they know if I say something, I mean it. I don’t want to be easily angered because children will be children, but when the behavior crosses that line I won’t stand for it. I really want to be on the level of the grade I’m teaching. Before I teach a lesson, I want to be able to put myself in their shoes and analyze how I’m teaching the material. If my teacher when I was that age taught this material to me in this particular way, would I be able to comprehend and apply it? If my students do not understand what I am teaching, I want to be able to change my teaching methods to a way that is best for my students. Because I want to work with younger kids, I feel it is very important to engage the imagination and curiosity as well. I would like to time set aside each week, maybe on Fridays, to have some type of activity that can really excite them, such as a simple science experiment. I do these type of things with the kids at my church, and they really enjoy it.

I would like to engage my students as much as possible. I would like to teach in a way that is good for my hands on, visual, and auditory learners. We will learn from problems instead of exercises because I want them to really understand the material- not just be able to robotically repeat all the information back to me. They will learn from demonstrations and hands on lessons whenever it is possible. When they leave my classroom at the end of the school year, I want them to have mastered everything they will need to prepare them for the next grade.

The tools I use will not just be repetition tools, but comprehension tools as well. I will experiment and find the best tools that enable my students to fully understand and apply the material they are learning. I will try to use the outside world as much as I can so they can recognize things they are learning in the classroom in hopes that when they are at the park or at the supermarket, they can see things and make the connection to what we learned in class. I would also like to focus on one thing at a time. For example, when teaching abc’s, instead of teaching them the whole alphabet at one time, I would rather focus on one letter for a day or two. The students can begin seeing the letter “A” and we can go around the classroom looking for words that contain the letter “A”. We can also do some coloring or little projects involving animals that start with the letter. Then, we can move onto writing the letter and so on.

I want my classroom to be a place of consistency and control. I don’t want children running around like they own the place, but I also want them to view the classroom as a fun place. I want to stick with a schedule so that they will know what activities will be done and when. Children, of the kindergarten age and older, need consistency because a lot of time they aren’t getting that at home. I want my classroom to have a warm, safe feeling to it that really reflects the age I’m teaching. I want to make school a place that they want to come to because they know they are cared about there. I want the walls of my room to be filled with art drawings from all the children, and birthdays will be acknowledged. I want my students to feel like my classroom is their classroom as well.


DR. PAUSCH

I have never heard a lecture or video clip on time management prior to Dr. Pausch. I agree with much of the stuff he says even though I don’t do any of it (I know I should). I don’t make “to-do” lists. I mainly just rely on my memory to remember if I have assignments to do or places to be. My memory has only failed me a few times, and those were times I was under a lot of stress. Another thing I don’t do is I tend to save the more difficult task for last. When I have a lot to do, I would rather do the small things first because when I finish the larger task, I want to just sit around and do nothing. Also, it usually takes me a couple days to get my thoughts together regarding projects and writing assignments; so, when I do the small things, it gives me more time to think of how I want to carry out the larger assignment.

I definitely feel I should manage my time better. I teach bible buddies for the preschoolers at my church on Sunday nights, and I come up with all the material on my own. Most of the time, (okay all of the time), I wait till after I get home from morning church to look at my materials and strategize how I want to do things that night. It is stressful, but I always seem to get it done; however, I would feel less rushed if I started planning my lessons sooner than later. This can be applied to my school studies as well. I always get things done that I need to get done, but if I spread out the work load over the course of a few days rather than trying to do an assignment at one time, I might find the work not as strenuous.