Doing yoga in P.E.??

Most all children love p.e. It is the time during the day that they look forward to the most. It is their chance to finally run free, to move around and not get in any trouble. Well, students at Pittsburgh Public Schools are integrating yoga into the phys ed curriculum. They are doing this in an effort to diversify the gym experience and give students at different levels of fitness an activity they can adapt to at their own pace and still have a workout.

Yoga can enhance P.E. because it creates a calm and confidence-building time for students. Not all students are able to keep up or participate in all of the sports, yoga offers an option for them. With yoga, there is no competition. There is no winner or loser. Yoga could definitely be used as a confidence builder in that children are really self conscious. They all want to be first place. In yoga, there is no opportunity for them to be a "loser".

Dr. Lippert, the school district's chief academic officer, said that "yoga allows an entry point for students who may feel like they don't want to get on a track or soccer field after third period, for example, because they don't feel like having to go through with the hustle of sweating at that point in their day."

To view the article in it's entirety, visit: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10109/1051535-114.stm

Rujumba, Karamagi, and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "City stretches phys ed curriculum through yoga." Post-Gazette.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Apr. 2010.

Obama's Commitment to Early Ed. Cheers Advocates, Despite Setback

Almost a year ago, President Obama's budget pledge to put early-childhood education as on of his top priorities created an abundance of excitement among advocates who had long pushed for greater federal investment in that area. "The excitement has cooled a bit. President Obama’s historic remaking of the country’s health-care system and the related measure overhauling student loans last month ultimately failed to include money for his proposed Early Learning Challenge Fund, which would have provided competitive grants to help states both create and improve the quality of services for at-risk children from birth to age 5." (Education Week)

Though many advocated of the budget pledge were disappointed, many are optimistic to the blueprints being made to the No Child Left Behind Act. The president’s blueprint for the ESEA reauthorization mentions requiring states to develop Pre-K through 12 grade literacy plans. "It also suggests that applicants for grants under a proposed expansion of the $650 million Investing in Innovation Fund—begun under the economic-stimulus program enacted last year—could be given preference for proposals that would improve early-learning options, among other high-priority needs."

Considering that I am an Early Chilldhood Education major, this really caught my eye. Many of the very basics that children learn are in during their early childhood years. I am not saying that we are more important than elementary or secondary teachers, we all play a significant role. I just feel that we are often overlooked because of so many different reasons. I hope that President Obama is eventually able to follow through with his budget pledge for early childhood education. Everyone seems to need money in all areas of education, I trust that he will do the best he can as soon as he can.

To view the full article, go to: http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2010/04/21/29obama-earlyed_ep-2.h29.html.

"Education Week: Login." Education Week American Education News Site of Record. N.p., n.d. Web. 20 Apr. 2010. .

School's 'Wicked Witch' sweeps out the 'no' foods

No packaged crackers? No processed lunch meat? No Oreos? No white bread? Without those things, what does a child's lunch consist of? I know for me growing up that items such as these made up my lunchbox. This is not the case for the students at Children's Success Academy, a 10-year-old charter school on Tucson's south side for children in kindergarten through the fifth grade. The school seems unusual for its food rules - it forbids refined sugar, white flour, and anything it defines as processed food. For example, second grade teacher Leticia Moreno had to take up two of her student's lunches because they brought in a burrito and a quesadilla made with white flour tortillas. When the 'no' foods have to be confiscated, teachers replace them with peanut butter and honey on wheat bread. Funds for the replacement foods are provided through donations and fundraisers. The school has no cafeteria, so it is mandatory for the parents and students to follow these strict food rules.

Although I support the large majority of the reasoning for having these food rules, I do believe some parts of it are still a little bizarre. For example, I see nothing wrong with foods made with white flour. I understand that food made with wheat is healthier, I just never realized how much of a factor that white flour foods made in childhood obesity.

Childhood obesity is a large part of what the school is trying to prevent,but behavioral problems is another factor in hopes of reducing. Although studies don't confirm that additives or preservatives would cause behavioral problems in children, there is some relating evidence. Rather than eating a candy bar that contains substantial amounts of sugar and getting a quick rush followed by a fast crash; the school encourages student's to eat foods such as apples instead. Although an apple will not give student's an instant rush, it still provides energy, just over an extended period of time.

Some examples of the 'no' foods include: American cheese, white bread, flavored yogurt, canned fruit, peanut butter made with sugar, processed meats, and virtually all packaged crackers.



Nanci Aiken, the school director and founder of Children's Success Academy says that preventing childhood obesity and lowering behavior problems is only a part of her reasoning, the overall health of her students is her biggest focus.

Some examples of the foods that students bring to eat include: scrambled eggs wrapped in a whole-wheat tortilla, tomato juice, plain unflavored Fritos corn chips, which are a "yes" food because it's a whole-grain food, sliced peaches, and whole wheat noodles.

To read the full article, go to http://azstarnet.com/news/local/article_d26e56b7-b1d5-52d8-bdef-9717ce18a61b.html.

"School's 'Wicked Witch' sweeps out the 'no' foods ." Welcome to StarNet - Tucson, Arizona. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Apr. 2010. .

Reflections on this semester

This past semester has been a life changing semester. I was accepted into the Teacher Education program within the College of Education. I am also enrolled in all education courses relevant to my major. God has blessed me in so many ways this semester is unbelievable. All of the opportunities that I have been provided with have altered/affected my life in so many different ways.

There are two milestones you have while you are in the College of Education at Auburn. The first one is getting accepted into Teacher Education and the second one is getting accepted into your internship. Well, I can thankfully say that I have have passed and been accepted into the Teacher Education program. The pre-teaching that I had to do before entering into Teacher Education was an incredible experience. I got to see first hand how a classroom operates and get a feeling of how it is to be the teacher in a classroom. Although I did not teach, my observing teacher let me participate in many of the activities that the students participated in. It assured my love for my future career even more than before.

I finally finished taking all of my basic classes and got into all education core classes. I am taking wonderful courses that have taught me so much about myself about teaching. One class that I have benefited from the most is my Media for Children class. Learning (and some re-learning) about book genres, appropriate age level books, ways to incorporate literature extension activities to get students involved with the story/book/reading, and much more. The more I learn in all of my classes the more anxious I get about teaching and eventually having my own classroom. Another class that I have thoroughly enjoyed this semester is my Technology in the Classroom course. I learned so many new ways to incorporate technology into my lessons, as well as into the activities for my students. I learned how to better use technology that I was already familiar with. For example, I learned how to make a PowerPoint most effective for different grade levels. For younger levels that I would teach with my Early Childhood Education degree, it is important to use images more dominantly in my slides rather than text. Being that most of them will not be able to read much at all, it is most effective to use images on the slides.

Overall, this semester in it's entirety has gotten me extremely excited and given me a new outlook on teaching as a whole. I can't wait to graduate and to be able to motivate my students the way that my teachers have this semester.

A Third of Americans Use Library Computers

According to an article on www.edweek.org, "a third of Americans 14 and older — about 77 million people — use public library computers to look for jobs, connect with friends, do their homework and improve their lives." This was somewhat shocking to read considering that I am in college and it seems as if majority of all of us have laptops or computers of our own. They say it used by a widespread of people thought, not just by poorer people that cannot afford computers or Internet.

Here are some interesting facts about computer use at the libraries from the article:
-- Researchers found that those living below the federal poverty line — families of four with a household income of $22,000 or less — had the highest use of library computers.
--Among those households, 44 percent reported using public library computers and Internet access during the past year.
--Among those aged 14 to 24 in poor households, 61 percent used public library computers and Internet for education purposes.
--Nearly half of the nation's 14- to 18-year-olds — about 11.8 million people — reported using a library last year and a quarter of teens used the library at least once a week.

The most common uses for library computers included:
--gaining access to government agencies
--searching for jobs and filling out applications
--doing homework
--communicating with friends and family
--banking
--seeking health advice
--running a business
--completing online courses
--seeking financial aid for college

One of the most interesting results that I found throughout all of their research was that over 80% of the users of the public computers changed their diets after using the computers. I thought this was very a very interesting result considering that health factors/diets/foods were not one of the most common uses for the library computers, yet 80% changed their diet after doing so. I would think that with such a large percentage, something relating to health would have been listed as one of the most common uses of the computers.

Another interesting fact that I found interesting from this study was that one in four Americans use public library computers while traveling. Being that I own my own personal laptop, I cannot imagine ever having to use a public computer when I am traveling. I just found this very interesting.

I hope you found these facts as interesting as I did. To read the article in it's entirety, go to: http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2010/03/25/341603uslibrarycomputeruse_ap.html.

"Education Week: Login." Education Week American Education News Site of Record. N.p., n.d. Web. 2 Apr. 2010. .

Saving money with a different font

According to Education Week online, a Wisconsin school figured out a way to save money. They changed the font in e-mails from Arial to Century Gothic. If you are thinking what I am thinking, that sounds like a very minimal thing. When I first start reading this article I did not really see how that could save anyone money. After reading the article a little further, students save money by printing less pages. With the font not being as large, the students are not having to print as many pages off, saving them money, it might be a minimal amount, but it does add up over time. The school's director of computing says the the font change saves about 30% less ink than the previous font did.

To prove how minimal this change in font really isn't, these savings will truly have an impact. Did you know that the cost of ink per gallon works out to be about $10,000. WOW! When you think of ink from that aspect, the change in font could make a drastic difference in costs used for printing.

This decision made by school is part of a 5 year plan to "go green". I love seeing all of the different efforts made by so many different people, companies, colleges, etc. I would love to have a classroom one day that was "green". Although I have not thought out all of the kinks of how I will do it, I am few things in mind that I would like to try and bring into my classroom. That is something that I want to look more into. Hopefully I will be able to get different ideas from current teachers on how they make their classrooms green.

To read the entire article, visit: http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2010/03/25/341611usoddcheaperemailfont_ap.html.



"Education Week: Login." Education Week American Education News Site of Record. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Apr. 2010. .

No Television on School nights

In response to the question, "What can parents do to help foster learning?", President Obama suggested not allowing your children watch television on school nights. He said that both of his daughters are expected to begin their homework as soon as they get home from school. If they finish early (before dinner) they are expected to read after dinner until they go to bed.

Another way that President Obama suggests parents to do to help foster learning is for parents to stay in touch with their children's teachers. He claims that he has not missed a single parent-teacher conference. It is significant for parents and teachers to collaborate together to provide the best opportunity and to assist them in the best way possible for education.

"Very early on, we set expectations for Malia and Sasha in terms of them taking responsibility for their own education," Obama said. They got alarm clocks at age 4 to begin waking themselves up, making their own beds and getting themselves ready to get to school on time. (Education) Personally, I couldn't imagine having an alarm clock at the age of four. I might have had one growing up that I used as a clock, but I never really used an alarm clock until I was in college. I always had my mom wake me up everyday for school. I think having the children use their alarm clocks and wake up each day on their own also teaches responsibility. To read the article in it's entirety, visit: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2011097346_apusobamaeducation.html.

I believe that President Obama has very good ideals for how to foster learning for kids. Even though that was not how I was raised, I believe that it is a wonderful way to foster education. I know that I would be a much better reader today and probably more motivated in school if my parents would have ran my household that way. Reading is something that is becoming less favorable by kids. Now that there are so many different technological devices for children to play with, it's rare to find a child who would rather read than play with their Gameboy, video game, or computer. Having children dive into good books will make them better readers, as well as have them enjoy reading, rather than dread it.

My favorite part of this article was when President Obama was explaining how he realized that him and the first lady had a multitude of resources and help that most families do not have. He said, "But I don't care how poor you are - you can turn off the television set during the week." (Education) That really touched home because that is so true. No matter what resources one may or may not have, turning off the television does not cost you any extra, no excuses.

"Education | Obama: No weeknight television for Malia, Sasha | Seattle Times Newspaper." The Seattle Times | Seattle Times Newspaper. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Mar. 2010. .

"No TV Please - Tír Na Saor - Freemen of Ireland." Tír Na Saor - Freemen of Ireland - Calling all Freemen... It's time to get organized!. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Mar. 2010. .