A Best Day in Education:
Wow! I have given this blog topic a lot of thought, and it has been really difficult for me to pinpoint just one day in my seven years of teaching to be The Best Day. For the most part, I have had mostly good days throughout my teaching career. I really love the school where I am teaching, and I love being in 5th grade. I spent two years of my career teaching 3rd grade. While I really enjoyed teaching 3rd, it was my two years that I spent there that I found out I am a 5th grade teacher through and through. Two years ago I moved back to 5th grade and I have not looked back!
Our school has six modular classrooms, and I am lucky enough to be team teaching in one of them with my teammate Mr. Nelson. We are a duo who believes in teaching through Project Based Learning and we use the Launch Cycle often.
We have done many projects over the last two years, but one of my favorite projects is the Body Systems Project that students participated in last year. One of our 5th grade science standards relates to the different body systems that the human body is made up of. Students were given the driving question: How can we, as students, promote health awareness and healthy habits without our school? Students were then sent out to research five of the human body systems, and pick a system that they wanted to promote health and wellness for. Students were grouped by similar body systems that they wanted to base their project on, and they had the freedom and choice creating a health and wellness plan of whatever they decided on. Students were grouped by similar body systems that they wanted to base their project on, and they had the freedom and choice creating a health and wellness plan of whatever they decided on. For example, some students chose the nervous system to focus on and wanted to bring mindfulness and meditation to the rest of the school by creating meditation and yoga videos.
After a few weeks of researching, working through the Launch Cycle, and collaborating in groups to develop their ideas, students were ready to meet with experts about their project ideas. Mr. Nelson and I invited in parents, community members and other staff members to come in and meet one on one with groups to give feedback about students' ideas and plans for health and wellness. We had a nurse, a social worker, a psychologist, a yoga instructor and a life coach come into the classroom one day. I would have to say that this was one of The Best Days for me because it was SO COOL to see students talking about their project ideas, working through roadblocks that they ran into, and gaining a new perspective about their topic. I told my teammate that it felt "like a proud mama moment" watching 10-11 year old students work with these professionals. Not only did I feel proud of my students' work, but they felt proud about their work which made it so much better!
When students finally got to launch the project, we invited the school, parents and staff members to our presentation day. That day was pretty exciting for students because they got to show off their weeks worth of hard work. Our school nurse was so inspired by one of the groups ideas, Walk to School Day, that is has become an annual thing that we do at our school.
It was that "proud mama moment" feeling that made the day stand out among the rest of my days as a teacher so far. I am looking forward to recognizing that feeling again this year when we work through more projects this year!
Brianna D.
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