Bio

My name is Yessica Rojo, I am 21 years old. I was born in Cuba in January 14 of 1988. I love my Family I spend most of my spare time with them; I live with my parents and my brother. I have lived in this country for 8 years. I spent most of my childhood in Cuba, and I left closed friends and family there that I will never forget. Since I was little I had a passion for helping others, my favorite game when little was playing the school game. I would spend most of the time at home, because my mother is one of those that thinks a girl should be inside the home, I had a few friends that would come to my house since I was not allowed to go into theirs, sometimes my mom would let me but those were rare times, my favorite game was the school game, I always wanted to be teacher, even when I was alone playing by myself I would teach my teddy bears. I had a little chalk board and a few color chalks that my grandma had given me; I think I got this from her since she was a teacher. I also have always loved Spanish language, I am so passionate about it still. I remember I would spend hours writing in that chalk board doing calligraphy. In high school I was still undecided I knew teaching was something I wanted to do but I was not so sure about it. When applying for college I put teaching as my major but I had my doubts whether I was going to do it or not. One of my dreams is to be able to inspire my students, just like several teachers inspired me. In high school I had an awesome Spanish teacher his name was Dr. Cruz I still go visit him once in a while, he is already retired but he still works part time. He says that the day he leaves school he might die of depression. Teaching has always been his thing; he is really good at it. Most people find Spanish classes to be boring but his class was special, everybody would be interested. He inspires, and the best thing about Dr. Cruz is the fact that he loves his students, and he helps them not only in class but also in real life. He cares about his students so much and that is what makes the difference, to get to know your students and help them not only with class problems but also real life problems. That is the type of teacher I want to be the one that cares about her students and inspires them . I am going to keep on working until I get my dream come true which is becoming a teacher. I just can’t wait to accomplish that goal, and start putting my grain of sand in society, I want to be able to make the difference in some kid’s life, and make this world a better place. I have a passion for kids but my real passion is the high school students, I just love that age when they start to become rebel, the best thing to do is to treat them with love and understanding, that is all they need. Most people that I meet and ask me about my major they try to convince not to become an educator, they always tell me teacher do not make enough money and they work too hard. What I always tell them is that teaching is rewarding experience that cannot be paid with money. It is something that must be done with love and not expecting a thing.


Reflection 1

Lesson plans have many formats, they all should have the following elements: a title, the time required for the lesson to be completed, the different materials that will be used, the objective which may be behavioral objectives, meaning what they student needs to do to complete the lesson plan, the objective could also be a knowledge objective meaning what the student is going to know after the lesson plan has finished, picture samples or even models can be shown to ask leading questions, or to review what the student should know already. Also the instructional component needs to be included, since it describes the succession of procedures that will take place as the lesson goes trough. It lets students try new skills and techniques on their own. Then there should be an independent practice so that the students can practice on their own what they are learning. Then it is time for the summary where the teacher should review the lesson and ask questions to the students. An evaluation should take place to make sure that the material was learned, it could be several answers or instructions to be followed. A strong lesson plan needs to be created to cover the students’ needs. It needs to show a relationship with the teacher’s philosophy of education. A lesson plan needs to also meet the school’s requirements, and it should have the teacher’s taste. The first thing to decide is on the focus of the lesson plan. Then the teacher needs to come up with a question that she wants to explore more deeply. Individual or group activities could be included; also research should be done to find out about new methods and ideas. The lesson plan needs to also correlate with the book assigned for the class. It is the instructor’s choice to decide whether assignments will be done as a whole class, small groups, workshops or even independent work, peer learning or contractual. Whole class is for the teacher to lecture. Small groups when students are placed in groups of 3 or 4 to complete an assignment. Workshops take place when the students have several tasks at the same time. Independent work is when students need to work on their own to complete the assignment. Peer learning allows he students to work with one another and learn from each other. Contractual work is when the teacher establishes an agreement with the student that he/she needs to complete a certain amount of work before a date. The teacher needs to find a way to evaluate each student. There are two types of testing summative assessment, this is the type that evaluates the students’ needs, it consists of tests, semester exams, end of unit chapter exams, which will evaluate student progress. There is also formative assessment which evaluates the process of learning needs. Both types of tests are used to discover holes and improve teaching or learning. Some teachers focus on evaluating and grading standards, some put emphasis on the amount of work and some in quality. The evaluating and grading should be balanced; the most important thing is that the teacher makes sure the students are learning.

Reflection 2

Behaviorist lesson plans should have a purpose or objective the teacher needs to explain what her purpose for this lesson plan is. It also has an anticipatory set or focus, a short activity that catches the students’ attention, this needs to be done before the lesson begins, it is mostly used as soon as the students enter the room, a handout, or even a question written on the board could be used. An input needs to be included, that’s when the students learn new vocabulary, skills and concepts, and everything that student needs to know. This type of lesson plan includes a model; the teacher should show the students what the final product will be like. Images can be used, we all love images, and they are easier to remember than words. Then a guided practice should take place, the teacher needs to lead the students to the different steps they will go through to learn the new material or skill, the teacher should use the trimodal approach hear, see, do. Then the checking for understanding can be done the teacher can ask different types of questions to make sure the students learn the new skill and are capable to master the new material. It depends on the student’s reaction for the teacher to decide whether she should go on with the lesson plan or go over it again. Then the teacher should let the students try on their own, the independent practice should take place, the teacher needs to let the students try the new skill on their own. Last but not least the closure should take place the teacher needs to wrap up the lesson for the students, a review should be done and the teacher can ask the students to show her what they learned and how they learned it. A constructivist lesson plan needs to have a situation that the teacher arranges for the students to explain it. It should have a title and then the situation should be described as a process of solving problems, creating metaphors, making decisions, drawing conclusions, etc. This type of lesson should include groups of students, the can be divided into groups of 2, 3, 4 or as desired and they should be created to correlate between what the students should know and what they will be learning, questions should be asked. Then comes the exhibit part, the students must show how they found their answers, a chart, visual presentation or even a video can be shown. Last but not least reflections should take place, where the students should be asked to explain thier feelings, images in their imagination and what they learned.

Reflection 3

Knowledge is seen in behavioral theories as passive, as outer causes due to our surroundings. According to cognitive theories knowledge is nothing more than abstract presentations that happen in our minds. In constructivism knowledge is something that is built by the individual. As we grow up or first teachers are our parents they teach us to talk, to walk, etc, that is how we start to gain knowledge, as we keep on learning we incorporate the new information and techniques to what we already know. That is why it is so important for teacher to create a bridge for students to connect the new material to the previously learned one. We construct it ourselves according to constructivism. So learning is not about memorizing key terms, it is about incorporating new information and experiences to the ones we already know. Learning is something that never stops. It is like what well known Cuban writer Jose Marti said once “We learn something new every day”. It is true we learn something every day, but most of the time we don’t even remember that there is something else we incorporated to our knowledge. Students take ideas and information and assimilated them with what is already familiar to them. Knowledge is learned not by communicating, it is learned by teaching. As we learn we modify our knowledge and refine it. Some theorists say that knowledge is constructed individually while others say that is constructed as we interact with one another and learn from each other. Since constructivism is a compilation of theories the way that teachers choose to deliver new information to students and the way they learn varies. Teachers cannot just deliver the information to students we have to keep in mind that every student learns in a different way, teacher need to find and create the right activities to attract their students. Learners must have the opportunity to build new knowledge on prior one, and take the initiative to learn it. Constructivist classrooms focus on learning in collaboration and context. Students should be asked to solve real life problems, teachers need to find a way to associate concepts to real life situations, and the information needs to make sense to the student, when it doesn’t make sense, we create a problem and students end up not learning anything. That is what used to happen to me in math classes I wasn’t interested in learning it that much because it wasn’t making sense to me. I was just memorizing information to pass the test I wasn’t really learning. The learning in a constructivist classroom needs to be project based learning, collaborative and discovery.

Reflection 4

A picture is worth a thousand words. It is easier for us to remember a picture than to remember words. Teacher’s lessons need to involve words but also need to involve pictures, and students need to be involved so that they forget what they are learning. The word inquiry means seeking for truth, information or knowledge, and it should be done through questioning. Human are born with it, we are always questioning our environments, when we are infants and we start to discover are surrounding, we start to learn by questioning. The process of inquiring information is done through our five senses, by touching, hearing, seeing, smelling and sensing. It is a fact our schools have lost the real and natural inquiry process, this is due to the lack of understanding we have in inquiry process. Students stop asking question as they grow. It is something that we learn and it has even happens to me sometimes I’m there sitting in class listening to the teacher and a question comes to mind and I just think it’ll be foolish to ask it. So I just wait for somebody else to do so, and sometimes it doesn’t happen and I leave class without an answer to my question. It is really sad, as students we think that what we have to say sometimes is not important so we end up not saying anything at all. I think it is the teacher’s responsibility to make the class environment comfortable enough for students to make questions; students need to be more open also. Memorizing information is not the most important technique today. We are constantly receiving information and information could be found everywhere in today’s world what we need is how to make a good sense of what we are learning. As educators we need to understand that it is not how much information we know but how much we actually use and make sense of. Inquire implies the need to know, and it is not meant to always find the right answer sometimes there is no right answer, it is about looking for possible resolution to problems and questions. Inquiry learning can be applied to every class. Most schools focus on teaching different basic skills that do not serve the needs of our new society. Most of this is due to the famous FCAT preparation. Schools spend the entire curriculum teaching the kids how to pass the FCAT that many kids end up not passing. The students are at risk, they know that it doesn’t matter how smart they are if they don’t pass that test they don’t go on. It is really sad, especially for teachers since most of the year they have to spend it teaching the kids about the FCAT there is little time to actually teach them what they really need to know.


Reflection 5

Collaborative learning is a method of teaching, students are team up together to try to find the answer to an important question and out of that question they are required to complete a certain project. It could be groups of students reviewing a lesson, or putting students from different schools to work together. The purpose of this method of teaching is to make students learn how to work in teams. This could be really hard to accomplish sometimes, because there is always that little lazy one that doesn’t want to do his/her part in the project, and there is also that someone who would do anything to get the A, and would work more than the rest, or do whatever the lazy one does not do. Working groups can also be very beneficial, because students learn from each other, and get to have a relationship. Smaller groups help students to share their strength, and it can also help them to develop their weak side as well. They develop their interpersonal skills; they get to know each other, while working on the project. They learn how to cope with conflict, because it doesn’t matter how good a group is and how much every team member is willing to work there is always space for conflicts. When the groups are well organized and guided by a clear objective students benefit from it by improving their knowledge on the particular subject they are working on. There are three things that the teacher must provide for students in order for them to be successful: students need to feel safe, the group needs to be small for everybody to work, and the task that students are expected to do must be clearly defined, they need to be sure of what they are doing, otherwise it will be a disaster. As teachers we need to provide a place for: learners to participate energetically, teachers become the student sometimes, the one that learn, and students must become the teacher sometime as well, respect needs to be present for everyone, projects and questions call students attention, diversity needs to be celebrated, each group member needs to appreciate it, students learn by solving a conflict, members should use their past experiences and knowledge in the project, goals are clearly identified and they are the ones that guide the students, students need to be provided with the necessary means, such as the internet , and last students need to be responsible for their own learning. Collaborative learning method can take place during any opportunity that the students work together, they could help each other with homework, this type of learning became popular in the 1980s and it has been used since then, because it can extremely effective.

Reflection 6

There is a new project that started in a class of Israel, it is a telecollaborative project called “We the Children” whose purpose is to ensure that all children can be in a safe environment, in order for students to learn they need to feel safe; otherwise they will not be capable to learn. This project is purpose was to explore one of the most basic human rights, the right to be safe. It is really sad that some children don’t have this they don’t feel safe in their schools, which makes it harder for them to learn. The students were asked to describe a safe classroom, they evaluate it their classroom and country. The thing that concerns most middle school students between ages 13 to 14 are the sports, music, weekend activities, and fashion. The Israeli students described the unsafe place where they live. They talked about how they are afraid to go into the streets, movie theater which is protected by guards, and not being able to use the public transportation system. A telecollaborative project is an activity where students to collaborate using the internet to solve an information problem. It can be done at any grade level. It is good to integrate technology in the classroom to use critical and creative thinking skills. It can be as simple as exchanging e-mails between children of different locations or developing a website on a certain classroom topic or collecting data from different places to produce new knowledge. Telecollaborative projects catch student’s attention, and motivate them. It can be used to develop any technological outcomes. It provides an opportunity for students to learn on their own, set goals and self assess. There are many reasons why teacher should consider engaging in telecollaborative projects for example it makes students work actively solving problems and contribute to discussion. It makes them learn independently. Students see themselves as sources of information and knowledge. Students are able to assess their whole and use personal knowledge and experience to experiment, interpret and manipulate tests and modify them. They are able to learn content in context. The develop their critical thinking skills by comparing similarity and differences, analyzing data, doing research, distinguishing fact from opinion, students are able to find information more quickly from a larger range of formats and they have the opportunity to make material more relevant to their lives. Teachers can bring guests into their classrooms. Students are able to take fieldtrips, etc.



Reflection 7

In 1994 the people at the center for digital storytelling sat together in a table to discuss how good it would be to make use of digital stories. So that it could become popular commercially and in the society. They knew since the beginning that the use of digital storytelling was going to have a big effect on careers, and that they would make good money out of it, so they decide it to give it a try and change the world. They decided to call it “movement building”. Their goal was to promote this new technology among people and change their behavior towards this, and to change the distribution of power and resources. Storytelling is now being used everywhere in businesses, in schools, and they got so far thanks to the people that promoted and appreciated it the work they were doing. They were helping people make their stories and that’s irresistibly positive for everyone. They were helped by the internet culture since they distributed all of this information to the public and they have conquered the dominant culture. Since then our culture has being using the internet tremendously. They still have much work to be done. Their goal is to see people value their real life stories. This movement has just begun and they feel like there is much work to be done, and knowledge to acquire. Thanks to this group of people is why instead of keeping a binder with all of our work as educators, we have the facility to have an online portfolio which can be updated and we can make it look good, and show it to everybody, it is just a click away. I feel that technology is complicated but it is vital in order to be successful. A major challenge that they face today with electronic portfolios is the fact that they want to keep the learner interested and motivated to engage deeply in the portfolio process. Another technology that is being widely used by young people is the blogs, the wikis, such as myspace, hi5, facebook. Even our old generation is interested. I have a facebook and I’m seeing older people are getting into this as well. It is all about communication. The portfolios can be used as digital stories to learn deeply. Students feel that digital portfolios are just a requirement that they must fulfill in order to graduate and that is not the purpose of it, its purpose is to be used as a lifelong learning tool. A portfolio is the learner’s property, modified and structured by its owner and a story told through the learner’s voice. Portfolios are meant to be for reflection and collaboration purposes. They are still researching about the use of gaming in education to engage students deeply.


Reflection 8

When I started in Miami Dade College I was undecided of what to do with my life. I had an idea more or less but I was not sure that I really wanted to be a teacher, because of the many drawbacks it has. For example teachers don’t make that much money, they work all the time, and have to be responsible. I feel that teachers have the future generation in their hands, so we have to set an example, and set the standards high for the students. Teaching has always being my passion, and I'm pretty good with languages, so I decided to become a Secondary Spanish Teacher. When I was little I used to love to play with my friends, and I would pretend to be their teacher. I want to teach my future students using a combination of the five philosophies of education. I want to use a little bit of essentialism, I'm going to teach students the mixed knowledge of our culture. I would love to inculcate in my students the essentials of academic knowledge, patriotism, and most important character development. I also want to use some perennialism in my classroom too. I want to use the student’s ideas to sharpen the curriculum, and teach them fundamental concepts that they need to know. I also want to use progressivism and this one is my favorite one. I want to engage the students in my class by discussing their concerns, answering their questions, curiosities, and teaching them using real life experiences. I also want to use in my lessons social reconstructions. I want to be an example for my students, and I want to figure out ways in which we could reconstruct our fallen society as a class. I want to teach them good manners, and give them advice. I want to use existentialism as well in my classes. I want to guide my students to find the meaning and direction in their lives. The other in professor McNair class we took a quiz to find out what are out teaching styles, and mine came up to be completely different to what I thought I ended up being 76 % existentialism, 68% constructivism, and 67% progressivism. Existentialism is about personal responsibility, it’s about showing kids to take responsibility and learn to be himself even when it requires going against the crowd and as teacher we should be able to lead them through it. Constructivism is about the student learning on his/ her own, as teachers we should provide them with a suitable environment, so that they can learn form their own experiences. Progressivism is about liberalism, I’m nothing like that I’m pretty conservative, and old school, progressivism is also about having an open mind, and being creative, so I guess that is why I got a high score in that.

Reflection 9

I have learned many important techniques about the use of technology that I wasn’t even aware of before taking this class. I have learned how to create a digital story that one is my favorite; it is a wonderful program in which you could put a poem or any writing and make it pretty with pictures that apply to each line, and even put music. I also learned a new thing that professor McNair taught us, and it is the simplest thing but I would have never discover it. When he was teaching us about digital stories he taught us how to edit a picture in paint and how you could actually add some space to the picture to write in the digital story. I thought it was amazing; I even used it the other day while doing a flyer for church. I also learned how to use live text our digital portfolio I’m pretty familiar with it now, and I feel pretty confortable using it thanks to EME2040. The professor also taught us how to include technology in our lesson plans to make it really interesting to catch’s kid’s attention. Let’s face it in the world that we live in most elementary students already have a cell phone, meaning they are pretty informed and aware of technology and they love it. So as educators we must include this in our classrooms. As time goes by the use of technology is going to become more and more popular, so we better be aware of it. I also learned in this class how to create lesson plans, I’m still learning, there are many things to be learned still, we learned how to do a behaviorist, constructivist, and inquiry lesson plan with the use of technology. The professor also made me aware of how educators can use educational videos in class to attract students. I want to keep on using all of these techniques and learning more, so that when I become an educator I can be helpful to students and make my classes attractive to them. We also learned how to create a grade book, using excel and how we can have all the students information whenever we are thanks to technology. Something else that we learned is how to create a student database instead of having those little cards that get lost pretty easily and when new information needs to be entered a new one must be created, with technology we can edit them and have the student’s information at hand. I just wish we would have more time in this class to learn even more because so far we have learned a bunch of things. We also learned how to create notes using word and make them look organized and pretty to study.

Reflection 10

I have learned many important and useful things in EME2040 with professor McNair. I learned that my nickname is Fickle and I also learned the meaning of the word. I think it was a great class even though we had many work to do, I learned so much not only in class but also from the professor, he sets the standards high, and he makes us realize that we do not know anything and that we are inexperience in the education field and also in life. One of the things that I found extremely interesting was the fact that he would teach us using personal experiences. I love to know about professors and professor McNair is not afraid to talk about himself, he is easy to get along with. I thought the class was extremely interesting and full of knowledge we learned how to use live text, I had taken other education courses that required live text but I just didn’t learn as much as I learned during this 6 week course. I also learned about digital stories how to create them, and how to use them in class. I even learned about you tube after taking the class I have an account, I also learned about blogs, and how interesting they could be it is like having a MySpace, or a face book, now a day’s everyone has one of those, even the older generation, and it is just due to the fact that technology attracts everyone because of the many uses it offers. I also learned how important is to use technology in class, to attract students, kids are always surrounded by technology so as teachers we need to find new skills and be aware of technology as well. I also learned how to use power points in class, videos. I learned how to use excel to create a grade book , I still have much work to be done with my formulas. I also learned how to create a student database with pictures and everything, that is so useful and creative. My most valuable experience in this class other than getting a nickname, is how a professor and a student need to get along, I loved that about professor McNair he would just find the way to become friends with each of his students, he would always make us laugh and while talking generally to class sometimes he was advising me in, it is just that I guess some of the things he would say were not as general, yet he made them look that way by talking about personal experiences. In one of the classes professor McNair motioned the story of one of his sisters that died, because she stopped eating, and that day I was feeling depressed and I’ve been having trouble with that, I barely eat when I’m having problems, but he made me realize that life is too short and too pretty and that the best is yet to come and that I should never give up. I thank professor McNair for his patience with me. Thanks for the many wonderful things I learned.