Shauna's Final Reflection

Overall, our presentation went well. We had trouble in the beginning since there was so much information about immigration. We had several different options on what exactly to teach. I think that using graphs, statistics, and charts to teach is a great way to get students interested in a topic. They can be used as a hook or they can be used throughout an entire lesson. I liked finding all of the information that we could use in our presentation; however, our presentation should have presented the class with more information about the topic. Even though we learned a lot, I am not sure if the class did from what we showed them. For example, we only asked a couple of questions that actually taught the class about the topic. We used more information from data from the class rather than teaching about immigration. It would have been good if we created a hand-out for people to analyze and then create the graphs/charts. I knew that people learned a little about the topic, but I wanted to teach more about it. We spent a little too much time explaining the different types of graphs and charts instead of focusing on the important information. The class had a great review of different types of charts/graphs, but may not have learned about immigration enough to be able to form an opinion. By the end when I asked whether or not people thought that immigration was a problem in this country, I was not sure that people had enough data and facts to formulate a strong opinion. I think the class enjoyed being able to choose which type of graph to make and learn a little more about immigration. The topic of immigration was very interesting for my partner and me. It is something that we hear about all the time, yet we lacked knowledge of some of the basic facts. After researching the topic, we were able to talk about it more and have an opinion about it. I learned a lot of information about the other current events as well, which are very important for teachers to know about. I liked the fact that we were all given different topics and strategies. Each presentation went well and it was great to hear from everyone. The whole class clearly did a lot of research and they were knowledgeable about their topics. Overall, this was a great way for people to learn more about current events and also to become more interested in them in the future. Since this project, I have become more interested in the news and in current events in general. It is important to use these topics in our classrooms someday and we should start to learn about them as soon as possible. Even though topics such as immigration are large and sometimes hard to jump into, with time and research anyone can gain a full understanding of what is happening in the world. The events that we learned about in class are issues taking place today. This was a great way for people to learn more about them and also to see how easy it is to research them and learn about them. Current events will certainly be a part of my classroom someday.

Kat's Final Reflection

During this presentation, I though that most of it went well. First, I worked well with my partner with my partner which is always plus because we both where always on task and knew what we needed to do. To get started on teaching the lesson we had so difficulty, but really tried to take your advice in polling the class about our topic to make the graphs. I also was able to find out some statistics to make other graphs. I think it is hard to teach charts and graphs on a foreign subject because a helpful hint in the book is to make them on information that students know about. I think our idea to have people make their own graphs was a better idea then to just look at graphs because that gets boring. our lesson was hands on and informative. the challenges would be the lack of knowledge of immigration. I think if we did this after a unit on immigration it would have been better. also the time constraint was a little tough to follow to describe the charts and graphs then to construct them, I also wish I could have talked slower and explained a little more. I learned that you need to take every lesson slow and make sure you do not get frustrated when students are confused. I will always remember to take my time to explain the lesson. I learned that the students did not really know a lot about the topic and if they didn't read the blog then they wouldn't really know what is going on. I would need to keep that in consideration. Having a more constructed directions would be something I would so differently if I was teaching it to a young class. I think for this exercise and for people to learn about the different graphs individually, the less direction were okay. I would also maybe give background information on immigration before starting to get their prior knowledge turning. Without this assignment I would have been in the same boat as most people with limited information. As a whole, I liked the blog prompts better than the presentation part. the presentation part lets you know that the other students are learning what you are, but I felt more comfortable in the blog situation. I learned a lot more about immigration than I thought I would. I know may not be totally confident in knowing all the information about immigration, but I think I have a good base to continue my learning. I am a little more interesting in the news and current events, but it still isn't my strong suit or my favorite topic. I will try to engage more in my community issues because they do impact me and my surroundings more than I thought before. I sent one email to a politician but there is much more I can do. I am on the right road to becoming an active citizen, but I wouldn't say I am completely there. I would like to learn and do more for my community before I call myself that with total confident. I am glad to be done with the assignment, but excited to learn more about my topic by myself.