Food and Exercise Journal

The last few weeks I have been keeping a daily food journal for health.  I have to admit that I really don't like to track my diet and purposefully stay away from weight loss plans that include counting and measuring because I can't be bothered.  I realized through the food journal that I have a pretty balanced diet.  This isn't a revelation for me because I tend to track my food mentally each day and try to balance it out over the course of a week.  This has become common practice for me because I have always struggled with my weight.

I come from a family that never taught portion size or proper nutrition.  As a child, my family always ate dinner together even if it meant we ate at 8:30pm after snacking all day on junk.  We also had to eat everything on our plates before we were allowed to leave the dinner table.  This is a practice that I will never do to my children.  Because of my past I am able to better relate to children who have never had dietary expectation laid out for them.  I think nutrition has to be taught to children as a give and take.  If you want a doughnut, have one and enjoy it.  Your next meal should be lower in carbs and higher in vegetables, like a salad and your beverage should be water or milk.  Children really need to understand the makeup of items.  Do they contain empty calories, carbs, proteins, or sugar?  People believe this to be common knowledge, but portion size and food content carries a standard based on family knowledge not common knowledge.  A lot of families feel that any food is good and are too busy to create a meal from start to finish.  Transferring knowledge to the child is empowering and allows them to make informed decisions about their own diet.

Another aspect of health that I appreciate and hope to model is one of physical fitness.  It is hard to find time in the day to exercise.  When my children were little, I could strap them in the double stroller and run.  Now that they have out grown it, I have to set aside time in my day with child care in mind to get some exercise in.   I know a lot of people don't like to exercise mid-day because it makes for a sweaty afternoon, but sometimes that is my only option.  When I worked in corporate I would spend my lunch hour at the gym, so I had more time with my family at the end of the day.  I may implement the same practice with teaching.  This both gets me moving and models good behavior for students.  The mood enhancement, ability to button my pants and physical strength are definitely more important than a little afternoon sweat.  I also try to involve my children with my exercise by racing them around the neighborhood and playing on the play ground with them.  Monkey bars are really hard to do as an adult!  I hope that my love of trying new things and running silly races will inspire other kids who are not the skinniest or the best at a particular sport to just get out there and try something new.

HC day 8

Sad to say this is my last post because this class was fun.  I really enjoyed learning about the different aspects of health within an adolescents education.  I learned that health not only encompasses the physical body, but mental and social health and awareness too.

HC day 7

Hello table people,
SO the other night while sitting on the couch my daughter said, "do you know that babies come out down here."  Hmm "where did you hear that?" "Oh from my friend." "Well, she's right." And now today I'm realizing that this summer is the time that I need to start having the sex education talk with my 1st grader.  I haven't really started it and after reading the "birds and the bees" article for the week, I think that I will use it this summer to give her some more information. 

HC day 6

I learned that candy and medicine do look a lot alike.  I am going to have to be more aware of the products in my household, as well as the products that my children will see at other people's homes.  It also reminds me of the dangers of teenagers and the mixing of drugs from medicine cabinets.  Children learn to indulge in many sweets at one time, so it is difficult to get them to understand the dangers of mixing medicines.

HC day 5

Today I learned about the importance of reporting suspected abuse.  Although this "secret" reporting is required, I feel comfort in the fact that I am required to report.  I'm equating it to England's rule that if you see an accident - you have to stop and offer assistance.  Why wouldn't we as parents and members of a community want our children taken care of?  I appreciate the additional information on "what to look for?" and how to respond appropriately.

HC day 4

I learned that although it is nice to plan a lesson with multiple people, it's hard to team teach with four adults.  It is also a lot of fun to watch adults try to act like 1st graders.  I enjoyed listening to them complain about the quality of the crayons they were given during our drawing assignment.

HC day3

Today I learned a lot about food labels and the information that they don't include.  I consider myself to be a fairly healthy person, but I was surprised to see how much information I fail to review on packages.  As a family we try to eat whole foods and stay away from prepackaged meals, but we do eat granola bars, cereal and crackers.  I feel like I need to review those items more often and make a more successful decisions.  I also try to keep sugar in check with my children and am trying to teach them how to balance items to create a successful diet.  After today's lesson on the amount of sugar found in beverages and packaged foods, I need to make sure that I really have a handle on the items that they have access to on a daily basis.  In our house I am able to monitor their intake of "junk", but it is increasing more difficult as they go on play-dates with friends and to club meetings.  Other parents seem to want to celebrate every event for children with lavish sugary treats.  

HC day2

I learned how to use Earls when planning a lesson.  Although I have used them once before, I still struggle with the understanding of "How many are appropriate?" when building a lesson plan.  The other aspect of their use that I need to sort out is "How many do I use across a calendar year?"  Do I need to use all of the Earls in each subject or just focus on one for each subject?

HC day 1

Health class is considered separate from sciences by most and is not treated as a subset of the science curriculum.  I wonder if students would in fact gain more knowledge of science through the use of more easily relatable subject matter such as food and body chemistry.
It also sounds like health class otherwise known as "sex ed" in my schooling has changed to encompass more information on personal safety, nutrition and fitness.  It seems like this class could empower a lot of students and change circumstances for many by showing a model for positive living and well being with a support system for those in need of change.

Poverty

After all of our discussions, the one topic that I feel I have learned the most from is poverty.  I understand that poverty is not something someone wishes for and when I think of poverty I often think about the part of society in government housing.   

In my experience, government housing is where all of the people who are struggling with alcohol and drugs live.  They are the part of society that has given up hope and is too lazy to pull themselves off of government help.  I don’t associate this group of people with immigrants or hard working people that live at the poverty line, because in my experience those groups of people live differently.  In my experience, those groups live in rental homes.  Immigrants tend to travel in groups or families and several members of the extended family will rent a home.  Each independent family will then share a room.  For Americans this would never work, but for people come from countries with smaller homes or apartments  an entire house is a lot of room.  

Part of my reason for laying the framework of my experience is because I have always felt like the different levels of poverty have different circumstances and values regarding education.  Most immigrants believe that education and opportunity is everything and that is why they risked it all for a better life for their family and children.  To me this is a sharp contrast to the children whose parents are lost in a world of abuse, drugs, and addiction.  I always assumed that they didn’t care about education or helping their child succeed in the world.  I assumed that they figured their child’s fate would be similar to theirs.  

It never occurred to me until our discussion on poverty that people in poverty were viewed as one class and lumped together with the shared title of "poverty".  It also didn’t occur to me that the most common reason that parents were not appearing to support their children was because of intimidation.  It seems so clear now as a reasonable assumption, but I really did need to have it pointed out to me.  If you left a failed system of education, most of the time with out mastery or a degree, it would be intimidating to send your child into the same structure.  The educational format hasn’t changed much, it has just become more difficult.  The presence in the school environment has remained similar over the years.  If you, as a child were intimidated, just entering the structure of the building would give the same sense of despair.  Knowing that your child's success will most likely be independent of your influence because of prior circumstances would create a sense of withdrawal in their educational life.

Gender

In the preparation for our presentation of gender roles we had some amazing conversations about gender, roles, impact, and shifts in gender roles.  We discussed whether children are setup from day one with the expectation to conform to an unwritten set of rules.  We discussed if the gender of siblings and birth order had any impact on the gender roles of a child?  What I ultimately discovered is that gender is impacted by everything and everything is impacted by gender.  Girls with older brothers and boys with older sisters are different than sibling with the same gender.  Why?  I’m still not sure if it is the exposure to different toys or just exposure to a different gender?  

I cannot think of a topic without relating it to gender and that was our biggest struggle as a group.  Finding a good mix of topics and conversations that we could contain and keep within a range.  Gender is one of those topics that can be seen in everything.  Do more people turn out for a girls’ basketball game than a boys’ basketball game? Why?  Do jobs become careers when they are held by men? Why are cooks women and chefs men?  Why is it okay for men to ride motorcycles, but not women?  Why is it the woman’s responsibility to prepare dinner?  Everywhere you turn you can see an issue containing gender. 

What I learned from this presentation was how to take my observation of gender and pull it apart to decipher the impact.  How will this impact a student?  How can I make this student feel included when an issue of gender is in the way?  This could be anything from have same sex parents to having a female student from a culture that doesn’t hold her in high esteem.  How will I as a person who was raised with the idea of equality and pride in working women deal with issue of gender?  Do I conform to the ideas within the culture to make the student feel comfortable? Or do I educate and allow the student to discover other options with the understanding that they may feel alienated?  These are the issues that I feel I will always struggle with.  I’m not a person who has to be all or nothing, but how do I gently rock the boat without sinking the ship?  

Gender is an issue that will never go away and will manifest itself in many ways.  I am interested to the see what future generations will fight for for their boys and girls.  The roles are constantly shifting and changing.  Right now there seems to be a big shift to men as the “stay at home” parent.  As a teacher I will need to be sure that I support all families and children, while staying current with gender trends.  Especially as the roles shift into territory that is not the “standard.”

inclusion

The idea of community established by “You can’t say you can’t play” presents the idea of inclusion.  I’m not sure if forced inclusion is a good idea.  The artificial nature in which children are taught to deal with one another seems to carry consequences that could be detrimental to their development.

The overall idea to include children into games and play by making it mandatory could potentially allow access to children who were not allowed access before, but it may cause the children who are forced to play to become resentful.  Exclusion is never fun, but it can bring up issues amongst children that can assist them in peer relationships and societal structure.  If a child is automatically included in play and not given checks or balances by their peer group they are forced to receive all true input from their family.  I think it is problematic for a child to be crying in her cubby daily, but why is she truly crying?  Is it because her parents allow her to use emotions to control a situation?  Is it because she has limited scope on relationships with peers? Or frankly, is it that the other girls don’t allow her to play because they are mean spirited?  In any of these circumstances, I think a better solution is to deal with the problem at hand and not force play amongst peers.  

Teaching tolerance and respect for others might be a better approach to dealing with young children.  It would teach them to understand people's differences and appreciate the person they are with out forcing play.  The children through lessons and stories can develop their own rational for dealing kindly in situations.

When children are young they understand the lessons and stories about being helpful and to not be afraid to stand up for what is “not kind”.  I don’t think that forcing inclusion is necessary.  When a child has a voice and a forum to practice they will most often follow the path that sounds the most recognizable and reasonable.  If the information given to them about empathy is consistent and modeled it just becomes part of the life they lead.  

standardized testing

As we discuss testing in our classes, I wonder why are we concentrating on testing so much?  Are the teachers of the nation about to rise up together and fight testing?  I know that we are going to learn how to assess children without using testing and we will be the “test subjects” for this type of assessment, but is it because we are being offered the chance to learn how to remove testing from our students everyday life so we can make their experience more enlightening and less stressful? or is it because "the teachers" are working on their own plan to remove standardized testing from the classrooms of America?

I really don’t know the answer to this, but this is what I’m going to take away from these discussions.  Teach the way you want to teach and in a way that is interesting and creative.  Try to work with other teachers across subjects or plan topics across subjects to keep the children engaged and information affirmed.  Try to incorporate student discussion in both small group and large group to allow students to hear others ideas and build off them.  Add role playing and hands on projects to surround the student in the subject matter.  Use creative and subjective ways to assess students, so they don’t consistently feel the pressure of exams.    A variety of learning methods will reach students in different ways and open access to students that are often neglected.  The enrichment of students will come through their engagement in the classroom and not through the repetition of knowledge in the same format.  If you offer many methods of learning and assessment in a classroom children will feel confident in themselves as scholars and will pass tests with out feeling the pressure of the standardized test.

paperclip

So I watched a video late last night that discussed children and a paperclip.  It was based on a study of endless imagination and thinking.  When young children were asked "what can you do with a paperclip?" 98% had an endless stream of ideas.  A few years later only 32% of the children had multiple ideas.  A few years later the percentage dropped by half and continued until only 2% of the children could imagine multiple possibilities.  The premise of the study is that children go into the education system with an open mind, but with the consistent push to a single correct answer their ability to imagine possibilities is poisoned. 

How do we create an atmosphere that allows for multiple answers?  Open discussions provide a format for people to share information and move off each others ideas, but is that the only way?

I wonder if an effective method is to have several people in a class give answers to a question and then have teams of people try to prove why they believe one answer is more correct than another.  The key is that it should last over two class periods, so students have a chance to ponder independently.  The information they provide to support or defend an answer must be solid, not just "because."

Would this open method keep the creativity in the classroom and provide us with more imaginative thinkers?

celebration

I must admit that as a parent of a kindergarten child I was shocked to find out that I couldn't help out in the classroom.  I may have lost my head if the teacher then said "there won't be any holiday parties or birthday celebrations either".

After a discussion on religion in the classroom my eyes opened.  Not about religion, but about birthdays and holidays.  My daughter's teacher does a Valentine's Day party and a Harvest Festival party, but I really like the idea of no party.  I know that sounds kind of lame, but here are a few reasons to change your mind.

* Kids get so many sweets at school, scouts, clubs, etc. you can't even give them a special treat at home.
* Kids love art
* Birthdays go on forever and it really should be one day thing
* Exclusion of children from events because of religious or cultural reasons

I think I will implement art day instead of stuff your face with sugar and run around with a turkey on your head.  I will remove birthday celebrations from the classroom and replace them with recognize a student week.  They can bring in pictures and tell us about their life and family.  Lastly, I will close the year with a class celebration to recognize the community that we have built together and focus on the  strengths that we shared with the group.  There may even be awards for kindness, support and sharing.

That sounds better to me than a weekly round of "happy birthday" and store bought cupcakes.  
I wonder if the parents will see it that way....

Relating gender

After a discussion on gender and "how it applies to the classroom?" I wondered, how will it apply to my classroom?

I started thinking about phrases and comments that I've used when teaching.  I try to emphasize the many families that make up my community.  When I recently addressed some children during a Mother's Day art project, I emphasized that they could make the project for a special woman in their life.  A mother, grandmother, aunt, friend, or anyone that they wanted to give the wonderful gift to.

The way I think gender will relate to my classroom is through the acknowledgement that families are all different.  Some children have two mothers or two fathers, some have "traditional" parents and some don't have parents.  How I shape my references will determine whether each child feels included and accepted within their classroom community.

My fear is that I will not know how to react when I deal with a culture that has very strict "gender roles".  How do I tone down my feelings of equality when I deal with children from cultures that view girls as inferior?  I feel that this will be a challenge for me.  Do I conform to their views for the sake of cultural standard or do I shake it up by sharing my views of equality?

math=confidence?

After reading a section of "Improving Access to Mathematics" (Nasir & Cobb, Eds) that discussed the pressure of knowing math and how children cope with it, I observed a few Middle School math classes.  The interesting thing about the two classes I observed was the freedoms within the classroom.

The first class was comprised of students who excelled in math.  All of the students were placed in a "fast track" class of Geometry based on their tests in 7th grade.  Their behavior in the classroom was one of freedom.  If someone had a question their peer would get up and walk over to their desk and explain the answer with confidence.  They joked around with each other and had continual conversations and competitions in the classroom.  The were not embarrassed to ask questions and the lesson plans were open to "hands on" techniques because time was available for the teacher to explore options.

The next class was pre-algebra or 8th grade math, which is for the children who struggle with math.  The classroom turned into a dictatorship.  The children were quiet and unsure in their surroundings.  The freedom of interaction was replaced with children who literally folded into their seats.  The teacher who had time to experiment with "hands on" teaching was back to writing formulas on the overhead projector.  I don't think she was even aware of the stark differences in her teaching methods with the two classes.  She was limited to time available to prepare the children for the upcoming State mandated testing and wanted all of the children to succeed.  She moved to a quick method of relaying a mass of information to the children to prepare for the tests.

The children who could really use the "hands on" teaching with different methods of learning were not getting them, while the children who already grasped the concepts received another method of confirmation.  If the teacher was given an extra 1/2 hour per day with the class that was struggling I'm confident that those students would have a higher understanding of pre-algebra.  It also seems that math is a subject that builds confidence in children.  Those who get it are confident and those who don't fold and melt into themselves.

culture

I was feeling a little talked out about culture, until I read the Ayers chapter.  His views on “what culture is” are refreshing and gave me a new scope to view culture.  As I sit in discussion of culture and race I can help but feel disappointed for our white children.  I remember being assigned a culture poster as a child.  We had to make a poster with the flag of our genetic trail and offer new and exciting information on our culture.  I remember feeling really badly that day.  I grew up in Washington State for the most part and I didn’t have a prominent race in my blended family.  Some kids represented Japan and others represented Russia.  I couldn’t figure out how to represent half Scottish with part English, German, Jewish and the rest of my blended and not well documented ancestry.  I can’t imagine what the children today have to try to represent.

I just know that that day I did not feel special.  My family didn’t have any real cultural threads.  We were a mix of a white girl from New Jersey who grew up in a Jewish neighborhood and a Scottish guy from New Jersey that grew up in an Italian neighborhood.  Not really story that was poster worthy.  My daughter who is in kindergarten is already seeing some of the effects of racial identity in school.  She asks why the kids who speak Spanish get “special” reading time.  She doesn’t see it as a negative thing, she doesn’t understand why she can’t be a part of it.  Kids are seeing culture through their friends and are looking for their own culture to relate it to.

I really like that Ayers basically says that culture is not just a race thing it can be anything that you do in your house.  I think this is a wonderful sentiment and one that I will use when I assign the dreaded poster.  I don’t want to know about the country you came from, I want to know about the culture your family lives in.  Do you enjoy spicy food or are you vegetarian?  Do you play board games or video games as a family?  What hobbies do you do as a family?  If they happen to be based on a specific culture, great.  If not, that’s great too.  I would like the celebration of other cultures to be one where some kids are feeling badly about themselves, while others are making connections.

Subs

After the discussion of the Biklin article, I started to wonder if part of the reason teaching is looked down upon as a profession is because of the use of substitute teachers?  Now that I've made that statement I want to emphasize that there is nothing wrong with the use of substitute teachers or being a substitute teacher.  What I mean by this comment is that in any other industry your absence is not so "seamless".  For example, in the corporate world if you are out sick your work is waiting there for you when you get back.  All of your co-workers, clients and managers notice your absence.  Granted in corporate jobs you are not responsible for the well being of youth for several hours so you don't need someone to step into your role, but does the ability of others to "cover" your job make it seem less important or skilled?  I know that substitute teachers are only able to accomplish a few tasks during their presence to assist the class teacher and that the work is still there for the main teacher to finish upon return.  I would be interested to know if the public has the same perception of this "seamless" coverage?