What’s On My Desk?

Developing an effective and thorough geography lesson takes a lot of effort. It can be daunting through all the hours of research, creation, and planning—oftentimes, we don’t necessarily have the time to spend on it — especially, if we have children and other responsibilities such as taking care of our aging parents, paying bills, keeping the yard mowed and house clean, in addition to other responsibilities outside of work, etc. To save time, it is okay to borrow lessons from others, here and there, if offered. I am sure they have spent a great amount of time and effort in developing them. In saying this, however, we all need to be willing to share our lessons, and divide the time equally. One person shouldn’t always be doing all the work and putting in all the time. They share theirs; you share yours.

I have strived for excellence in my lessons, and my personal life has often paid the price. But whatever I sacrificed, I did it for my students because I wanted them to have the best education possible. There is a reason I decided to go into education—to give others a better education than I felt I received. Do it differently. Make it fun and exciting! There had to be a better way to educate than the redundant question & answer concept. Some teachers who influenced my decision to become a classroom teacher were (1) my 5th grade English teacher, Mrs. Roberts, who always made her students feel loved and cared for and created an environment in which I could thrive and not feel anxious about our performances. I remember seeing her at my weekend softball games and thought to myself, “She really cares!” Then, there was my senior language arts teacher, Ms. Valerie Thomas; she was young, spry, and enthusiastic. I was a heavy daydreamer, and I remember wondering what her life was like outside the classroom. But most of the time, she kept my attention. She taught me that education was more than worksheets and end-of-the-chapter questions. The most memorable lessons were Simon’s and Garfunkle’s Bridge over Troubled Water poetry lesson (One reason I love incorporating music in the classroom) and The Scarlet Letter book study. When she had us write essays, she walked from student to student giving us pointers and feedback—rather than sitting behind her desk, as most teachers did at the time, waiting for us to complete our work quietly and turn it in. She wanted to make sure we were able to master our writing skills, and I did!

I have always tried to reach for excellence in my planning and teaching, and as I continue to develop and create lessons for the geography classroom, I hope for easy-to-use, fun, high-level, challenging, multi-level lessons.

WHAT AM I CURRENTLY WORKING ON?

Teaching population trends can be challenging, but it can be fun! I am currently developing, Population Trends: A Geographical Study of Distribution and Density, which incorporates various disciplines such as math calculation and graphing, language arts, and technology. It focuses on the causes and effects of population trends and distribution throughout the world, in addition to population sparsity and density—while giving students autonomy in their learning through choices. Students can choose to create a hardcopy population pyramid chart with the resources provided or use Google (with provided instructions) to create a population pyramid. They also have freedom in choosing what population trends they find most interesting to study. This lesson will incorporate group reading, a cooperative learning activity having students create population pyramids, exit cards, and more!

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