Blog Post #1

Background
Hey everyone! As you may know, my name is William Brown, but I go by my middle name Brody. I am from a small town in north Alabama called Arab, just south of Huntsville. I double major in Social Science and History of Secondary Education. My favorite of the two is History because the subject has interested my since an early age and I've had several teacher influences in the subject. I decided to attend USA after two years at Auburn University for several reasons. One major reason was to be closer to my girlfriend, Taylor. I also have family in the area and they are very important in my life.

I have a close relationship with my family. I have two older brothers, the oldest lives in Marietta, Ga. and the other lives with me in Daphne. My parents are no longer together, they divorced when I was younger. My mother still lives in my hometown and my father lives in Okeechobee, Fl. I feel in love with History in 6th grade, I had an excellent teacher who showed me that learning could be fun. My grandmother was a teacher for a number of years and everyone who had her always said she was the best teacher they had. You could say she is my role model as a teacher because she helped so many students lives.

My Classroom
I plan on teaching high school in subjects that fall under Social Science. I aim to make my class fun and exciting, that means I will have to make my teaching style fun and exciting. I will always have to up beat and exciting while I teach my students.

As I previously stated, my students will be in high school, their ages will range from about 14 to 18 years. I cannot tell you how they will learn, but I will teach them ways I used when I was their age. Most of the material covered in Social Science can be studied by note or flash cards. I believe that is the easiest way to memorize the people, terms, dates, etc.

In the learning process, I will use several tools to help my students. I will use power points during my class discussions to help the students keep up. Then I will email the power points to the students or printout the notes for the ones that may not have an email. I am not a big fan of textbooks, but I do know I will be forced to issue them in a public high school. I would also like to issue secondary books that would fit the topic, to help the students understand the topic better.

I am a very neat an organized person and my classroom will reflect that. However I do not want to be a teacher who doesn't allow food or drinks into the classroom, I will expect my students to pick up after themselves. I would like my classroom to be a good atmosphere for my students. I hope to have up to date technology in the room, but I know that will most likely be up to the school system financial means.

Randy Pausch on Time Management
The first thing I learned from Dr. Pausch's video is goal setting. When setting a goal you need to ask why you are doing it instead of just doing it. Next, is to ask yourself what is the goal and how do you get to it. Third, you need to ask yourself what happens if I do not accomplish the goal? Will you be punished for not doing the goal or would it go by unnoticed? The next thing I understood from the video, is not to focus on doing things right, Pausch thinks that can be very dangerous. It is much more important to do the right things than to do the wrong things beautifully.

Another key topic in the video is experience. It is very valuable and there is no easy way to get it. Meaning that experience comes from bad judgment and it is important to remember when things are going bad you gaining experience. The topic of planning is important also. It has to be done in multiple levels. For someone that is academics the levels may consist of what is needed to be done today, this week, and this semester. It is important to know that a plan will sometimes have to changed and you can't change it if you don't have one! To do list are good for when you have a lot on your plate. It helps to get the ball rolling and get your goals accomplished. The thing to remember with to do list is to start with the worst thing first.