Blog Post #1

About Me

My name is Stephen Alexander. I'm from Mobile Alabama and have lived here my whole life. My parents Jeff and Donna Alexander are both from Montgomery Alabama. They moved to Mobile in 1985 because of my dads job and have lived here ever since. My major interests could be narrowed down to three things, being active, enjoying the beach, and mission trips.
I attended the University of Southern Miss for two years, then decided to take a semester off and come back home and attend South Alabama. I choose to go into education because I enjoy making a impact on the youth in our society. Plus I promised my mom that I would get a degree. My heart is for missions, I travel to Guatemala twice a year and work at a orphanage that has over 500 kids living there. I hope to move there one day and do missions full time.

In The Future

In my future class room I think I will teach with a mixture of hands on and verbal instruction,in order to help every student understand the material. I personally understand things better when they are hands on, on the other hand other kids do better with verbal instructions. Teaching with a mixture of the two will help every student in my class succeed and ultimately retain the information.I am a laid back individual who enjoys a good joke. My teaching style will be fun and free flowing. I'm not one to take life too seriously. Do not look at that and think that I do not expect the very best out of my students, because I will, I just want my class to be enjoyable and interesting.
My students will be expected to learn the information by first reading the assigned chapter and in addition the completion of the vocabulary words. This will give the students a foundation for understanding the material. Second, my students will be exposed to videos material that applies to and supports the course of instruction. The last thing I will do is assign projects for them to complete,something that will enhance the lesson and take a little work on the part of the student.
I will be teaching social science, so that could deal with anything from history to a psychology. I will be dealing with grades nine through twelve. I know I will have my work cut out for me. At that age they believe they already know everything, and its cooler not to care than to put effort into schoolwork. That is why I will have a free flowing class that is fun and interesting and its cooler to put effort into my class then to just sit there and do nothing.

Time Management Video

I learned from this video that its better to eat the biggest frog first. What I believe he is saying that its better to knock out the hardest part of something than to start with the easiest. Put the bulk of your energy into what's the hardest for you. I also learned that you should think about why you are doing something and how this can help you. To often I find myself looking at school work as a negative. When I start to look at it as a positive and start thinking about how this is helping me I understand how this will be beneficial for me in the future. I then find myself enjoying the whole process.