Slide 1

UCF Students Presents:

Growing

Glowing

Garden

A week long of

fun and exciting

Activities all about

How We Grow!

Provided to you by:

Osma Castro

Angela Martin

Elaina Herrin

Danelle Evans

Jason Sanchez

Caitlin Butler

1

Crystal Lake Elementary

After School Program Pre- K and Kindergarten

Mrs. Van Rees (certified ESE) 24 Total Children

4 ESE Students 2 ESOL Students 3:30 5:30 Mon Fri

We created a program, which initiated from wanting to help Haiti and learn about ourselves in the process.

2

Monday: Growing by Helping Others

Making a Name Necklace

Making a Quilt for Haiti

If Your Happy and You Know It Digital Presentation

Tuesday: We Are Growing

Popsicle People

Rhythm Sticks

Caterpillar Clips

Wednesday: Growing and Grooving

Read it Aloud

Grooving It.

Graph It

Thursday: Art in the Garden

Rock Coloring

Growing Big Dance

Story Rock

Friday : Jack and the Beanstalk

Leaf Mobile

Jack and the Beanstalk

Have you Filled your Bucket?

Our Itinerary for the Week

3

Flyers We Made For Parents & Staff

4

Growing Glowing GardenTIA|UCF Team Members

We have spent most of our planning time brainstorming about activities and working with the Principal of Crystal Lake and the Afterschool Director. We have come up with flyers, permission slips for photos, and a flyer that introduces our group members. We have arrange our week that 3 group members will be there everyday except on Monday when all members will be there. Each member will have 5 hours of actual time during the week with the students. The counselor for this class told us there are numerous children that are hearing impaired, one child with a developmental delay , and one child with a moderate form of Autism.

The Following Slides Are Our Individual Reflections about our Day!

6

Elaina Herrin

This was an exciting project for me that was a great lesson in organizing and time management. Since we were working with my daughters school I became the liaison between our group and the Administrators .

My day was Monday, after we made our Name Tags, we briefly discussed Haiti and how we wanted to do something to help them. Each child took precut pieces of a house and as a group we placed them together on felt. The children were very happy with the outcome, later I took the quilt home and put it together (washable fabric glue No Sew!) for the finished product. On Friday, I brought it back so all the children could see.

Since I knew we would be working with a variety of children I wanted to create a visual project I knew they would all enjoy. With the help of the storybook, If Your Happy and You Know It I produced a little digital video that would coordinate with the song.

7

Elaina: I learned many specific tips from our teacher, Mrs. Van Rees. While she pretty much let us do our thing she consistently monitored Adam, a high functioning autistic in the Pre K program. I noticed how she would see warning signs in Adam and preemptively used strategies to keep him from getting to upset. Once he became frustrated with his coloring she pulled him aside and asked to see Adams happy face again, to which a larger frown appeared.

She tried another

approach; she asked

him to smell the

roses (breath through

nose) and blow out the

candle (exhale through

the mouth) a perfect

for technique for all

children (and adults).

About the Exceptionalities:

He went back to the and seemed to fit back in but I think she saw some other clues that I was missing because she took him away from the table and asked

him to take a break on the bean bags. He sat there for awhile playing with the stuffed animals and reading a book. When we transitioned into another activity he came and joined us and completely enjoyed making the next project. He was thrilled when he completed his garden about himself and proudly showed his mother when she walked in.

8

Osma Castro

Wednesday February 24th

Graphing & Grooving

Team Members

Osma & Jason

9

Osma Castro

On Wednesday February 24th, Jason and I worked on the following:

10

Osma Castro

As the lesson/activities developed all the children were working at a great pace and were actively engaged in all the planned activities. However, it began with one of the students with an exceptionality (Freddy) who was mishandling the classroom materials and tools such as the scissors. The certified teacher supervising our Teachers in Action Project asked this student to stand at a corner as an intervention method to have the student reflect on his unsafe poor choice.

Next, the student with autism had a frustrating incident because he drew numbers with a crayon and accidentally made an error writing #2 and could not move past that error. The teacher approached him to find out what was wrong and interrupted his emotional behavior by assigning her assistant to take him to the reading corner. The teacher and the assistant selected a well illustrated and printed book which kept such student engaged while the other students continued with their learning.

Finally, there was a third student who perhaps is a gifted student who had his incident. He was the first one to complete the given activities and was engaged, one after the other, at a much faster pace compared to his peers. He was the first one sitting waiting for the activity to be completed and be modeled by my example. While the other students were trying to figure out the graph game by counting syllables, he was ready to do the challenging words and became frustrated waiting that he began to cry in an outburst that he wanted to finish.

At the end, the movement song used by Jason was enjoyed and done by all the students including Freddy and Juan Diego. As to Adam, the assistant and the teacher had to interrupt him from continuing to look at the same book and brought him back to the class activities because otherwise he would just stay sitting in the reading corner by himself.

Osma CastroExceptionalities

Unfortunately, I felt a bit distress from what I experienced with these specific students. I realized that the first student I noticed was more of a behavioral aspect where immediate attention is needed for that student to reflect on his actions. However, with respect to the possible gifted student, I learned that even when I was giving him challenging work he still held a power to be first in everything. Therefore, as a future teacher, I believe I would have to be consistent in leading him to understand that giving out a bit of his power to the other students will help him develop his social skills and reinforce his own knowledge.

As to the other student with autism, I learned that it requires lots of patience, fast thinking when implementing strategies, and setting up the classroom with a specific area that accommodates that student to intervene their emotional behavior. I wanted to learn how the student with autism would be placed the following year. Ms. Van Rees explained that the student may be referred to an accommodating school where there is more adult instruction and assistance and less student ratio to provide the needed attention.

I also found it interesting how the teacher uses body movements, dance, and music to allow these students to participate and dissipate much of that energy that blocks their learning. I remember entering the room and the students where singing a song and each student would come on up and show their dance moves and Adam was one who was really grooving it!

Osma Castro Lesson & Activity

Osma Castro Lesson & Activity (cont.)

Graph It!

Growing Glowing Garden

Handprints that Grow

Danelle Evans- Fridays Activities:

My assigned day was Friday. I thought it would be a great idea to incorporate a famous literature piece, Jack and The Beanstalk to our Glowing Growing Garden theme. I read aloud the book Jack and the Beanstalk to the children and they loved it! Afterwards we then made our own beanstalks with paper plates and color construction paper. Before Friday I cut the plates in a shape of a spiral and small pieces of construction paper for the children to use. They then designed their beanstalk whatever way they wanted to. It was a great fun activity for the children to be creative.

Afterwards we really got hands on and planted our own beanstalk. The children each had a cup where they planted their own lima beans with the soil and shovel I brought to class. They really enjoyed planting their own beanstalk. It was great to see the children's excitement and hope that it would grow as tall as Jack's beanstalk beanstalk. Once we completed the project the children took their craft and plant home for their parents to see.

I read to the children Jack and the Beanstalk. This book was a pop up version that I had when I was younger.

We then made our own

beanstalks. Each beanstalk

was unique with their own

choices of color.

We got our hands dirty planting our own beanstalk to take home! The kids loved it!

* Activities planned for Friday by Danelle Evans

16

Danelle Evans Exceptionalities:

On Friday, I had a child who was slightly autistic, his name was Adam. He was great and I made sure he was comfortable and understood what was going on around his environment. I also tried to interact with Adam for a while, since he was a bit unsociable. I asked his friends around him and Adam some questions to get them to socialize together, it seemed to help, since Adam was talking.

Adam taught me a great deal of patience. Directions were always repeated for him to follow. Being repetitive helps Adam stay on task. I know repeating can get old but seeing the outcome of his projects was really worth it. He truly was a great child to work with and I am grateful to have such an amazing opportunity to work with Adam.

Danelle Evans - Teamwork

We all worked really well together as a team. It was a great idea for each of the members to pick a day and plan out activities. Communication and support are sometimes problems when working in a group, but not ours. Luckily most of us are enrolled in courses with each other, so we could catch up. However, even if some of us were not in the same class, we communicated constantly through emails. With that being said no one was left out of the loop. We also had a very supportive group that worked well with each other. We made sure that each member had enough supplies and help on that day. It was great to see what we all accomplished together. It was a great experience that I'm sure we will never forget!

18

Caitlin Butler

My day was Tuesday. I worked with Jason and Elaina. First, the students created little caterpillars with clothes pins. They used these caterpillars to clip onto their name tag. Next, we made little gardens.

Activity: My growing garden

Materials:

Small Styrofoam box (planter) (green foam)

Crayons/ colored pencils

Scissors

Glue stick

Pencil

Popsicle sticks (1 person shaped and 2 regular sticks)

Decorative cutouts (1 rainbow, 1 sun)

Purpose:

The idea of this activity is for students to think about all the stuff they like and like to do. On one stick they will create a picture of themselves (or use a cutout), by gluing it on. They will be given two other sticks to create pictures (on cutouts) to describe themselves. Students will then take the Styrofoam box and decorate it with the construction paper. This box will become the planter for their Popsicle sticks. The end product will be a beautiful garden of themselves!

19

Exceptionalities

On Monday, I worked a little with a boy named Eli. He

was totally deaf. I was very impressed by how he well

he followed directions and completed his activity. The

teacher told us that he looks and follows other

students. I was surprised though to learn that he

didnt sign very much. The teacher only said that he

signs for the bathroom and eating.

Caitlin Butler:

20

Jason Sanchez:

My Grooving activities included Listening and Dancing.

I felt that it would be fun to get the children to engage all physical and mental muscle groups for coordination, listening, dancing, gross motor skills and cardio. The children seemed to have fun with it because when we first visited the class they were already doing fun dancing. I believe this could be used as a warm-up to wake the kids up and get the energized for any class activity or even a fun cool down after a days work.

Jason Sanchez:

On the days I was in the classroom, I worked more with Adam who was a boy with autism. When we were working on the graphs we ran into a problem where he had drawn the number 2 wrong. He could not get over the mistake and started crying. When his teacher came over, she told him to go to the quiet center and pick out a book he liked. After

about twenty minutes he was able to come back to the table and finish his work. I have never seen anything liked it but she knew what he needed to get over the hump and I thought that was very interesting . The teacher explained to me how she handles these problems and it was very helpful for my future knowledge.

Angela Martin:

On Thursday during the rock coloring activity I spent some time with Juan Diego. I noticed he had finished coloring his rock ahead of the others in the class and was persistent in wanting to color a flower rock. Each student was given one rock to color and he did not understand why he could not color the flower rock tool and wanted to know what he was supposed to be doing next. At that point I realized just engaging in conversation was not satisfying. Ms. VanRees, the teacher in the classroom reiterated to him what I had said to Juan Diego. To keep his attention I had him gather the art materials at the table he was at when we were about to move to the carpet to read The Tiny Seed. As a future teacher I know I will experience situations like Juan Diego and will give me the experience needed to enhance the learning experience.

Angela Martin

My day was Thursday, art in the garden. Caitlin and Danelle worked with me. The students started off by using markers to color a white mushroom with a snail or a flower rock. The students enjoyed making their rock their own. Next, I read The Tiny Seed by Eric Carle. After the story each student did a seed dance together as a class relating to the book The Tiny Seed. The students all crouched down to the ground like a tiny seed and eventually stood tall like a flower after being watered and being in the sun. To get the students moving we did a sticky dance to instrumental music. Caitlin, Danelle and I placed duct tape sticky side out around each student s shoe and danced away.

Angela MartinWhite Carnation ExperimentWe thought it would be a fun activity for the students to create an experiment that they could take home and observe the changes. Each student got a Styrofoam cup with a lid, two white carnations and the color of their choice for the water using food coloring. After the students put together their carnation cup they would be able to see the changes the following day.

25

Growing Glowing GardenTIA|UCF Team Members

Our group was very fortunate to have each member as we have other classes together and personally know each other. As evidenced by the next slide, our group held productive discussions every Monday through Thursday after our other UCF courses. In addition, our group had many lengthy e-mail transmissions with ideas, feedback, attachments, and updates. As a group, we all shared the different roles of being the finder, the grinder, and the binder when we narrowed our location, fulfilled the school requisites, prepared the requested documents inviting the school, the students and parents to the planned activity, decorating our invitations to our TIA program, committing to a schedule and a cohesive activity theme, and gathering and purchasing the materials needed for each days activity. We implemented a UCF dress-code, we communicated each day after our assigned activity to cover all basis, and we implemented a wonderful and exciting theme of helping others with a Growing Glowing Garden topic for each day making the activities developmental and educational with integration purposes. Ultimately, on the first day we were thrilled to share the planned activity of creating a quilt with its art & crafts component and to share the rest of the weeks fun planned activities. That first day is when we all began to spot the specific students with exceptionalities and we knew we were there to learn from them so that as future teachers we can help our own assigned students the best possible way.

26

Growing Glowing GardenTIA|UCF Team Members

Timesheets for Planning TIA Project

27

Name:__________________________________________________

Fruits Color and cut out

pear plum strawberry

apple grapes peach

orange lemon cherry