Auditory Learner - Jackie Steer

 IPads and Computers are a big part of Career and Technical Education. We are very appreciative that our school has the funds to support technology in the classroom. Many of the early childhood task require the students to learn how to be independent. My students can be found typing away as they work on research papers that relate to early childhood, creating parent newsletter, or brochures on particular child development topics. The students enjoy exploring the IPads for fun, interactive games for preschool children.

I do allow my students to listen to music on Friday's when they are finishing their theory work and planning their lesson plans for the upcoming week in preschool.  When you listen to music, much more is happening in your body than simple auditory processing. "Music triggers activity in the nucleus accumbens, a part of your brain that releases the feel-good chemical dopamine and is involved in forming expectations. At the same time, the amygdala, which is involved in processing emotion, and the prefrontal cortex, which makes possible abstract decision-making, are also activated," according to Science Journal.

 A typical day in the preschool classroom! Here some of my students are helping give out directions to the game "Hokie Pokie." The students were identifying different body parts and listening to the directions given by the high school students... "that's what it's all about."

A tour of 5th graders got the chance to come into the early childhood program and participate in a lesson plan. One of the 5th graders was able to read the story, "If you Give a Mouse a Cookie"to the preschool classrooms. We followed up the reading with a writing activity where the 5th graders helped the preschoolers to if you give a ____ a ____. They came up with all kinds of cute stories for example: If you give a horse a horn, it will turn into a unicorn. The 5th graders discussed what the preschoolers wanted and wrote it for them. Together they colored their story page. I ended up making the 5th grade visit into a classroom book. The final part of the activity was to eat warm chocolate chip cookies, made by my early childhood students of course!

This is an example of an auditory lesson that involved a little bit of tactile learning as well. The math coach and I co-taught a lesson on graphing. I try to incorporate all of the learning modalities when it comes to teaching the high school students but a big part of their learning comes from direct instruction. I have to share with them the information about child development for them to be able to model, demonstrate, and apply it to the preschool students.