Food Journal Reflection

            I really enjoyed creating a food journal and keeping track of my daily food intake and the different activities that I did each day. It was kind of hard at first to remember to write in my food journal every time I ate something but after awhile it started to become a second nature to me. During my first week of the journaling I noticed that my food intake was very balanced when it came to fruit and vegetables but I noticed that although I ate healthy during the day my dinner was not always the healthiest. After having the discussion about the food plate I realized that creating a food journal is a great way to keep track of the different items someone should have each day to maintain a balanced healthy diet. I think that I am going to continue using a food journal and keep track of my daily intake of food and beverages. After having the lesson on sugar it has really influenced how much sugar I intake and which sugars are good and bad for someone. At the end of the first week of our journaling assignment we were told to create a goal of something we wanted to change for the next week of journaling.

Last week I did not do as much activity as I should have but sometimes it is really hard to be motivated when I am in school all day and have homework to do at night. I decided to make my goal to add more activity to each day this week and so far I have done a pretty good job at adding more activity to my daily routine. I worked all weekend, so I got a lot of activity because I was on my feet for hours. Because the weather was so nice I decided to go on a few different walks after class as well as swim in the pool because it was hot and I know that swimming is a great source of exercise. I am hoping that I can come up with a routine where daily activity is one of my main priorities and that I can make time for it each day.

            Last year I taught a nutritional unit to 5^th graders and part of their homework was to create a food journal/activity log and record what they ate each day for a week and what activity they did as well. It was a great learning experience because it showed me that 5^th graders had a very hard time remembering to write in their journal and sometimes I felt like they were just copying day to day. Having students create a journal helped them to understand the lesson of nutrition and allow them to see what they eat every day. I think when you are teaching health to students it is very important to allow the students to see what they are eating and how much activity they are getting each day, so they can evaluate their actions and how it can affect them long term in the future. This assignment was great because it allowed me to set a goal and work on achieving which is very important when it comes to teaching students because goal setting is a great way for students to understand the meaning of the lesson and what they should get out of it. 

Day 8 of Health and Fitness

Today was our last day of health and fitness and it was a great class! I have learned so much over the past 3 weeks and I have gotten some great resources that will be very helpful in the future when I am teaching these lessons to my own students. I have learned how important it is to ask probing and leading questions to help students start their thinking and how important discussion is for students to get their ideas and thoughts out in the open. I never knew how important the brain was when it comes to your social and emotional health, your brain doesn't only involve your mental health but it is important for your physical health as well. Exercising not only keeps your body healthy but it also keeps your brain healthy as well. I think it is important to teach students about all the essential elements of health and that they know that balance and moderation are key to keeping a healthy system. I can't wait to teach health and science together in my own classroom!

Day 7 of Health and Fitness

(I wrote this on paper because I was not able to get to a computer yesterday) Today was an interesting day. We learned about different methods about teaching reproduction and sexual health. It was a great learning day because some people are uncomfortable with talking about certain terms but after learning different methods of teaching about the topic i think most people started to feel a little more comfortable. I think in general it is important know that there are going to be topics that teachers feel more confident teaching then others and I do think sexual health is one of those topics that I at first felt uncomfortable talking about but now i feel that i could teach the topic to a class especially after seeing a microteaching on it and participating in Carrie's lessons and methods.

Day 6 of Health and Fitness

Today was a great day! I got to teach my first lesson with my group on media literacy. Overall I think it went really well. We worked great together coming up with different ideas and trying to make a cohesive presentation. It was a great learning experience because we got some good feedback on what to improve and what strengths we had in our lesson. I think our lesson would be a great lesson to teach to 8th graders but there are things that we could have changed and I plan on putting that in my new lesson plan as changes like for example putting up both videos on a power point for the students to view and maybe picking out before and after images for students  to compare to one another. All of these suggestions are very helpful when figuring out changes for our lesson. Today I also learned how important it is to teach children about the differences between certain products, medicines, and candies. It is very important to teach children what to look for and that they should not try anything without talking to an adult. I am looking forward to creating more lesson plans in the future and developing a repertoire for all the different lessons my classmates have presented.