Katherine Wendling

Reflective Paper

May 1st, 2023

My original goal for taking this course was to expand on my knowledge of physical

education and expand on the health education I received during undergrad. I was excited to see

the differences in lesson planning for physical education and health education. Two previous

methods I used in my teaching were displays and bulletin boards and mass media. These

methods changed through my time in this course because I learned that bulletin boards can be

cute, but also informational. The use of attention-grabbing pictures and colors is something I was

already implementing, but I think I could add puns, riddles or comic strips to interest other

students. (Gilbert, Sawyer & McNeill, 2015). Mass media is a method I enjoy including in my

teaching because it can relate to topics and current events that students are aware of and

interested in. Newspaper clippings can be harder to find in 2023 with many newspapers going to

online versions, but these changes can work better for students who are used to working with

technology. I learned that it is sometimes difficult to gain access to some forms of mass media

and it can become very expensive. (Gilbert, Sawyer & McNeill, 2015). This is a concern I will be

more aware of in the future when deciding what types of mass media, I would use in my

classroom.

A few changes I will be making to my teaching after taking this class are cultural

diversity, seating arrangements and using different methods to motivate students. Cultural

diversity is something I am always very aware of in teaching, but I think I could do better. Some

changes I would make would be to teach to the different populations of my students. I would
research different health disparities that effect certain ethnicities or cultures and make sure we

are completing topics on those disparities. I would also like to include a health research project

for students to complete based on their own cultures and ethnic backgrounds, even family

history. Seating arrangements is something not every teacher thinks about thoroughly and I think

this is something I learned is very important to the culture of the classroom. Different topics

would have different seating arrangements such as a circle, working in groups with desks in 4’s

or even just straight rows. This change is important to me so I can keep the classroom interesting,

while still sticking to what works best for my students and the positive environment of the

classroom. Using different methods to keep students interesting is the biggest change I will make

to my teaching after this course. I plan to make sure my students are intrinsically motivated and

want to learn in my class because it will benefit them in the long run. “Individuals tend to repeat

behaviors that are rewarded (reinforced).” (Gilbert, Sawyer & McNeill, 2015). Having a reward

system in the classroom is something I will utilize to motivate students to participate and

contribute to the class. This change is important to me because I know how to motivate students

in the gym for physical education, but it is totally different when it comes to being in a classroom

setting.

To evaluate these changes, I would want to give the students an opportunity to give me

feedback every month. These evaluations would include questions about the topics and lesson

within the last month, an area for recommendations or suggestion for new topics and things that

could be changed or fixed for next year. Students would receive an incentive for completing the

evaluations and being honest and appropriate when answering the questions. After reviewing the

evaluations, I would be able to consider the student’s feedback and make changes or

improvements where I think things could be improved. As a result of these changes, I hope that
students feel more comfortable in my classroom, they feel welcome, they are excited to learn,

and they respect and look up to me as their health education teacher.

A few priorities that I will include in my future classroom teaching will be to have lamps,

rugs and tennis balls on the bottom of student’s seats. These are things I have seen done in other

classrooms and are things I would like to add to mine to ensure a comfortable and inviting

learning space for my students. I will also plan to always have access to Chromebooks and a

paper copy of the assignment for students to choose what works best for them. This includes

having chargers, pencils and extra materials for lessons always on hand.

Creating a smart goal for me personally as a health and physical educator, to achieve for

my students and my classroom at the end of the year would be “Understand each student to the

best of your ability and continue to help them succeed throughout the entire year.” Throughout

this course and semester, I have learned more about what it means to be a great educator to my

wonderful students. I will take away many different new concepts, theories and methods to

teaching that I did not know about before taking this class. Overall, I know that the skills I

learned in this class are skills I will be able to use throughout my teaching career and hopefully

inspire some students to want to be just like me when they are older!

Self-Care

Looking back on journal number one, I think I did stick to some of my original plans to

keep up with self-care during this semester. I did not get the chance to read more books and I

think that will be hard one for me to integrate into my life other than when I am on vacation,

because I am so busy with other activities. I was able to continue walking with my students and

on the weekends with our puppy, Myra Jane at a local nature preserve. The social piece of my
self-care plan was the most difficult for me this semester because I moved away from home. My

friends were still only a phone call or text away and I did make a few new friends, but that is one

thing I think I should have worked on more this semester. I improved a lot in the organizational

category with not having to put everything away that day or minute and constantly straightening

up. My boyfriend, Zack helped me a lot with this category letting me know it’s okay to wait on

certain things.

Work has caused challenges and very positive moments for me this year. I have been

100% in the moment with my students, and I have spent a lot of my extra time going to their

extracurricular activities such as school sports, musicals and dance performances. This part of

teaching is the most rewarding to me when I arrive, and they are so happy and excited to see me

there supporting them. Overall, I think I have improved in some areas of my self-care plan, while

other areas need more work. Self-care is something that I think a lot of people do not take time to

analyze and realize what they could improve on. I also think that self-care is a lifetime challenge

that changes during different times in life and moving is a big challenge that will affect self-care.

I am grateful that I can look back on this assignment from the beginning of the year and work

towards pieces of the plan that I still need to improve on.

Bibliography

Gilbert, G. G., Sawyer, R. G., & McNeill, E. B. (2015). Health Education Creating Strategies

for

School and Community Health (4th ed.).