Monday, April 27, 2015

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder

            Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) can continue through adolescence and adulthood but it is one of the most common childhood “brain disorders” among the other disorders that there may be. Before the new name Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder came, it was called Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD).The symptoms may include difficulty staying focused on a particular task, paying attention, they have trouble controlling their behavior, and they have hyperactivity or over-activity. Without the proper treatment for ADHD, it can cause difficulty at home, school, at work, and getting along with other children or adults. With the proper treatment, however, most people with ADHD can be successful in school, at home, at work, and they could lead in their productive lives that they may have.
            There is no cure for the disorder but there may be treatments that can help relieve the symptoms of ADHD. The key behaviors of ADHD are inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsivity. To be diagnosed with ADHD, a child must have the symptoms for at least 6 or more months to be considered to have the disorder. Children who have symptoms of inattention may: Be easily distracted, they miss details, forget things, and they may change from activity to activity. They have difficulty focusing on just one thing. They become bored with an activity or task just after a few minutes, unless they are doing something fun and enjoyable. They have trouble paying attention with organizing, completing a task or learning something new in class. The student may have trouble completing or turning in homework. For example, they often lose some of their school supplies, such as, pencils, assignments, or pens in order to complete whatever their assignment is or activity. They don’t listen when someone is talking to them. They may daydream or become easily confused and move slowly. Apart from a normal person, they think differently like they have difficulty procession information as quickly and efficient as other people do. Lastly, they have trouble following instructions that are given to them. Children who have symptoms of hyperactivity may: move around in their seat, can’t stay in one spot for too long, talk nonstop, touch everything they see, be constantly in motion, and have trouble being quiet. Children who have symptoms of impulsivity may: be very impatient, say inappropriate comments, show their emotions without hesitating, and act without knowing what the consequences are, they have trouble waiting for things that they need or want when either playing a game or completing a task. Lastly, they often interrupt or intrude in others conversation or activity. This certain disorder of ADHD may be mistaken for other common problems.
            The causes of ADHD may be the genes that come in your family bloodline, environmental factors, brain injuries, sugar, and food additives. Treatments include medication, various types of psychotherapy, education and training, or a combination of treatments that may help the ADHD patient. The people who are in risk of this disorder can be any age but the average age is before the age of 7 years old. Learning, change in their lives, sleeping as well as getting along with others are the problems during this time of age in the ADHD patient person.
            There is no way to prevent Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). The use of cigarettes, alcohol, or other drugs during pregnancy may increase the rick of retrieving ADHD. So, I suggest that pregnant mothers to not smoke drink or do any drugs that may risk your child receiving this disorder ADHD. It is bad to do that; too, it could cause other disorders.
            There are many instructional strategies that can help student with ADHD. Teachers could help with their distractibility issues. They could help with their interrupting issues. The third thing that teachers could help with is impulsivity. The fourth difficulty that they could help with is fidgeting and hyperactivity. The last thing that they could try to help with is their following directions and getting along with others. For other issues, they could help with the subjects for if they like math, the teacher could help them master it and they could master in their homework at home. These are the instructional strategies that could help teachers who have students with ADHD. In conclusion, all of these facts and things about ADHD will help teachers, parents, and others to get to know about this disorder.

Resources:




How to Recognize ADHD Symptoms in Children” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GIx-JYdLZs





Wednesday, April 22, 2015

Christa McAullife: Reach For The Stars

            A social studies teacher from Concord, New Hampshire was selected to become NASA’s first civilian astronaut as documentary filmmakers Renee Sotile and Jo Godges explore the remarkable life of Christa McAullife, the educator who lost her life when the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded on January 12, 1986. She was one of the seven-crew members killed in the Space Shuttle Challenger explosion. She was selected from thousands of applicants for the journey into the stars; McAullife’s personal mission was to make space exploration exciting for school children everywhere. She received her bachelor’s degree in education and history from Framingham State College in 1970, and also a master’s in education supervision and administration from Bowie State University in 1978. She took a teaching position as a social studies teacher at Concord High School in New Hampshire in 1983.
             In 1985, she was selected from more than 11,000 applicants to participate in the NASA Teacher in Space Project and was scheduled to become the first teacher in space.  She was a member of the mission, STS-51-L. She planned to conduct experiments and teach two lessons from Space Shuttle Challenger. On January 28, 1986, the shuttle broke apart after 73 seconds or 1 minute and 13 seconds after the launch. After her death, schools and scholarships were named in her honor, and in 2004 she was awarded the Congressional Space Medal of Honor.
             During her early life, she was born on September 2, 1948, in Boston, Massachusetts. She was the oldest of five children of her dad the accountant Edward Christopher Corrigan of Irish descent and Grace Mary Corrigan, a substitute teacher, whose father was of Lebanese Maronite descent. Christa’s previous name before she changed it to Sharon Christa McAullife was Sharon Christa Corrigan. The year when she was born, her father was completing his sophomore year at Boston College. Then, in Boston, Massachusetts, Christa attended and graduated from Marian High School in 1966. After high school, she attended Framingham State College in her hometown, graduating in 1970. A few weeks later after she had graduated, she married her boyfriend whom she had known since high school, Steven J. McAullife, a 1970 graduate of the Virginia Military Institute. They moved closer to Washington D.C. so Steven could attend the Georgetown University Law Center. They had two children together, Scott and Caroline, who were only nine and six, when Christa died in the accident.
               Christa obtained her first teaching position in 1970. She was an American History teacher at Benjamin Foulois Junior High School in Morningside, Maryland. From 1971 to 1978, she taught history and civics at Thomas Johnson Middle School in Lanham, Maryland. In 1978, she moved to Concord, New Hampshire, when Steven a job as an assistant to the New Hampshire Attorney General. She taught 7th and 8th grade American History and English in Concord, NH in 9th grade English in Bow, NH, before taking a teaching position at Concord High School in 1983. She was a social studies teacher and taught many courses including American History, Law, Economics and in addition to that was her self-designated course: ”The American Woman”.
               In 1984, President Ronald Reagan announced the Teacher in Space Project, and Christa learned about it having the first civilian, an educator, to fly in space. On July 1, 1985, she was announcing one of the ten finalists, and on July 7, she traveled to the Johnson Space Center for medical examinations before the space flight. On July 19th, Vice President George Bush announced that she had been selected for the position. Unfortunately, a year after, January 12, 1986, she died in an explosion in a Space Shuttle.
               My thought on the movie was that she was a good astronaut and teacher. She was inspirational in a way. I liked her accomplishments and her job. It would be cool to go up into space. It was a great movie to watch about a woman who was so accomplished, brave, successful, and admired.

               Apart from her life, dreams, and goals, I have different dreams and goals to accomplish. I want to major in Law or Government. I want to either accomplish becoming a lawyer, senator of Alaska, Mayor, or the President of the United States of America. I have always had the dream of becoming the President of the United States of America. These are dreams and goals that I have that are different than Christa McAullife’s.

Resources: Christa McAullife: Reach For The Stars Documentary    

Monday, April 20, 2015

Why Teach in Alaska? By: Naomi Edenshaw

            Wáa sá iyatee. (wa-saw-ee-ya-tee). This is a way of saying hello in Tlingit. Killem iigahamna. This is Good morning in Aleut. My name is Naomi Edenshaw and I am a graduating senior and the FEA President. Sinoo dung hiigan. How are you? I am Haida, Tlingit, and I have a little Yup’ik blood in me. I know four languages; a little Aleut, Russian, Haida, and Tlingit. I am from the Eagle clan and there is also the Raven clan; which is the clan that my dad is from. My mom is the one to pass down the clan where I came from. I am from Hydaburg, Alaska, a small town in the Southeast area. I am currently 18 years old and I am the daughter of Rosalind Washington and Ivan Edenshaw. I grew up there in Hydaburg and when I turned 6 years old, I moved to Anchorage, Alaska and stayed here, up until I was in the eighth grade.  Then, I moved to Saint Paul Island, Alaska in 2008 and I have lived there for 7 years now. Okay, enough about me, my topic is Why teach in Alaska?
           
            Why teach in Alaska? We need our Alaskan teachers. Most of the teachers in Alaska are from out of state and only some are Alaska Native. Having Alaskan teachers can help keep the culture and language alive in Alaska and help reduce the teacher drop out rate. Alaska teachers connect to the students’ culture and they could help culture strive in the villages or city like Anchorage. In my community, we are losing people who know our language and culture. Our language is slowly starting to die out but we try to keep it alive. Our dancing is starting to die out too. We don’t have that many people who dance. My teacher is teaching Aleut to the younger generation and hopefully they will keep our culture alive. Alaska needs Alaska Native teachers. The teacher turnover rate in Alaska is bad and we need to overcome that and teach in Alaska as Alaska Native teachers in Alaska.

           We are the future. Future Educators of Alaska is growing our own Native educators in Alaska. Future Educators of Alaska is helping us to pursue our teaching careers. FEA benefits students in a very great way, like it has benefited me. I have been in FEA for three years now. I have been the Secretary of State, Vice President, and now I’m President. We are all apart of the Career Technical Student Organizations and it has impacted all of our lives in a very big way. We can change the world in Alaska. We can change the Alaska Native educator percentage in Alaska and easily make it increase to a bigger percentage of future teachers in Alaska. Future Educators of Alaska can also benefit teachers to give them the opportunity to become advisors and to share their happiness with their students to become the future educators in Alaska. Also, we can benefit communities. We can encourage others and inspire others to become educators and prosper in the career of education. Apart from that, we support the career development for Alaska Native college students and it acts as a vehicle to the students who plan to become a future educator in Alaska.

            The impact of teacher dropout rate is big. “Teacher dropout” is being an increasingly common problem across the United States. Teacher dropout is when they leave, move, or quit teaching completely. “Roughly half a million U.S. teachers either move or leave the profession each year,” according to a new report from the Alliance for Excellent Education, a public support group. And this kind of turnover comes at a steep cost, not only to students but also to districts. The cost is up to $2.2 billion a year. There were more than 3 million full time teachers in 2013, according to the Department of Education, meaning nearly 15 percent of the workforce is moving or leaving every year. And the study says, at-risk students suffer the most. Nearly 20 percent of teachers at high-poverty schools leave every year, a rate 50 percent higher than at more affluent schools or wealthy schools. That’s one of every five teachers, gone by next semester. As for that $2.2 billion, this money is largely spent on induction, a professional development process that is organized by a teacher and is trained and it supports them, human resources says Jason Amos, Vice President of Communications for the Alliance. That includes recruiting and processing new hires of teachers along with money spent on training and development. This is a big issue in Alaska. This issue also affects students such as myself. I like teachers who stay, so I can get to know them and come to grow attached to them. I’ve had teachers who stayed a year and in that one year I’ve grown attached to them but unfortunately they left. I don’t feel too good when teachers that I end of really liking leave the school and the students have grown attached to them and have gotten used to their teaching styles. It is like a feeling of sadness to see them go when I know they are great teachers in our school. I feel we shouldn’t have new teachers every year because students need to stay used to one teacher. We can’t recover just like that the year after and deal with the new teacher and their teaching style.

              Another impact of our lack of Alaska Native teachers in Alaska is that each year, about 400 teachers are hired from outside Alaska to staff rural schools. Research shows that most of them will leave after a year or two on the job. Today, about 75 percent of teachers working in Alaska were hired outside of the state, according to research by University of Alaska Anchorage’s Center for Alaska Education Policy Research. Also, teachers that are hired from outside tend to cycle through schools more quickly. Turnover rates from year to year: the top 30 percent in more than a few rural districts, much higher than urban Alaska districts. The students in the rural schools have much to lose because the high dropout or turnover, inexperienced teachers can have serious and negative impacts on the students learning. “In the five highest turnover districts, which have an average yearly turnover rate of 37.9 percent, less than half; an average of only 46.9 percent of students score “proficient” in reading state tests.” Then, in the “five districts with the lowest turnover, 85.8 percent of students score “proficient.”

            To solve that problem in having new teachers every year is hiring more local teachers who lives’ in the community and who has the experience with the community that the students live in. The community is more likely to fully support and inspire or encourage locals to pursue their dream and life-long goal of teaching in their community. Local teachers are great to have. They can handle the rural areas because they have lived there. Local teachers can grow more attached with the students and the students will love them. The students wouldn’t have to go through so many new teachers in the school that they have to get used to every year they leave and when the new ones come. That is where we come in, the Future Educators of Alaska. All of us Alaska Native students live in Alaska and we can grow our own educators in our communities. Encourage and inspire others to join FEA so we can have more future educators that is what we need. FEA students and State Officers in the past and future are future educators and so they should pass it down from generation to generation. We are the leaders of Alaska. We came here to pursue our dreams and leadership goals. To conquer our fears, to overcome our obstacles in life, and to strive for greatness. In order to change the world, we have the potential to change our selves first and become leaders of the world and Alaska Native educators of the state of Alaska.

              Also, our Alaska Natives are under represented in the teaching community of Alaska. We need to be represented in education in order to preserve our cultures, and to provide the best education to our Alaska Natives in the state of Alaska; we must continue Alaska Native education. According to the University of Alaska Anchorage’s Center for Alaska Education Policy Research, Annual reach turnover rates vary among rural districts, ranging from a low 7% to over 52%, while urban districts have turnover rates that are generally lower and more similar, from about 8% to just over 10%. Almost 90% of teachers in Alaska are White. Alaska Natives and American Indians continue to make up only 5% of the teacher workforce.

             Teacher turnover rate has been a major issue in Alaska and Alaska is addressing teacher turnover through an organization called Future Educators of Alaska. I think the student organization that will help grow Alaskan educators in Alaska is Future Educators of Alaska. The Future Educators of Alaska is a statewide collaborative effort to inspire and support Alaska Native k-12 students to pursue careers in the field of education. Future Educators of Alaska provides Alaska Native students the opportunity to explore careers in education and to meet other students that are also interested in education.

             So, why is teaching in Alaska so important? Why teach in Alaska? Alaska needs more representation of Alaska Native Educators in Alaska. We need to reduce the teacher turnover or dropout rate in Alaska. Alaska needs to grow our own educators like Future Educators of Alaska does with students, communities, and teachers. With our Alaska Native teachers or Future Educators of Alaska, we can preserve our cultures, give the students the best education they can receive and help others succeed in life.

             I encourage the FEA State officers and members of Future Educators of Alaska to pursue their life-long dreams and goals in teaching or wherever it may be. It would be best if we take our knowledge and skills from FEA and become the representatives of our Alaska Native communities or tribes in education in the community. Nothing is impossible! Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined and plan for the future. Explore, dream, and discover. We wish to see one of you as a State Advisor one day being the greatest FEA representative on state level in Career and Technical Student Organizations. I hope you, the Future Educators of Alaska, can pursue your dreams in education in Alaska, we need your leadership and knowledge! Haw’aa. Guneshcheesh. Which means thank you in both Haida and Tlingit. In Haida, we say Haws dang hi kiinsang. I’ll see you again. 

Wednesday, April 15, 2015

Why Sleepwalking Happens


          "Sleepwalking (also called somnambulism) is a disorder of arousal, where the brain is triggered to rouse the body while in a deep sleep." This disorder causes people to get out of bed and move around while they're asleep. They might creep along the house, run through home, or even climb out the window or walk out the door. Their eyes may be open and glassy. If you ask them questions, there is a chance that they may not even answer or they will answer very slowly. Sleepwalking occurs when you are in the first third of the night when you are in the deepest stages of sleep and that is called NREM sleep. In this sleep cycle, your brainwaves may be slow but your body is really active and this time of night is when you toss and turn the most. The age that sleepwalking is most likely to occur in is the age of 4 and 8 years old. If they suffered from night terrors when they were babies, then they are more at risk. They outgrow this sleepwalking disorder by the time they turn 12 years old. However, sleepwalking is not just for kids, it is said that nearly four percent of adults in the United States do it, too. 
          There is no particular reason why people sleepwalk, but several factors influence the occurrence of sleepwalking. One reason may be the genetics in families. It may run in the family. Another reason is that there may be environmental triggers. Not having enough sleep is a common cause for sleepwalking. The third reason could be medical conditions. Medications can make you more prone or more likely to sleepwalk. There could be irregular heartbeats, sleep apnea, post-traumatic stress disorder, panic attacks, and asthma. These are three typical reasons why people sleepwalk. 
         There once was a time where I slept walk and I was at a young age. I think I was at least 10 years old. I remember when I was living in Anchorage when one night I slept walked to the fridge. I must have been dreaming of a toilet or going to the bathroom because I went to the fridge opened it and almost went to the bathroom. Luckily, my mom caught me and stopped me. She took me back to my room and put me back in bed. Another sleepwalking incident happened my last Anchorage trip for my braces. It was shortly after my appointment, I went back to the hotel and slept the rest of the time almost. My mom said that I slept walk to the curtains in our hotel room and started touching them. I was just feeling curtains. When I woke up, I was laying on the bed in the room weird and at the end of the bed. I don't remember how I got that way and what I did. That is the outcome of sleepwalking and what it can do.

Resources: "Sleepwalking: Why It Happens." Web log post. Sleep.org. National Sleep Foundation, n.d. Web. 15 Apr. 2015.

Monday, April 6, 2015

My Pulled Muscle/Back Strain Has Healed!

            It is official; my pulled muscle in my back has healed! My back is feeling way better than before. I have going through a lot of pain with my back and today I feel refreshed. Today in school, I have been feeling good. For once, my back doesn't hurt or ache.
           Now, since I know to stretch every time before I play, I do stretch. Today in gym, I did some backstretches and regular stretches before I played basketball. I was kind of nervous for playing but that feeling left my body once I started playing and shooting around. My injury lasted seven days and that is a long time for basketball players. I was feeling pretty mad when I was sitting out while the others were playing basketball while I was sitting on the bench. Injuries really make you want to do something you are not supposed to. When my back wasn't healed, I really wanted to play basketball and play softball with the class but I couldn't.
            This injury made me think about all of the downsides of not stretching. I understand why the teachers tell us to stretch before playing around in the gym or working out. You will pay the price, if you don't stretch properly before playing sports or playing in active activities. Anyways, today was a good day. It was full of laughter and happiness. 
            In gym, I had such a blast. Before I played basketball, I stretched. My teacher helped me with some backstretches and showed me some good ones. It felt good to stretch but my teacher said that he noticed that I am still kind of stiff. I know that because I don't want to have an injury again and so I am being cautious. I'm trying not to be too stiff but I still need to be cautious and to not stretch too hard. 
           This week will be great since my back is fine now. I am ready to be active everyday and get back into working out in gym class. I want to be fit for the summer and that is not so far away. Hopefully, I will have a summer body or at least something when I go to college. Well, that is it. I can tell this summer is going to be the most amazing summer I can ever ask for because I graduate May 15 and that is 39 days away. My last blogs will be May 15, 2015. Before that, my blogs may be done. So, for all of my viewers, treasure the last of my blogs for which the day is coming closer and closer.