The Chronicles of Becoming an Ag Educator

The digital era is upon us, what does that mean for the future of education? Many schools are choosing to become completely digitally converted providing students with their own personal I-Pads and other digital devices. With the digital conversion taking over will students be required to take digital notes? What does the mean for test scores? These are the specific questions I looked to answer during my action research project. I joined a digitally converted school for my student teaching experience and was pressed with the challenge of including technology in the classroom. Coming from a high school that still required teachers to sign out computer carts I was thrown a little out of my element. With a little warming up to the idea of students utilizing technology on a daily occurrence in the classroom I found that I truly enjoyed it. I was intrigued by how students chose to use their I-Pads to organize and take notes. Certain classes are already requiring that students keep their

The time has come... all week I have been avoiding this blog post however, all good things must come to an end. This week marks the end of an era, with the beginning of a new adventure. This week I said “see ya later” to my student teaching experience. These past 15 weeks are more than I could have ever asked for and way more than I could have ever imagined. I have learned more than I thought was possible, grew as an educator, and most importantly I gained some of the best memories. Here’s 15 things I learned in 15 weeks. 1.  Be willing to adapt . Things rarely go as expected in the classroom. There will always be something that goes wrong it’s inevitable be ready for the impromptu learning opportunities, they usually turn out to be some of best. 2.  Take every moment to connect with your students . Even if it seems small like sitting with a student on the bus during an FFA event, those moments are important. Those moments remind you of the why for teaching and allow for a greater

For our second SAE visit we headed to see Alyssa Hargraves. Alyssa is a senior at Central Columbia and an active FFA member. Alyssa is an avid hunter and fisherman. She truly loves all things outdoors. Alyssa received her Keystone degree this years through keeping SAE records on her work with developing food plots and running a deer management program. Alyssa hopes to continue her love for the outdoors as a Wildlife Biologist, she was also recent accepted into Penn State! Due to the "off season" for Alyssa's SAE we chose to meet at Keller's Taxidermy. We discussed her SAE and future goals as we scored her buck from last fall for the Buck Pool put in by the agriculture program at Central Columbia. I was impressed by Alyssa's buck harvest this year and it was evident that she has put much time into her deer management program. It was fitting for us to meet at Keller's as she gets her deer mounted there each year. Alyssa shared that she puts in a lot of work ov

I have always thought about Agriculture Education and everyone involved in it as one BIG family. We continuously connect with other agriculture teachers from across the country and click with them as we all have a common interest of having a passion for teaching the next generation of youth from all corners of the country. We all work together to make agricultural education the best that it possibly can be for our students. One way we go about doing this is through both state and national associations of agricultural educators. In Pennsylvania we specific refer to our organization at Pennsylvania Association of Agricultural Educations or PAAE. I have found a home in being a part of this association knowing that I will always have mentors to rely on for guidance. This family began long ago as I began to make connections with agriculture teachers in my home county and in my region. It was refreshing that one of our assignments was to attend the regional PAAE meeting with our Cooperatin

I previously wrote about the importance of having a growth mindset. While I have always believed in its importance this student experience has really pushed me to live it. Every day I was looking for new ways to better myself as an educator, one of which was growing my content knowledge. I learned something new in as far as content knowledge everyday right along with my students. I grew most in areas that I was terrified in the beginning to teach and I still found areas to grow in content that I felt like I knew my whole life. One area in which I didn't teach this go around but felt that I needed to know a little bit more about was environmental science. What better way to learn about environmental science than to head to the Columbia County Agriculture Conference. During my time at the conference I learned valuable knowledge about improving soil health and managing pests in field crops, along with many valuable resources. Something I didn't think about was the valuable conne