Portfolio Showcase Spring 2012 including 4 ePortfolios

The Cortland PE Department awarded 16 teacher-candidates with Honors on their Portfolios during the Spring 2012 Portfolio Showcase at Park Center on Thursday April 26, 2012.  The recipients were J. Trenton Jones, Anthony DiRienzo, Melanie Matassa, Rebekah Fredickson, Jessica Volz, Bree Zogaria, Jamie Boldish, Andrew Hettinger, Nicole Petit, Sunnie Bifarella, Pete Johnson, Lima Stafford, Carlee Hoyt, Kimberly Quartier, Michelle Krisa, and Charles Giardino.

Please take notice that the first four recipients had Electronic Portfolios and that more and more people are choosing to represent their ability to meet NCATE Initial Teacher Standards with this tool. Click here to find out more information on how to start your own ePortfolio.  To date there have been nearly 200 ePortfolios created from current Cortland PE teacher-candidates and alumni and to see more samples and get directions to creating your own, please click here. In fact 11 of the 16 recipients all have blogs and ePortfolios and are part of the Rockstar PE Family.  Congratulations and Good Luck during Student-Teaching.

Kick Out The Ladder

Besides Honda's innovation in automobiles, their success and dedication to the pursuit of their goals is legendary and I love the metaphor "Kick Out the Ladder" as featured in the NYT some time ago.


Can this be an effective method in the education setting? Have you experienced this "Ladder" sensation before and what did it feel like and what was the result?

The so-called webisodes, each about seven minutes,  at Honda's site (dreams.honda.com), under the rubric of the “Dream the Impossible documentary series.”

"If your goal is too easy to meet, you are not challenging yourself enough."


"Never Stop Learning" and "Dream the Impossible"

PED 201 Live Concert

The PED 201 Spring 2012 - Infant Development Concert was awesome. Thank you to all that helped in setting up and running the show. Thank you to all the PED 201 students and TA's for getting this group ready for our first Poolside performance. It was a packed house and of course thank you to all the faculty and friends who came to watch and supported this performance-based learning project. It was truly a semester of firsts and we wish to encourage you to keep pursuing your passion  (Never Stop Improving) to help your students learn and grow.

Motor Development (PED 201) Infant Presentations

In PED 201 - Motor Development, students are given this project assignment to produce a representation of their understanding for a particular chapter. Each group must complete a musical video/song with lyrics appropriately explaining/teaching the audience the most important concepts. They will also have to perform in front of an audience which gives them another opportunity to show their commitment to communication and performing with passion. All part of becoming a Rockstar PE Teacher http://www.rockstarpe.org/ 

Come to Poolside next Wednesday, April 11, 2012 at 12:30pm to catch this semester's latest and greatest performances.  Come out to support this semester's groups and perhaps catch some repeat performances from previous groups.

Motor Development Videos & Concert Spring 2012

In PED 201 - Motor Development, students are given this project assignment to produce a representation of their understanding for a particular chapter. Each group must complete a musical video/song with lyrics appropriately explaining/teaching the audience the most important concepts. They will also have to perform in front of an audience which gives them another opportunity to show their commitment to communication and performing with passion. All part of becoming a Rockstar PE Teacher http://www.rockstarpe.org/ 

Come to Poolside next Wednesday, April 11, 2012 at 12:30pm to catch this semester's latest and greatest performances.  Come out to support this semester's groups and perhaps catch some repeat performances from previous groups.

Past videos and performances.

Spring 2012

Spring 2011
Spring 2010
Fall 2009
Spring 2009

Yoga, Zumba, & Fun Oh My!

What a great start to Lab D lessons with tons of great teaching elements covered so thoroughly. Thank you to Trish and Dan for putting so much into getting prepared for your lessons and for thinking about student learning. Remember, the remainder of groups will need to incorporate your assessment forms that you created into your lesson. Trish and Dan will be assessing with the video artifacts they created. Don't forget to get your technology needs figured out and tested way ahead of time. Please also post your practice videos to your blogs and discuss the things you want to improve.  Bonne Chance...Bueno Suerte!

Oscar The Grouch Appeared and loved Lab 4 (201)

This week we saw some great adaptations and adjustments to pre-planned games as well as on the fly. Be sure to come with even more games and ideas to use with the students. Remember they have 4 closets full of equipment, so as soon as you get there, go through the closets to see if anything else will grab your attention. Be open to ideas and tips I give you as you're leading your games, as I think know most of you are ready for some more practical teaching strategies and refinements to what we started. Remember above all, that it is your job to provide a SAFE and POSITIVE learning environment. You need to clearly give a signal of attention, define boundaries, demonstrate the activity you want them to do, and provide developmentally appropriate tasks for the needs and abilities of your students.  Oscar was a HUGE hit and I encourage you to bring more visual aids and props to generate that buzz that you witnessed.

A Pac(ked) Nutrition Infographic

@JoeyFeith from http://www.thephysicaleducator.com posted this great Nutrition Poster using classic Pac Man characters and I think its such a smart way to present content in a visually appealing format (well at least for us older folk who grew up playing classic arcade and video games).   Keep up all the great work you're doing Joey & Crew! PDF

Gaming Is Good For You

Source: Frugal Dad

Structure in Chaos: Reflection

If you're reading this you're probably wondering why I have a picture of batman to the left... In the movie The Dark Knight batman tries to bring order and structure to a city that is just in chaos. That's how my partner and I felt today after teaching our lesson for our EDU 355 observation. I'm writing this as a reflection of my lesson but also as something fellow physical education majors can look to as they progress their way through the program.