It’s always fun to share the cool things teachers do. I wish I had more time, because each and every class has amazing activities that inspire thought and, of course, learning. To generate these activities, teachers put in a lot of time outside the classroom to come up with some cool things and coordinate all the effort to get it done. This past week for example, the business department brought in several outside members of the community to judge their mock interviews and to have community members provide feedback on interview skills. Needless to say, they covered everything from the handshake, business card exchange and the right questions and answers to ask. Needless to say, it was way cool.
One of the other activities is our principles of biomed class learning in our biomedical career cluster. Basically, this is a real world look at what students might experience in a medical career. Students who might consider a career in biomed have a great background and everything is taught from a perspective of being a professional.
This past week, we saw two great activities in that cluster. One was Mrs. Saunders and the wounds lab. Now you can’t really gauge how to treat a wound unless you’re actually looking at one, correct? Well, kind of. Anyway, for this activity students actually create a fake wound and then go through and assess what the wound looks like and what might be going on.
A second great activity I got to observe was Mrs. Mahoney’s blood draw lab. She had borrowed the phlebotomy lab model blood draw arms, in which students can practice actually drawing fluid from the arm. What I liked most about this activity was students were generally very excited, obviously, but also had a real world sense for what is going on. Imagine all the levels this activity supports a student in real life. Students work with needles, review safety procedures and discuss proper techniques. The opportunity to know the background of what a person drawing the blood is actually trying to do is powerful. Students used real needles, with real fluids, to help simulate what everything would feel like. It was so neat to see the nervous energy and, at the same time, sense of accomplishment when they picked it up and we’re able to draw the fluid successfully.
Again, I’m so proud of Springfield High School teachers and all they do for our community and kids.
