Teach Like Your Hair's On Fire- Chapter 9 Art Lover- Chapter 10 Put Me In, Coach

Chapter 9- Art Lover
I really enjoyed this chapter because I really enjoy creative activities. In school, I always loved arts and crafts because there was no limit to what I could create. There were no boundaries. I could express myself however I wanted to. Unfortunately, I can barely draw a stick person with the help of a ruler. That's one reason why I liked this chapter on incorporating art into the classroom. You don't have to be the best artist in the world to open your students' eyes to their own creativity. Using simple activities like the ones Rafe mentioned are wonderful ideas to make your students feel like professional artists. The classroom shouldn't just be about shoving all kinds of information into the students' heads. The classroom should be a place where the students can express themselves, both academically and artistically. Arts and crafts, music, and drama all allow the students to take a break from cramming information into their brains. Activities like these allow them to have fun and show a different side of themselves. Who knows? You may have the next Picasso or Mozart in your class. How else will you know if you don't allow your students to explore their creative side?

Chapter 10- Put Me In, Coach
This was a really interesting chapter. I really liked Rafe's approach to incorporating physical education in his classroom. I especially liked his "World Series Night" idea. It was a really cool way to cross math and physical education. Throughout this book, Rafe has talked about how he marries different subjects together. Physical education and math are no different. If you think about it, they go hand-in-hand. You could really see Rafe's passion behind teaching his students how to score a baseball game correctly, and I could see his frustration when he realized how difficult it would be to take all of those kids to an actual ballgame and help them score the game successfully. But I loved his solution to that problem. "World Series Night" was a wonderful idea. It was an activity the classroom could participate in outside of school, they could work on their scoring skills, and they probably bonded a lot because of it.