University of Tennessee Knoxville - Volunteer Yearbook (Knoxville, TN)

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ZZhAcademics -C, Sexton The Educational Media Center provides materials for stu- dents of deaf education to v1'deotape and audiotape them- selves for practice and self-evaluation. Through the videotape. interpreters can Check their signingt J.J. Johnson, a senior audiovisual aids technician, operates the equipment used to videotape individual students. Every winter quarter, a 10 week intensive interpreter's train- ing Class is sponsored by the UT National lnterpreter's Train- ing Consortium Students in the course are required to be able to sign what they hear on audio tapes from speeds of 60 to 120 words a minute. Shown in the lab, students review an interpreting training tape. Sleeping and doing nothing all day is what education senior Diane Davis did during snow days while student teaching winter quarter. Davis said, HThe worst part of student teaching is going to bed and getting up so early. The best part is the great supervisors at the university who are a big help. Davis taught kindergarten and second grade at Rocky Hill Elementary School

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educating the masses lf therels a word to describe a career in education, it's patience. For the 5,000 education majors at the largest College of Education in the Southeast, learning patience plus a little caring and un- derstanding is what teaching is all about. HEvery aspiring teacher has to want to help other people, Amy Hughes, a junior from Sevierville, said. iiA really good teacher is hard to find. We're being taught not only to teach but to be un- derstanding. If you can work with kids, you can work with anybody? Education majors get an opportunity to put their patience into practice. Jane Finley, a senior from Houston, said every student must spend at least one quarter student teaching before qualifying for certification. She taught French at Tyson Junior High during winter quarter and felt it was beneficial to her career. I enjoy children and teaching mem what live learned, Finley said. One complaint Cited by education majors is that students in other colleges think that it is ex- tremely easy. Not so, according to Kathy Reedy, a junior from Kingsport. HMethods classes are not easy, Reedy said. HYou have to do lesson plans and create activities. They re- quire a lot of extra time and effort. Reedy described teaching as Hdeveloping lit- tle minds. HTherels so much in their minds when they are young even though they dont seem to have much potentialf' Reedy said. Ul may never see the results of my work, but lim still helping form who they will become. Patience is also a necessity for aspiring teachers in deaf and special education. Victor Cranford, a senior from Memphis, learned to sing, using hands to form letters, while on a choir trip and called his craft, uan opportunity to help people who may not be helped by regular communication. Cranford said it takes a truly dedicated per- son to be an interpreter. HYou can always spot interpreters. Whether theylre reading a magazine or singing a song, their fingers are always moving, he said. While most education majors concentrate on elementary or secondary teaching, many find working with handicapped children to be very rewarding. uThe handicapped deserve the opportunity to develop to their full potential, Bruce Anderson, a sophomore from Bristol, said. Special education is a lot more than teaching. It's developing personalities and hav- ing concern for people and what their future is going to be like, Anderson said. Terri Donovan, a senior from Knoxville, :alled special education a challenge because :eaching materials must be adapted to the para :icular needs of each special child. Hlt takes a great deal of patience, Donovan raid. She spent part of her field experience utoring a boy who had difficulty reading and vorking math problems. Hlt was a good ex- perience to tutor him but I wasnt really sure how much he had been helped, she said. She was delighted to hear later that the boy's mother had noted an improvement in his abilities. -MR.J Showing films can be a very important part of teaching. As most elementary teachers know, Eileen Combs, a graduate student in elementary education, experiments with different -C Sexton models of movie projectors. Academics h21

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FC. Sexton uozxag Do A long awaited major HThe new dance major offered through the College of Education is the only one taught in Tennessee, Richard Croskey, coordinator of the dance program said. HStudents have been waiting for a dance major for many years, Croskey said. Dance in- struction, a part of the division of physical education, has always been an area of interest to students, Croskey stated. Until this fall, serious dance majors had to go out of the state to study. uif a dance major was not offered, I would have gone here for two years and then transfered to either Florida State or East Carolina State University, Patti Holt, a junior from Jefferson City, said. The major, approved in August by the Tennessee Higher Education Council, took about four years to plan. Half of the 26 students in the new major are freshmen. Croskey said many of the upper classmen have assumed dance as a double major. HI stayed undeclared for two years waiting for the dance major, Holt said. The dance ma- jor consists of two main concentrations of study: classical ballet and modern dance. Although in the College of Education, the Its always painful? said Alisa Williams, a sophomore in dance. Williams, Bonnie Anhur and Kathy Jo Richardson practice dance sequences in an intermediate ballet class. Students in dance must be highly dedicated, spending up to ten hours a day working out in Alumni Gym. dance major is basically composed of a liberal arts curriculum. With a minimum of 82 hours devoted to dance, 193 hours are required for a dance ma- jor to receive a Bachelor of Science degree in Education. Two years of study with the New Reperatory Dance Company is also required. Hlt's difficult for a dance major to dance and still keep up with academics, because the dance courses are only two hours credit, Julia Giliis, a freshman from Caryville, said. But all the hard work is worth it. iiTraditionaily, only two areas of application were open to those interested in dance- teaching and professional dancing, Croskey said. HBut now new fields are opening up. Treatment of the mentally and physical! han- dicapped is one of these new areas, Craskey said. While Gillis plans to enter a professional dance company when she graduates, Holt plans to enter graduate school. HThis is a growing, growing major, Croskey said. HThere has been the need for a dance major for many years in this university. -MLM Academics i23