Noyce Scholar Profile
Karen Seigman
Undergraduate major or graduate field of study: Psychology
Subject area(s) and grade level teaching focus: 7-12 Life Science
Category of scholarship/fellowship:
Master Teaching Fellow
Name of Noyce institution:
UT3 Noyce University of Toledo
Current academic or teaching status:
6 months
School and school district:
Lima City Schools
Background:
I have a BS Psychology degree from Ashland University. I worked in the classroom providing alcohol/drug and conflict resolution presentations and facilating peer mediation. I really enjoyed being in the classroom and wanted to have my own class.
Why do you want to teach:
I want to make a difference in the lives of our youth. Being a teacher isn’t just giving them information about a certain topic or concept, it’s about having the opportunity to impact their lives.
Describe a memorable teaching experience:
During my methods field experience, I was teaching mitosis and used word association to help students remember the steps of cell division. For Metaphase, i told them to remember middle. For anaphase, think ana-banana, banana splits. In anaphase the chromosomes will split apart. At first the students thought that this was silly. But, during their test over mitosis, I could hear students saying quietly, metaphse-middle and ana-banana, banana splits.
This stands out to me because the students were certain they were too mature to use these word associations, but they did and all passed exam. My cooperating teacher e-mailed me a few months later and thanked me for the word associations. He was teaching meiosis and students were still using the word association to help themselves remember. He said it was the easiest time he ever had teaching meiosis. The students got it.
What does the Noyce program mean to you:
I had dreamed of being a teacher and the Noyce program has given me the opportunity to teach and have my own classroom. Without this program, I would never have had the opportunity to fulfill this dream.
