Auto Pilot or Autonomy?

In this picture we are beginning to make pumpkin candy. We are melting the butter and getting ready to cut the pumpkin into ½ inch pieces.

The activity we were doing was making pumpkin candy. I had never heard of pumpkin candy until this day but I must say it is amazing. The activity required that first melt butter into the pan then cut the pumpkin into ½ inch pieces. After we cut up the pumpkin we added it to the butter to allow it to cook for twenty minutes. Once the twenty minutes had passed we added maple syrup, sugar, cinnamon and ginger to the pumpkin pieces to sugar coat it. We then let it cool down over night so that we could eat it during Thursday’s class.

During this activity I observed that everyone was working together as a team and doing the activities on their own. I noticed that Bobby did not need to constantly give instructions to the students for them to complete their tasks.

During this activity I developed a better understanding of the content we are required to obtain from this class. I believe this was an example of autonomy in a classroom because everyone was busy doing their task and working together while Bobby was going around, taking pictures. She wasn’t really needed for the students to complete their tasks. However, she is needed in the classroom because she so much fun to be around.