Blog Entry #8

"What is the most important thing you have learned in this class?"

I think that the most important thing I have learned throughout the duration of this class is all the behind the scenes things you don't automatically think of when you think of being a teacher. I think at first being a teacher would sound fun to just about anyone. Especially if you like kids. Or at least it has always been something that has sounded fun to me. It was a nice reminder to be shown that there is a not so pretty reality that goes along with being a teacher. That there are responsibilites that come with the job that you may not have automatically thought of. Like parent meetings of unruly children, or recess duty, or long meetings and conferences. But i'm happy to say that even after learning about all those extra things i'm still confident in the fact that being an Elementary School teacher is what I want to do. Even with those not so fun things it still is so worth it to me to be able to be a teacher.

I honestly found this whole course interesting and it got me excited to be a teacher and start the process. Learning about all the fundamentals and teaching standards, as boring as that all sounds, was actually quite interesting and exciting because it's making this more real to me instead of just saying I want to be a teacher I am becoming a teacher.

Last but not least, something that was more beneficial to me than anything was the field work. Actually being there and seeing how teaching is going ot be and how to handle things really made the difference and also made everything worth while. Being able to interact with the children taught me so much about teaching and even about myself. It was so much fun and such a great learning experience to get out there and throw myself into it, even if it was just for a couple of hours a week. Teaching, just like almost everything is something that I think you are just going to have to pick up as you go along. The longer you do it and the more experiences and situations you are in the better knowledged you will become and the better you will be able to handle things. You'll learn what techniques you like the best and what works best for your own individual classes and individual students.

This class has been a great introduction and I truly am so grateful I have taken it to further my drive to become a teacher. 

Blog Entry #7

"What are the classroom rules?/How are the materials organized?"

In the class I do my field work for the rules are fairly standard and basic. Things like; Treat others how you want to be treated, always raise your hand, keep your space clean, be respectful so on and so forth. Nothing to out of the norm. She does have a system for when the students break the rules though, which is still a pretty standard procedure. If they break a rule once its a verbal warning. If they break a rule twice they have to go stand outside. If they break a rule three times they have to take a note home to their parents and have it signed, and if they break a rule four times they call their parents right there. I always felt like this wasn't a very good way to handle things because the students probably don't really believe that you will follow through. But I am telling you once they see it happen to one kid in the class they do not want to be that kid that's for sure.

Something that I really like and relate to the teacher I help is how organized she is. Anyone who knows me knows that  I am a complete clean freak. I'm the kind of person who has a label maker and a place for everything. Not only do I have a place for everything, I have a binder that tells me where that exact place is just in case I happen to forget. She may not be quite as organized as that but as far as her classroom goes it is pretty neat and organized. She has stations around the room for every kind of category. Like for example there is an art section and a library section and a magazine section, its just all laid out really well and always kept tidy. Another thing I like that she does is that she switches up the seating arrangment in her classroom a lot. She's constantly moving their seats and their positions almost every other week. She says that she likes to do this beacuse it helps them meet more people and sit next to new people, but that she also every once in awhile will let them pick who they are going to sit by, but that that will generally lead to mass chaos if she's not careful. She, like me, is realy into change and not keeping things boring and normal. She's always looking for new ways to teach, new activies, new anything to keep things fresh and exciting not only for herself but for the students as well.



Blog Entry #5

"What strategies does the teacher use to actively engage the student and how effective are these strategies?"

There are a couple of things the teacher does to make sure the students are actively engaged that I am really fond of. One of them is she does the names on the popsicle sticks, so that when she asks a question she just draws a stick out to see who is going to answer. When I was in elementary school I know I hated this. I never wanted to be the one who was called on, but now looking at it from a teacher perspective I think its a really smart way to do things. Students don't want to get the answer wrong, or at least I know that I didn't want to because I would have been embarrassed and felt bad. So by having that little pressure that it might be them thats called on I think it keeps everyone on guard and paying more attention than they would be if they knew someone could just raise their hand.

Another thing she likes to do is that when she can see everyone is losing focus and getting a little bored she tries to improve a physical activity to go with her lesson. Even if its just doing a lap around the school and having them point things out that go along with what their learning. Or going outside and playing some kind of game. She just likes to bring a little bit of fun into situations but still make sure they are learning and staying on track. One example of this is that they were learning about multiplication and working on their math, you could tell everyone was not  fan. So she decided to walk around the school and have a scavenger hunt to see who could find the most numbers and or math symbols and whoever got the most got a little treat. It sounds so simple but they were all so excited to get up and walk around and stop staring at paper even if it was just for 5 minutes.