So, what is next?

Wow, what an experience it has been starting back to school.  When the semester started, I thought I am too old for this and I was nervous if I could handle the school work and more the idea of being an older teacher. Even though I felt this way, I was not going into it blindly.  I have worked in the school system for 8 years and had an idea of what it takes to be a teacher at some level of education.  I was a little uneducated of the actual life of a teacher but this new revelation has not deterred me too much. So, after all my times in schools and now doing service learning through this class, my decision is yes this is the path for me and I definitely still want to be a teacher no matter how scared I may be now. My decision is to move ahead and become a teacher as quickly as possible.

I have been an aide or facilitator for over five years.  I was an instructor at a medical assistant course for almost 2 years.  And, I have been subbing for almost a year.  I thought I was completely ready for the life of a teacher.  The last couple of months have been eye opening.  As fun as it is to have a class and have relationships with the students in your class.  It is a lot more work than I was aware of.  I did not realize the time it took out of class to prep, grade, and deal with daily situations that may arise besides teaching.

I realized there were things that would be more difficult than I thought.  I was unaware before service learning of the time it would take to prep for all types of learners in your class as well as the time it takes to make sure the children are able to understand what I am teaching.  This may turn my prep plans totally upside down.  I learned after the service time that I worry if I will be able to reach the students who may struggle for all the many reasons (diversity, activity, or disability).I worry if I will be open minded and adaptable to my school, classes, and students that may not be the normal.  I also think, will I be able to cover and know all the standards that must be met to have successful classes?

I also saw during service learning and through this class that there is a lot more positive aspects to being a teacher.  I realize the most important thing is making relationships and reaching children in order to help and teach them.  They are people before students.  I love children so much and want to share my love and knowledge with them.  I want to show them that someone cares for them more than just during school time.  I want to show my students that my room is a comfortable place to learn and a safe place to be and enjoy their time there.  I have learned so many great ideas from this class and the classrooms I was in that I cannot wait to implement.  Things I did not think I could do before I started this class (ie, STEM), I know I can do and do well after seeing them in action. 

It is a scary thought of what is ahead but I want to do it and do it well.  I know that anything scary is worth it.  And, anything that is hard is worth doing well.  I will push myself to be the best teacher.  I know that it will take tons of work but it will be so worth it.  So what is next?  I will apply for the program by the March deadline and hopefully start in August to get through school and get to work.

Assessment

I love the idea of writing a blog to keep track of everything that is done throughout service learning activities.  It is fun to look back and remember the fun times that I had in the school class.  I love sharing my own ideas of how I feel about being a teacher. 

One of the problems that I have had with blogging during service learning is that the topics for the blog sometimes do not match up with what I am experiencing during the time in the class.  I also find that some of the schools do not have a chance to have the experiences that I need to learn about (ie. culture, economical situations, and diversity).

Standards

As I am doing observations, I can see that classes follow the standards to the best of their abilities.  They have a schedule every day where they have time for all the parts of the core.  The main subject matter standards that are emphasized are definitely Math and Writing skills.  The early birds and later gators also focus their small group time on Reading.  The subjects that are not being addressed are health and it seems like social studies skills are mostly taught only in 6th Grade.  Science is only done rarely.

When I finished my observation this week I was able to talk to the teacher I was observing and get her feelings on Standards and standardized testing.  She stated that it was hard to follow all standards because not all standards seem to be age appropriate.  She feels they need to be refined to make them better for each grade level.  As far as standardized testing she feels that it is only one look at each student.  She feels that looking at students from a teachers point of view or even administrators show more of what the child is capable of.  Some students do not do well with testing but can show their understanding through other means.  The school used a Rise test which ended up having way to many glitches and ended up not being usable data.  So, we need to figure out how to show the students in the best light for their abilities. 

Diversity

As I have been doing my observations I have not ran in to very many diversity issues in the classroom.  The two classes that I observe do not have many children in the class that are different from others  These to classes are both in fairly well off school areas as well as being mostly Caucasian.

I do want to talk about diversity in behavior as part of this.  I was in a class the other day that was a very well run class as well as being very structured.  For the most part this class had no behavioral issues but did have a couple of students that she monitored a little closer.  The first student I felt was just ambivalent to school in general.  I could see that she would monitor to keep him on track and then he was so great to get things done and done well.  The second child was monitored because he was more active in class and not able to sit and get his work done as well. I did feel that as I observed it was an attention thing.  He wanted her to know where he was and what he was doing at all times.  I have not seen how teachers deal with issues in the class very much and hope that as I go along in the program I can get more training in this area as it is a concern for me.  I want to learn how behavior issues could and should be handled as I know there are students with issues that cause it to be really hard for them but I also can see that some behavior is just for show and attention and I would love to learn how to deal with this to not make it a bigger issue.

I love the idea of exceptional and gifted children in a classroom together.  I believe that sometimes pairing them up could be a help to both. I also feel that sometimes you need to have activities that you can have gifted students work on together at their own pace so as to have time with the exceptional students as one on one with the teacher.

Historical Events and Laws in school

I have noticed a lot regarding the laws and historical events regarding schools especially as I have been a substitute in schools.  I have the opportunity to see different classes in many schools in our area.  As far as the events in the past that shape our schools now a days The launch of Sputnik I feel made big strides in teaching our students more science and technology and we build on it now as STEM is such an important way of teaching in this day and age.  I was in a STEM classroom and had the best experience watching as they explored how to make roller coasters with marbles and pool noodles.  They worked in groups to figure out what they could make the noodles do to make the marble keep going.  Sometimes they would make them go too high and it would stop momentum.  It was such a great lesson.

I have been in different schools that have different cultural diversity in each classroom.  I have also seen how cultural diversity and how it varies in different areas around our county.  I do believe that the opportunity to learn English is so important in this area.  I have noticed that even though there are different groups of students the language barrier does not seem to be as prevalent as it has been in the past.  Sadly, I have not had any experience learning how our schools teach English as a second language but I would be very interested in knowing how this is accomplished.

Engaging Learners in Meaningful Ways

I love the idea of engaged learning.  I have never been a person that could learn very much by just sitting and listening.  I am a visual learner.  I know that there is time that lecturing is needed but I have learned lately that the most important part when you do this is to have discussions and take time to make sure that people understand.

This week I had the best opportunity to see good engaged learning at work.  I attended Mrs. Whipple's 5th grade class as they were having a day to make sure that they understood how to do the box method for 2 digit multiplication.  The lesson started with 2 problems that she put on the overhead for them to figure out.  She called this Hot Math.  The questions had multiple answers so they could discuss how they figured out their answers.  They did these problems with their partner on white boards.  They had a great discussion in the class with white boards as they practiced a few problems of the 2 digit multiplication and the teacher answered any questions they had.  Once, they did their review she told them to take their marker, eraser, and white board with them and they were going to do an activity outside.  She then told the students that she was separating them into two teams (early birds and later gators) and they were going to go out and each take a turn doing a problem on the 4 square court and see which team could do it the fastest without talking.  She let them know that this was a new idea and may not work exactly as she imagined.  There were a couple issues but it was a great idea.  The students had to work together without speaking.  There were enough students on a team that one person could take charge and help get people where they should be.  Each student either had to be part of the problem itself, or an answer in a box, or  5 students were the answers being added together to get the final answer.  I love thinking out of the box and this teacher definitely does this.

Positive Classrooms

I love being able to be in the classroom.  I am so impressed  with how easy they seem to keep things flowing.  The thing that is also so impressive to me is how they can show so much love and caring but also to show the students what they expect as far as routine and expectations for behavior are concerned.

I am in a class room where the teacher feels that in order for her students to feel loved and not overlooked as well as safe.  She expects a lot from the first graders.  She does not let them know that they are too young to follow instructions.  She has started from day one with an everyday routine. They know exactly what needs to be done and when each day.  So, if there is a problem in the classroom she calls them out to make sure they know what isn't being done and then she lets them know that she cares.  One part of her routine that I think encourages a positive community is that when they come in each morning that put there stuff in their cubbies and then they each must answer a graph question of the day.  It may be "what is your pet?"  and then it will say, "dog, cat, fish, or bird".  They love seeing what everyone marks on the chart and where theirs fit in.

In the fifth grade class, I feel like she is really great at recognizing the students skills.  I feel like this is easier to do in older classes.  The way she does this is by doing a lot of independent study and activities in class.  She allows the students to work together and work at their pace.  I feel this shows that if someone understands they are able to help others and teach them.  And, in return someone else may be able to teach a different thing later on.