Internship Teaching #5

For this blog post, I believe it is important to talk about how my full time student teaching is going. As of last week, I have started teaching completely on my own in both Math and Science. In the mornings, I teach Math to one section of 7th and 8th grade. Once lunch is over, I then teach 2 sections of 6th grade Science and a section of 8th grade Science. The thing that is important to keep in mind though is that the same 8th graders I see in the morning, I also see in the afternoon for Science. So these students have the luxury (or pain) of having me twice in one day for the same subject. This has (so far) been a great experience for me. The reason being is because my students have seemed to make a connection with me. It may have to do that I am now their teacher in both class and in doing my research study; the classes are coinciding with one another. What I mean by this is that the students are doing distance time and speed in Math class. The students are relating the concept to both classes and it seems to be keeping them engaged for both subjects. The thing I like most about this research is that there are some students who showed little interest in Science but now, they seem to really like doing the projects. This has been a good experience for me. I love that all the students are interested; my only hope is that when this project is complete, they will still look forward to the next project, even if it does not have Math and Science mixed together.

Intern Teaching #4

Throughout my time here at Bruceton School, I have learned many things about myself so far. I feel as though, now students respect me as their teacher and also like having me as their teacher. The evidence I have to prove this comes from last week. It was a short week due to "Buckwheat Festival" in Preston County. Students were actually only in school Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday of last week. Due to these festivities, my mentor teacher in Math cause taking a personal day for Wednesday. He asked me if I felt comfortable teaching the entire day. After talking with him, I realized that I wanted to try it. I felt confident in myself to teach for the entire day and I also thought the students would like it as well. He instructed me that I would have a mentor teacher in the room but she would only help if needed. Knowing this, I felt a little added pressure. Another thing that made me nervous was working with the 7th grade students in the afternoon class that I hadn't previously worked with. This was nerve wrecking to me because I didn't know any of their names and I didn't want them to think they could take advantage of me during the class period since I was not their normal teacher. Not only did my day go really well, I think all the students in the afternoon classes had a good time listening to me and I made it fun for them. I was worried for nothing. After teaching for the entire day, I also felt like the day went by very quickly because I moved from one subject to the next and had little down time. After the day I had, I felt much more confident in my abilities as a teacher and I can't wait to start teaching on my own in the upcoming weeks!

Intership Teaching #3

As I begin to settle myself into the daily routines of school and each of my place settings, I am starting to see how teaching really works. What I mean by this is how the students perceive me as their teacher, and friend. Since the third week of school is over, I have had been able to start teaching all on my own. This has been an exciting and scary thing at the same time. The reason why is because I am getting my feet wet, but the students are also pushing their limits with me because they think I will allow them to get away with things that my mentor teacher does not. This is where I am learning the most because I realize now that it is all about being consistent. What I yell at one student for, I must do to every other student. Believe me, if you don’t do this, the students will pick up on it and shout you out (Especially in the middle school). I have also figured out what I will be doing for my action research with my 2 placements. I will be doing a study on meaningful learning with my 8th grade students as I try to incorporate distance, speed, and acceleration into both Math and Science class. The students will practice using the formulas for distance speed etc. in Math class. Then during Science, they will create a race car of some sort (Leaving this open ended) and will then race them down the hallways. The students will then measure their distance and time to calculate their speed and acceleration. The team that builds to best car will win! I think overall, my semester is going very well so far. The students all seem to be treating me like each of their other teachers and are showing equal respect towards me. My hope is that they will enjoy the project I will be working with them on and they will soon understand how each of their course are related to one another.

Intern Teaching #2

For my second blog post, I would like to discuss my 8th graders in my afternoon Science course. This year, my Science mentor teacher has decided to switch things up a bit and do "stations" with each of his classes. The students (so far) seem to like this new transition from last year. Among these students though are a few who try to slide by with doing as little work as possible. They are simply trying to rely on their group members to do the work them. A way to fix this was to make each student do a notebook. Each student is now in charge of bringing their notebook to class every day and putting all the information needed to complete the expeirment and so on. The students are also responsible for doing ~8 vocab terms (definition, sentence, synonyms, and a drawing). The notebooks are collected at the end of each concept/unit and is counted as a test grade (100/100 points). The students are also responsible for posting to their blog online while rotating through stations. Since this has been implemented in the classroom, we have seen a wide range of results. Some students have rose to the occasion and have began to take action in their learning and organization skills so that their notebooks are done correctly. Some students have went backwards and are doing little to no work in their notebooks and their grades are showing it. After this week, I am going to try to accomidate to some students to help them improve their notebook grades. We'll see how it goes!

Internship Teaching #1

Although this is my first blog post, I have a lot to talk about my time here at Bruceton school. The year started off with 6 teachers leaving the school and new staff members reporting to the building. To add to this, the school also had a change in the daily schedule and students now spend one hour extra in the school than last year. Instead of being dismissed at 2:30, the students now are dismissed at 3:30. With that being said, each period was extended by 7 minutes. This has made it nice to work with the students in Science class because it gives extra time to do experiments. In relation to this, I have now figured out my schedule since I am doing a multi-study placement at the same time. During the morning hours until lunch time, I am working with the one section of 7th grade and two sections of 8th grade in the morning for Math class. Then after lunch, I am working with 2 sections of 6th grade, and a section of 8th grade for Science. In doing so, I do get to see the same 8th graders in the afternoon as I did in the morning. I've noticed that the students do not really mind this, rather they seem to like it. I like it as well because I begin to see student tendencies. WhatI mean by this is that some students work harder in Math and participate more in Math than they do in Science. (Or vice-versa) This has opened my eyes to a lot of things and ultimately I think this is where I will begin to do some of my research for the semester.

Post #3 Reflections of the Inquiry Celebration

After attending the Inquiry Celebration, I feel that I learned a lot about the inquiry process.

The  first session that I attended outlined the importance of using technology to review for tests and assessments. I think this was a great study because it allowed me to see that students love the chance to use technology whenever given the chance. Another study I viewed was using manipulatives to aid content in of Mathematics. Although the study did not directly look at tests scores, it was important to note that students seemed to stay more engaged  throughout the entire class period. I found this to be very important because as an upcoming math teacher, I want to do whatever I can to keep my students attention and help them learn the content so it makes sense. Kinesthetic learners learn best by doing, so if you manipulatives helps them succeed, I am going to do it.

I also learned about an intern who used math games in her daily routine to help her students have fun while learning math. I thought this was every helpful as well  because all kids like playing games, and even though they may not know it, they are still learning while playing the game.                              

I feel that the inquiry celebration was very beneficial for both the presenter and the viewers. I feel this way because it gave me a chance to learn about things that work in the classroom, but also things that didn't work. This is equally important because as a young teacher, I want to stay away from practices that do not have a positive outcome or aid in teaching content effectively.

Blog # 2- Novice Teacher Characteristics

Characteristic #2: Effective Communicator
For this characteristic, there are multiple artifacts one can use in order to describe myself as an effective communicator. One of the artifacts I plan to use for this is the co-teaching strategy that was implemented in my Sped 460 course. During this course, I planned a lesson and wrote a plan with two peers. Then during the class, we actually taught the lesson to our entire class. This co-teaching is a great way to show my skills as an effective communicator because it is important to be able to work with colleauges and not become repetitive. The lesson plan that was created was created for 2nd grade reading and language arts content. It also uses various activities and student involvement so that all students are able to participate and succeed.
Another artifact I will consider using is the powerpoints and prezi's I have created for lessons plans in the past. I have created multiple prezi's for certain content. I have also created powerpoints and prezi's that have been implemented to my college level courses. These powerpoints and perzi's show my understanding for certain content. It also is a way to effectively communicate with my students, and also colleagues.

Characteristic #3 Teaching is a Professional, Moral, and Ethical Enterprise
For this characteristic, there are multiple artifacts I can use. The main artifact I am going to use for this characteristic is my educational philosophy. I think this document is extremely important because it show my beliefs and understandings of teaching and how my character as a person will be brought out in my classroom. I think this philosophy is a great thing to show future employers and also the parents of my students whenever I get hired.
The second artifact that I will use for this characteristic is the character education lesson plans I have created for my Educ 450 class. These plans are a great way of showing how I want my students to act because it gives them a chance to learn how they should act when working in small groups, but also how to act when simply sharing supplies. I have created these lesson plans so that the students practice character traits but they are not explicitly taught. What I mean by this is that since the characteristics that I want my students to learn are embedded with content driven instruction, I am essentially killing two birds with one stone.