Self-Identity

Self-identity. I find myself questioning my own identity from time to time. Mostly I question if I am going to make a good mother, or even a good teacher.  As the semester winds down, I have realized now more than ever that I am extremely nervous for my student teaching semester. My observations have been great this semester, and I have had nothing but great feedback. I know that my CT will be there to help me with anything that I might need: help plan, coordinate lessons with the strategic planning guide, classroom management, etc., but I am still nervous. I care about the education of my students; I am always worried that I am going to say something incorrect or teach them something incorrect. (This I must admit is my biggest fear of all.)

My three week unit went very well, and I have been incorporating bits and pieces of it into my semester plan. I had great feedback from everyone that watched my teaching, and I will be making some adjustments because of the feedback. I am extremely nervous for this coming semester, though. My CT and I do not know what will be in the strategic planning guides for the next semester and are on pins and needles waiting to know what we will be teaching. When you are a student teacher (or pre-student teacher) and you are anticipating your next semester, it can be difficult and slightly nerve-racking when you do not know what is in store for you.

… On a different note, I am curious on how to create a safe learning environment for all of my students. I want my students to know that they are welcomed into my classroom every day, at any time they may need it. I do not want any student to feel uncomfortable in my classroom. My hope for my classroom is my students will use their reflection journals to share things with me that they may not be comfortable sharing in front of the class. Many students may not use this opportunity in my classroom, and that is perfectly fine. As long as one student is able to let something out that they needed to get out, then I have reached one of my goals as a teacher.

Recently, we have been discussing LGBTQ young adult literature and how to address these works within our future classrooms. This brought up great discussions among my classmates as to how we would like to address this, or even how it was addressed when we were the age of our students. I left that discussion with many thoughts on my mind concerning my future classroom. I would like to be cautious with literature that could be skewed and cause an uncomfortable vibe in my classroom, but I also want to be able to have literature that is going to reach my students. Again, I want my classroom to be a safe environment for all students, unfortunately what literature that I teach in my classroom will depend on where I end up teaching. I know that there are still some school districts that “shy” away from some of these issues that currently face our students. We as teachers need to be aware that there are many ways that we as teachers if we are placed in that position that we could still reach our students that could possibly need our help. Something as simple as a small sticker by our desk could let our students know that we here for them. We are there not just to teach these students, but we are there to foster learning. That learning may just be that student learning about who they really are, their own self-identity.

Educating Educators

Attending the KATE conference this past week was a new experience for me. Many of the breakout sessions that I attended were great learning experiences for me. I am grateful for the experience to attend such a conference as a student.

            One of the best sessions that I attended was the session on Voice Threads as an alternative to book reports. This free program allows students to record their voices and place pictures to it instead of the standard book report. This gave me a multitude of ideas to use for my future classroom. I could not only have my students use this as a book report, but I could also adapt this technology and use it for many other uses in my classroom. If I used this technology and applied it to my semester plan, I could have my students “record” messages home from Peeta and Katniss to their families instead of writing letters. The students could also “record” commercials for their specific districts and apply them to their group projects as well. Voice threads can allow students to use technology in many ways for projects that used to be traditional. This is just one of the many ways that teachers can update their “old school” projects to something that the students may enjoy a bit better.

            Out of all the other sessions that I attended over the two days of the conference that I learned the most from was the group of new teachers giving advice to the future or new teachers. Some of the things that they pointed out in their session were things that I never considered for my classroom. Of course, one of the most obvious ideas that they shared with us was to “beg, borrow, and steal” from out CTs as well as anyone who would be willing to allow us to take their lesson plans, worksheets, ideas, etc. I have previously had a professor that had told us that, but I did not truly believe him. I did not think that the teachers that we would be working with would actually help us, but the farther I go in my student teaching the more I know that other teachers want to see us succeed. Hearing the “new” teachers advice gave me the understanding to know that what I have been hearing in my classes for so long has been correct. The little tips and strategies can be taken to heart because they do work, as long as they are implemented properly.

            I never believed that I could learn so much from a conference in two days. Things that have taken years to learn in other classes I learned in 45 minute sessions. From what I have learned in those two days, I will be attending the KATE conference again. I believe that learning from other people that are in the same profession is one of the best ways to learn. I believe that it is true what they say, it does take a village to raise a child. With that in mind, it will take many educators to educate each other just so we can educate our students.

The Light Bulb..... Genre Reflection

 

 

     Being in the classroom this semester has been an amazing learning experience for me. I enjoy learning from my students, but for the first few weeks of school it seemed that I was not reaching one of my students. He was trying so hard, but he just couldn't understand everything that we were teaching him. We decided to try some scaffolding techniques with him and have had success. This particular student never hesitates when he needs to ask questions, but he still struggles. I will never forget the day when we found a strategy that worked for him. 

 

The Light bulb

That moment when that oh so familiar hand goes up

His brow is furrowed-he’s perplexed

I think to myself, “Crap, he didn’t get it.”

He looks at me with concern in his eyes when he whispers,

“I don’t get it Ms.”

I try to help, I try to answer his question

He doesn’t understand

Even after I explain it the first time

So I try a different explanation

He begins to get frustrated

I can see the look in his eyes

That deer in the headlights look

He is overwhelmed, he takes a deep breath and lets out a sigh

He and I both know that I am trying to help

I just can’t seem to get him to understand

I try yet another way of explaining

He asks a few more questions…

“Wait, what was the word you used for the main character?”

“If this is the resolution, wouldn’t this be the conflict?”

Yes he still has that look on his face

But his brow is not quite as furrowed

He asks two clarifying questions

They were relevant and coherent

“If he is the main character…, what was the word you used for him again?”

“His conflict is inside himself,… so that makes it…internal conflict?”

He has it!

It finally “clicked”

He really seemed to be struggling, then – BING

His eyes grew wide

His sheepish grin grew wider

His face lit up

“Thank you Ms. That really helped.”



(Post 2) Value lines and how not to cross the lines with values

            Values, values, values. That is what my students are learning about right now. They are learning how to understand the values of other people, the value of others, the value of education and the education of others. Their whole unit is on values and how to value other people. Their unit uses the history of Native Americans and their culture to teach values to our students. Going into this unit, my CT and I both knew that this could be a tricky unit to teach. We knew we had to teach carefully on how we taught these lessons, because we did not want to offend anyone.

                On the first day of our unit, my CT and I decided to have the students to an “Agree, Disagree, Unsure” activity with our students. The premise was very similar to a value line, except we used areas in the room instead of a straight line (constraints in the classroom made an actual value line almost impossible). Some of the questions were meant to challenge the minds of our students and get them to really think about how they would answer the question. We posed questions like “Should students be made to recite the “Pledge of Allegiance” in school?” or “Should parents monitor the activity of their children on the internet?”  As we began asking our students questions, some of our students were trying to answer the questions the way that they wanted to answer them. Unfortunately, the longer the activity went, the more the students actually started siding with their friends instead of answering for themselves. The students were then asked to look over a list of items that they could value: family, friends, money, sports, etc. They were to pick the top ten items off of the list, and put a heart next to one of the items that they believed to be the item that they valued most. We decided that we were not actually going to grade this assignment, but just note if the student completed it or not.

                The next day in class, the students were asked to read a short story and compare and contrast the values of the protagonist and antagonist. My CT and I decided to model a few of the values from our protagonist so the students knew what we were looking for. We aimed for an “I do, We do, You do” approach, and that really seemed to get the students ideas’ going. They really seemed to understand how to find in the text what we were asking for.

The hardest part of what we are teaching to the students is trying to get them to understand other’s values without actually teaching them values. How are we as teachers to teach something in our classroom that parents and guardians could say should be taught at home? How do we, as teachers, guide our students into learning the value of other’s culture and the value of other people without crossing a line to offend others? As a future teacher, I want to be able to teach my students about other cultures by using literature from that specific culture. I also want to be able to be aware of values of culture of my students to be able to incorporate those into the classroom as well. I want to be able to teach my students with a variety of texts, a variety of cultures, a variety of genres, so that each and every one of my students could be exposed to something new. If I have the opportunity, should I send home (maybe at enrollment, or the first week of school) a survey to the students and their parents on what topics and themes they would like to see in the classroom?

The Remarkable Discovery of Student Reading...

For a grade: Blog due September 2, 2013.

As I look forward for the semester, I have come to a remarkable discovery. My CT and I played a “game” in class with the students on the first couple of days. We used “take off, touch down” to get to know the students a bit better. The idea of the game was to just get to know basic information about our students; however, we started asking questions that were a little more involved for our students. Unfortunately, within our game, we noticed that most of our students had not actually read a book since they were assigned a book in the fourth grade! We had asked our students to “take off” if they had read a book over the summer, three stood up. So we extended our question, we asked them to “take off” if they had read a book in the last year. We had only two more students join the three standing.

 My CT and I decided to use another closing to find out when the rest of the class had actually completed a novel. The next day, we had the students do a “whip around” by telling everyone in the class what the last book they had read.  My CT and I were both dumbfounded as to how our students had made it from the fourth grade to the eighth grade without actually reading a book. We do know that some of the students were joking when they told us that the last book they had read was “Clifford the Big Red Dog,” but there were atleast a handful of students that honestly and openly admitted that they had not actually read books in a “couple of years.”

Within the first pages of our reading for the week, Bomer discusses how we engage student reading and interaction within the class. Bomer notes that “literature activity situated within students’ relationships, spaces, and interests outside their English class-but supported by it. The students are highly engaged in what they are doing…” (Bomer, 2011, p. 3). I am wondering what would be some of the ways to “engage” our students in their reading. Their school has a book campaign requirement for them already, but most students do not strive to meet that goal. My CT also has it listed in her syllabus that the students must read “every night” as part of their homework.

 I do not believe that all of the students will be motivated to read outside of school. I was hoping to integrate activities within the classroom to motivate the students to read more. I am at a loss of ideas on how to get the students to read. I have been able to get previous students to read by having students “find” something that would engage them, i.e. magazine articles, non-fiction books on sports, etc. It is difficult to get students to read books for class when the books that are assigned to read are not something that they would typically read.

How do I, as a future teacher, get my students to read more? I want my students to be able to engage in the learning process and find something that they enjoy reading. I know that most of my students will enjoy reading as much as I do, but I do want my students to be able to enjoy reading. I want my students to read, read anything. I want them to find something that they can engage themselves into reading. This is my challenge for the year. I want to get the majority of my classes reading outside of school. My  ideal goal is 100% of the students, but I know that not all of my students will read outside of school.

For my last year...

      I am embarking on the end to a long journey this year. Fall 2013 is the start of my "official" senior year of college. After this May, I will hopefully be a fully credited/licensed teacher (with a job by graduation). With that being said, I want to take this last year to make memories with my fellow seniors who will be graduating with me. Most of us had one class or another together over the last few years and it is exciting to be able to have colleagues to share this journey with.

      I want to take the time to ask as many questions as possible from my CT. She is a "well" of knowledge, and I plan to take full advantage of that knowledge while I can. My CT is giving me so many opportunities within her classroom this year to be able to not only co-teach with her but to take the reigns in the classroom as well. She is not only guiding and helping me with my future classroom, but she is also helping me as a person. My CT and I are working on my weaknesses that I know that I have in the classroom so that when the time comes for me to be able to have my own class (or even when I am teaching in her class) I have better control of what I am doing. I am going to use this year to improve on anything that I can within the classroom that I need to and am capable of.

     This year is the last year that I have my school to help me in any way that I could possibly need when it comes to my education. Up until this year, everything has been structured and well laid out that I knew exactly where I needed to be and when I needed to be there. We have a little more freedom with our teaching this year which is going to make a great learning experience for all of us. I believe that this will be the beginning of us being able to spread our metaphorical wings and see how far we fly. We still have the guidance of our CTs and teachers to help us if we fall.

      I think this year is going to be a fantastic experience for me. I want to be able to expand my knowledge, gain and grown on so many levels this year so that I will hopefully be more prepared when I embark on my own journey without the "hand" of my college guiding me. I know that I cannot always depend on others around me to help me out. Eventually, I will have to do all of this virtually on my own. I hope that with the experience that I am gaining this year, I will be ready to embark on the intriguing new adventure that awaits me.

...And so it begins. ...