Simple Question

I forgot to mention this in my previous post.

Upon completing our Remembrance Day celebration in the gym, we walked back to classrooom. As we entered the classroom, a grade four student tapped me on the back. I turned around, to which she responded with: "I have a question. Why do we call it a War For Peace when everyone is just killing one another?"

She gets it, how come nobody else does?

First Week Over

So I survived my first week of placement!!

After my first two days of teaching block I called my mom and told her that I'm not sure if the teaching profession is right for me. After each day of teaching I came home and napped for a minimum of 2 hours before going to bed. I couldn't control my class's behaviour. I was hungry, tired, frustrated, and wanted time for me again. Not the greatest start.

Come Friday, I decided that YES, the teaching profession is exactly where I should be. From the help of my associates I learned how to control my classroom all by myself. What an amazing feeling. I hope I can keep this up (especially with our evaluations quickly approaching and all). I am enjoying every minute I spend with my students. They are so random, I feel like I should write a book about them. They definitely keep me entertained. However if I hear one more comment about when I'm going to get married, I may ask if I can start giving detentions.

Sometimes I feel like I'm learning more from my students than they are learning from me. Students at the junior level crave structure, they like being told what to do. Whenever I disciplined my class I felt like I was being mean, but that's not the case at all. My students still respect me and listen. That's a very comforting feeling.

I think above all, students want to be heard and be noticed and be loved and cared for. I ask students to help me with many things,and I make a big deal about it because to them, it is. One student taught me to knit again during last recess because I forgot the rules. Another student wrote words on contruction paper fruit for me for an assembly in his NEATEST AND LARGREST hand writing. It's amazing how willing these students are to help.

I'm really enjoying the time I'm spending with my 4/5's. I hope that the rest of my teaching block is as enjoyable as Thursday and Friday was. Fingers crossed.

Got the Unit Planning Blues

I don't know about any of you, but prior to our block that begins on Tuesday, I have spent three days straight sitting in front of my computer attempting to create a unit for 4/5 mathematics as well as 4 Social Studies. Here is what I have come to realize during this time:

1) I will never feel the wind on my skin ever again

2) My eye sight is only going to last a few more months if this keeps up

3) Pre-Service teachers should also reap the benefits given to certified teachers - ie. massages. We are doing the same work after all.

4) Wanting to make models of every assignment you give your students will cause you to have no life, no boyfriends, and no contact with the outside world.

5) I skip meals by accident. This is against everything I believe in.

Moral of this weekend is this: No matter how much work you have to get done, take a BREAK! Watch a movie, go grocery shopping, call a friend. ANYTHING. And this is why it's so important for us to have socials during our block. It's all I'm saying...

Guest Speaker - Colleen

I really enjoyed Colleen's presentation. I found it to be very realistic and useful to our future teaching careers. There were two points she made that resonated with me very much.

1) Behaviour is managed but rarely modified. That's where we fall short
Too often we tell students what not to do, such as "quit talking", "don't get out of your seat", "no running in the hallways". Colleen stated that in order to have a long-term improvement, bad behaviour must be modified. One way to do this is to let students know how they are to behave, rather than telling them how they are not to behave. I loved the idea of practicing recess as well as practicing gathering for announcements. I plan to implement these strategies into my own classrooms. By practicing these routines students will quickly learn what is expected of them and why. By doing so, I believe that over time their behaviour will not only be managed, but modified as well. As Colleen said, it's important to teach discipline rather than react to it.

2) Children do well if they can
I think Colleen made a very good point when she said that you can't motivate skills that students do not have. For example, telling students to study so that they will do well on a test is fine and dandy. However, if students do not have the skills to study properly, it's useless to tell them to go home and study. We must make sure that students know how to complete the instructions that we are giving them. In other words, make sure we are motivating skills that students DO HAVE!

I hopt to implement these ideas into my future classrooms. I feel that they will prove to be very successful.

When a Lesson Goes Wrong

On Friday October 19^th I learned a very valuable lesson: You will survive a lesson that does not go very well. I experienced this when I was in charge of teaching a double math period to my grade fours and fives about measurement. I had what I thought was a thought-provoking and exciting activity planned for that day. What I quickly came to realize about twenty minutes into my lesson was that these students were nowhere NEAR where I assumed they were in terms of their measurement skills. I was bombarded with “Miss Garside I don’t understand” and “Miss Garside what does this mean?” When these questions are coming at you 24-fold, it can be quite overwhelming. My associate teacher and I decided to get back to the basics…we actually taught our students HOW to use a ruler. We realized that if they did not know how to do this, they would not be able to digest the idea that 10mm = 1 cm, 10 cm = dm, and so on.

What I learned from this experience is that no matter how great you think your lesson is there is always a chance that students will not understand. Don’t feel bad about yourself if this happens. Regardless of how many years experience you have, you will always encounter a lesson that just doesn’t work with your students. My associate teacher approved my lesson before I began. She stated afterward for me not to worry because she would have been in the exact same position. That provided me with some comfort.

I hope that none of you will have to encounter such an experience. But in case you do, I just want to let you know that it’s not the end of the world!

Things I Have Learned From My Students

Throughout my placement so far I have learned an extraordinary amount of information from my grade fours and fives. I thought I would brighten your day up a bit and share this information with you now.

What I have learned from my students:
1) Apparently I'm too old to be called "Ms. Garside". One student actually told me that it's weird that I am not married yet. I thought only my Nona felt this way ... apparently not.
2) Playstation 2 should replace class. I have heard about many 'teenager' games, in particular one called BULLY. The object of the game is to hit your fellow students, kill teachers, cause food fights, and so on. No big deal.
3) No matter how hard you try to cover up your name tag, your students will beg you to tell them your first name, middle name, birthday, SIN number, and visa card number.
4) Students will never go to the washroom during recess or their lunch period. They will only have to go during a very important lesson. They will wave their hands eagerly in the air seeming like they want to answer a question you spent all night trying to thinking of, only to answer with "I really have to go to the washroom, can I go?".
5) You are never too young to start wearing cologne.

I hope that I continue to learn from my students as I continue through this Block I experience.

How To Dress For a Field Trip

I wanted to fill you in on a little secret I learned...the hard way. When it is time for your class to go on a field trip that will be taking place outdoors, you DO NOT have to dress as you would if you were spending the day in the classroom. I did not realize this. As I walked into my classroom before we were to leave for the Water Festival at Balls Falls, I looked around only to see that every student AND TEACHER were wearing comfortable clothes with running shoes. What did I decide to wear that day, you ask? Dress pants, dress shirt with vest, and heeled shoes. My associate teacher informed me that any field trip we take in the future we are allowed to dress casually, such as jeans and running shoes. I thought I would share this information with all of you, just in case you were wondering what to wear the next time you go on an outdoor field trip.
The Water Festival was a wonderful time by the way. Students seemed to really enjoy themselves, and we all learned a lot of interesting facts about how we can conserve water and help our environment.

Mini-Micro vs. Micro

Some of you may agree with me on this: I felt much more relaxed during my micro-teaching than I did during my mini-micro teach. How about you? I believe there are two factors that can explain this. For my mini-micro-teach I chose to do “How To Jump Start Your Car” because I myself had no idea how to, and wanted to learn. Although I did the research, I feel like I did not have a sufficient amount of knowledge regarding this topic. This in turn led to nervousness as I was frightened someone in our group would tell me I’m wrong. I’m thankful to all of you for not going that to me! I believe I will feel this anxiety toward any subject that I teach that I feel I do not have a lot of knowledge in, such as government or history. It’s important to do the necessary research before getting in front of a class!

I really enjoyed the mini-micro teaching, as I learned how to do things that I’ve always wanted to learn, such as how to tie and tie or how to properly use chopsticks. So thank you to all of you for doing a wonderful job. I hope that you learned something from me as well!

I believe I was less nervous for my micro-teaching because I know stem-and-leaf plots and histograms very well. Some could say I’ve been cursed with an infatuation with mathematics. As such, I love teaching it and feel comfortable whenever asked to do so. I appreciated the constructive criticism that our counsellors gave after our lessons. I did not realize how improper my grammar skills are. I definitely need to work on this for the future. In addition, I need to stop cramming my lessons with too much information. Instead, I need to plan a lesson that gives students a sufficient amount of time to master one skill without feeling overloaded or rushed.

I believe that these two teaching experiences will help us develop the skills we need to be successful in our teaching blocks. I hope everyone else had a positive experience.

First Day of Placement

When I found out that I was going to be teaching a grade 4/5 split class, I was excited, yet very apprehensive, as I believe teaching split classes are very challenging. I remember being in many split classes growing up, and teachers would simply give me busy work and teach the other grade. I did not want this to be the case in my placement class. I was very pleased to realize that my classroom did not work in this fashion.

I have two associate teachers, one who teaches in the morning and one who teaches in the afternoon. I thought that this may not be good for the students as they need consistency and order. After observing the class routines I was relieved to learn that each teacher runs their lessons and disciplines the students in the same way. Hooray for teamwork!

On my first day I witnessed a lot of positive things happening in this grade 4/5 split class. In the morning students read for fifteen minutes. This program is called “Just Right Books”. Every Friday students hand in a reading response telling the teacher what occurred in the chapter they read that week. Every student reads a novel that is at par with their reading level. Students are also learning the roles of literature circles, and will begin forming them very soon. The teacher also conferenced with the students during this class, discussing their response to a story that was read to them. After lunch classical music plays over the announcements for three minutes, and students are to write about how the music makes them feel, either through words or pictures. In math, students worked with manipulatives (base 10 blocks) and worked in groups to display the number 3821 in as many ways as they could (words, symbols, expanded form, standard form, etc). In science students created their own habitats out of pop bottles and materials that had been collected over the week.

These are just five very productive teaching techniques that I witnessed on my first day. I believe that I will learn a lot from my associate teachers, as well as from my students. Here’s hoping for a very productive Block 1 experience!