I intended to start this blog when I first began student teaching; however, we all know how time seems to escape us. I began on January 3rd. The first few days were quite intimidating with names of students, faculty, and staff being thrown at me left and right. I was unsure that I would ever learn all 150 names of the students! However, it only took me about 2 weeks to know every single student's name comfortably. I am quite proud of this feat. At first I was uncertain if I would ever be able to identify them just walking down the hallway, I knew names and by their seats in class, but seeing them in the pod or hallways was a place of uncertainty. Names and faces were not matched comfortably until the second week.
I was glad to immediately be able to contribute lesson ideas and activities for the Government unit the students were studying. The RDA DVD was excellent as was the three branches grid, government quote writing assignment, and the three branches game. I think the three branches game went over the best because the students seemed to like the competitive aspect and I got to know names and interact with the students more.
Designing the primary source activity was tiring, but I think well worth it in the end. Students seemed to walk away with a better understanding, I wish we would have had time to debrief about the activity because I think there was still some confusion for students with primary sources. The concept is challenging at their age. But I think the stations were a success in the end.
Creating my first lesson for the mini-unit on the presidencies was scary. I wanted to make sure there was enough diversification of activities, that my instructions would be clear, that I would not spend too long on notes, and that I was giving students a chance to retain and really capture the information. Sometimes I am still afraid that I do too much bookwork, but perhaps that is a fallback when you are a young teacher just starting out. The textbook is a helpful guide to help you understand what information they should know and how in depth to go with it. I am still trying to work on incorporating more aspects of the social sciences within my lessons. Sometimes it is difficult because I am so concentrated on getting them the necessary information about the historical events/people/terms that I forget to bring in those other factors. I know this is a place I want to continue putting my efforts towards in improving.
Some of the non-academic aspects of middle school have brought back old memories and have also showed new surprises. There are so many students who do not complete work at a quality level. Grappling with this concept has been very tough for me because I have always worked very hard to be successful in school. Organizing late and absent work has been a test as well. I am thankful for my organizational skills when it comes to this. I never realized how much paperwork teachers deal with though.
Many students also do not seem to have an understanding of respect or manners. One of the most frustrating parts is having students continue to talk and hold side conversations when you are giving directions. It is upsetting because I feel I am there to help them and guide them, but if they are not going or not willing to listen, I am not sure of how I can help them. This is also a constant thought when I have bad days or feel that the students were acting out of hand on certain days.
As far as my lessons at this point, I feel comfortable with what I have done. I think I do a good job of keeping activities diversified. I want to focus on differentiating more though. It is still a tricky thing for me to keep in mind the various levels of students and that I have to modify activities 3 or 4 different ways to reach the diverse populations of learners I teach.
I think students did well with:
-The jigsaw activity - Most students seem to work effectively in groups. Most groups did not finish however. May need to consider pre-arranged groups for some activity - did so for this activity for one class.
-Primary source readings - I want to continue to incorporate these throughout the time I teach - the students have done very well with pulling direct quotes and I think this is an essential skill they will need in both high school and university-level schooling.
-Guided notes - These seem to be helpful because students at this age seem to struggle with pulling out what information is important. This is something they will continue to refine and master even through high school.
-Warm ups - Most classes do a very good job of coming in and beginning on the warm-up that is projected on the screen. Some students still need a budge to get going, but this is typical for students at this age I feel. Students often have insightful responses to the questions and illustrate that they are grasping the concepts.
Aspects of my lessons I want to improve upon:
-Increasing participation - Though this varies naturally from day to day and class to class, I want to maintain a steady level of participation from all classes. I am trying out different techniques with just calling on students if no one is willing to answer or offering some kind of consequence if they do or do not answer. I have used candy as well hinting towards taking away their walks during block periods. I would like to try the deck of cards idea for each class so that if students are not going to participate they will be randomly selected. I feel this is a good way to keep students accountable throughout the lesson as well.
-Giving students more time/chances to reflect - My lessons are usually pretty full and because I am someone who likes efficiency and progress I have a tendency to move through the information fairly quickly without giving students a chance to mull it over. I want to take more time throughout my lessons to give them opportunities to share their ideas (class, or with small groups/partners) and use the vocabulary for the current unit we are studying.
-Differentiating - I find this is one of the trickiest things about teaching. I need to dedicate more time to creating materials that apply to both lower and higher end students. I have found that bookwork activities do not usually work well with low-readers in my classes and I want to find resources that provide me with readings at their level. I also want to incorporate more higher-end activities for my students in the Discovery program and other high-performing students. This is such a key part to education in our society today and I want to work on really mastering it.
-Providing clear instruction - I have found that chunking the instruction is helpful for students and asking specific students questions help them understand my expectation and gives them no reason to not understand what I expect. I would like to continue to use this strategy throughout my lessons.
-Closure activities - I think this ties in with the reflection piece for students, but I want to incorporate more activities at the end of the lesson for students to internalize the information and bring some closure to the day's activities.
-Personality - I sometimes worry that I am too serious with the students as I am teaching and that it is all about the "business." I worry because I do not want students to get the wrong impression of me and that I do not like to have fun or that I do not want them to. I want to work on allowing my personality to shine through a bit more. I think this comes with time and comfort with the students - some students I am much more comfortable doing this with than some others.
-Incorporating math and other social science areas - Math has been tricky for me to incorporate thus far, but I think with some upcoming activities I will be able to. I really want to focus on including that more throughout my lessons daily. I also need to improve on bringing in other aspects of social sciences (geography, econ, and political science).
-Self-reflection - I feel that I do a good job with reflecting sometimes, but I want to make it a consistent habit of mine to write down notes about positives as well as improvements that I need to make for future lessons.
I think my relationships with the students have developed appropriately and nicely as time has gone on. I try to show respect and understanding for each student even if I am frustrated with them. I think parent/teacher conferences gave me an opportunity to practice this. My fellow teachers tell me how different the students have taken to me compared to the student teacher they had in math during the beginning of the school year. I think most students are comfortable coming up and talking to me, asking questions or joking around. I have really enjoyed teaching these kids because of their personalities and how sweet they are (mostly ;)). There are also many bright students - most are incredibly capable, but some put forth the effort more than others.
In the future, I want to reflect upon individual lessons and break them down into positives and improvements.
