October 24, 2019

Practicum 1: Reflection 1

Although I have been in multiple classroom settings over the last five years, I was unaware I would feel the way that I did on the first day of practicum; this is my “aha” moment. 

 A student was rolling around in the middle of the carpet during lesson/instruction time. He was flapping his arms and legs and making crying out noises. It was my instinct to want to approach the child, crouch down to his level and encourage him to come with me for a walk, or perhaps to take a sensory break. However, I resisted this urge.

For almost five years, I have been a CEA for SD73. During this first practicum day, it became evident that I needed to take the CEA hat off and learn to adapt to my new role as a teacher candidate, and ultimately as a teacher. This situation enabled me to reflect on the different functions of the adults in the classroom. As a teacher, I will not be able to leave the classroom to deal with behaviour; the remainder of the class would be left unattended, creating a safety concern. So, the question remains, how might behaviour issues be dealt with when you are the only adult in the classroom. The answer is too lengthy for a one-paragraph reflection. Still, it is something that I will be aware of as I continue on my learning journey, seeking out those strategies that will be helpful to me, and that address this situation.  

 

Nov. 7, 2019

Journal Reflection #2

Something that I noticed in the classroom and in my teacher mentors teaching is that a variety of subjects are embedded in her teaching and student’s learning. For example, “calendar” is not just reviewing the day of the week and the month of the year. She has set up her calendar in such a way that math, as well as other subjects, is infused into it also. Examples of math infusion are the number/date pieces. These pieces are cut into shapes and follow an ABAB pattern.  The calendar number cards alternate in two ways; by the color red and by shape; black, red, black, red, and circle, triangle, circle, triangle. This reinforces learning color, if this is something they do not know yet, shapes, and a simple repeating pattern. Later on, this pattern could be expanded to incorporate more complex repeating patterns. The teacher encourages students’ problem solving and counting by asking questions such as, “How many days have we had in November so far?” or “how many days until there is a day off school?”. I understand the importance of this embedded learning and teaching as students learning is multidimensional and not limited to learning inside a box, subject by subject. This is a practice that I will remember and implement in my own future teaching.

 

Nov. 21, 2019

Journal 3 – Week 6

“Two Stars and a Wish”

Two Stars:

  1. During this first practicum, I was really able to see the importance of questioning, and have shown growth in this area.  During my first lesson, I found myself posing a “think about this statement,” as a question. The result was 19 students all calling out at the same time attempting to give me their response.  By the time I taught the fourth lesson, I had reworded these type of statements to say “If you think________touch your nose”, or perhaps asking the students to indicate their thoughts with the “thumbs up, thumbs sideways, thumbs down” approach, or to simply ask one student directly for a response.  Applying these techniques helped me a lot with managing classroom behavior during carpet instruction/lesson times.
  2. I have made growth in my ability to write lesson plans.  Before starting practicum I had only written one fictitious lesson plan with no actual experience of implementation.  The opportunity I had to plan and implement four lessons taught me a lot. It allowed me to practice not just planning activities for the students, but to explore the curriculum and make connections to the why, and the purpose of each lesson.  By the time I wrote my fourth lesson, I felt much more relaxed and confident in my ability to plan a lesson that would benefit the students learning while engaging them at the same time.

My Wish:

During this practicum, I lacked on using positive management in the classroom.  It is my goal to make sure that I am noticing when students are showing expected behaviors and to comment on them, with the hopes that this encourages not only their appropriate behaviour but also stimulates other students to do the same. 

 

March 12, 2020 – Follow Up Reflection

As I near the end of the first year in the Bachelor of Elementary Education at Thompson Rivers University, I can reflect on my personal growth thus far.  This growth has been prominent. Firstly, I have realized how fortunate I am to have an Early Childhood background and experience working for the school district as a Certified Education Assistant.  I feel that both of these educational paths/careers are invaluable to this process. At first, I felt myself needing to make a shift from dealing with conflicts/classroom issues with my CEA hat on, to recognizing how I would need to handle things a little differently as a teacher.  This is still true in many aspects. For example, as a teacher, I will not be able to leave a classroom to deal with one behavior, as I described in my first practicum reflection post. However, what I have come to realize is that it is less giving up one for the other, and more adding to what I already am. The experience I have been fortunate enough to gain over the last 20 plus years is going to allow me to be a better teacher than I would have been without it.  I see the change in myself already as I continue to work as a relief CEA while going to school. This change lights me up and makes me excited to learn and grow even more. I have never been more sure that this is the path I was meant to take, and I am excited to see where it takes me from here.