Observations

So far I have learned a lot in the Kindergarten classroom that I have been in.  One thing that I have observed is the teacher going over the rules for the classroom, different centers and different activities.  When she goes through these things she either posts the rules in the classroom or has a hand signal to remind the students of what the rules are.  In addition to seeing the teacher go over the rules I have also seen the teacher enforce the rules.  I have seen the teacher have to tell students to stop what they are doing and also go back over the rules to remind the students of them.  I have also seen the teacher enforce the rules by using her behavior chart which she fills out every day. 

I have also observed that there are students from all over the spectrum of learning.  There are some students who are advanced and there are some students who are below where they should be.  I have seen her do some one on one work that can start to help some of the students.  She is still trying to get in the swing of things and get the basic rules followed before she starts changing instruction for certain students. 

Teaching Style

            The teacher in my classroom has set up the classroom as a teacher centered classroom.  Most of the time the teacher is lecturing to the students; sometimes that students are able to go into their own groups and do some thinking in small groups. 

My teaching style is a combination of teacher and student centered learning.  In the lesson plans that I form I try to make sure that there is a combination of the two.  In Kindergarten there does need to be a lot of teacher centered activities because the students do not know what they are supposed to be doing.  I think that a teacher needs to be actively thinking of ways to make a classroom students centered instead of teacher centered.  I also like to keep the students constantly engaged.  With a group of students that is six years old a teacher has to always giving them options and introducing new things so the students do not start staring off into space or messing with their crayon boxes.

Incorporating the Two Styles

One thing that I am going to take from my supervising teachers teaching style is the way that the teacher talks and her facial expressions when reading a book.  She is someone that will change the way that she is talking when she is reading story.  This makes the students more interested in what is being read.  She will also change the way that her face looks depending on how the story is going.  Even when she is asking a questions her face and voice look and sound like they are asking a questions.  Being exaggerated in this way helps the students to be more interested in what is being taught or read. 

New Elements

            One instructional element that is new to me is the computer software that the teachers use.  The students are required to go through a computer game that helps the students to build computer skills and also learn words.  This is something that I like; it gives the students a chance to see something different and see something presented in a different way.  I also like that the students are getting a chance to work on computers.  A lot of the students have not been on computers before or if they have been on one they have not done a lot of them.  This gives the students the experience that they need to start forming in order to be successful in their generation.

Comfortable Elements

            There were a lot of things that were familiar to me.  The ELMOs are something that I had at my first internship, so I am already used to how they work and what they should be used for.  I am also used to seeing teachers using songs as an instructional element.  I was surprised the first time when I came in and the students were signing the “letter sounds” song that I already knew, and “the days of the week” song.  I really like using songs to help the students remember information that they are learning.   One other instructional element that I am used to is to have hand signals to let the students do something.  My teacher says, “Give me five” and the students put one hand up.  That means the students need to be quiet and have eyes on the teacher.   The students also have to put up two fingers to go to the bathroom.  

Professional Development

            One thing that I want to do next is to perfect my classroom management skills and also think of different ways to help students learn the information they need to know in a different way.  This coming week I am going to have a chance to do that.  My internship teacher is going to be doing testing on Tuesday with the students at the computer, so she is going to tell me what she wants me to do and I am going to do it while she is doing the testing.  I am also going to do my peer to peer which will be a good way for someone else to come in and tell me what they think about my teaching style.

Tell me and I'll forget; show me and I may remember; involve me and I'll understand.

~ Chinese Proverb

Blog #1

Since I have been in the College of Education I have taken all of the classes that are required except ESOL 3, Linking Literacy and Integrating the Exceptional Student into the Classroom.  Those classes I am taking this semester.  After this semester I will be done with all of my classes and I will only have to take my final internship!

 From all of the classes that I have taken in the College of Education I had two classes that have impacted me the most.  The first one is my classroom management and level one internship.   These classes where set up differently than normal.  They were joined together and co taught with the same two teachers.  We were also paired with the special education majors and their two teachers in both classes so we would be able to learn how to co teach.  I was able to experience co teaching from this experience and also learn more about special education than other people taking the class do.   I also really learned a lot from my teaching writing class.  We are able to work with a group of elementary school students and come up with a script and movie to film with the kids about math.  This gave me the experience of working with students while having deadlines, managing the group, and having fun at the same time. 

I have been lucky in the past couple of years; I have been able to have a lot of experiences with children.  When I came to college I got a job at a child development center.  I have been working with children from the ages of three to six for the past four years.  During two of the summers there I was able to take over a classroom of three year olds and become the lead teacher for the whole summers.  We were able to work on writing names, letters and numbers, and developing motor skills.  Then, for one of the summers I was able to be a lead summer camp teachers for five and six years olds going into Kindergarten.  I have also been tutoring students in the fourth and fifth grade in math for the past year.   From the experiences that I have had I have been able to be exposed to teaching many different age groups the past couple of years.  

Teach at the child development center has impacted me the most.  This is where I work for eight or ten hour days, so I am able to see how it is to be a teacher and manage a classroom.  It has showed me that you need to be prepared and even have extra things to do and that being organized can help a lot.  I have learned that as a teacher I have to stay on task or things will not get done during the day.

In this internship I expect to keep on learning how to better manage a classroom, I think that this is going to be one of the hardest things when I am a teacher so I want to learn as many strategies as I can now.  I will be keeping an eye out for different teaching techniques that I have not seen before.   This way I will be able to remember then for when I have my own classroom, I will be able to see if they work in the classroom that I have.   I hope that I have a supervising teacher that is very helpful and that will let me be hands on with the students, my fear is that I have a teacher and that will not let me be active in the classroom.  One other thing that I fear is that when I get up to teach some of the students will not listen and they will be disrespectful.  I think that if I have good classroom management I will be fine.

What I want in my classroom.

What I do not want in my classroom.

From all of the teachers that I have had in my life, a lot of my science teachers stick out as being good teachers.  They were the teachers that always had us doing something.  They were either demonstrating things or letting us make something or doing things to demonstrate what we were learning.  They were also always willing to listen to questions that the students had and made sure that they explained it in different ways so the students could understand what was being talked about.  They were the classes that we learned about the stars, made rockets, boats and egg car.  These teachers seemed to be happy teachers that were willing to help.

The mediocre teacher tells.  The good teacher explains.  The superior teacher demonstrates.  The great teacher inspires. 

 ~William Arthur Ward