Schmidt Chapter Eleven-Great Teachers Speak in Tongues

Mastering Communication in the Infomration Age



         I always find the reading in Schmidt to be extremely beneficial. I was able to review on how important communication is in the classroom. This means not only between my students and I but parents, teachers and other staff members. When I am communicating with parents I should remember ten essentials of effective communication. The first on the first is being proactive. This means that I should make contact as early as possible to the parents of my students. I can do this by sending a personal note. The second step for essential communication is to be positive. I should always start all conversation written or verbal on an upbeat note. I want to make sure that I prospect for anything good and then slowly build a bridge to the rest of the message that I need to say. The third is to be frequent.  I want to make sure that I am establishing a regular schedule between my classroom and my parents. I can do this through notices, a classroom news letter, homework packets and requests. Fourth on the list is that I am always clear. This means that I want to keep my writing simple. The fifth is to also be basic. When the list tells me to be basic when communicating with parents, I have to understand that I am not able to tell a parent everything I am doing with in the classroom. Some basic information that parents should know is the schedule dates for report cards (IEP meetings), procedures for field trips, when a student is absent and many other general needs. Sixth and seventh on the list is to be attention grabbing and appealing. The eighth on the list is to be inclusive. This means that I need to step certain group rules with my parents. If I am going to allow my parent to email for everything I could get “buried” in all the emails or even miss something important. I want to make sure that I stress that phone calls should be used for emergencies or health concerns (medication) and other issues can be handled through my email. I will let them know that I will always check my email at lunch and right after school so if anything is sent after, I will not able to read it until the following morning. As a teacher it is also important that I am timely. If I want my parents involved in what their students are doing I need to make sure that I am giving them time to participate or to know what is going on inside the classroom before it happens. Being error free ends this important list of essential communication. It would be very unprofessional if I send home a news letter with grammatical or spelling errors when I am the one teaching their child. This could cause many parents to lose confidence in my skills and teaching.

Week Six

This was my last full week at my seven week placement. I can’t believe how much time has flown by. I keep thinking back when I was sitting in orientation freaking hearing that I would be teaching a full day in a classroom. Now, I couldn’t imagine just sitting in the classroom observing or only teaching ten lessons like Novice teaching.

This week was filled with many great opportunities. Since my teacher has a busy week my final week of my placement, I observed four other teachers in my school this week instead. I found this experience very rewarding. It allowed me to see other teaching styles than my cooperating teacher and my own. It also allowed me to take in ideas that I would want to use in my own classroom.

The best part of my week was being able to be a part of creating the new goals and objectives for IEP’s for four students from my class. My teacher allowed me to have a say and to create the goals and objectives with her since she said I have been working so well with the students. Once we had finished writing them on a “rough draft” we went onto the computer system called “Easy IEP.” I was so excited to learn about this software because this could be a system that I could be using in my future classroom. My teacher allowed me to write in the information for the present level of performance, the goals and then the objectives. Once we had finished the information we printed out a copy and each took a turn proof reading what we had created. Once we were both happy with the IEP’s, we sent them to the office to be looked over before the actual IEP meetings that would be happening in April. We were able to complete the IEP earlier this year because our students had just completed taking the Aims Web and John Woodcock reading and math tests. This experience in the classroom made me feel more prepared as a special education teacher and I feel more confident to talk to a future employer on how I was apart of the process of writing an IEP, implementing the goals, and using the “Easy IEP” program. Writing IEP’s has always been something that I was concerned about once I had my own classroom. Even though I have done mock IEP’s and meetings in my special education classes, it never felt like I truly understood it. By being a part of this classroom and working with actual students who I am writing the IEP about, everything feels so much more natural to me. My teacher even allowed me to take an example of each IEP with me so I can use as an example (all names were whited out).

This week I also was able to be a part of an in-service for my school. On Friday we had a half day and the teachers were allowed to pick between two different classes. The first class was lesson on the interactive white board and a vocabulary lesson for middle school students. I wanted to learn as much as I could about technology in the classroom, so I ended up learning more about the interactive white board. We were shown by a certified teacher on the Promethean board, different ways of assessing our students. She handed out a “controller” to each of us that highly resembled a cell phone. The teacher could ask a question in multiple choice, short answer, or true/false. The students were able to write there answer how they do when they write a text message. What was great about the controllers is that they are numbered so that if any student would decide to be inappropriate the teacher would know because each student would be a specific number.

The best part of my week was that I was able to chaperone our Valentine’s dance. I was able to do with a fellow student teacher from Trinity and I had such a blast being with my students out of a classroom setting. I was a little worried in the beginning because I wasn’t sure how the students would behave but it ended up being a very smooth dance. There were some tears and drama but who are we kidding, I am student teaching in a middle school. The dance ended with a large amount of balloons falling from the ceiling and a graduation song for our 8^th graders. I had a great time seeing my students be themselves and free from a classroom.

Schmidt Chapter Three: Great Teachers are Ring Masters

What’s the Big Idea about Behavior?

In Schmidt chapter three it focuses on student’s behavior. I found this chapter the most interesting and helpful so far. What all new teachers and even more seasoned teachers struggle with is behavior management.  I learned from reading this chapter that all behaviors are motivated by two basic instincts. The first one being “to seek pleasure” and the second is “to avoid pain.” When reading this first page I couldn’t believe the author could some up something so large into two main categories but I see now by teaching in the classroom how very true this statement can be.

I also found the “Understanding Camouflagers” in this chapter very helpful. I had fun reading through the first few “names” like the class clown and I could reflect on my own education and who each of my classmates were and what “name” I might of fell under as a student. What was interesting was learning why we have students like the class clown. This chapter broke down these “names” and gave a reasons why a student might portray themselves this way. I remember looking back at the class clown and just seeing a student who was funny and knew how to distract the teacher so we didn’t have to do as much work. By reading this chapter I realize now that distracting the teacher wasn’t only the main concern. My class clown could have been distracting the teacher because even though he looked like he was smart and understood what was going on in class he might have had trouble comprehending what was actually going on during a lesson. He might have been afraid to look “stupid” to the class and being hurt so he acted funny instead.

In my own classroom I realize many of my students fall under the “bad boys and victims.” One of the main phrases used in my classroom is “stop looking at me (insert students name here.”) Even though I only have five students most of the day, a couple of my students have a hard time working with other students. Even though all my students have a day were I can see them as “bad boy” or “victim,” I have two students in particular who are these “names” on a daily bases. I learned that this strategy allows the student to get out of work when they feel frustrated or “daunted” at the task at hand. I learned that this is why one of my students who falls under the “victim name” will yell out “Stop looking at me!” and the student making the faces will always tell me “I’m not doing anything.” I learned to keep these students separated when I am able to and when I know a lesson will be challenging I will sometimes break the class apart and teach them in different groups so they can’t take their frustrations out on each other. This allows the student to ask questions if they are confused or frustrated instead of trying to have an out. The book advised that when this happens instead of jumping into the middle of the fight that I should take a second and figure out why my student are “hiding” behind this behavior.

Week Four

I can’t believe that I have already finished my fourth week of student teaching. This week was a very meaningful one to me. I learned that even though we might have things out of control outside school that we have to have a different persona in the classroom. I learned by talking through my rough times with my teacher that no matter how hard the day is going for you, that if you seem that you do not want to be at school that your students will be able to read that from your attitude and body language. It was a concept to learn before I started in my own classroom. I always want my students to know that I am excited to teach and to learn with them even if things can be rough out of the school walls.

This week also allowed me to attend a few meeting that were going on around the school. My first meeting was on Monday and it was with five other teachers (three general education and two special education teachers). It was a meeting called MARS and it is on a math class that the teachers are currently taking every other Saturday. During their meeting they are given a task for their students to complete. It is a math “quiz” that shows if the students are at the current level in mathematics. There is three different test for sixth grade, seventh grade, and eighth. Before this meeting my cooperating teacher and I had to hand out this quiz with helping or accommodating the quiz in many way even through we are teaching in a special education classroom. During this meeting, with the other staff we worked as a team to grade the quizzes according to specific numbers. This way the person in charge at MARS could see where the students are at in mathematics at Hamlin Upper grades. During this meeting the teachers also shared their concerns on this quiz. My teacher explained how she was frustrated on how she couldn’t prepare her students before the quiz just so they understood what they were supposed to be doing (area and perimeter). After the teacher’s next class in a week from now they will be informed on how the students did, share their concerns and be taught on how to prepare students for the next found of quizzes now that they took the pre-test. My teacher explained to me that the pre-test and quiz were not made for students who weren’t on grade level. Our class is currently at a third and fourth grade level so she wanted to talk to her teacher and explain how the quiz isn’t an appropriate level for her students and how it will help them if she could even read what the problem is asking since many are lower readers.

This week I also learned how to accommodate the testing for student learning the constitution. We have one seventh grader in our class and in order to go on to 8^th grade she needs to pass the constitution test. Since this student has a documented IEP she does not have to take the regular test like the other students at Hamlin. My cooperating teacher and I spent many plan periods and time after school putting together a folder on the constituting that will replace the regular test on the constitution. We found many helpful worksheets on edHelper.com. This student needs to keep all the papers, quizzes or writings in a specific folder so that the school can document that she passed the accommodated constitution test. I found it really helpful on how the school allowed my teacher and I to have freedom in choosing what would replace the basic test. This allowed us to choose readings, worksheets and quizzes that were not only interesting but also on level for our students.

This week I was also able to help my teacher create goals and benchmarks for three different upcoming IEP’s. This was such a great experience to see this in action and it was so good of my teacher to include me in this process since this is so important to know in my future. I was able to work with the program ‘Easy IEP,” on the schools network. I found it so reassuring that even my teacher after thirty years of experience in special education sometimes felt unsure while writing the student’s IEP’s. She told me how even though she will write them on her own at first, it is always helpful to collaborate with another teacher to see what they think. My cooperating teacher explained that she thought the hardest part of IEP’s was writing on how they were going to measure the goals. We took a couple of plan periods and wrote out three “rough drafts” of the student’s IEP’s. We will finish them later next week once we get the test results back from both the Lexia reading program and AIMSweb.

At this point in my student teaching I feel very comfortable in my classroom with both my cooperating teacher and my students. From this experience I know that I will not only have a mentor for several weeks but that we will stay in touch long after this. My teacher is always willing to help me or give me advice when it is needed. She has allowed me freedom in the classroom and to take over different subjects and put my own passion and teaching style in place. In my teaching style, I learned to keep it at the same level as my cooperating teacher. Instead of her being the “ruler” of the classroom, she created an environment that everyone feels equal. This type of atmosphere allows students to feel safe to share personal stories, ask questions, and not being afraid to answer something if they are unsure. When a student does over step their boundaries she is clear and strict on what the “lines” are and students and makes sure that all the students see how it is not appropriate. My favorite part is that she uses humor in the classroom. This was a breath of fresh air to me because it allowed me to be on a different level with my students and made us more comfortable with each other. I love the fact that I can joke around with my students during down times but still have that boundary of the teacher and student. My teacher was a great model of being personable in the class and students knowing that they are being cared for. When I talked to her about this she explained that she doesn’t want to be friends with her students because there needs to be a level of control in the classroom but she still wants every student to feel equal and apart of the classroom community were her students can also feel safe.

This next week is going to bring a whole new round of experiences. This is going to be my first week were I am teaching each lesson and many of them will be on my own. My teacher will be pulling out different students to complete the AIMSweb testing and since she has a student teacher I am saving the school from sending in a substitute teacher. I will be teaching independently four out of the six periods and during the other two I will still be leading the lesson. I remember during Orientation how nervous I felt to be going into a school were I would be teaching and left on my own. Now being familiar with my students, school and routine I feel confident that this week will help me grow in many different ways. One way is how I control the behavior management without my teacher’s guidance, making sure that lessons end on time before the next period starts and giving the students the help they need when I don’t have someone else there to help me when many students are asking for help.