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.