Last Day w/ELL

Today was my last day visiting with my ELL buddy, it was a sad one for me.  First, we caught up by talking about her week and my visit during her ELL lab Math class. She should me a picture of her and her friend Angela that they took while they were at the movies last weekend.  She also thought it was funny to tell me a joke about her being pregnant which of course I only found funny after I found out it was a joke, then at the end of the meeting we played the same joke on Allison and her  little buddy who thought it was funny too.  Well so that no one thinks that we did not do any work we also worked on her geography, I helped explain what the assignment was about and gave clarification on the subject and the directions.  We also looked at some of her math grades and went over one of the handouts that she had failed and needed clarification on.

Well today the lesson went well.   This has been a rewarding experience for me.  I was able to utilize a lot of the strategies that I have learned throughout the semester.  Some of the things I used effectively was my reading to understand, how important rapport is when dealing with students and how to effectively engage and communicate with ELL.  As a proficent english spreaker I commend these students for there effort in learning a new language.  This kids want to learn and deserve an atmsophere that is learning friendly for them.  After interacting with my ELL this semester I have gained great insight for future dealings with my ELL learners.

In reflecting back on this experience, I must admit this was not something that I was looking forward to, but know after having done it I would not have passed up this experience for anything in the world.  I think this has made me a better person in so many ways and allows me the opportunity to use what I have learned in the future for when I deal with ELL students in my class. This has been more than experience this has been imbedded into the fabric of my ability to become an effective teacher.  thanks ELL buddy KA

Last Day w/ Cooperating Teacher

Well today was my last day working with my 2nd period cooperating teacher.  This has been a rewarding experience and I have learned so much.  As a result of this experience I was able to build a rapport with my students which made this a good experience and helped me practice and see how important rappore is when dealing with my students in the future.  I also learned how to manage good consistant classroom management because my cooperating teacher was very good at managing that. while interning at Akins I gained an insight on some of the things I need to improve  and reflect on if i want to be a good teacher, especially my tone of voice and overall demeaner, when dealing with collegues and school personal.  I also was able to experience group teaching which is something that I know most teachers don’t do in schools today but because of this I will work extra hard at trying to incorporate this into my teaching.   

The students of course had different personalities but this was good practice for me at getting to work with multiple personalilites so I think in the future I am more prepared.  Akins student body is different I will admit but the kids are all awesome little people.  I hope that in the future,as a result of this experience it makes me a better and more effective teacher for my students.

This was a sad day for me because I will mess my students, they were great and I have learned more from being with them then they’ll ever know.  I will truly miss being in the classroom.  But like all things good things always come to an end. And so that is the case here, the end.

Free Write/Journal Entry

Well this semester has been both rewarding and challenging for me.  I have experienced a variety of different emotions pertaining to teaching.  One of the things I have learned that I found to be very rewarding in the need to model for my students.  I say this because it has really bothered me since my second teach.  I feel like that without proper modeling for my students it really makes learning difficult.  I also have learned how important class management is to making class time productive and to get the most out of it.  Today I had a not so pleasant experience with the front office at Akin which I feel like I could have handled better and as was told to me there are just some people at a school that are helpful and some that are not and it is a good rule of thumb to know which ones you can count on and which ones you can’t.  I have also learned that I can work as a team no matter what my personal fear feelings are especially if me and that person work good together when it really matters.  I have more than enjoyed my co-teaches a lot more than I expected, that has been a very rewarding experience.  Even though I found this course to be more then intense I have truly enjoyed it and working with my fellow colleagues and professors.

My first Experience Co-teaching

Today I had the opportunity to co teach with one of my collegues.  This turned out to be a rewarding experience.  Today we taught the students about Africa.  we played african type music while the sts. did a warm up asking them a basic question about africa. then my collegue did a brief lecture on the african continient.  we then broke the students in to five groups each one representing a part of africa(north, east, south, west, and central africa)  each group had a different activity for the students to complete.  these activites we intended to engage and keep them engage in learning about africa.  at the end we elaborated on the warm asking them what new and interesting information they learned about africa.

I thought that this lesson went well. the information given on central africa seemed to be something that the kids were able to do with ease. but the activity for west africa was a bit to complicated for the alloted time we had.  I think i should have pick which african countries to look and no more than 7 and then have them answer a question on it, i think they would have walked away with a better understanding of that concept of GDP.  i also say the many varieties of teaching strategies which we have learned through out the semester.  the board game, getting information from text, crossword puzzle, application activities, etc. were all incorporated in this lesson today. i do see that these work well when combined.

Reflecting on the events of today, i must admit it went much better than i had anticipated.  My collegue and i worked well together and we do in fact compliment one another.  i do know that there are many things that i would change about the way it went. and that is lesson some of the activities. Also if i had more time i would have modeled much better instead of having to explain the activities fuller during the learning time.  I would not teach all these at the same time i would only do two at a time because these worked well but might have been more enjoyable if it was smaller information given with adequete time.   I think lack of good modeling was the biggest down fall, but overall this was the best teaching experience i have had all semester long, on top of the fact that the cooperating teacher is awesome.

Teaching w/my ELL

Today i had the opportunity to work with my ELL student on a lesson that was being taught in her geography class. the assignment required that she be able to read sections from the book and answer questions that pertained to the section. as we went through the lesson she read some and i read some of the sections. at the end of each section and also as i went through the material i answered and clarified any misunderstanding that she had. my little buddy was able to do a large amount of the work with minimal assistance. we made it through at least half of the lesson. she answered all the questions asked about the sections and we also did a recap of some of the things that was discussed in the preassessment portion of the assignment, she was much more at ease when answering these questions after reading some of the sections.

In this lesson I found myself using some of the the things that have been stressed through out the semester.  with my little buddy because she was absent the day the assignment was given out, it gave me the opportunity to really teach and her learn the material. she didn’t know much about the material so the pre assessment portion was a slow process but i didn’t push her because i didn’t want up to put up a filter on me because then we would have accomplished nothing instead we just moved on and worked on the parts that she was comfortable doing and did some reading which would help her better understand the material and as a wrap up i decided to go back to the pre assessment lesson and asked her to elaborate more on it now since she had read the material and we had talked about it, and this time she was at great ease and even asked some really good questions about the subject matter.

as a result of this lesson i was able to get a better feel of what working with an ELL student is like. of course there are things I would have done differently but over all it went well.  If i would have had more time i would have allowed for her to do more of the reading to help her with her speaking and reading, i will also in the future learn to speak more Bics which i think will greatly improve my relationship with my ELL students.   overall great experience

Teaching Week

Today, my colleague did a map quiz review with the students to help them prepare for next week map test. The students did well.  After the map quiz the class was put into pairs and worked on a study guide for the up and coming test on SW Asia.

During the map quiz today my colleagued used one of Professor Bond’s teaching strategy to help the students learn where differnt places were in this region.  In order to do this the students were engaging in what Prof. Bonds has taught about this week pertaining to Bloom’s levels of thinking. This particular activity required the students to identify wher certain counties were using the knowledge level.  When it was time to do the study guide the students then entered into the application level of Bloom’s model of thinking, the kids then were asked to put into practice what they had learned.  Classroom management was important in this lesson because it needed to be run in a smooth manner that would make the environment conducive to all involve.   The rules were clearly defined and expected to followed.  this activity was a great example of how important it is to maintain good classroom management, especially considering this was a large classroom and a lot of group activity going on.

For as the way this class went today, I thought it went well.  I would have made some changes to the way in which it was conducted.  I would have gave the students more time to study the maps before starting the activity.  I would have also like to have seen some background knowledge and also demonstrated the activity to the students before starting.  I also thought that it should have been explained that the students were not to have any notes on their desk and I would have made sure.  Far as the classroom management it was awesome especially since we had five teachers present in the room, I felt like the students were able to get the necessary help needed.  One big thing I would change and that is have a answer key to help me better help the students and for my aid to be of better assistance to the students.  Overall this class experience was good.

Preassessing ELL Language Proficiency

This week on Monday, I had pleasure of visiting with another colleagues ELL students because mines was absent. She started of by recapping on the conversation from the last meeting.  She asked each of them about what they had been up to since they last talked. She asked them how they thought they would do on the TAKS test which they were going to be taking in a couple of days. My colleague then went on to explain today what she was going to be working on with them today.  She explained to them she would be assessing their level of language proficiency during the session.  She explained to them that she would be talking to them about a family and at the end they would be making a family tree describing their own family.

My colleagued seemed to have a pretty good rapport with her little buddies, though these two girls may look at this as time to socialize.  She begin the lesson by reading the first passage and after doing so I was able to conclude that one of the girls was on the novice level and wasn’t as proficient with even BICs.  also that same girl seemed to be experiencing the affective filter which is something that was taught during Prof. Bond’s class.  The girl was quiet and then just didn’t want to participate at all.  The other girl seemed to be on an intermediate level, she was able to communicate much better than the other girl.  When asked to respond to the questions being asked both girls were really slow to respond if they responded at all.  Some of the questions had to be re-stated in order for the girls to understand.  When it came time for the girls to read one girl had no really problems she did it without hesitation where the other girl didn’t want to and even experienced that she didn’t want to read and that the intern should do the reading for her and once again the affective filter was put up.  Even when asked did they understand they said yes but I don’t think they really got the lesson.  The girls did not have a hard time creating a family tree about their family because at the beginning of the lesson we had already modeled one for them so they had to problem.  the modeling made this an easy task for the girls to complete.  I learned how to assess language but I’m not sure what they girls really gained from the experience.

This was a great experience for me, I learned a lot.  I learned that it is ok to have a good rapport with the students but is pointless if the kids don’t respect you or don’t see you as an authoritative figure, which these girls clearly did not.  It is important to make your role known up front on the first meeting which is something that has been stressed throughout the  (classroom management).  Also knowing which level of proficiency is important when trying to teach ELL students.  If this was my situation I would have handled it differently, I would have made it clear what there roles where and what mines was.

Working w/ the students

today was an unusaul day for me.  I worked in a small group with about three of the kids to try and get an assignment completed.  One of the it was hard to get him to focus and do the assignment but he did do it after I promised him a piece of gum.  He was very successful at getting quit a bit of work completed.  The rewards strategy we learned in class came in handy today.  The more time I spend in the classroom with the students the more I appriciate this profession.  One student was sent to the nurses office which the students later informed me was going to most likely be tested for drugs, which I thought was odd.  He did return to class and actually did some work.  The teacher was also good at following through with his classroom procedures. and also did a good job at getting the students engaged in the lesson.  Today was  good experience.

All About My Cooperating Teacher’s

Both of my cooperating teachers are really cool so far.  They are both males and is very knowledgable in their subject matter.  They relate well with their students.  They are always on top of their game and have very good control of the tone of their classes.  The students are well informed of the procedures that are expected from them in the class and overall do a very good job in following the classroom directions.  Today in my second period class the kids worked on a study guide for Fridays test.  I thought that the teacher gave them to much independent time to work on the assignment and instead it just gave them time to talk and play around making it to where the kids were just waiting on him to give the answers.  What was suprising about the whole thing is in the end after he gave them the answers he did a quiz game over the material and suprisingly most of the students knew the answers to the question.   Overall I think I would have made this a take home study guide that they turned in to me and then next class period I would have given it back and let them grade and correct it, leaving it for them to complete the assignment on their own.   This would have given more time for studing and quizzing the kids and clearing up any misunderstanding about the material an also time to introduce the next topic.  this was to much down time for my taste.  But overall it showed great success. 

My First Encounter w/ My ELL Student

My first encounter with my Ell student was a rewarding experience,  I learned a lot about what she likes and dislikes, what her future goals are, why she came to the United States and she also told me about her family life including how many brothers and sisters she has who speaks fluent english already and even their ages.  She also told me a great deal about her parents and their reasons for bring the family to the states.  I found her to be very mature for her age even though she is only a 9th grader she was able to carry on a conversation with me in english very well.  she is a really sweet girl.  My meeting well exceptional well I gained so much from this.  I also understand more about working these types of students and also what types of things matter to these kids including how they feel about attending Akins.  This encounter will help to become more considerate of my ELL students and understand that they are just as interested in learning as another child who speaks english.  As a result, I as a teacher will do everything I can to enrich all of my students learning capablities.