My Path to Inspiration and Inquiry

Teaching Reflection: Week 4 (Earth Week: Art/ Buddy)

My students did a lot of Earth Awareness related activities throughout the week. We learned as a class that Earth Day is not just a special day to take care of the Earth, instead we should be helping “our” Earth every day in class, at home, or wherever they are. My students came up with a list of ideas and made connections to our previous activities such as planting, recycling, turning off lights and tap when not in use and more as they think of taking care of our Earth.

I felt my instruction are more clear and succinct for my activities this week, however, I am still working on how to naturally transition them from one place to another and when giving instruction so they don’t have to move around so much without a purpose. For example, they don’t necessary have to sit around the carpet for instruction, I could technically do it all the message white board…etc.. On Friday, I have moved a tall white board that was rarely in use on the side to the front of the classroom. I wanted to experiment if with this tall upright rectangle white board can help students to see more easily as I do large white poster paper activities instead of having it on the ground at a low eye level. I will see how it goes on Monday as I introduce my “letter of the week: Qq.” It was an eventful day on Friday as I prepped an Earth Day activity for my Kinders and their buddy class. I connected with both my SA and my grade 4 buddy class teacher, Mr. E on my activity as this would be my first time working with his class. The finished art product was a Earth Day Promise 2015 Keepsake. My Kinders worked on getting mixing the pre-prepped blue and green salt dough ready as a morning activity. To my surprise, my Kinders really enjoyed the sensory touch of the salt dough and created their own interpretation of the Earth with their own discovery. After lunch, as our grad 5 buddy class joined us, the buddies were given instructions to help the Kinders with the ornament keepsake. After they have completed that task, Buddies and their Kinder partner can each have an extra salt dough to create something together.

It was a lot of work in terms of material preparation on my end, but, as soon as I saw how intrigued and excited my Kinders were, everything was worth it! My feedback from my grade 5 buddy class and their teacher was that it was a lot of fun! It was a bit noisy at times, but Mr. E, the grade 5 teacher said, “it’s learning noise!” I made a visual instruction for my grade 5 buddy class and explained it to them, so they can refer back to any steps at any time. I used both the Kindergarten classroom and the open area for the art collaboration activity as I knew I had more than 45 kids. When I had all 45 plus kids packed in the kindergarten classroom, I felt I was sweating!! It wasn’t actually warm in the classroom, perhaps I was nervous?! I had to wipe sweat from my forehead. This experience was definitely different from the grade 7 social study teaching at Cougar Canyon.  If the weather is nice next Friday, Mr. E suggested that I do an outdoor physical collaboration activity for Buddy time. I will come up with an activity that allows me to get to know his students more and allowing more bonding moments between the two grades.

Goals to Work on:

• Organization of Record Keeping: maintain & keeping track of assessment for my lessons for each student. I am currently working on a template to allow me to do oral tracking of each student’s progress. I am working on how to use subject appropriate assessment, evaluation and navigating strategies for reporting. At the end, I would like to be able to use the data from assessment to help me set future learning goals, adapting my lessons, and see how I can motivate my student’s in their learning interest.
• Having my lesson plans ready for my SA before she leaves at 3:30pm or 4pm. I have been working at the school till around 5:30pm to complete revisions. My lesson plans and preparation for my next day have been ready before I left the school. However, I would like to try to prep in advance in terms of lesson plans at least 2 to 3 days in advance, so my SA can see it before she leaves for the day.

Everything was going smoothly…until…

There were two parts to their task during my art lesson that day.

My first step of instructions was very clearly laid out. It was short in length with modeling and students reciting/reviewing. It went smoothly, all students were very engaged and focused during the first task. They were very engaged in their first task of creating them stem and leaves. Their attention of focusing on step 1 was longer than I expected! My focus of the lesson was to have clear, short instructions and refrain from repeating myself which goes hand in hand with having concise modeling of steps. Everything was going well as I saw they are really well focused on their step 1 task. All of the students were on task and knew what to do.

The flow of my lesson and sticking to clear instructions was going well until I brought them altogether at the carpet to explain the following step. That was when everything went to spiral out of control in terms of my clear & concise instruction focus.  I took a glance at the clock and somehow I started to panic! I thought I was running behind and was worried that they might not be able to finish their step 2 task before lunch time. Somehow my panic and stress took over the fact of reality that students didn’t necessary need to finish and that I didn’t really need to stick to the timing of my intended lesson if my students were still so engaged minus the few that were ready for the next step. My mind at that split moment as I glanced at the clock was: I needed my kids to have enough time to produce my intended art result. So, in order to “meet” my intended “students’ art product,” I skipped my original instruction routine: explain, model, and review with my students. I blended the explain and model together for a quick 101 break down of what they needed to do. Then, I “quickly” sent them back to their tables to continue the rest of the task. I realized I forgot to do the review part as they headed back to their tables. “Oh no!” I thought! I didn’t want to interrupt them again as I knew most were focused again on their work. I was trying to find a good timing to readdress the step 2 instructions again….

I am not happy with how I rushed through my instructions and left some students’ who needed explicit visual/hands on review of directions in confusion. I addressed the confusion during the last bit of the lesson as a class and apologized to the class that I understood some of the instruction were explained too quickly and it was tricky to remember all the steps. I am still impressed at their result despite my rushing of instruction. I wished for future lessons, I will keep in mind of ensuring the learning process is calm, flexible and enjoyable! Go with the flow of the class. And, not stress out about the time. And, that it’s okay if we don’t get to finish our intended work, they can always continue during another time perhaps during centre time.

I will attach a photo of their work after I have put it on the wall.

Compared to the first week, I am starting to feel more connected physically, mentally and emotionally to the immense concept of my practicum experience. I feel more in sync with my students, my SA & FA, VP, principal and other school staff as well as my fellow colleagues who have a shared experience in the school. Taking time and making room for establishing relationships has really helped me to feel more settled in to the whole practicum experience. I am grateful I have received so much encouragement and support from everyone in the school. Some of their words of affirmation was really warm and powerful as I remind myself of my own attributes not just focusing on what I felt didn’t go well. I am constantly keeping a positive and cheerful check-in with myself throughout the days to ensure I am showing my students, and parents the best and professional side of myself.

My father left for family emergency to Taiwan as of Friday evening, and will not return till June 3^rd, which is the last day of my practicum due to family obligation. I have been quite dependent on my father for the sense of safety and security. His absence will give me an opportunity to step it up in terms of taking on more responsibilities. I am sure I will realize how grateful I am to have him around! I will be taking care of the house, front/back yard, getting myself to and from school early, and just the day to day errands on top of my own teaching preparation. I will make sure I use my weekend efficiently to prep for the coming weeks in advance so I won’t feel frazzled during the weekdays. In terms of emotional security around my house, I will be visiting my UBC counselor once per month to do a check-in. I will ensure my teaching preparation is already on my SA’s table to go before I leave the school for my appointment. I have notified both my SA & FA about this.

In terms of teaching this week, I felt my first gym soccer lesson didn’t go as well as I had imagined. There were multiple problems, for example, taking too much time to get all my students partnered up, lining formation for activities, repeating my instructions too often, and the closing game at the end was quite out of control in terms of having to repeatedly remind them of the rules especially with their energy so high. If I were to change things around, I would perhaps have cones set up the next time they do soccer drills for a more efficient grouping and lining up. I am working on not repeating my instructions. I am doing better at it in the classroom lessons, and I should translate that in the gym setting as well. I think the reason why I repeated my instructions was because I wanted to ensure all my students were actively participating and knowing what to do. I am learning that reminders are not always a positive thing, as it may hinder my student’s growth of paying attention and developing their skills of focusing. My FA & SA have pointed out to me, if students know I will be repeating instructions later, they will learn quickly and possibly will adapt to the idea that they don’t have necessary have to pay attention the first time around. The good news is the second time around my soccer gym lesson addressed with modification yielded a much better teaching and learning result for both my students and I! I was able to form the students into pairs and passing them soccer balls more efficiently, the transition was cleaner in terms of instruction giving. We learned simple soccer rules and even did a mini soccer game at the end! If the weather is nice, I will continue my soccer lessons outside as we don’t have access to the gym for the next 2 weeks or so for mural painting.

I am really looking forward to my planting theme next week! I brought all my students’ plants home over the weekend to ensure a speedier growth with sun exposure! Hopefully the weather holds out the coming week! It will be a busy week to come with Vaisakhi celebration!

I am learning an indescribable amount from being in my practicum class consistently every single day. I am building my rapport with my students which helps with transitions, and establishing a positive teacher presence. I am working on getting to know my student in the class. She is slowly starting to warm up a bit. Both my SA and I are taking small steps at a time with our new student G, there are some good days and there are some days G is not really cooperative. I learned from Mr. D our Youth Worker in the school that this is G’s 3rd kindergarten school this year. We are trying to recognize and praise good behaviours whenever we can as well as helping G start to build new friendships in the class.  In terms of lesson structure, I am learning that I need to work on clarity and the amount of instructions I am giving my students for their tasks. I am working on how to scaffold or design my tasks so students who are struggling to finish wouldn’t feel too far behind the rest who have finished already. I learned from my FA, Claire, that we don’t and shouldn’t expect all of our students to complete all the given task. It is okay to set the minimal expectation first, and then let them know they can continue to work on it at another set time (e.g. 1 on 1 special time with me during centre time to further help them)