My Path to Inspiration and Inquiry | practicum experience

Inquiry: Teaching Philosphy

My goal as an educator is to aspire to engage students in rich and meaningful learning that will provide them with the tools they need to be successful in the classroom and beyond. I also want to help my students develop their passions , sustain their curiosity and help them reach their fullest potential.

I want my students to walk into their classroom feeling comfortable and confident to safely express their feelings, thoughts and needs with each other as well as to their teachers.

I want to ensure my students are all given an opportunity to be positively heard. I am extremely conscious with the power and impact of speech and body language it can have on another’s social emotional development. I want my students to feel safe in my classroom.

I will strive to listen attentively and maintain a positive and trusting relationship to allow open communication between children and families. In order to build good-rapport in a group setting, I will encourage positive behaviour support language while maintaining an inclusive framework that adapts to meet each child’s needs.

I want to guide my students to reach and explore their learning potential. I acknowledge, celebrate, and respect each child as unique individuals rather than just focusing on their behaviours. My goals as an educator would be to ensure that I meet each child’s needs to reach their learning potential, and the challenge of becoming one is acquiring knowledge and accessing resources to aid their exploration.

After taking a First Nations foundation course, I was shocked to know how lacking of Indigenous people’s involvement with history of Canada I had from my elementary and high school curriculum. I want to provide opportunities for my students to respectfully recognize knowledge of Indigenous peoples and an accurate account of decolonized history of Canada at an adequate age developmental level.

Mar.07

Inquiry: Living Inquiry Reflection

Posted by weitingc in Inquiry

It was a great experience getting to chat with colleagues from other cohorts (PL-Tech and Middle Years). It was interesting with the 2 sessions outline. I had one session with my research topic: the inquiry based learning and the other an interest of my choice: differentiated learning. The first session was with people with similar research topic, and the second was people who have a keen interest and perhaps have not done explicit research. I really enjoyed the differentiated learning session, even though none of us in the group have done research on it, everyone contributed and made connections to their practicum class. I was even able to bring experiences from our Cougar Canyon social studies class to the discussion. Our discussion revolved around what might differentiated classroom might look like: standing tables? desks? how do we meet all students learning needs?

I wished we had a bit more time to rotate through different topics too! It would have been nice if we had a bigger room to facilitate a big group sharing such as this.

Feb.27

Practicum Visit: February 18

Posted by weitingc in Practicum

Assessment Dilemma

I was asked by my school advisor to help with assessment with during centre time with my kindergarten students. When the kids were playing at their interest areas, I was asked to ask one kid to come up at a time to do a short 2-part assessment takes about 2 minutes or so to do. The first task was for the kids to count up from 1 to as many number as they can up to 100. And, I would have to observe and record if there were any mistakes, or were they repeating or self-correcting when they are counting. I would then jot down the last number they were able to count correctly. The second task was for the kids to count back from 10 to 0 which the kids knew as a “blast-off” activity. For this activity, I was just asked to do a check mark if they can or cannot count back from 10. If they couldn’t, I would jot a short note down of my observation.

Students are provided several opportunities each day during instruction with number counting up and down through their morning routines to the lesson activities whenever possible. Sometimes, they would include it in their chants and songs. I wonder what it means for the students who were able to complete each task successfully and the implication for those students who don’t. It was surprising to see some of the result. Some students who were struggling with their fine motor and writing sills excelled with counting. I wonder what some strategies some of the students used when doing rote-count? What is the purpose of assessing the students with these 2 activities? I definitely saw students who also struggled with the counting. How much prompts are we able to give? My school advisor did say to give some prompts to help them relate to activities we usually did in class? But, how much is too much? Does it effect the validity of the assessment?

Feb.22

Practicum Visit: February 11, 2016

Posted by weitingc in Practicum

There are a few different ways of getting student’s attention I learned from Kal, my SA today:

“non-verbal cues”: my SA started some finger pattern movement and built on more as she attracted the whole class to the crowd. (*I was really amazed at how the crowd gathered at the carpet so quickly and how the kids are so intrigued with the finger pattern and hand movement)
“how many claps (syllables) in your name”: for lining up to wash their hands for recess or lunch, my SA would say if you have “X number of claps” in your name, you may go wash your hand
if your name starts with “a phonetic sounds of X”, you may go wash you hand

Friendship Lesson

Tension between 2 girls at the carpet just before I was about to start my lesson today. I was debating for a slight second on the spot whether to address it or not. I felt it was relevant to the friendship conflict resolution activity I was about to start. So, I took their situation and asked the class how we can help our friends out! I was amazed at the helpful input from the rest of the class. However, the two girls still couldn’t get along, and I knew I had to keep the lesson flowing so I discretely separated them as I continue to start the first part of my lesson, a story. I understand at times we might want to to do classroom management right away to keep the flow. I just thought of experimenting and taking an inquiry approach of bringing a real scenario that was happening to spark student input and share helpful strategies.

Feb.15

Inquiry: 11 Basics to take into consideration

Posted by weitingc in Inquiry

http://www.teachhub.com/11-ways-make-inquiry-based-classroom

If we are able to take the following 11 points into consideration prior, during, and after lessons, we are able to show our students:

a sense of pride in themselves
a statement of respect (value of questions)
it’s an inviting learning space

Listen when students speak
Encourage questions
Don’t answer student questions–show them how to do it themselves.
Spend time on projects, not lecturing
Lessons are fluid
Publish and share
Reflection is included in every lesson plan
You are a fellow learner
Flip the classroom
Questions don’t have yes-no answers
Summative assessments are less paper-and-pencil and more hands-on, creative, and student-centered

Jan.24

Bear Art Lesson: Wonders

Posted by weitingc in Practicum

I did a bear art lesson introducing the eight types of bears that lives around the world. Prior to designing the art activity, I did some research on bears at the Education Library to make sure I am aware of the general characteristics, habitat and additional information about bears. I wanted to be prepared to answer questions and direct them to where we can find out the information if the students were to raise any. From doing background research, I learned there are eight general species bears: Black, Brown, Polar, Sloth, Spectacled, Sun, Moon and Panda. I wanted to also raise the students’ awareness to the bears that live in our community, so I emphasized on the three that lives in Canada: Polar Bear, Black Bear and Brown Bear. I brought about 20 books that had real depiction of assorted species of bears to my Kindergarten class in case they might be intrigued to find out more about the topic after the lesson. I also did put these books out during morning reading time, (prior to bear art activity), and tub time (post art activity). I did also let Kal, my SA know that she can keep the books until next week when she is finished with her Bear Themed lessons. Overall, I am glad the pacing of activities and engagement of student’s interest was much more sustained than my very first lesson on a SEL Story about sadness! My goal this time around was to design activities that use the students’ funds of knowledge on what they know about bears!

Reflection on Teaching

I do understand there were some calling outs during the video clip viewing or when I posed a question, but I did not pause to correct them as they were on topic and just a bit more engaged then I expected. I should definitely take their interest level into consideration and allow more opportunities and time to do a more in-depth pair-share or class-share for future activities, especially when they are so engaged. (E.g. Perhaps….even something short and brief: “I hear you have so much ideas, quickly, turn to your partner, and share you ideas quickly!”)
Classroom Design: How do I ensure I can have constant access to monitor all students? How do I situate myself despite the kids’ built-in routine of bringing their work up to the rainbow table which is situated at the very back of the class while some are playing with tubs in the front? In terms of the long practicum, I definitely have to give it more thought and research into what fits with this group of kids and how can I use the physical classroom environment to my advantage?
Assessment: I am still not quite sure how do I set a measurable lesson learning objective? How do I actually know for certain that I know the student have achieved it? What is their evidence of learning, and does it match up to the lesson learning objective? What do I want the students to understand? AND, WHY?
Inquiry: How do I extend this lesson? While each student came up to me at the rainbow table, I asked them about what they had created. From each of their story, I definitely can take what they wonder about bears and take that exploration further in depth.
Video Clip: too quick, lots of information to take in, fun, the tune is great! If I were to use clips so info-packed as this, I definitely should realize that I can always pause and elaborate or even prep the students in advance what details to look for, such as, colours of fur, facial features…etc..
I didn’t want to limit the students to which bears they want to depict or what they can use to represent it. I did provide a slight framework of using a bear template, glue sticks, wax crayon, and oil pastels. I did show a visual musical clips that introduced all 8 bears. Also, I showed an art demo of what the three bears in Canada would look like. And, off they went onto their creations! I did give suggestions on using the already sorted white, black, or brown wax crayon or oil pastels. Some students did venture off into grabbing markers, I didn’t impede on their choice as my learning objective this time around was not on techniques. Perhaps, I can set stroke, brushing, shading techniques as an objective for future arts lessons. One thing I forgot was taking a photo of their finished product.

Looking forward to the Teddy Bear Picnic this Thursday as a closing activity to conclude the Bear Themed Unit.

Jan.24

Inquiry: Extending learning to outdoor space

Posted by weitingc in Inquiry

I attended a UBC Orchard Garden Workshop on January 16, 2016 (10am-2pm) ran by Susan Gerofsky, who is a co-founder of UBC ‘s Orchard Garden Program. Susan is a passionate math professor who advocates for environmental issues. She said we should try to teach all our lessons outdoor, and to get to know our community as we plan our lessons.

The workshop focused on”Teaching curriculum in the school garden”. Two graduate student teachers from Education presented their topic or research. Both of them have emphasized that by including outdoor learning in our lesson, it fosters a sense of stewardship and raises social emotional awareness in students as they engage with the natural environment around them.

• Toni Lazarova introduced a hands-on session on her new resource book on Teaching Home Ec in the School Garden, developed as part of her MEd project.

• John Ames led a participatory “Draw Me A Garden” workshop on integrating social art (co-designed drawing and storytelling) in garden-based learning for elementary learners, a project he has developed for his PhD research.

From this session (My Take Away)

teaching integrated curriculum by using the outdoor natural setting
provide student hands on opportunities to enhance their learning experience
how art can open up learning concepts and allow everyone to participate at a level of their comfort

E.g. We had a task to draw either a garden or recipe of the soup we were tasting that day.

Everyone engaged with the task with their own interpretation! Some drew the plants, some drew a garden, some represented the sequence of the steps in the recipe visually.

I wonder how I can teach my themes with this type of open-flexible style and set up of the environment in the long practicum.

Jan.17

Inquiry Approach: QFT (Question Formulation Technique)

Posted by weitingc in Inquiry

The Question Formulation Technique is based on a book “Make Just Once Change” by Dan Rothestein and Luz Santana. The QFT can be used as a technique to model and provide students with an inquiry learning opportunity in classroom. How do you introduce the model thinking through questions with your students…

Approach questions with the following:

Produce your own questions
Improve Your Questions
Prioritize Your questions.

Produce your own questions

Ask as many questions you can do
change statements into a question

Improve your own questions

close-ended vs open-ended questions
Change questions from one type to another
Discuss the value of both type of question

Prioritize your Questions

Choose the 3 most important questions you created
Why did you choose these there as the most important?
How are you going to use your questions?

Jan.10

Lesson Plan Consideration: Man Power!

Posted by weitingc in Practicum

We have been learning the importance of scaffolding in our LLED classes for students of all abilities. And, I realized that on one thing it is great to scaffold activities for my student’s learning process. But, on the other, what is the proportion of time spent of breaking down steps versus meeting my learning objective. During my “Hickory Dickory Dock ” clock/dramatic play art, I have to realization that it is okay for me to pre-built activities in a a way as long as it helped me focus on meeting my learning goal: whether it is working on fine motor skills, literacy, counting, etc..I should be clear on setting one learning goal and built my activity around that as a foundation!

If it was not for the assistance of the TOC, I don’t think I had the man-power to monitor the class and attend to each little steps. This is another teaching”a-ha” moment for me! Last time, it was routine, this time is around clear learning purpose of activities and not to scaffold too much & too often. Don’t try to meet too many learning goals in one activity. I knew the kids enjoyed the activity, but I also knew if I didn’t have an extra hand in the class, the art craft wouldn’t have been able to come together as smoothly as it did!

What I did this time around:

I pre-cut clock, mouse, and lyric templates

Steps I could have done prior to teaching and will take into consideration for the future:

pre-pin the clock hands
pre-tape the pop-sticks to the mouse template

Dec.01

2 Weeks Practicum Sum Up + Inspirational Pro-D workshop

Posted by weitingc in Practicum, Pro-D

A couple things that I would like to work on for my future Thursday visits and the long practicum:

I would like to see understand more about some of my student’s learning needs, for example, in terms of a possible selectively mute student. How do I support the student in the journey of becoming more comfortable in class? I have been doing some background research along with my inquiry question.
I would like to find my balance in the classroom as a developing teacher as allowing my students room to explore in things of interest to them but at the same time have a structure that is maintained by adequate amount of classroom management. I am still working on a framework that best suits my teaching/learning needs as I get to know my students more.
Teacher Presence: Be more aware on how I vocalize myself, and how I present myself in different situations with varied facial expression and tone accordingly to context (e.g. be more dramatic during finger puppet play/ stories..etc.)
More positive reinforcement during class management: praise the good behaviours to attract other students follow suit, rather than calling out the negatives all the time. Use more non-verbal cues during classroom management so it does not disturb the flow or pace of instruction or activity time.
Be more firm and consistent with my expecatations. It’s okay to be firm yet reasonable during instruction time. Scanning the whole class more frequently to ensure I have student’s full attention. And, when I don’t, it’s okay to address it.

Things I have done in the past 2 weeks:

Morning Routines (Greetings at the door, change shoes, sign-in books (print their name and a word of their choice), providing students feedback on their letter formation in their sign in books, assist special helper to initiate good mornings to all classmates) Assist or guide students in tying shoes laces when they switch between inside and outside shoes.
Morning Message (Come up with a sentence for the day, count with the kids how many words there are in the sentence. Write down the blanks needed for “kindergarten writing”. Next, come up with the class at least the first and last letter of each word. Lastly, model the correct way of spelling in “book writing” and read it with the class at a normal pace.
Calendar (Go over the spelling of the month, count the days, what’s today/ yesterday/ tomorrow, what’s the season, what’s the weather, what’s the season, how may days have the students attended kindergarten) It requires singing when doing calendar time.
Ensure enough transition time is allotted for students to get ready and make it in time for Music classes or Library time. The use of singing and music is crucial during transitions, body movement brain breaks, and before going home. Reminder song for hallway behaviour and marshmallow feet. Nursery rhymes with singing and dramatic movements.
Talking Tables: I first observed my SA and Paige Whittemore, the Early Literacy teacher leading the activity together. Then, I led literacy activities with the use Talking Tables kindergarten program binder with Paige.
Centres (allow students to make a choice of where they would like to spend their time during centre time, provide guidance and manage behaviours when needed)
I introduced the concept of 4 through a song, allowing students to use various manipulative to represent their understanding of the number 4.
I retold an SEL story “When I feel sad” with focus on identifying the character’s emotions through the use of document camera. The lesson was followed by an activity how to be a good listener when someone is sharing a personal story with you especially when it’s a sad one. I modeled what good listening looked like and also asked the students for ideas
Non-verbal cues for what listening looks like (one hand to cover mouth and one hand raised)

Inquiry Hub/Suwa’lkh School Principal

I was blown away by Jay Jang, an Inquiry Hub student who presented his passion with technology. Just by the way he articulated his interest, I wouldn’t have known he was a high school student. I am amazed by his programming skills and knowledge of different inter phases. It was quite magical to see someone dream, and to witness a glimpse of that process through his presentation. I hope that in my teachings, I can allow students to think outside the box and dare to dream! I want to provide them the safety net that I will be there to guide them as they explore curiosity of the world.
I really liked how Suwa’lkh School Principal emphasized that we as educator must teach from the heart, especially for the marginalized population, as they need us the most. The children are quite quick at picking that up, and we want to take every opportunity as educators to allow learning to happen not only academically but also to guide them through their self-discovery if it means in terms of scaffolding career planning. (*This example, was relevant to high school students seeking to work right after graduation, and how they need to have the tool to seek a career in various trades of interest to them)

Nov.15