Today was the first (unofficial) day of my 2 week practicum in Ms. McCredie’s 5/6 split class. Some teacher roles that I took on within the classroom today were: taking attendance, helping a smaller group of students with math homework, handing out field-trip permission slip forms, and moving around the classroom talking to students about their science research projects.
Today my main focus of observation was on the 2 different types of questions asked within the classroom:
1. Instructional Questions
2. Inquiry Questions
Within the class, there is pretty much a constant stream of instructional questions being asked by many of the students. Questions such as: What are we doing next? When do I hand in my assignment? Can I go to the washroom? How much longer until we start the next activity? Can I work outside in the hall? Do we have homework tonight? Can I help hand out the worksheets? Are we going to have DPA this afternoon?
These types of instructional questions within the class are usually very quick to be answered by the teacher and most times they are a simple yes/no/soon/maybe answer. What is really interesting about observing these types of questions is how often they are asked throughout the course of a school day. So much of Ms. McCredie’s time before, during, and after activities is spent answering these types of questions for all of her students. It’s really interesting to observe exactly how much of the day is spent answering these types of instructional questions, as well as observing which students most commonly ask them. On this particular day, it appears as if the students who ask the most instructional questions are those with outgoing personalities, those who have a lot of energy, those who are hands on, those who like to be involved, and those who appear to be very outwardly stimulated by the various classroom activities.
Contrary to the many instructional questions asked throughout the day, I would say that I only observed several inquiry-based questions. The inquiry questions that I observed today appeared to take place during longer activities in which the students were able to focus on and engage with the material being taught. The main activity that I was able to observe these types of questions in was during the afternoon in science, when the students had to research in pairs about the 5 Different Kingdoms of Life. During this activity the students got to use textbooks, worksheets, and iPads to research their particular kingdom. As I walked around the class, I got a chance to speak with many of the students about what types of information they had found out about their kingdom. Every single student I spoke with was extremely excited and engaged with the assignment. They were thrilled to show and tell me about information they had already researched, and additionally, several of the students had great inquiry-type questions. Questions such as: What is the biggest shark and how does it become so big? Is bacteria the same as germs that makes people sick? Is coral an animal or would it be considered a plant and why? I thought all of these inquiry questions asked by the students were fantastic!! They were all really great questions that led them to ask further questions that were related to their original question. These questions show that the students were curious and that they wondered about something, which is exactly what inquiry is. It was really interesting to pay attention to these types of questions in the classroom and to observe when these types of questions were most prominently asked.
I think it is important to note though that today was an abnormally very busy and excitable day. There were many different activities that needed to be accomplished in a short time period of time, there were guest speakers that spoke to the class, there were several individual student reactions that disrupted the class slightly, and finally, the building excitement of the halloween dance was very evident amongst the students. Their ability to focus on this particular day was slightly off, which is likely why I was unable to observe more inquiry questions from the students.
I addition to the few great inquiry questions that I was able to observe today from the students, I also wanted to note that during the financial education presentation I was so taken aback by some of the intellectual and creative answers given by many of the students. These answers showed that this class is full of not only creative and smart personalities, but that these students are also fantastic critical thinkers. I am so excited to work with them more over the next 2 weeks and for the rest of the school year.
One big question that I have after my day in the classroom today is: what are some ways that can help to motivate a student that does not want to participate in a certain classroom activity?