My Community Field Experience was at Citadel Middle School, working with the student services team. I took on the role of a student services teacher and was responsible for supporting students with exceptional learning needs. Citadel actually has the highest ratio of students with designated learning needs for a middle school in Coquitlam. A whopping 36% of the student body has a designated learning need. Although this included gifted students, the amount of extra support required was astounding.
I no longer know…The extent of how much work goes into the process of ensuring that each student receives the support they deserve. Every single student is unique in their own way. No two students have the same needs or require the same form of adaptations in order to succeed in their learning. There is a tremendous amount of work that goes into figuring out what each student needs and how they can best grow and develop as people. Student services teachers are required to review each student’s G4 file and past assessments in order to help develop individualized education plans. Consistent communication with core teachers and parents is also necessary to carefully monitor the student’s progress. Not knowing the amount of time and effort that actually went into the role of a student services teacher has given me a new found respect for the work that these educators do.
The importance of this realization will ensure that I will always be sensitive to the different learning needs of each of my students in a future classroom. The unknown extent – that is an individual student’s learning needs – is largely important to any teacher’s practice. Teachers have to continually be able to learn and adapt their teaching styles so that their students are always learning in the best way possible for them.