Category: Practicum Reflections

This week came with a lot more responsibility. Unfortunately, my S.A. picked up a few of the many germs floating around an elementary school classrooms and was out for two of our three days together last week. A TOC was called in for both days and luckily, there was one available to cover our Grade 2 classroom. I was more than happy (and ready!) to step up and take on the responsibility of the classroom since I know the kids and our routines. There is a lot to think about when you are the central teacher in the classroom… Did the fish get fed four times today? When will that important notice go home? What are the plans for next week? Do the fish need a water change? Did the potatoes get watered? And those are just the questions I asked myself (and my S.A. via text), let alone the many questions I get throughout the day from my students! An experience that came out of this was that I had to communicate to parents on my own. I had to have a conversation with a parent regarding an incident that was problematic with a parent. This experience connects well with inquiry topic because I have been interested in and researching about school-home relationships. Luckily, it was with a parent that I had been building a relationship with over the past months of being at my practicum school. The conversation may have gone differently had it not been with a parent that I see every day, twice a day. The incident was dealt with and a solution was reached with the help of the parent, the student and our E.A. It was oddly comforting having this test of responsibility so close to transitioning into the four weeks of full load teaching. Although I still need the support of my School Advisor, I feel like I am ready for this next milestone and challenge in the practicum.

Week three came and went before I even knew it. Not only was it a short week with having Good Friday off, but there was so much going on throughout the week that it just flew by. As I drove home on Thursday evening I was thinking of what this week’s theme was. It came to me that with so many interruptions throughout the week it was flexibility. I believe that being flexible as a teacher is one of the most important skills, especially in elementary education. Power outages, rain storms, class photos, and longer-than-expected assemblies are just a few things that went on at our school this week. Some things got shifted to different days, some were adjusted throughout the day and there were some things that just out-right didn’t happen. What’s important in this is that we, as teachers, are organized and calm for our students. Some children do not adapt well to change, our job is to make that transition as easy as possible for them. Teacher’s must always have something up their sleeves to be flexible with schedule changes. I noted this throughout the week, an Easter Egg hunt didn’t go at the time we expected due to rain and my S.A. transitioned seamlessly into working on a “No Excuses” word and a story. My goal in the next couple weeks as I transition into the full-time portion of my practicum is to begin to build a pool of activities that can be used in these situations.

It felt like this week’s theme of the week was relationships. Being in the classroom every day and teaching up to 50% of the day has allowed me to build relationships with my students on a deeper level. Yes, I have been working with them since October however, being there and seeing their everyday ebb and flows has allowed me to read them better and know where they are at. As I was helping one student one-on-one while a lesson was going on, I noticed that another student sitting at the table group wasn’t looking quite like themselves. I asked them if they were feeling okay (as the stomach flu has been going around!) and they replied with “O.K.”. I knew, from spending so much time with them now that this was not the case. I probed further with another question and the student broke down in tears. We were able to remedy the problem and this student ended up having a great day by creating strategies through that conversation. I believe that the student-teacher relationship should be one of the most important things in the classroom, knowing your learners is just as important (if not more) than facilitating the actual learning. I am so privileged to have an S.A. that also places a high importance on relationships because I get to see how she interacts with students, remedies problems, and builds trust within the classroom. At the end of week two, I am feeling excited to be back in the classroom and Monday to see my students and hear how their weekend went.

After the first week of being in the classroom for my extended 10-week practicum, it seemed like this week’s theme was schedule and structure. Like the students, we as adults also rely on a schedule and structure in our everyday lives. At the beginning of this week I was feeling very hesitant about being in the classroom. I was feeling unsettled in this new role of being in the classroom every day, all-day teaching. It is quite a shift from sitting in a classroom every day, all-day. Halfway through the week I made the analogy for myself that I am a little pre-schooler getting ready to go to kindergarten. I may know my ABC’s and I know how to count to ten, but I am certainly not going to know how to do multiplication. In the grand scheme of my career as a teacher I am that pre-schooler. Being in the classroom since October has helped me know the classroom routines and how my School Advisor (S.A.) deals with certain difficult situations however and I am still learning every day. Using this analogy has helped me throughout the rest of the week because I notice things that I could have done/said/handled better and I am applying those learnings into my next lesson. Something I am working on for myself if seeing the positive in my lessons and the delight that some of the lessons bring to my students. At the end of the week I am feeling more settled into my role in the classroom and the shift in schedule and structure of my life.

My inquiry on barriers and strategies to forming strong home-school relationships has been very useful as an educator because this is a type of relationship I am going to be engaging in for my whole careers. This topic is something that is lasting, the only thing that may shift throughout my career is the language we use as well as the mode of communication, however the actual need for the relationship and communication will be everlasting. Since this relationship will impact my whole careers it was important that I do this research now before I have my own classroom and relationships to develop. The implications of this research can have an impact on other educators as well by sharing knowledge on this topic as well as strategies for difficult relationships.

 

I am curious, after doing this research and noting observations in my practicum class, as to what actions can I take when parents/guardians are not being responsive or withdraw from the relationship once you have established a relationship with them. My research has primarily been on creating strong home-school relationships, now that I have done my preliminary research on this topic and gathered some valuable strategies, I am left wondering, how are these relationships maintained over time?

 

The topic of my inquiry can be connected/linked to much of the coursework we have been doing in other courses because it a lot of what we have been learning is forming relationships and knowing your students as well as communicating learning. For example, in our classroom environment class, one important factor of creating an environment that is positive is building relationships with students. This can be extended to building relationships with the student’s home life because their day does not start the moment they walk in the school doors and does not end when they leave out those same doors. Building a relationship with a student’s home can create an even more positive classroom environment because parents/guardians can become engaged and more supportive of their child’s learning. Other coursework this had connections/links to is assessment. Involving a student’s home life is valuable because there is communication occurring about what their child is doing while they are away from home most of the day. A parent/guardian can also be involved in the assessment process. This allows the student and the parent/guardian to see areas of strength, growth, and what they still need to work on.

 

Going forward into my extended practicum, it is important to “live” this inquiry because this is a time that I can try different techniques in a very safe and supportive space. An idea that could be valuable is keeping a “home journal” that documents the interactions that I have with parents/guardians. Over time it would interesting to see how the interactions change and grow (or if they do at all). Another idea is learning about different family types and having a “family day” in the classroom as a fun way to get the parents/guardians into the classroom and building those types of positive relationships and interactions. I believe that the learning that I have had through this inquiry process will be valuable throughout my career as an educator, not only the content that I have covered but also the process.

As I have research more in depth into my topic there have been a couple shifts in my thinking. The first is the ultimate benefit of the student. In the first round of my research, I focused more of the barriers and challenges to forming strong home-school relationships as well as a few strategies to do so. While finding articles and resources for the second time, I had a realization that the reason to forming strong home-school relationships is ultimately for the benefit of the student. If it is not student-focused then why are we concerned with forming these types relationships? The research presented by Fuller (2010) of The Benefits of Parent Involvement: What Research Has to Say was a very useful resource because it broke down the benefits of parental involvement into the benefits for the child, the teacher, the parent, the school, and the community. It was a comprehensive meta-analysis, citing eighty-five studies in their collection of data.

 

Thinking about how I can link my research on my topic into practicum and my further practice in education I think it would beneficial to try out some of the strategies my research has outlined. I have already connected with some of the parents of the students in my class because of field trips, meetings about the students, and friendly conversation at the classroom door. However, to further extend these relationships as well as reach out to parents/guardians I have no met it would be valuable for me to make a phone call home in the first few weeks of my extended practicum. This phone call would be a positive interaction, telling the students home adult that they have a positive impact on the classroom. This way, I can start building a relationship with home in case anything should come up when I am the primary teacher in the classroom. I am lucky in that we have an outside door directly in the classroom so I can chat with parents before and after school while they drop-off/pick-up their child.  These simple strategies are great to try out during my extended practicum because I have the support of my School Advisor, Faculty Advisor and administration.

After doing my preliminary research for my inquiry question – what are the barriers and strategies to forming a strong home-school relationship? – I have learned that many of the barriers to forming this type of relationship are ones that we have discussed in class. These include cultural or language barriers, history of schooling for the parent/guardian, and/or economic/time constraints. Another learning that has shifted my question is using the terms school and home instead of teacher and parent/guardian since they are more diverse and inclusive terms. This is an important shift in my question because family dynamics are becoming more diverse, especially in the area of my practicum school.

However, what I have found to be very useful is a lot of the strategies the resources have provided. Many of the strategies the authors/presenters have presented are very simple approaches to connecting with parents and/or guardians. Strategies such as calling home, writing home in a child’s planner or even putting up a welcome sign in your classroom. These interactions can be one-way, two-way or even through technology. An interesting point that was brought up in a TedTalk that I watched was that by connecting with parents/guardians about their child, you learn more about your students. This presenter had brought up a situation in which we didn’t really know what was going on for a student and upon calling home, she discovered that the reason why this student didn’t want to go on a trip that he had fundraised for, was because he was worried he wouldn’t know anyone. After learning this the teacher and the parent worked in partnership to connect the child with other students that were going on the trip so he would feel less socially anxious. This anecdote demonstrates why it’s so important to connect with parents about their child.

My next steps in my inquiry process would be connecting with my School Advisor (S.A.) about implementing some of these strategies leading up to and throughout my extended practicum. When I am at my practicum school for my weekly visits I am finding it difficult to connect with parents/guardians because again, I am only there once a week. At the beginning of the year my S.A. and I sent home an introduction letter, explaining who I was and why I was there. However, I have yet to connect with many of the parents on a personal level. While I go into 60, or even 80 percent teaching load, I will be the primary teacher in the classroom and must connect with the parents now so they feel comfortable discussing their child with me and vice versa.