5 weeks down, 5 more weeks to go. Where is the time going!? Wasn’t it just yesterday that I had just started my practicum? In any case, here is what happened during the last week.

This week has been a tough week. My students were chatty throughout the entire week, which really tested my classroom management skills. I am really trying hard at getting better in having that “wait” time and making sure that everyone is looking at me when I am giving new instructions during my lesson. This has been something that I have been working on since practicum started, and I do believe that I have made some progress in this area. Of course, there is more improvement that needs to be made.

For Fairytales, the students are continuing to work on their Fairytale projects. This week, we also learned all about plant parts, including the stem, leaves, and flower. We did the Celery Stem experiment and got to see how the celery stalks changed in colour when we put it in water with red food colouring. The students bean plants are really coming along as well!

I also got to experience my first field trip as a teacher, taking my class to the Honey Bee Center. The students got to learn about developmental stages of the honey bee, saw a real bee hive, and got to put on beekeeper clothes! Overall, the students really enjoyed the field trip. One student commented that it was the best field trip he has ever been to.

Our classroom has been working on SEL approaches to help our students focus and do their best learning. This week, we introduced fidget toys into the classroom. The students were (as expected) very excited about the fidget toys. We decided to slowly introduce the students to them, so we first started out with Playdough and bean bags for the students to utilize. We made sure to set the rules when using the fidget toys (i.e. it cannot be seen and you can’t make noise with it). It will be interesting to see how well the fidget toys will be used within the classroom.

Stay tuned for next week.