The first week of the long practicum laid the groundwork for the remaining 9 weeks to come. I received helpful feedback on what to work on going forward and am also beginning to establish presence in front of the students. I was also fortunate to have both of my school advisors present at Dickens earlier in the week to touch base and to really ease my “anxiety” going into the long practicum. The first day was more observing as I was not familiar with the Monday activities. However, it is always a pleasure watching my school advisor teach and I can learn a lot from her. By Friday, I was leading most of the day, including the small transitions like bringing the students to the lunchroom, gathering students at carpet, and also helping more with classroom management while my school advisor was leading. We also launched our Insect Unit this week, which has started out very promising. It was interesting to have done the first lesson with our peers at UBC, and then with our students. The flow of the lesson was just as expected (and successful) but the classroom management really surfaces when it comes to your own students. There were triumphs this week: I was able to engage a behaviour student in all of the Insect lessons and tried the “giving you two choices” strategy – with success! The student did not want to participate in silent reading so I gave two choices – I will select a book for you or you can choose your own. This meant that I was really becoming an authority figure to this student, rather than a “classroom helper.” Along with triumphs, there were also things to consider going forward. Here are my main “takeaways” from this week:

• Don’t be afraid of “uncharted territory”: Coming from an inquiry based cohort, I am no stranger to the concept. But when teaching the first insect lesson, I felt some fear if I asked “Why?” to a student’s response; I would not be prepared for their answer – “uncharted territory.” For example, I had written in my lesson plan to question students why they had placed certain animals in the categories of mammals, fish and insects. But I had “skipped” this step because I was worried that too much information would be revealed by the student OR I would be unsure how to handle that student’s response. You would be surprised of students’ background knowledge…
• Knowing what “responding to call outs” means: I receive this feedback regularly and it is something I am striving to improve on. But up until now, I didn’t realize I was actually unclear on what it meant. I thought it was verbally reprimanding a student who called out an answer (“Johnny, no!”), but according to my school advisor, it is giving affirmation to students who call out answers without putting their hand up. For example, I would ask a question “What are the three main body parts of an insect?” and I would say “correct” to the student who called all of them out without being told. I was heartbroken to learn that one of my behaviour students was waiting patiently with his hand up, and I did not even notice. Which leads to my next takeaway…
• Decide how you want to receive answers from students, and try to be consistent: Do I want to choose “quiet” hands, or have the class answer all together. I should establish how I want to receive my answers first, before affirming.
• Using time wisely before and after school: Making photocopies last minute is not fun. Going forward, it is recommended, especially by our very organized school advisors, to really be on top of making photocopies ahead of time. Coming in early in the morning certainly has its benefits: no students around, quiet atmosphere, no lineups at the copy machine, prep in peace!