Walking into my practicum classroom for the first time was, I admit, a little bit daunting. Many questions ran through my head. Will the students like me? Will I be able to teach the material effectively? Will I be able to keep everyone under control and in a productive state? My Student Advisor was very supportive, however, and with his guidance, and the guidance of many others, I was able to complete my practicum and in the process learn about how to effectively teach a class.
“Introduce yourself to all of the students,” my Student Advisor instructed me, “and then clearly set out your expectations for the class. You do have expectations for them, right?” Up to that point, I can honestly say that I did not really think about the expectations for the class. I obviously wanted them to listen to me and not talk during lessons but these words made me realize that I would not have opened with any expectations at all. I quickly learned that expectations for both the class, and myself, were one of the most important components of teaching a lesson. This concept was really brought home for me with one specific lesson. The students were tasked to create a remembrance day wreath for an assembly and part of the process was using green paint to paint their hands to create a print that constituted leaves of the poppies. I did not think that I would need to state that the paint only belonged on their hands, paper and brushes. It was not long, however, before a few students realized that they could paint more than just their palms and before I knew it, many of the students had painted themselves up to their elbows. The next day, they were tasked with painting the poppy petals red and I made a special note to lay out my expectations for the paint. With clear guidelines, the paint did not appear in places that it was not supposed to be. After that lesson, I was careful to explicitly layout my expectations for each lesson. Having clear expectations also helped my classroom management and gave both myself and my students a concrete foundation that could be built upon.
In my teaching philosophy, I stressed the need to be honest and genuine with your students in order to gain their trust and to build an academic relationship with them. I believe that you must take interest in them and when you do, they will be more inclined to learn from you as a teacher. “Learn more about students’ lives outside of the classroom so that [teachers] can connect with students on a more personal level” (Hamre & Pianta, 2006, p.65). I believe that this concept is so important to teaching in order to maximize your effectiveness in this profession. I learned of the necessity for this during my practicum by not only interacting with the students, but also by observing how my Student Advisor interacted with the students. He had obviously developed a relationship with his students even before they entered his class and as such, made his job easier when they arrived in his grade. He was friendly, supportive and he made himself available to them even outside of class time. I made a point to arrive at school early to interact with students who also arrived early and to help out those who needed help with their homework. Likewise, after school I made myself available to anyone who wanted to talk. This helped to develop a positive relationship with my students which translated into my teaching. It helped to intrinsically motivate them as they valued what I had to say.
One of the most practical lesson that I learned about teaching is being able to be flexible and adaptable while maintaining an educational environment. I quickly learned that grade sixes and sevens are relied upon a great deal for a myriad of activities and jobs within the school. Oftentimes, I found that I did not have a complete class either because some students had recycling, others had to go to the gym to lead the weekly aerobics session, there were various collection jobs to be done or for any number of reasons. I learned that a teacher is required to be flexible in order to maintain a productive class environment. This also connects back to having clear expectations. Does practicing a dance routine for the upcoming assembly excuse some students from having to finish their missed lesson? I believe that it does not and I made sure that my students understood that and that they knew what I still required from them.
Perhaps one of the hardest lessons for me to learn was keeping consistent assessment notes for each class. In order to be a consistent and fair teacher, I realized that I must make thorough assessments of my students. They allow me to see how everyone is doing whether they are excelling or struggling and shows me if I need to redo a lesson. They are also integral when communicating with parents about their children. If a student is struggling, the parent will want to see evidence of this. Likewise, if a parent approaches you in regards to their child’s academic performance, detailed and frequent assessment notes can help them understand where their child is at.
These above points were what really impacted me over the course of my practicum. I learned greatly over those weeks about these topics and the result was a well maintained and productive class environment. I by no means have finished my learning process but I feel that I have developed a solid foundation with which to build the rest of my practices upon.
This is the Remembrance Day wreath I spoke of in the above example.
References
Hamre, B. K., & Pianta, R. C. (2006). Student-teacher relationships. In G. G. Bear & K. Minke
(Eds.), Children’s Needs III: Development, prevention, and intervention (pp. 59-71). Bethesda, MD: NASP.