Entering my second week of practicum was nerve-racking because Monday was my observation day. Although I’ve been observed before, this one being the first one of my long practicum seemed more important than all the other ones. Moreover, I was set to be observed near the end of the day which I have never experienced before.  I was so glad to hear that my classroom management has improved greatly. However, I do need to work on my pacing and brain breaks as mentioned before. I also need to reconsider everything that I plan for my lesson to make sure it is something that the students could handle or will it ruin the enjoyment of the lesson.

As for asking important and critical questions, I tried my best during my math and science lessons to help students extend thinking and learning. When I ask questions, I try and have students explain out loud their thinking to the rest of the class so that they can show that they really understand the concept and it’s also a great way for other students to learn something as well. Sometimes, it’s much easier for students to just say the answer to something rather than explain it, so I try and give them an extra minute and come back to them. I emphasize that the answer is not as important as showing their work or explaining how they got to that answer. This really shows students that effort needs to be implemented in their work in order to succeed. This is difficult because only a few students can really do this and others are either too shy to share or they really don’t know how to. Usually when I have a written assessment, I can see that most students are capable of the concept and are showing their work, but are just afraid of sharing out loud which is completely fine. I hope to try and build more confidence in students and I always try and pick students who usually do not raise their hand. Even if I am confident that a student will not be able to answer a question, and they continuously have their hands up, I will still choose them and scaffold and facilitate their understanding by leading them to the right direction. I hope that this shows students that it’s okay if they are a little confused and that I will help them towards the right direction.

For Division, although there is always one right answer, there are multiple ways of getting to that answer. I have allowed students to share their work when answering a division problem to show other students that each and every way of thinking is correct. Some students can do it mentally, while others need to draw it out and sketch the problem to help their learning and all ways are okay. I ask students many times during a lesson if there is only one way to do a problem and they always say no. Sometimes I even ask students to try doing a problem in two different ways to help them understand the concept better.

I will continue to try and ask deeper and more critical questions to help students in their learning. I am looking forward to the other eight weeks of practicum to not only enhance the students’ learning but my own learning as well.