Monthly Archives: April 2014

This week was defined by the teachers’ job action. Unfortunately, it is causing me some stress and upset but I am working with it. Also, I had many positive feedback sessions and evaluations and one of my lessons is being written about in the school newsletter!

Job action starting on Wednesday has limited the hours that teachers spend at school. Although I am not someone to come in extremely early or stay very late, I still do not like having limits on my time. We all have to leave at 4 pm, whether the prep work for the next day is completed or not. Of course, I am taking work home with me, but I personally enjoy working in the classroom space as I have multiple resources there and I like to look at the space around me and imagine and determine how I am going to use it. Overall, I feel very rushed to perform and I feel there is a sense of awkwardness in the air amongst the teachers in my school. Some are very dedicated to the union while others are also taking work home but not telling many people that they are.

Despite this issue, I had many positive lessons this week as well as many downfalls. I felt I put in a lot of energy and planning and although a lot of paid off, some of it still came crashing down. To me, that is the ups and downs of teaching and I am learning to deal with it. I am currently taking it all very personally but am working to move past it and learn from my mistakes. Friday was a very good day for me and we only had 2 students move on the traffic light- a major accomplishment for our group of monkeys!

For grade 2 socials, I have officially taken over and we have started a mini unit on Technology. This week, I had my roommate Angela come in and show the students the technology that she uses every day for work. It is a 3D scanner that helps build customized prosthetics and braces for people that need them to increase mobility and overall quality of life. The students really enjoyed seeing the scanner in action and asking lots of questions. During the lesson, the principal came in, took pictures, and has asked me to write a blurb about the activity to be published in the school newsletter. Very exciting!

Finally, I went to our first Long Jump practice for track and field. Mr. English has said that I am welcome to help out with Long Jump whenever I can, as there are many students who have signed up for it. I am looking forward to it and can’t wait to get out more and get jumping!

Lots of art projects and lesson ideas on Pinterest looking fantastic and perfect for you classroom. However, I caution you: they don’t always work.

This art lesson was a major lesson for me as well as the students. I saw pictures of this art project on Pinterest and thought they would be adorable for Easter- a somewhat functional creation that could be used for a variety of purposes and most likely not done in the past. However, even though I did attempt the project myself in advance, none of them worked out.

They were intended to look like this:

So I set the classroom up during lunch and everything was perfect and ready to go!

The students were excited and after I gave a short demo, the fun began. The fun lasted about 2 minutes. Students realized their strings weren’t sticking to the balloons and kept falling off. Many had to re-do their entire balloon several times. Once they had given up, we hung them up to dry over night.

After they strings dry, the instructions are to pop the balloons and the strings will hold their shape. I popped them in the morning before students were in the room as I had a feeling over night they weren’t going to work. This was the result:

Instead of an egg, students ended up with piles of strings. I kept popping hoping at least 1 would work. But they all ended up as just a small mess.

As the students lined up outside the classroom before the bell rang, my heart pounded. I was scared to tell them what happened. I felt like it was my fault. So I joined them in the hallway after the bell rang and told them I had something I have to tell them. I started with a long apology and ended up explaining the resulting situation.

One of my youngest students raises her hand and says “It’s OK Miss Smith, now we have a bird’s nest instead of an egg!” I almost cried. The optimism of this girl was overwhelming. It was nice to hear that I wasn’t a complete failure.

Lesson learned: make sure you follow all the directions carefully. Don’t make personal edits and choices to the materials or the steps involved.

After spending two weeks in practicum, I have learned that I desperately need to work on my chart paper writing. Many of my lessons involve the SmartBoard so I do not have to consider the text being legible to students. However, when the reason to write on the chart paper arises, I seem to struggle making sure my letters are neat and straight. As a teacher, you are a role model at all times, and that includes printing on chart paper. Here is a sample of my current state of chart paper writing skills…yikes…

Here is the board I created with my students in art classes the past two weeks. Students were given a choice from a number of projects they could work on that would add to this board. After we finished up our unit on soil in science, we added our labels for the different layers and added rocks to our bedrock. Next week, we will start our unit on plants. The intention is to add to the board next to this one with art and information that we learn about plants.

This week was the start of many new units and teaching methods as well as a time to refine the old ones. This week I started a math unit, a poetry unit, and a theatre unit. I taught lessons of my own but also continued with impromptu lessons and even team teaching with my SA. Overall it was a good week full of lots of waiting.

What I mean by waiting is my approach to classroom management. My SA’s biggest piece of feedback last week was that she wanted me to make sure I had 100% of the students’ attention before speaking and moving on. Her suggestion when you only have 80%: wait. Just stop talking, breathe, and wait. Eventually, they catch on and stop talking. Those that do not will be moved up on our traffic light system. Did it work? Yes, but a lot of time was wasted. In total, I probably wait 30 minutes a day for what I have asked for, usually silence or a pause in activity and/or work. However, it was worth it when I had 100% of their attention because then there was no reason for excuses about not actually completing my instructions when everyone heard.

In relation to the traffic light, I had three incidences of tears this week when moving students up due to not following directions or the rules of the classroom. Two were quite serious breakdowns with tears, screaming and body shutdowns, which resulted in trips to the office. The other, I was able to manage on my own. After reflection with another teacher about strategies to deal with this, as I have never seen such dramatic expositions before, we came to the conclusion that for some, it is not an effective method. Now, I knew that about my certain students who are on the light every day, many times a day, but I never had thought about the opposite end of the spectrum. I will have to keep brainstorming methods on how to deal with these specific cases.

On a more positive note, my theatre unit went off with a bang this week. I walked into Mr. English’s grade 4/5 classroom and I felt like I was in a whole other world. Seconds after the morning bell had rung, all of this students were sitting on the carpet, having quiet conversations in a calm manner and facing him at the front in his chair. It was amazing. Then, as I took over, I was quick to get to who I was, what I was doing there, and what we were going to accomplish together as a group on Thursday mornings. I also laid out my expectations, brainstorming a list of them with the students. In my head, I knew I did not HAVE to do that with this group of cooperative and respectful students, but did it anyways and received praise for it by Mr. English. We then moved into our activities and they all went very well. In particular, one boy who has a  developmental disability and a SSW with him everyday was making great strides. Both Mr. English and his SSW told me how amazing it was to see him present the way he did and they want to film his work next week to show progress in his development. For me, that was a very touching moment and I cannot wait to work more with this group and especially him.

Finally, Friday afternoon, after school, I joined a group of teachers from Carr and played in the Baldwin Bash, a fundraising volleyball tournament of teachers versus teachers. I had a really great time. I enjoyed interacting with my fellow teachers from Carr in a more relaxed environment. This school has always been very inclusive of us TCs from the beginning and I am very appreciative of it.

The first week of practicum has come and gone. I cannot believe how quickly it passed by! It was full of many ups and downs but overall, I am very happy with how my performance went this week.

My number one challenge was creating and implementing impromptu lessons. Unfortunately, my students had a lot of catch up to do so we had to continue on with units of study from before March Break. So, the day before, I would be told about what needed to be taught the next day and figure it out the night before. I actually really enjoyed the challenge because it seemed very realistic to me. Teaching needs to be flexible and different needs arise at different times that need to be dealt with. I also feel that my delivery of those impromptu lessons went really well and my SA has confirmed that for me. My class’ works at a variety of speeds so I consistently needing to compensate. Planning ahead can sometimes be seen as ineffective with this bunch of students.

I feel very included in my school community. The faculty has been very welcoming and friendly to both Kate and I. We attended our first staff meeting, which I found to be a very eye-opening experience. I had never thought of all of the politics when running a school. It ran the full hour before school started and I had to hustle to get to the classroom to let students in. I did not like the rush before the day. I have learned that I need the time to settle and get my materials and myself ready for the day.

I have been able to find academic highlights in many of my students and have begun recording them in my journal. During Thursday visits, I focused on getting to know my students as individuals. Now that I am in more of a teacher role, I am looking for specific points about their learning and interactions with others. In math for example, I have been recording which students are able to finish their work early and move on to a higher-level challenge. Others, I have noticed that they have been using very polite language and offering to help student. I am also noting down the elements that are less positive such as aggressive behaviours and lack of respect. I am unsure how to resolve those issues or even approach them at this moment, but I will continue to observe and look for an answer.

This week, I have gained an greater sense of comfort in the classroom, having less and less episodes of “purple cheeks” as my students call it. (I get them when I teach longer lessons and when I am nervous about my performance). My SA has given me lots of positive verbal feedback every day. On Friday afternoon we mapped out Week 2 but I can almost guarantee with will change multiple time and that’ OK with me. It happens and I will roll with the punches as they come.