Prompt - My First TCMS After-School Experience

On Thursday of this week I experienced my first middle school dance as a teacher chaperon. To start off this entry on a positive note, I will say that the experience was greatly helped by my constant presence at the school; students behaved respectfully towards me, and I was familiar with much of the staff and faculty. It really does make a difference to be at the school all day every day from the beginning of the year. However, I must really applaud teachers who help out at after-school functions that require manual labor. Working at the concession stand of this dance after being up and around the class room all day was exhausting. We spent a solid, non-stop two hours filling drinks for the students and handing out pizza. Needless to say, the 50 minute drive back to Morgantown from Grafton wasn't easy.

As much as I can complain about spending a total of 12 hours at the middle school, I really think that my participation in this dance really did a lot for my professional integrity as a student teacher. I met several other faculty members, talked with the school's vice principal, and most importantly I showed the students that I cared about being there even after school let out. I'm truly glad I made the choice to participate at this dance, because only two hours of help truly made a difference that will last the rest of my internship.

Reflecting on the Practicum Plan

Thinking back on the Practicum Plan we used this semester to organize our assignments and learning goals, I don't believe it had a huge effect on my performance as a participant this semester. It was very rare that I actually even looked at my plan; I usually look to my checklist. I do suggest that Benedum continue to use the plan for the participants next year, mostly for organizational purposes. I would also suggest that the learning goal aspect of the plan be changed, because I feel it wasn't really a useful place to put learning goals or dates to complete them.

The most successful aspect of the Practicum Plan was allowing us to put a "target date" for completion. I believe this leads to my conclusion that the Practicum Plan was best for organizing our time at the beginning of the semester and making the number of assignments seem more do-able, rather than making our teaching better in any way or assisting the work done later in the semester. I feel that my work load this semester seemed less overwhelming and I think I was more organized with completing my assignments on time. However, I feel that it's possible this change could be do to my smaller class load or the move from TCMS to UHS.

Two Characteristics of the Novice Teacher

Characteristic 3 of the Novice Teacher pertains to the ethical and moral duties we have as educators. It is of great importance that every classroom has an environment that exudes professionalism, and makes our students feel that they will be treated in a fair way. We must also integrate these values into our teaching in order to transfer these values onto our students. I feel that the best example of this characteristic in my teaching is the Holocaust unit I recently taught in my 11th grade class. In this unit, I asked students to understand that the eleven million who were persecuted should not be thought of as a number, but remembered as individuals who had their lives changed forever by the events of the Holocaust. To encourage my students to learn more about different people affected, I had my students make "passports" that contained a picture of a victim of the Holocaust and their birth date, country of origin, and personal history up until the 1940s. After this unit I gave my students more information on these victims, if they lived, and what their lives were like after liberation. My students truly got a understanding of how dangerous it is to dehumanize others, and how important it is to look at individual lives.

Characteristic 6 requires the novice teacher to show an in depth knowledge of the content that he or she will be teaching. This characteristic is particularly important for secondary educators, who must have a great deal of knowledge of content. As I am a social studies teacher, I feel that it is most important to show my knowledge of history. My best example of content knowledge would be a analytical paper I wrote about the Renaissance era literature for my Italian history class. In this analysis, I discussed how the culture of Italy in this era had an enormous influence on the presence of women in literature. This essay is a wonderful example of the content knowledge I have that is require in a social studies classroom.

Practicum Plan Progress

One of my most important learning goals listed in my Practicum Plan was my aim to increase control of my classroom to ensure that students respect me as a teacher. I feel that this could be best accomplished by establishing a better relationship with my students that makes them feel comfortable in the classroom when I am teaching and allows them to bring their questions to my attention. I tried to do this by learning student names as soon as possible to be able to call on specific students during lessons. I also decided to add more discussion activities to my curriculum so my students understand that I respect their thoughts and opinions so they will learn to also respect mine.

In my plan, I originally included a lesson that includes Creative Arts in relation to social studies to be completed in February. Although I have not removed this from my plan, I have not been able to complete this lesson in February. I will have to change the target date for completion to a date in March.

Looking through my plan, I have already completed every activity that I planned to complete in February. At the moment I am also already planning my activities for March. Though I feel good about my organization and completion so far, I am extremely worried about the about of activities and lessons due in March. March is going to be the biggest problem in my plan, mostly because we have very few days of school in March. Our county has a Spring Break in addition to an Easter Break of three days. I will definitely have to buckle down to complete everything required for this time.

Two Characteristics for the Novice Teacher

Characteristic 2 for the Novice Teacher emphasizes the importance of being an effective communicator. This communication can occur in various forms: a teacher may communicate in a written manner, through speech, or even in a non-verbal way. These exchanges often occur between the teacher and student, but it is also important to note that a teacher must also communicate with parents, faculty, and other individuals in the school community.

My most important artifact associated with communication is the student blog I set up at Taylor County Middle School. I created a blog through a website specifically made for student use to ensure student safety and ease of use in order for students to answer critical thinking questions. With this website I was also able to reply to the blog entries with comments and suggestions. I find this to be my most notable artifact because my students were excited to complete this assignment, and were eager to use blogging again in the future.

Characteristic 4 relates to the essential duty of each teacher to ensure learning for all students. Being a facilitator to learning for each students involves a commitment to meeting students needs in various ways.

I believe I best met my students' needs in a lesson dedicated to differentiated instruction. I designed this lesson specifically to meet the different learning styles in my classroom. In this lesson on the French and Indian War, students used a RAFT to complete a writing activity. I also played traditional Appalachian music to help my students who work better with sound in the room. I find this to be a great artifact because my students were more equipped to complete a writing assignment than in past lessons.

These characteristics important to teacher development are connected by emphasizing a clear understanding of the student and his or her needs. Communication with the student is essential to understanding needs and thoughts. By becoming receptive to our students, we as novice teachers can improve the quality of our teaching and therefore the likelihood of student learning. Furthermore, without effective communication with our students' parents and our own colleagues, it is much more difficult to learn the details of student needs and specific strategies to use.

Mentoring

I think that my mentor relationship has by far been the most reliable and strong relationship I have at my PDS. I have had a wonderful experience gaining insight and suggestions from my mentor teacher, and I hope I have extend new techniques and different strategies or technologies to her classroom. Many times we will both construct a lesson for a day that I visit my PDS, and we will collaborate by fusing our lessons together or choosing which lesson the students are better prepared to learn. She has also set up an account on the site Delicious that allows both of us to bookmark useful websites and share them with each other. I believe this type of practice is extremely helpful in a mentor and student relationship; it extends outside our meetings together and outside the classroom, but still allows us to connect our ideas. I also believe my mentor teacher is extremely receptive to what I would like to do for a lesson and allows me the freedom to teach my lesson. I have never had felt stepped-on while I am teaching a lesson when she is offering more information. Many times I will help my mentor teacher decide what unit is best to cover next. I am incredibly grateful for this opportunity to have a say in the material and feel like more than just a pre-service teacher in the classroom.
I am also appreciative of the respect that she demands from the students when I teach a lesson or I am briefly in charge of the class. It is often extremely difficult to gain respect from students when they know you are young and inexperienced to some degree. It seems at times it is students' only goal to take advantage of their student teacher's authority. Every single time I have had difficulty maintaining my classroom, my mentor teacher has helped by reminding them of my authority. I am so thankful for this support, as I believe it really has contributed to my development as a teacher this year.

Creating a Wiki

Wikis can be incredibly beneficial to use in a classroom for multiple reasons. Developing a wiki creates a wonderful opportunity for students or teachers to work together and grow as team members. With a wiki, collaborating on each different element of the website is required. Creating a wiki allows each student to have one area or page to complete, and therefore encourages all students to cooperate and pull his or her own weight. Having this area of specialization gives the student a responsibility and accountability for the rest of the group that is absent in many group project. Wikis also allow for a great deal of creative freedom that many students yearn for in each lesson, while also giving them experience in a form of technology many students may have never used. With wikis we as teachers allow students to express their ideas and visions while also sharing ideas with their peers.

As we worked in teams with our fellow pre-service teachers to create our wikis, teachers in a school can work together to create a wiki. This wiki assignment was particularly help to the participants because working with colleagues and administrators as a team is a constant part of being an educator. The reality is this sort of technologically intensive assignment is that sharing responsibilities, communicating ideas, and making decisions as a group is rarely easy; yet as teachers, whether we want to or not, we must learn how to make collaboration work.

One interesting feature my participant group covered in our Taylor County Middle School wiki is a brief description of the R & R Program on the "School Information" page. The Respect and Responsibility Program, often called R & R, is a program offer by TCMS the rewards students for good behavior and grades by sponsoring trips to movies, dances, etc. This reward is an effective incentive for students to improve their performance at TCMS.