Students' Growth

It was so great returning to my kindergarten main placement class today and seeing all the children again! Although it has only been two months since I've seen them, they have grown and learned so much! The students are becoming much more independent and responsible. They have become very familiar with the classroom routines and transitions; my cooperating teacher no longer has to bring them to the rug to re-group and re-direct nearly as frequently. The classroom community feels even stronger than it did in September. It is quite evident that students feel comfortable and that they are an important member of the class, they have learned much about each other and have developed strong relationships while I have been away.

I was impressed with how much the students have grown academically as well. In their reading workshop, students are learning a variety of tools to read tricky words, in writing workshop, they are learning to write small moments with details, and in math, they are learning how to read, write, count and make the numbers 0-10, all of which is so very exciting!

I could not be more pleased to be back! :)

Professional Development & Collaborative Literacy

Last week at my dyad placement, I was able to take part in a professional development experience with my cooperating teacher. Teachers from third grade through sixth grade from my placement school met at a neighboring elementary school within the district to discuss and observe a demonstration lesson taught by an exceptional sixth grade teacher surrounding collaborative literacy and guided practice. Overall, I felt this was a very constructive and beneficial professional development workshop for everyone who attended, as well as a wonderful learning opportunity for me, a developing teacher.

Prior to observing the literacy lesson, we discussed the importance of guided practice, small group practice and one-on-one conferencing as an effective way to maximize instruction for each individual child and in meeting each of your student’s needs. We also went over focus questions and shared what we hoped to take away from this observation experience personally.

When I stepped into the sixth-grade teacher’s room we would be observing, I was so excited, yet completely overwhelmed. There was an unbelievably amazing amount going on within this classroom, it truly was alive with learning. The room itself was so bright and friendly with lots of student work on the walls, there was a daily letter from the teacher to her students taped up to the whiteboard, their class mission statement, “To live, to love, to learn and to leave a legacy” was displayed proudly; the relationship that existed between teacher and student felt so personal. Her classroom was a culture of leaders; every student had a leadership role within the classroom and you could truly feel the thriving sense of community.

When she began teaching her poetry lesson, the students were completely engaged. Each student seemed so excited and eager to be there, to learn; everyone was actively listening and taking notes, offering insights and asking questions. The level of respect between teacher and students was inspiring. She welcomed comments and questions and verbally requested that students disagree or challenge her thinking if they thought or saw something differently than she did, making it clear that she was there to learn along with her students.

After the poetry lesson was over, the students began to work on their individual literacy activities specifically chosen for them, allowing the teacher the opportunity to meet with individual students or with literacy groups she needed to check-in with. The students’ sense of community was apparent during this time as well; as students worked independently, I saw students asking for and offering help to one another in a variety of ways and on a number of different occasions.

Overall, this experience provided me with a wonderful opportunity to grow in my own professional development. Although I have only touched on a few of the things I took away from this experience, it truly was amazing and inspiring to see a teacher’s deep knowledge and understanding of her students and their needs, as she strived to meet them exactly where they were in their development.

Relying on a Professional Community

In order for us, as educators, to look for opportunities in situations for us to strengthen the values we want to pass on to children, we must first be aware of our own social, political, cultural and gender assumptions. It can be so challenging to view a situation from an unbiased standpoint because each one of us views every situation through our own lens. We must continuously be evaluating ourselves and asking questions like: What do I know about this particular issue? What kind of experiences have I had in my lifetime that may influence how I’m viewing this situation or this child? Am I responding to this incident with my heart or my intellectual reflection? What personal social-political experiences and identities do I bring to my observations?

Because the way in which we view a situation or a particular child directly relates to how we may approach subtle “teachable moments” in our classrooms, it is essential to know ourselves as individuals and as teachers and to strive to always remain unbiased.

As professionals just entering the field, it is comforting to know that in our professional community, we are encouraged to work closely with one another and pass our ideas and work through other teachers’ eyes. If we encounter a situation in class that we want other opinions on, we should, and need to be asking: Am I doing this right? What do you think about this? Do you see anything that I am missing in this situation? Not only will we always be pushing ourselves to know more, we will be doing what we can to ensure that we are bringing clarity and awareness to our planning and our teaching. Through relying on a whole community, we will also be justifying that what we are doing is valid.