In my practicum there does not appear to be any obvious dialectic variations or ELL students. However I feel that Mrs. L’s nature and creative approach to teaching would be an environment where ELL students would thrive. Mrs. L takes various creative approaches to learning, and it is so fun that it appears that students are learning without feeling like they are learning. One activity they do that could be easily constructed around cultural awareness or acceptance is that they have a few days every semester that they focus on a particular extracurricular activity. I can’t remember what it is called, but the students choose an activity like baking, painting, or volunteering, ect. They then take an entire day, with the help of several parent volunteers, and learn about this activity in detail. It’s a fun activity where they learn group planning, cooperation, group skills, writing and communication skills, and much more in a real life experience.
Technology is a large part of today’s classroom and one use that I have seen that I really enjoy in my practicum classroom is a cooperative project between the 5/6th graders and the 1st graders. The first grade teacher selected several books for the 5/6th graders to read on keynote. The teacher then takes the recordings and the 1st grade students listen along to the 5/6th graders as they read their books. This tool is helping to teach the 1st graders how to read and at the same time educating the 5/6th graders on how to use keynote and volunteer their time for someone else. It’s a fun project that all the students enjoy.
Saturday, April 17, 2010
Thursday, April 1, 2010
VaRiEtY is the Spice of Life
Today in my practicum I was able to see several different types of situations that called for different types of discourse. When I arrived, my practicum teacher informed me that she was not feeling well and had lost her voice. For the few hours that I was there she would tell me what she would like the class to do and I would simply repeat her words in a louder voice where everyone could hear. (It was so fun!!) The first discourse marker I used was raising my hand to show five fingers. This initiates the students and asks them without words to be quiet and return to their seats. I slowly would bring down each finger until by the time I had three fingers up the students where at their tables and looking at me waiting to hear what I had to say. I didn’t even have to say a thing!
We began our discussion by me asking, “Please get your homework from last night and discuss it amongst your groups. Make sure to remember your goals.” Ok.. I must admit I have no idea what their goals were I was just repeating what Mrs. L told me to say, but the students knew exactly what to do. They pulled out their homework and the conversations began as one student would initiate the conversation by reading what they had found. Rewind… sorry, their homework was to read an article about the North and the South during the Revolutionary War and do a venn diagram on the article, i.e so they organized the facts from the article in the diagram to compare and contrast the North and the South.
Ok so back to the discussion… The students began as one of the students would read their homework aloud, then another would fallow with, “I have that two but I also have this…” Then another student may say, “but doesn’t that really belong in the other one?” And the conversation would build on each other.
The time came for small group discussion to be over and Mrs. L raised her hand silently and in a short time all the students had their eyes on her, and were quietly waiting to hear what was next. She then asked me to have the students share how they did. Now I expected to hear things about the Revolutionary War; instead one student form every table stood up and gave a grade on a scale of 1-4 on how they think the conversation went. One is the worst and four is the best. The first student began and said, “I think our group should have a three, we met all of our goals and everyone added to the conversation, but I think we could work on sharing our opinions because some people had a hard time in the beginning.” Each table went on like this giving the conversation a grade and then saying what they did well as well and then how they could improve the experience next time. I was shocked at how honest and insightful the students were.
Now it was time to make a venn diagram for the entire class. Mrs. L would ask the students “What are some things you read about the North?” they then continued the activity in the I-R-E format until their venn diagram was complete. Mrs. L also used a lot of authentic question responses and guided the conversation to illuminate the economic implications of the war and how slavery was not necessarily only a moral issue but also an economic issue.
The next activity was a lesson on speaker tags and punctuating dialog, which I got to lead… it was awesome! We had the class gather on the carpet for a change of pace (its supposed to keep them engaged, I guess by sitting in one spot for a long periods of time, students begin to loose interest and are more prone to getting distracted.) Everyone brought their books and we read together the section on punctuating dialog. I restated it in my own words and then asked for questions. We then did an awesome activity that I will share in our wiki area but it involved dialogic classroom discourse in a creative way that worked beautifully.
We began our discussion by me asking, “Please get your homework from last night and discuss it amongst your groups. Make sure to remember your goals.” Ok.. I must admit I have no idea what their goals were I was just repeating what Mrs. L told me to say, but the students knew exactly what to do. They pulled out their homework and the conversations began as one student would initiate the conversation by reading what they had found. Rewind… sorry, their homework was to read an article about the North and the South during the Revolutionary War and do a venn diagram on the article, i.e so they organized the facts from the article in the diagram to compare and contrast the North and the South.
Ok so back to the discussion… The students began as one of the students would read their homework aloud, then another would fallow with, “I have that two but I also have this…” Then another student may say, “but doesn’t that really belong in the other one?” And the conversation would build on each other.
The time came for small group discussion to be over and Mrs. L raised her hand silently and in a short time all the students had their eyes on her, and were quietly waiting to hear what was next. She then asked me to have the students share how they did. Now I expected to hear things about the Revolutionary War; instead one student form every table stood up and gave a grade on a scale of 1-4 on how they think the conversation went. One is the worst and four is the best. The first student began and said, “I think our group should have a three, we met all of our goals and everyone added to the conversation, but I think we could work on sharing our opinions because some people had a hard time in the beginning.” Each table went on like this giving the conversation a grade and then saying what they did well as well and then how they could improve the experience next time. I was shocked at how honest and insightful the students were.
Now it was time to make a venn diagram for the entire class. Mrs. L would ask the students “What are some things you read about the North?” they then continued the activity in the I-R-E format until their venn diagram was complete. Mrs. L also used a lot of authentic question responses and guided the conversation to illuminate the economic implications of the war and how slavery was not necessarily only a moral issue but also an economic issue.
The next activity was a lesson on speaker tags and punctuating dialog, which I got to lead… it was awesome! We had the class gather on the carpet for a change of pace (its supposed to keep them engaged, I guess by sitting in one spot for a long periods of time, students begin to loose interest and are more prone to getting distracted.) Everyone brought their books and we read together the section on punctuating dialog. I restated it in my own words and then asked for questions. We then did an awesome activity that I will share in our wiki area but it involved dialogic classroom discourse in a creative way that worked beautifully.
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Verbs... TrIcKy TrIcKy VeRbS
One strategy used in the classroom that I love is their writing journals. They are writing every night about what they are reading or an open ended question from the teacher. They are finishing up their space unit and finalizing their moon journals. Every night over the first semester they were asked to look at the moon and write about their experience, what they saw, what they felt, where they where and so on. Then they were asked to sketch the moon and do some scientific observations such as where the moon was in the sky and other numerical representations for the science aspect of the class.
The teacher said she chose this project because the children were having trouble writing in complete sentences. They were able to understand subject easy enough but it was the predicate that they were having trouble with. Mrs. L told me that children have an easier time understanding active verbs, so this practice was designed to help them in writing in an active voice. They also did activities where they would come up with active verbs, dissect sentence structure and even did some linguistic trees. The students have come a long way in making their sentences interesting by using varied word choice, but they are having issues translating their skills into passive voice for their creation myth stories.
Mrs. L also told me that it is important to revisit key topics such as sentence and paragraph structure throughout the year in various different situations. Being creative is an exciting part of being a teacher, and instrumental in how well the children will learn. At the moment they are concentrating on passive voice and transitions sentences to connect paragraphs and give a better flow to their writing. The most challenging part of teaching English, according to Mrs. L, is knowing when to stop and how much to correct. She says it is hard not to correct everything about a child’s writing and it is important to make sure that even through all the suggestions you may have as a teacher that you let the child’s voice remain in their writing. I did notice that if you give a child a suggestion on how to word something or ask them what they mean and how they could say that differently that they often times take your words and do not try to use there own.
Expectations are challenging for me to pin point because everyone appears to be on slightly different levels. I think that everyone is expected to be capable of forming complete sentences, formulating paragraphs and also asking questions when they are confused. One thing I noticed is that their final drafts were done via word processor and the children were using the spell check feature! Ok I know this is hypocritical but it worries me that they depend on the feature instead of learning how to spell the word.
The teacher said she chose this project because the children were having trouble writing in complete sentences. They were able to understand subject easy enough but it was the predicate that they were having trouble with. Mrs. L told me that children have an easier time understanding active verbs, so this practice was designed to help them in writing in an active voice. They also did activities where they would come up with active verbs, dissect sentence structure and even did some linguistic trees. The students have come a long way in making their sentences interesting by using varied word choice, but they are having issues translating their skills into passive voice for their creation myth stories.
Mrs. L also told me that it is important to revisit key topics such as sentence and paragraph structure throughout the year in various different situations. Being creative is an exciting part of being a teacher, and instrumental in how well the children will learn. At the moment they are concentrating on passive voice and transitions sentences to connect paragraphs and give a better flow to their writing. The most challenging part of teaching English, according to Mrs. L, is knowing when to stop and how much to correct. She says it is hard not to correct everything about a child’s writing and it is important to make sure that even through all the suggestions you may have as a teacher that you let the child’s voice remain in their writing. I did notice that if you give a child a suggestion on how to word something or ask them what they mean and how they could say that differently that they often times take your words and do not try to use there own.
Expectations are challenging for me to pin point because everyone appears to be on slightly different levels. I think that everyone is expected to be capable of forming complete sentences, formulating paragraphs and also asking questions when they are confused. One thing I noticed is that their final drafts were done via word processor and the children were using the spell check feature! Ok I know this is hypocritical but it worries me that they depend on the feature instead of learning how to spell the word.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
learning environment
Physical environment
This is the coolest set up I have ever seen. The kids are a mixed group of 5/6th graders; half the class, math and science, is taught in the adjoining classroom; while the other half, English and social studies, is taught in the classroom I am working in. The kids are split into two teams. The teams are separated for individual instruction and during work periods the wall dividing the classrooms folds back creating a huge work room.
In our side of the classroom there are 5 hexagon shaped tables with 4 to 5 children per table with these awesome midget chairs that you only experience in elementary. In the center of each table is a basket full of pencils and scrap paper as well as some other miscellaneous supplies. Off to the left of the classroom is a colorful rug headed by a comfy chair where the students gather to discus various things about their writing projects or to listen to the teacher read in class. On the opposite side of the room is another carpeted area surrounded by bookshelves that are loaded to the max with books. Some are resource books and chapter books, but my favorite part was a section of the student’s stories. These are beautifully illustrated stories written by her students from the current year as well as from previous years. At the dead center of the room is a projector that faces a white board that is barley visible through all the posters and pieces of paper placed on it. In the far right corner of the board there is just enough space to list out the days activities. In the back corner of the classroom are seven huge Macintosh computers exactly like the ones we have in our classroom at UAA.
At first site the room appears unorganized and buried under paper, but it is actually cleverly structured. The students have their homework files, their in class files, their tubs of supplies, and their portfolios. Everyone knows where everything is, and it is all set out to be easy to find, collect, and return.
Curricular environment
Ok this is taking me a bit to understand, but this classroom has NO GRADES! The children are in the classroom for two years and self asses their progress as they go along. The program works closely with the student and their parents to ensure that milestones are being met without the pressure of a grading system. The curriculum is structured but allows the students to have a say in what they want to learn. There is a lot of focus on group collaboration and teamwork. The children are naturally chatty so this allows them to talk while working on instrumental projects. As far as text books, they use grade appropriate grammar books and spelling books where the teacher copies worksheets for the students to complete.
One interesting thing I was told is that the teacher teaches the 5th grade curriculum one year and the 6th grade curriculum the next, so a student may get 6th grade before 5th grade depending on when they enter the classroom.
Human environment
The students address their teachers by their first names, and communication is encouraged at appropriate times. The students have 30 minutes of quite reading time a day and during that time they find a cozy place to read independently away from their friends. There is a new student in the class who is Alaskan Native and I get to complete a reading assessment on him next week, which I am totally excited for. There are defintley clicks in the classroom that I am still figuring out. There are the quiet students, the loud students, and it is a mixture of different colored faces. I have not heard any distinct accents or seen any real linguistic challenges besides the class wide misspelling of gose for goes and dose for does, that was announced today as the entire class spelled it aloud as a group 3 times. One other thing that steuck me as odd was that the children eat freely and leave to the bathroom throughout the period. They simply get up, from say the rug time activity, saying nothing. They go to their bag and get chips or a banana or whatever their snack may be and then return to the rug area and eat while the teacher continues her lesson.
This is the coolest set up I have ever seen. The kids are a mixed group of 5/6th graders; half the class, math and science, is taught in the adjoining classroom; while the other half, English and social studies, is taught in the classroom I am working in. The kids are split into two teams. The teams are separated for individual instruction and during work periods the wall dividing the classrooms folds back creating a huge work room.
In our side of the classroom there are 5 hexagon shaped tables with 4 to 5 children per table with these awesome midget chairs that you only experience in elementary. In the center of each table is a basket full of pencils and scrap paper as well as some other miscellaneous supplies. Off to the left of the classroom is a colorful rug headed by a comfy chair where the students gather to discus various things about their writing projects or to listen to the teacher read in class. On the opposite side of the room is another carpeted area surrounded by bookshelves that are loaded to the max with books. Some are resource books and chapter books, but my favorite part was a section of the student’s stories. These are beautifully illustrated stories written by her students from the current year as well as from previous years. At the dead center of the room is a projector that faces a white board that is barley visible through all the posters and pieces of paper placed on it. In the far right corner of the board there is just enough space to list out the days activities. In the back corner of the classroom are seven huge Macintosh computers exactly like the ones we have in our classroom at UAA.
At first site the room appears unorganized and buried under paper, but it is actually cleverly structured. The students have their homework files, their in class files, their tubs of supplies, and their portfolios. Everyone knows where everything is, and it is all set out to be easy to find, collect, and return.
Curricular environment
Ok this is taking me a bit to understand, but this classroom has NO GRADES! The children are in the classroom for two years and self asses their progress as they go along. The program works closely with the student and their parents to ensure that milestones are being met without the pressure of a grading system. The curriculum is structured but allows the students to have a say in what they want to learn. There is a lot of focus on group collaboration and teamwork. The children are naturally chatty so this allows them to talk while working on instrumental projects. As far as text books, they use grade appropriate grammar books and spelling books where the teacher copies worksheets for the students to complete.
One interesting thing I was told is that the teacher teaches the 5th grade curriculum one year and the 6th grade curriculum the next, so a student may get 6th grade before 5th grade depending on when they enter the classroom.
Human environment
The students address their teachers by their first names, and communication is encouraged at appropriate times. The students have 30 minutes of quite reading time a day and during that time they find a cozy place to read independently away from their friends. There is a new student in the class who is Alaskan Native and I get to complete a reading assessment on him next week, which I am totally excited for. There are defintley clicks in the classroom that I am still figuring out. There are the quiet students, the loud students, and it is a mixture of different colored faces. I have not heard any distinct accents or seen any real linguistic challenges besides the class wide misspelling of gose for goes and dose for does, that was announced today as the entire class spelled it aloud as a group 3 times. One other thing that steuck me as odd was that the children eat freely and leave to the bathroom throughout the period. They simply get up, from say the rug time activity, saying nothing. They go to their bag and get chips or a banana or whatever their snack may be and then return to the rug area and eat while the teacher continues her lesson.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
My 1st Week with 5/6th graders and upcomming events
My practicum this week was rescheduled until Wednesday because my advising teacher is out of town, but the exciting thing is that I get to work with the kids on Wednesday and will be able to attend an assembly by J. Mortenson, the mother of G. Mortenson who has built schools for girls in Pakistan and Afghanistan!
Last week we began brainstorming ideas for their planet stories. The children were asked to make story webs and create a story line that consisted of the planets as characters. The plot line is set up in four stages where a conflict arises and a solution is found that ends up creating a trait of a particular planet. For example, how Saturn got its rings, or how Pluto feels about being a dwarf.
This week we will begin the week by writing the Constitution and a biography study about Ben Franklin, and finish the week with the planet stories.
Last week we began brainstorming ideas for their planet stories. The children were asked to make story webs and create a story line that consisted of the planets as characters. The plot line is set up in four stages where a conflict arises and a solution is found that ends up creating a trait of a particular planet. For example, how Saturn got its rings, or how Pluto feels about being a dwarf.
This week we will begin the week by writing the Constitution and a biography study about Ben Franklin, and finish the week with the planet stories.
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