Blog #3

First Day of Placement:

This week was my first day of field placement at Bear Creek Elementary school in the Etown School district.  The school itself is amazing, this being the first year students are attending it.  It is a huge school with separate wings for each grade, my home for the semester being the fifth grade wing.  Of course, my classroom is at the very end of the hallway in a little secluded learning support classroom with an amazing teacher named Mrs. Jordan.

Mrs. Jordan has three classes in the 2 hours that I am in her classroom.  The first is a reading "fast track" program, which is basically just seven students in fifth grade who need extra support with reading due to their diagnosed learning disabilities, including ADD, ADHD, and autism.  These students are pulled out into Mrs. Jordan's classroom during their general ed class' reading classes as well so they are not missing important material in other subjects.  This is a 45 minute period, where unfortunately, little work was actually done.  The class got off topic a lot, and a lot of students were calling out and getting out of their seats.  Mrs. Jordan made an effort to get more done, but with 7 against 1, it was unsuccessful.

The second class is out of Mrs. Jordan's classroom.  We traveled across the hall to Mr. Mooney's fifth grade general ed class, where 11 out of his 27 students have IEP's.  Somehow, he seemed to have a good handle of the class and everyone seemed to be generally on task while working on group projects on Benjamin Franklin and his life.  Mrs. Jordan's job during this class was to just walk around and make sure students were on task and understanding the assignment.  She assisted students with reading and proofreading their sentences, as well as asking them questions to make sure they were comprehending the assignment.  After about twenty minutes, the class seemed to wrap up and Mrs. Jordan took the 11 students with IEP's back to her room.

The third class that Mrs. Jordan has is another "Fast Track" reading program, just with a different topic than the first group.  The Fast Track program is basically a basal for special education students that helps them with reading and comprehension.  The students receive a little magazine type book with one topic at a time so they don't get distracted, and the teacher is responsible for introducing new vocab, reading the story, and questioning the students in their predictions, comprehensions, and conclusions.  This third group was a very rambunctious group, making Mrs. Jordan stop the lesson several times to remind them of proper school behavior.  Unfortunately, the only thing the students gained from their lesson today was three new vocab words, which none of them even wrote down.

I am very excited to continue working in Mrs. Jordan's classroom because I'm sure it will be a challenge.  I am also eager to work one on one with one of the students in her first class on his ORFs and MAZEs.  Hopefully the students' behavior will get a little better so the rest of the semester will go a little smoother, but as of now, I feel like I am really going to enjoy this placement and learn a lot from Mrs. Jordan.

American Teacher Reflection

I thought the presentation of American Teacher was a huge eye opener to the field of education.  I never realized how many hours I would have to add to my day as a teacher.  All of my cooperating teachers for field placements would talk about going on home visits, grading papers, and working tutoring programs or the school play after school, but I never actually sat down and considered how much extra time these minor details could add up to be.  Hearing the teachers in the movie say they were at school from 6 am until about 5:30 pm was amazing.  I never thought I would be at my job that much each day, adding up to about 60 hours per week.  This made me think about how I will never have to listen to my sister complain about being at her accounting job for 50 hours a week.  I definitely win :)  Regardless of the long hours, I'm still 200% sure that I want to be a teacher.

Seeing how dedicated these teachers were made me realize the type of teacher I want to be.  I want to be the teacher that stays 12 hours a day, that helps students in and out of the classroom, that calls students ten years down the road when tragedy strikes, and i want to be that teacher that makes learning fun and interesting.  I want to push my students to the best of their abilities and make them realize that they really can do anything.  I think that Mr. Benner's story was the most inspiring.  Although it was so sad to see his marriage end because of how dedicated it was, it was amazing to see how far he was willing to go to support his family on his teaching (then later floor store) salary.  I feel like he would be so motivating to have as a teacher, coming from basically nothing and turning into a driven, successful, and happy teacher, father, and coach.  I wish that I was able to have a teacher who cared as much as Mr. Benner did.

One thing I did not like about the movie was how much it referenced salaries of teachers and stressed the need to get a second job.  I feel like if teachers want to teach, they should not be discouraged for any reason. I think this movie could turn students away from being a teacher because of how much it stressed how little money they would receive compared to doctors and lawyers.  I feel like it's not really fair because without teachers, the doctors and lawyers would not have gotten the educations they needed to progress that far into their careers.  I feel as though teachers are completely under appreciated and seen as more of a burden (because of people who don't want to pay taxes or don't help their child get pushed as much as needed) than a blessing.  I think everyone should watch this movie to see how much a teacher really does each day and how little time they actually get for themselves.

I also thought that it was great to have current teachers involved in the discussion at the end to provide some input that the movie did not provide a lot of detail on.  I thought it was great to hear how long some of the teachers had been teaching, and to hear that one was even willing to move 5 and a half hours away in order to find a job.  Knowing that this is something I may need to do to get a job is scary, but I think it's necessary to challenge myself and push myself outside my comfort zone in order to be the best teacher I can be.  I definitely agree that connecting with the students is one of the most important parts of being a teacher.  If you can't connect with students, they will not listen to you, respect you, or want to learn.  Information needs to be relevant and relatable for students to succeed.  I thought the American Teacher presentation was a great way to open my eyes to the world of teaching beyond what I have been taught in the classrooms at Etown.