Classroom Reflection

The goal in every math classroom is for students to achieve automaticity, flexibility, and ultimately accuracy. For each student to excel in the classroom, he or she must first have strong foundational skills in place. This process was challenging for me, but not because I did not understand the needs of the student or how to remediate. The challenge for me, was that I was placed in a kindergarten classroom and struggled to find someone that would provide me with student errors to complete this assignment. Therefore, my reflection is one of an outsider, who has not had the privilege of working with the students or seeing the teacher in action in the classroom. My experience consisted of receiving weekly texts of student work to review, analyze, identify errors, and provide insight to how I would remediate in the classroom.

My time spent in the Clinical setting, so far, has been extremely inciteful as to how to become a better educator in a classroom setting. Through the data I collected I was able to connect Borich’s Seven Variables of learning to the students. By being in the clinical setting for nearly two months, I have been exposed to new ways of thinking when it comes to structuring a classroom and instructing a classroom. Within this reflection you will find out how I would better plan an effective lesson for the pupils in my future classroom. You will also discover what I will do about certain issues in the classroom and how I will address/fix them.

My fieldwork for my diverse populations class was stationed at Brightwood Elementary School. The teacher that I was assigned to was Tonya Johnson. She is an EC pullout teacher that helps accommodate students when needed. During the time that I have been at Brightwood, Ms. Johnson has had me work with several different students and assist them when needed.

On November 6th, 2017 at Fulton County Juvenile Court Center. Upon my arrival at the building, I was immediately asked to see my ID, but I had left all my items in the car so the two officer had to make sure that I did not have a phone and proceeded to let me enter the court house through a metal detector and asked me to place my notebook in a gray box to be sent through a dual-energy X-ray system. As I walked in the courtroom, it took me by surprise of how the set-up was because I was thinking that it would look like the courtrooms that are presented on television. Although, this set-up was very different. In the courtroom they had a total of four benches on the right side and three on the left side. Most of the probation officer, school counselors, and other people that were working on the behalf of the juvenile defendant were sitting on the left side of the room and that is where I decided to sit as well. There were no raised layers except for the judge. There was no defendant box, but there were two stands on each side facing towards the judge for both parties. While observing the people that were coming in for a hearing it took me by surprise that none of the young adults or parents were in business causal clothing. Majority of the cases that were being heard were dealing with the African American ethnicity.

While reading chapter 3 this week, there were three main concepts that stuck out to me more than some of the other did. The three major concepts which got my attention while reading were; literature as content, reading hypothesis, and question of transfer. To me, all three of these concepts have a major part in today’s education system and making sure that all children are getting the correct information and knowledge needed. Of course, everything that was mentioned in this chapter holds an important key to writing and reading in the education field. Although for me these three concepts listed made me really think about.,m;lpo9 what I will want to do within my future classroom. To give all students the best start to the rest of the school career and in later stages of life. I want to be the teacher who does everything possible to make sure every student feels like they are given the best care and aren’t stressed or overwhelmed with the things going around them. Reading and writing are one of the most basic life skills needed for everyone and starting at a young age and continue to expand the student's knowledge of information.

On September 25, 2017, I attended the Dallas Center- Grimes school board meeting at Heritage Elementary. When I arrived, a typed-out agenda was provided to each person in attendance. The meeting began promptly at seven o’clock p.m.

Throughout the semester, I had a chance to be able to work on all of my goals in almost every combination but still feel I can work on them more. Over the semester I have noticed a lot that I have worked on but still end up freaking out every chance when it came to executing the midterm and final.From taking Modern I my third time I wanted to able to gain insight from each time I took the course.This semester I felt like I took a different approach towards being able to grasp the material as well as having a clear focus what I needed and wished to work on. Evaluating over the course of the semester shows my goals that I wanted to As I continue with taking modern classes in the future there is something that I can always make progress on to keep on improving and be more confident.

Today, more children can run applications and video games than riding a bike or tie their shoelaces – a fact which may frighten parents and educators. It’s our job as teachers to use their interest as a tool for their learning. In this particular lesson, I used Ipads’ to work on student’s fitness level focusing on strength, agility, and flexibility.

The class started with Mrs. Hurn explaining what the students will be doing since this was a new activity. The first activity was a warm-up, where students were to explain the difference between multiples and factors. The main activity for that day was the three different workshops. The first workshop was called Independent Rows, where students used laptops to access Google classroom to work on problems dealing with multiplies. The students were to work quietly on their own. The second workshop was called Problem Solvers, students worked on story problems. The students were allowed to talk quietly with their neighbors, but not work together. The third workshop was called Small Group Instruction, the students worked on problems instructed by Mrs. Hurn. All of the students worked on ratios or multiples problems.

This unit was created with my class from the 16-17 school year in mind. My class last year, as a whole performed above average on almost every indicator. I found myself running across a problem I know that many teachers don’t often come across. I found that for about half of my class the curriculum was not challenging enough, for about one-fourth of the class, it was just right, and for the other fourth it was a little more challenging. I know typically this is the other way around, but I designed this unit specifically to meet the needs of all of my learners.

This semester I observed Mrs. Sizemore at Walter Williams High School. She teaches two math 3 inclusion classes and one math 3 honors class. I learned a lot from watching Mrs. Sizemore teach, assisting the students with math worksheets, explaining problems on the board to the class, and talking with Mrs. Sizemore during breaks. The following three class articles, “Tracking from Theory to Practice,” “Trust in Schools,” and “The School and the Community” are all applicable to the experiences I had.

During May 2016, School of Visual Art and Design Professors Amanda Wangwright and Mary Robinson led a group of Honors students on a ten day Global Classroom Program to Japan. Professors and students travelled to the historic city of Kyoto and the modern metropolis of Osaka in addition to day trips to the smaller cities of Nara and Uji. While in Japan, the class visited World Heritage Sites and studied firsthand Japanese cultural and religious practices and architecture. Furthermore, the class produced their own art while abroad at a washi papermaking workshop at the Kyoto University of Art and Design and at modern artist Haruka Furusaka's printmaking studio.

One concept we discussed during class was the demographics of the school not aligning with the demographics of the teachers. A main point we talked about was how a lot of younger grades were taught mostly by white, female teachers. This negatively impacts students of color and their feelings surrounding school and forces an invisible tax on teachers of color working at underrepresented schools. In the school I did my field experience in, Chelsea Heights Elementary school, I noticed this point very clearly. Of all the staff I interacted with who taught at the school, five of them appeared to be white women, one was a woman of color, and two were white men. It was also interesting to note that the woman of color was a paraprofessional, and only interacted with one student at the end of the day. Both of the male teachers were specialist teachers, and taught physical education and science, which are stereotypically male subjects. In the group of homeroom teachers the class I observed interacted with, all three teachers were white and female. Compared to my field experience class, where over half of the students were students of color, this staff ratio was clearly disproportionate to the actual student population. By observing this information, I was able to actually visualize what we talked about in class, and see the population difference between teachers and students.

The changes that I would have made during this unit would include not always assessing with worksheets and varying my instruction. I would have still used some of the worksheets that came with the book, but not after each lesson like I did. I would have liked to use various instructional strategies that would have got the students up and moving during the lesson and not just having to sit there for a majority of them. My student’s performance told me that I taught the material very well and in a way that they could understand. I say this because all of the students improved by at least 15 percent from their pre-test. Yes, my students achieved the level of growth that I expected them to after looking at the pre-test and then looking at their post-test after the unit. The explanation for this is take the students knew what was expected on them each day in class regardless of how the lesson was being taught. When I began teaching and the students were sitting up front on the floor I set expectations for them. If they didn’t follow these expectations I would ask them to move a magnet. In the beginning I would remind the students of the expectations and then after a while I would just say remember the expectations. By setting these right away it showed the student what I expected and left no room to say that they didn’t know what I expected of them. My strengths were presenting the material at a level that the students could understand and being able to be flexible with my

Teaching can be a challenge, you never know what to expect and each classroom will be unique. However, you will always have to be prepare for teaching in a situation you may not be comfertable with. Educating students and practicing proper knowledge on subjects such as race, class, gender, sexual orientation and disability are vital in creating a safe and respectful classroom for all. School is often looked upon as a place of security for students and it is our job as teachers to help maintain that status.