Observation In Elementary School

Looking out the window, anyone could see from the dark, shady sky, it was going to rain. It was the end of freshman year, end of spring, early summer, and everyone had formed their study groups to study for the Algebra final the following week. I, however, wasn’t in a group and kept to myself, in my corner by the window. I had no interest in studying and instead was captivated by the dim, warms, of the outside world.

I observed a sixth grade classroom (eleven to twelve years of age) at a middle school in Ringgold, Georgia. The classroom seemed to be fairly even in regards to how many children of each sex were in the classroom. The majority of the students were white with a few african american and hispanic children among the mix. The sixth grade classes did not have enough employees to only teach one subject therefore, the teacher that I observed taught language arts and mathematics. The first thing you notice when you walk into the classroom is the mathematical shapes all along the upper wall like a wallpaper border. These shapes were projects from her students in the years before. The next thing that you’ll notice is the way the desks were set up. They were set up in three separate groups. One group of around twelve desks faced the

An unannounced monitoring inspection was conducted on 1/6/2016. I arrived at the operation which is located at 3422 Richmond Rd, Texarkana about 12:57 pm. I was greeted by Comekia Island, the person in charge while director was at lunch. I handed her business card and then explained the purpose of my inspection and reviewed the subchapters I would be observing. Roshonda Epps the director arrived approximately a hour later. When Epps arrived I handed her business card and then explained the purpose of my inspection and reviewed the subchapters I would be observing.

Observing in the children’s pre-school was an incredible opportunity because I had the ability to physically see sign language being practiced in the classroom. It was exciting to see the children signing and speaking to both the teacher and the graduate students in the pre-school while having normal conversations with their peers. Before coming to college, I never had any exposure to sign language, so being able to see a group of children learning curriculum with both of these communication methods was intriguing and fun to watch.

On the first day of observations, Ben entered the classroom and began crying once his mother left to go to the restroom. He ran after her and followed her into the restroom. Once she left, he was able to calm down and began following his teacher around. Eventually, Ben moved over to the coloring table and colored with the other students. He continued to try to talk to his teacher, Cindi, even though she was talking to other students. Ben played with other students and took a toy cash register from another girl. After he returned it, he then began to play with a toy and walked around the classroom showing it to his classmates and other teachers. He continued to play by himself, singing and talking to himself as he played. Before moving to the sensory table to play with a student teacher and another student, he gave his teacher a hug. He copied what the student teacher was doing with the beads and asked to take another girl’s beads before simply taking them. Ben was very excited about playing with the beads until he slammed his bowl down, screamed and ran over to talk to another student teacher. Later on, he returned to the sensory table only to watch the girl playing next to him.

The room is arranged in a way to promote group learning. The desks are grouped together in either groups of four or five. There are 18 students in the room, 3 are absent in first period. The room has three separate places to do reading, one with just a cluster of pillows, another in the corner of the room with book shelves, drapes to create a warm and fun environment, with more pillows, and another underneath a paper made tree, with a seat and more pillows. There are no other adults in the classroom, other than the teacher. There are no students with obvious physical impairments of mobility issues. There are no rules for the classroom behavior posted. The teacher is very firm, yet quite loving, the students seem to hold a great deal of respect

When I first walked in, a lot of memories crossed my mind; I started remembering my elementary school with the smell I absorbed. The smell of hand sanitizer filled the cafeteria. When I walked in the office to sign in they all welcomed me with open arms. I was nervous going there for the first time not knowing what to expect. While I was making my way to the classroom, I was thinking how would the kids react when the saw me. I entered the class the kids were already solving math problems; so they didn’t notice me, which made it easy for me. I started making my way to the kids and introduced myself. Some of them accepted my help. However, some were very distant. I am really excited to see what the kids have to offer and how they will open up

When I arrived at the classroom, Mr. Art was in the room and appeared to be picking up a stack of books. He told me that the class was out at lunch and that when the class returned, they would be splitting into two groups. The 6th graders would be staying in the classroom with another teacher to work on math and the 5th graders would be going with him to another room to work on a few different subjects. Since the students were not currently in the room, I took this time before my observation to get a layout of the room and note all the information that was written on the whiteboard. I looked around to see what was on student’s desks and what materials seemed to be available to students in the classroom. The student’s desks were in a pod like

The engagement consisted of the teacher displaying all the color coordinated flower parts terminology on the word wall. The students were encouraged to do a talk, pair, share to come up with possible ideas for what the lesson was about. The teacher introduced and briefly discussed five vocabulary terms that were essential for the flower part dissection lab, which were: sepal, ovary, petals, stamen, and pistils. These terms were placed on their labeling diagram, which helped the students when labeling their flower parts lab diagram during the dissection. The students were extremely motivated to figure out what the lesson was a bout from the word wall terminology. Most of the students had a pretty good idea for what the lesson was about,

Today I went to Sunrise Elementary to observe Ms. Thune’s first grade classroom. The teacher was extremely friendly and has only been teaching for three years. Right away we headed to recess to pick up the students who were patiently waiting in line. It was a class size of twenty first graders and I quickly realized the teacher was super personable! I was surprised right away because the students did not go to their desks, instead they headed towards the big mat on the floor in front of the promethean board. I thought that was a good idea because each child had a lily pad they sat on that was a part of the mat which helped them decipher their space. The whole room was themed around frogs and leaping to learn. When I walked into the room I

The observation hours completed for this education course were extremely beneficial to me. Working in education as a substitute for the past ten years, I never had the option to go in depth with all the planning one really does as a teacher. Previously, I assumed teachers jobs were one of the easiest to come across, due to my friends all getting degrees in education, I thought it was a walk in the park. Little did I know there is so much effort put into even the smallest of class activities? However, that is if you are a good teacher. I am eager to say I was baffled by the styles in which the two classes I observed altered. One of the teachers that I had was absolutely meticulous in the way she ran her classroom. The second teacher I observed was polar opposite, where he had lessons planned, everything else seemed to fall where it may throughout the day. Through both teachers I gathered the different techniques they used to gather their data, how they tracked students’ accommodations’ in the classroom. I was able to compare the classroom management during student transitions from group work to individual work, as well as find strategies used in both classrooms to keep students engaged throughout instruction, reading and group times.

While observing it was evident that classroom management was going to be a problem. The educators' approach was to sit in her chair at the front of the classroom and sit silently waiting for students to look in her direction. Eventually, she would grab everyone’s attention by stating, “raise your hand if you’re listening.” The students would take about five minutes before completely cooperating. One boy, in particular, was extremely rowdy every time class would begin and during the actual class time. He was not a bad student in fact; he was a talented artist but would do things like scream across the room, shouting out jokes or singing loudly. It was a cry for attention. The teacher would go over to the boy, sit down next to him, and speak to him individually. This approach seemed like a good

I observed Mrs. Ruffs First grade class at Carlin Park Elementary. The class consisted of 11 girls and 11 boys. While I watched the class, I focused in on trying to notice the difference between the two sexes. I observed that the girls and the boys are similar in the way they carry themselves. They were both very active in the activity they were playing. The activity they played was a version of tag that there was one person it and they all needed to run away from the tagger and if they were tag, they turned into a zombie where they crawled around trying to tag other people that were still in. The catch of the game is that everyone needed to run on a line in on the gym floor. Boy or girl, they all were very energetic in not wanting to get tagged. The boys sometimes went off track and didn’t pay attention to directions as much as the girls did but for the most part, the instructions were explained in detail that the first graders could understand the game and have fun playing it.

This semester, I’ve had the pleasure of completing my service learning hours at Floyd Middle School in Cobb county, Georgia which was established in 1965. I observed Mr. Kasisi Brown, who is a sixth grade social studies teacher and also the 2016-2017 teacher of the year at Floyd Middle School. I completed my observation within a span of two days. The first day, I observed Mr. Browns class for three hours and the second day I observed his class for three hours as well. On the first day, I arrived when Mr. Brown’s class was on the way to lunch. I met Mr. Brown in line and when he made sure all his students were in the lunch line, he took me to the teachers table. The teachers table was very interesting. I received a lot of the answers to the questions I had when I was sitting with all the teachers.

I observed that Saint Cloud High School’s facilities were flawless, and the green areas were well kept, it has modern and innovative technology that provide students with permanent opportunities for skill preparation. I also detected that the security is, for instance, well-intentioned to keep the students safe. Surveillance cameras are installed throughout the building and the surrounding areas of the school.