Reflection Essay

When I first got accepted into Stuyvesant High School, I heard countless of rumors stating: “Oh the workload is terrible”, “The competition is so fierce” or “Out of schoolwork, extracurriculars, or sleep: you can only pick two.” I found it hard to let it faze me, since I graduated from one of the most prestigious middle schools. However, the rumors transformed into reality when I stepped into Mr. Nieves’ Freshman Composition Class. The workload at the beginning of the year was brutal, coupled with assignments from other core classes that seem unaware of the workload of other teachers. Reading assignments were a regular, and there were journal entries and occasional quizzes to keep us in line. What made it bearable was the friends I made in that class; everyone had their own opinion about the topic we were talking about, and listening to other perspectives really broadened my horizon and enriched my learning experience in Stuy. Another thing that this class has taught me is the importance of time management, a skill that I will carry on for the rest of my high school career and life. When I choose to sign up for Mr. Nieves’ AP American Literature class in my Junior Year, I was hoping to relive the discussion-based lesson plans and meet more outstanding peers. I was not disappointed, to say the least, reflecting through all the experiences at the end of the course. The lesson plans he laid out for us were an interesting mix between small lectures and class output, and what I

It is still so surreal to reflect back on my first semester as an incoming college student in the ENC1101 course, analyzing at my progression as a reader and writer in literacy. Since the first day of class I set in stone my goals for this class: receive a 4.0 GPA, develop my connecting theories skills in writing, and become more aware of objectives for each Unit throughout the course. All of these goals became achievements that not only make others proud but most importantly give me self pride. In order to earn the grades and achieve these goals, I went after every opportunity that I was given as an incoming college student, such as office hours and extra credit. By taking this course I have gained confidence with the utilization of literacy, and made an addition to my group of impactful literacy sponsors. Once students are finished with high school they assume that there is nothing else to learn beyond the stereotypical five paragraph essay, but they are so wrong. I was able to obtain so much knowledge about numerous course concepts from Writing about Writing, articles, and my professor. These concepts will carry on with me throughout a bright future of writing courses, job interviews, and any other skills that require literacy. The four outcomes listed below will help illuminate how I improved as a writer, by being a driven college student and going out of the way to earn my achievements in this course. In the first outcome I improved comprehending scholar texts,

A work tray will have been compiled of the necessary resources for the Numeracy task. A student may be working on shape/colour recognition; the resources may contain a tracing card with a square, a circle and a triangle; a pencil and paper. Then the student is asked to trace the shape which may require hand over hand support. Other resources will also be used but using a different approach such as solid shapes in various colours, the student will be shown a shape and asked “what is the shape?” or more simply “it’s a .....” leaving time for the student to respond and complete the sentence. They may be asked to “take the yellow circle” from a choice of two shapes. Progress is then recorded and will aid the teacher to plan for future lessons depending on the progress made or whether the task is achievable and needs adapting to best suit the ability of the

[The learning goal states that the focus learner will be able to formulate learning that all circles are similar through application of transformation techniques (translation and dilation), by the end of the learning segment. The IEP goal states requires the focus learner to describe relationships between similar geometric shapes with 70% accuracy on informal assessments, utilizing one to two supports, by the ending of May 2016. In each lesson the objectives systematically build upon each other as they support the focus learner in accomplishing the learning goal that is based on the focus learner’s IEP goal. The lesson goal and the IEP goal both relate to learning of geometric shapes, with the learning goal being more specific, the circle. After selecting the circle a Common

And it connects with the Australian Curriculum areas: Create symmetrical patterns, pictures and shapes with or without digital technologies. The Storytelling strategy engages all students in listening and promotes their imagination, emotions and critical thinking skills while learning the main concept of math. The class discussion along with questioning strategy throughout the lesson promotes students’ exploratory conversations and shared experiences on mathematics. The main theme of this lesson is to enable students to understand Aboriginal symbols in the painting and reinforce the relation of the mathematical concepts behind the symbols.

Even thou, geometry involve shapes, nature, conjectures, proofs, angles, formulas and patty paper, one needs the common language to express attributes. She was able to tell the number of sides a triangle, pentagon, and rectangles. She could not complete parallel line task because she did not know what parallel meant, which affected the parallelogram activity. I know that we were not supposed to give instruction, but what a great learning moment we shared. We found lines and shapes in the classroom environment and talk about where the lines started and ended. We addressed corners and where two lines met. We traced tile lines on the floor. She came to the conclusions that “top and bottom don’t touch.” We marked parallel lines and talked about what parallel meant. She remembered parallel the next day so it did make sense in her mind. In fact, she remembered the words from the warm-up. Many activities had a rubric that made it clear on how to analysis the

The product EngageNY is an ELA and math curriculum created by the New York State Education Department (NYSED). Although it is not the adopted curriculum of this evaluator’s district, it is a resource that’s being used district wide as a key supplement in mathematics. The 4th grade math curriculum consists of 7 “module” (units) ranging from 20-40 days in length. The NYSED has converted all of the components into free, downloadable resources (including a pacing guide), which has made them a convenient and comprehensive resource.

Upon observing your class, we have learned a lot about the methods you utilize in order to help the students with mathematics and about how the students learn. Observing your class was both an honor and a learning opportunity for us, as you are an important, and well-respected faculty member in the school system. However, while we appreciate your goals and tactics to make learning mathematics easier for the students, we have discovered some flaws in the use of mnemonics, rules, and tricks for helping students understand the subject material.

15 minutes later, I learned this concept with tears in my eyes, wailing, and kicking furiously. Unlike the other kids, I could not understand the teacher’s language.

I continued to think. I drew in between moments of deep thinking. Getting my mind halfway off the subject and halfway onto another would sometimes helps me think. At first circles were the only thing that decorated the page, but they slowly turned into characters I had created or ones that others had created. None of the ideas I got seemed to help me in any way.

Digging through the recycling bin of the math supervisor's office, I pull out an old piece of paper with typed font on one side, and blankness on the other -- perfect. “Mom,” I say, looking up with my four-year old eyes, “Do you have a pencil?” She goes into her purse to retrieve one, eager to see what simple drawing I could create as we waited for my dad (who was a math teacher at the time) to come out of his meeting. However, as she is searching, I waddle right up to the bookshelf and pursue my options. A vast array of different grade-level textbooks were laid out before me; the third-grade option seemed most suitable. I took my pencil, the book, and the paper, and sat sat down at the table to see what I could make of the advanced problems.

While completing the assessment Sarah raced through the block building, as well as the ‘copy forms’ section the only shape she had trouble drawing was the triangle, but I think the problem was that she was trying to go too fast. Part I-C was Sarah’s favorite, we asked her to draw a person and she not only drew a person, but a dog and a roller coaster as well.

Ahriah quickly flips through pages and we are no longer reading at this point. She is making her own story up as she tells me what she sees. So I decided to play along asking her other questions that could help me understand her concept of print. I ask her does she see any letters that she knows and again she points at the letter “A”. I then ask her does she know the alphabet and she tells me yes, but I don’t make her recite them to me. I just slowly bring up questions in the conversations that she starts to have with me. Ahriah goes through describing all the pictures that she see’s to me and by doing that she is showing me different skills that she has. She first is able to tell the difference in the size of the polar bears. She tells me that she sees the adult polar bears and the baby polar bears while they play in the snow. She then demonstrates to me that she is able to count as I ask her how many polar bears does she see on the page? She tells me she sees two adult polar bears and three baby polar bears. She then notices the moon on the page. I ask her what letter does the word moon start with, and she tells me that it starts with an “M”. I tell her you are very bright. The moon was also spelled in the book and I asked her does she see an “M” in the book, but instead of pointing to the “M” she points at a stick that is

The sun lazily creeps through the window, painting the normally gray walls a calming yellow. During its rare appearance over the tiny elementary school in Washington, students labor over their math worksheets within the confines of their matching gray desk. Except for one little girl. Her appearance matches her Norwegian town with her blond hair and light-colored eyes. Sitting at her desk, she begins to explain her answer. She shows her teacher how she used numbers to solve the problem. Then she shows the sheep that she drew to represent the problem, just as the worksheet asked. She even wrote the explanation “I used my brain.” This statement, unfortunately, does the teacher's requirement. The teacher wants her to write about how she used the sheep to count how many 3x4 would be but fails to understand that the girl drew the sheep because the problem told her to not because she needed to use them.

This article focuses on SQUINK a chart that was develop in Ms. Capraro’s second grade class. The article explains that SQUINK is an acronym for schema, questions, inferring and new knowledge. This chart is meant to help students think about and comprehend the text they are reading. At the beginning, the article explains how the chart came to be. It explains that Ms. Capraro wanted a chart that could help her students understand and be more aware of their knowledge and thoughts as they read different texts. Furthermore, the article explains that Ms. Capraro came up with the