Week Fifteen

This week concluded my time full time teaching. I enjoyed teaching full time so much that I don’t want to stop. I wish I could continue to teach my transitioning adults.

During my time as full time teaching I learned so much about teach special education. The biggest lesson I learned was to be flexible. Something that I pride myself in is my careful planning. While teaching my transitioning adults I learned that what I plan is not always what will happen. There were many lesson when I had to think on my toes and adjust my lessons according to the answers the students gave. For example, I taught a lesson about word problems with time. The lesson was all about adding time. For example:

If Jonny started his homework at 7:00 and spent 1:00 on his homework, what time did he finish his work?

My morning class caught on right away and was able to answer the questions without a problem. My afternoon class struggled with adding without a manipulative or something tangible. So, I had to think on my feet. I used the practice clock in the classroom to teach the students that when the big hand makes an entire rotation around the clock that one hour has passed. From there, I had to practice with the students to make sure they understood that rotating the big hand around the clock will help them answer the questions. I had to step away from my planning to help my students understand how to find an hour first.

Illinois Professional Teaching Standard 5 states, “The competent teacher differentiates instruction by using a variety of strategies that support critical and creative thinking, problem-solving, and continuous growth and learning. This teacher understands that the classroom is a dynamic environment requiring ongoing modification of instruction to enhance learning for each student.” Performance Indicator 5J states that the competent teacher, “monitors and adjusts strategies in response to feedback from the student.” I have learned that my job is not plan excellent lessons, but to teach excellent lessons. The only way I can actually teach an excellent lesson is when my students are growing and learning meaningful content in a relevant and engaging way. My lessons may be planned perfectly, but if I am not flexible enough to adjust my lessons according to my student’s understanding then I am not teaching well at all.

I look forward to my last week of student teaching. I will spend a lot of time this week getting to observe other classroom with students that are lower functioning then my students. I also get to bring my students to my campus on a field trip this Tuesday. My students will be practicing their social and vocational skills by serving the students at my college cookies and hot chocolate.

Week Thirteen

I began full time teaching this week. On Monday, I was so nervous about teaching my students full time. I knew that I had carefully planned the entire week, however, I was terrified that my preparations weren’t going to be enough.

While I did carefully plan, I learned this week that student responses to the lesson will determine its appropriateness. For example, I planned a Thanksgiving budgeting lesson for Wednesday. This lesson was supposed to take only 45 minutes. It took one group two 45 minutes sessions spread over two days, and the other group still has not completed the lesson. Because of this, several of the lessons planned for Thursday did not get taught. My perfectionist mind struggles with falling behind. Naturally, I want to run on schedule and complete the planned lessons, however, this week I had to remind myself that if I rush through the lesson just to get to the next material then I am taking away from my students. Excellent teaching needs to be student led. If my student’s understanding of the content doesn’t drive what I teach then I am not doing a good job at teaching them.

Along with being stretched and challenged in my actual teaching, my classroom management has also been challenged. In my Transitional classroom, I have a wide variety of students. With that variety of students comes a vast number of diverse behaviors. Some of my behaviors range from defiant/task avoidance to anxiety driven. I can’t say that I’ve figured their behaviors out because I haven’t. Each individual is so unique. There were a lot of times this week when I had no idea what to say or do in response to a student behavior, however, I am fervently taking notes and observations. Research has aided me in giving ideas with how to respond to behaviors. More than anything, I am so thankful for the support of my cooperating teacher. She never lets me sink even when I feel as though I am. Between my observations, research, and the aide of cooperating teacher I know that I will learn how best to manage behaviors in my classroom.

A large part of special education is the related services that my students receive. Although all of my students are ambulatory some of them has Occupational and Physical Therapy every week. Many of students see the Speech and Language Pathologist for therapy as well. This past Friday, I took my students out into the community. We went to the library to complete a library assignment that required the students to utilize the resources found at the library. While there, the SLP tagged along to get some minutes in. All week prior to our visit the SLP and I were in contact about student goals and ways that they can be assessed at the library. The assignment the students worked on while there was essentially crafted by myself and the SLP in order to make sure my objectives for the lesson and her speech and language goals were being assessed. This level of collaboration is crucial in teaching Special Education.

Illinois Professional Teaching Standard 8 says, “The competent teacher builds and maintains collaborative relationships to foster cognitive, linguistic, physical, and social and emotional development. This teacher works as a team member with professional colleagues, students, parents or guardians, and community members.” This week, I got to work along side the SLP to aide in the linguistic development of my students. Performance indicator 8K says that the competent teacher, “participates in collaborative decision-making and problem-solving with colleagues and other professionals to achieve success for all students” Together we created an assignment that met both of our goals and objectives and was meaningful and formative to the development of our students as adults.

Classroom Confidential

My transition classroom is all about teaching students meaningful, functional skills to aide them in living outside of transition. Students go out into the community every single Friday and go out on service learning trips every other Tuesday. While reading Schmidt chapter seven I found myself, “Amening” to a lot of the things she said. Connecting content the is taught within the classroom to the community make content authentic and gives it a purpose. While this concept is exceptionally true for the transition classroom I am currently in it is also true for all classrooms. In my transition classroom, going out into the community is an authentic way that we connect what the students learn in the classroom with reality, however, in the general education classroom, it is difficult to go out into the community. Schmidt talks about how connecting to the community can be as simple as showing students pictures to help them relate the content outside of the classroom. In my fifth grade placement, my cooperating teacher stressed using pictures to teach new vocabulary. She always told me that aides in giving the students a visual representation but it also created connections. In a small, simple way we were bringing the community into our classroom rather than taking our classroom into the community. Regardless of where one teaches the community is our greatest asset to accessing and building knowledge.

Week Twelve

Week 12:

I officially started teaching this week! While not every lesson went as smoothly as hoped I was so pleased with the way it turned out. It has been quite the transition from fifth grade to transition. In fifth grade my lesson were fast paced, dynamic, and filled with “Why?” questions. In transition, my lessons are simple yet so important, slow paced, and filled with straight forward, “What?” questions. My transitioning adults are taught life skills, daily living skills, vocational skills, and social skills. The lessons, while still being academic, are geared to teach the students skills appropriate for transition.

My teacher and I taught a cooking lesson to the students. We made chocolate croissants. The students practiced making an easy snack individually. Teaching the students to make chocolate croissants is teaching them daily living skills. It’s a basic skill that the students can use in their daily lives. After making the croissants, students completed a comprehension check. This lesson partnered daily living with basic reading and comprehension. Teaching transition is all about preparing our students for life outside of school while still teaching them academic skills.

Illinois Professional Teaching Standard 2 says, “The competent teacher has in-depth understanding of content area knowledge that includes central concepts, methods of inquiry, structures of the disciplines, and content area literacy. The teacher creates meaningful learning experiences for each student based upon interactions among content area and pedagogical knowledge, and evidence-based practice.” Performance indicator 2N states that the competent teacher, “facilitates learning experiences that make connections to other content areas and to life experiences.” The most important thing that a Special Education Transition teacher needs to have is a knowledge of how to connect content area and academic content to daily living, social, and vocational skills. In my lesson planning, I have become better and better at making content appropriate for transitioning adults. For example, I taught a consumer math lesson about counting bills and buying items. The activity in the lesson was called, “What’s in my wallet?” Students were given a price for an item and had to count the amount of money in their wallet to determine if they had enough money to buy the item. This lesson used the basic skill of counting money and comparing quantities partnered with the life skill of purchasing items.

I begin full time teaching Monday! This coming week is jammed packed with valuable life skills and appropriate academic content. I am so excited to continue my growth and learning in Transition.

Classroom Confidential

Teaching requires teachers that are lifelong learners. Teaching is a profession that is constantly changing and evolving. Teachers need to be lifelong learners that are willing to change and evolve with its profession. There are dozens of reasons for a teacher to be a lifelong learner. Teachers touch so many generations during their time as a teacher. As we touch different generations we need to have the necessary skills and resources to teach each generation. Technology is always expanding. Teachers need to understand the technology students are interacting with daily to best connect with their students. Professional Development helps teachers stay current with practices and tools that they can utilize in their classrooms.

Week Eleven

As I continue my journey of adjusting to my new, but wonderful classroom I am learning more and more each day. In the past week, I have developed relationships with my students and coworkers. My classroom has two paraprofessionals and one classroom aide. They are all absolutely wonderful! I have appreciated how much support I receive from the support staff and my cooperating teacher. They are always willing to listen to my questions and offer guidance where they see needed.

This week, I observed a lot of behaviors. Several of my students have a primary diagnosis of Autism. With autism comes a lot of anxiety due to schedule changes. As a result, I’ve had the opportunity of watching my teacher work magic in deescalating student’s anxieties and behaviors. I have learned so much about the kinds of redirections that my students respond best to. Most of the class responds well to being prompted to remain flexible. Student will often finish a sentence such as, “We are going to be,” with the word, “flexible.” Praising the students by saying things like, “Great job being flexible.” Also reinforces their flexibility and is an excellent to remind students to be flexible.

I also found myself teaching a lot of impromptu lessons. Because we have two classes, our AM class and our PM class, my teacher modelled teaching the lessons to the AM group and gave the opportunity to teach the same content to the PM group. On Thursday, I got to teach a lesson where students practiced reading schedules. Together, we practiced reading a family weekend schedule. We answered questions that required us to read the schedule and tell time. I was also given the opportunity to introduce a lesson involving a job description to work at the Clothes Barn as a dressing room assistant. I got to talk about the skills needed for the job and the kind of work students would do as a dressing room assistant.

Fridays we go out into the community for community education. This Friday I got to go with my students to the store. The AM class went to the dollar store. We were split into two groups. Each group was given $25 dollars to spend. One group was assigned a little boy between the ages of 5 and 9. The other group was assigned a little girl between the ages of 5 and 9. Each group picked items for their assigned child. We bought items like toys, hygiene products, puzzles, books, or crayons. The items that students bought are going to be put into shoeboxes and sent to Operation Christmas Child. The shoeboxes will be given to children around the world in need.

The PM class went to Wal-Mart to buy the necessary supplies for our cooking class. On Monday, we picked three dishes to make for cooking class. We picked one breakfast, one lunch, and one snack. The students chose to make cinnamon toast for breakfast, macaroni and cheese for lunch, and chocolate croissants for snack. The PM class was divided into two groups each group was given a list of ingredients for our chosen dishes. I learned so much from getting to go shopping with the students.

Classroom Confidential

1.       Social justice is something that all teachers, especially Christian teachers, need to be well educated on. Because we live in a broken world tainted by sin we often encounter issues in the way that people are being treated. As Christians we are called to love and serve everyone. Understanding social justice and social justice reforms as a Christian educator helps me to love my students and serve them. Schmidt argues that students want to discuss social injustices but don’t know how to. They need educated adults to help them learn to talk about social injustices. Teachers are examples love and equality to our students. Students also gain many skills from social justice projects such as: problem solving, critical thinking, persuasive speaking and writing, risk taking, awareness of community needs, and personal convictions. It’s crucial for teachers to know how to facilitate social justice discussions.

Week Ten

This week I began my seven week placement in a Transition classroom working with adults with disabilities. I spent my first days of the week in training learning all about the history of the school, how to transport students in wheelchairs, how to aide students that use communication devices, and so much. It was so exciting to learn all about how this incredible school services their diverse students.

On Wednesday, I got to meet my classroom. My class consists of 17 students all with a variety of disabilities. Students in the transition program have jobs that they spend half of the day at. Some students work in the community and some work at the school. Half of the students in my classroom work in the morning and the other half work in the afternoon. All seventeen students are together for morning meetings, lunch, and dismissal. Many of my students can read, write, and compute basic math. The majority of the class falls between the third and fourth grade range of academic ability. All of my students self-feed and dress. My students do not need assistance in the bathroom, but they need to be monitored for safety. All seventeen of my students have communication deficits but are verbal. At the beginning of every school day one student is picked to pray over the upcoming day. Students pray again prior to lunch and before dismissal. It has been beautiful hearing my student’s voices as they pray.

My students are not necessarily aggressive, however, many of them have defiant or aggressive behaviors. Many of the student’s behaviors are far worse at home then at school. One student threatens to become aggressive often throughout the day and tell his parents he wants to hurt his 

teacher.

In this transition classroom, students are taught social skills, problem solving, vocational skills, daily living skills, and other essential life skills. Every Friday, students are taken out into the community to practice a variety of social skills. Students participate in adaptive Physical Education once a week. All of my students are ambulatory, however, some of them have physical needs. Along with Physical Education, students also swim in the school’s swimming pool every other week.

I have learned so much about teaching special education in the three days I’ve been in the classroom. Because it is only my first week, I only observed and read through the paperwork of my students. I’ve gotten to know each of my students.

The school I am in now is a whole different world than that of my fifth grade classroom. Even though I have not begun to teach my adults, I can already see that I will have a lot of valuable experience working with diverse students. Illinois Professional Teaching standard number 1 states, “The competent teacher understands the diverse characteristics and abilities of each student and how individuals develop and learn within the context of their social, economic, cultural, linguistic, and academic experiences. The teacher uses these experiences to create instructional opportunities that maximize student learning.” My previous placement taught me all about teaching students with diverse social, economic, and academic experiences. Knowledge indicator 1A states that the competent teacher, “understands the spectrum of student diversity (e.g., race and ethnicity, socioeconomic status, special education, gifted, English language learners (ELL), sexual orientation, gender, gender identity) and the assets that each student brings to learning across the curriculum.” I’m excited to learn more about special education, how to teach students with disabilities in a self-contained classroom, and what my students have to offer the classroom.

Classroom Confidential

In my previous placement students wrote in their journals every day after lunch. The students had 15 minutes to write in their journals. Once a week, they had free journal writing where they could write about whatever they want. Every other day, they were given a simple prompt that they could do whatever they want with. Grammar and spelling don’t count. As long as the students are writing they receive full credit for their writing. In chapter six, Schmidt writes about warm ups as an effective strategy for writing instruction. When I was reading this I was reminded of my fifth grade class and their journal time. I think warm ups are a great way for students to get their brains churning whether they are preparing for more writing or other instructional time. Warm ups, I think, is a great strategy that all teachers can use with their students.

Week Nine

This week came like a flood of emotions as I concluded my time at my fifth grade placement. It’s unbelievable how fast the time flew and how much I have grown in that time. While learning and growing with my fifth graders, my philosophy was put to the test along with my classroom management and my patience.

Teaching in a Title 1 school has taught me so much more about teaching than I think I could’ve learned at any other school. Each of my students were incredibly different. Each had different interests, families, income, cultures, and abilities. Every day I had to seek out ways to connect the content to each student and make it meaningful. Although it was a lot of planning and intentional inclusion of culture, interests, and content, I loved every minute because every day I saw a light bulb go off or a spark be ignited. My students are so unique and deserved to be taught in a way that serviced each of them individually.

In the process of differentiating on many levels I learned about teaching styles. Coming into this placement I knew that group work was important, however, I didn’t see how important it really is. I knew that research supports cooperative learning, but I hadn’t seen its benefits until teaching my fifth graders. Allowing students to work in groups help them gain independence and enhances their learning because they get to take charge. I am convinced that teaching using a stations model where students rotate between several stations is a very effective way for students practice and apply skills while also learning crucial independence skills. This method of teaching also allows for small group teaching where a teacher can work with a small group of 3 or 4 students. Research shows that many students learn best in a small group setting.

Illinois Professional Teaching Standard 4 Performance Indicator K states that the competent teacher, “uses strategies to create a smoothly functioning learning community in which students assume responsibility for themselves and one another, participate in decision-making, work collaboratively and independently, use appropriate technology, and engage in purposeful learning activities.” Using station teaching allows for students to be independent and take control of their own learning and be a apart of a team. I have learned how to implement stations in a meaningful and engaging way.

I continue this wonderful journey of becoming a teacher by beginning my placement in a Special Education classroom with students ages 18-21. While I am aware that the students I will be teaching are vastly different from my fifth graders, I am ready to learn and grow in a new environment with my new students.

Week Eight

This week felt a bit chaotic to me. I’m learning more and more each day about how demanding and overwhelming teaching can be. There were several times where it seemed that what I had planned either went half right or didn’t happen. Although it was overwhelming I simply improvised and went with what happened. All in all the students and I had a great week. I just had to practice my improvising skills.

This week, I wrapped up my EdTPA lessons. I was really unsure about what I had chosen to teach for the learning segment. The comprehension skill for the story the students were working on was inferencing so that is what I chose to teach. I was concerned about whether I would teach it well enough to the students, however, I knew that I loved doing it so I gave it my best shot. In the end, I was very proud of my students. They were superstars at inferences and they really enjoyed it! I loved getting to see that strategies they created for themselves to help them. Many of my students used highlighters to highlight clues in the text or listed clues as they read them. I was so proud of them.

I am feeling confident about my EdTPA. I am excited to see how it turns out.

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During one of my math lessons, this week, the district’s Math Instructional Coach came to observe. I definitely was not expecting her to walk in. I don’t think my cooperating teacher knew she was coming in either. What made it worse was that she came in while I was teaching prime factorization which I was not one hundred percent sure on. While I’m not bad at it, I get nervous whenever I teach it because it is my weakest subject.

Thankfully, although I wasn’t doing poorly, the instructional coach was willing to give me pointers on ways that I can improve. I learned about how helpful content area coaches are. While she made me so nervous when she got there I was so thankful for her help in the end!

Illinois Professional Teaching Standard 8 says, “The competent teacher builds and maintains collaborative relationships to foster cognitive, linguistic, physical, and social and emotional development. This teacher works as a team member with professional colleagues, students, parents or guardians, and community members.”

Performance indicator 8L says that the competent teacher, “initiates collaboration with others to create opportunities that enhance student learning.”

This week, I began to learn about the importance of collaboration. It’s unbelievable how much support I received from the instructional coach. She didn’t judge me or make me feel like I wasn’t a good teacher. She built me up and gave me some really good pointers.

While this week felt so chaotic and wonderful at the same time, I am quickly approaching the end of my time at my fifth grade placement. My next blog will be my final blog about my fifth grade classroom. I will beginning my seven week placement in a Special Education Transition classroom with adults ages 18-21.