Midterm Reflection

So far in my student teaching experience, I have met with many various challenges and I feel that as a whole I have been able to solve these challenges in an effective manner with the help of my cooperating teacher. There are still many areas where I need to continue to grow in my knowledge and ability, and I will keep working toward my goals as the rest of the semester progresses.

Goal 1:    Plan and implement assessments that match the learning targets for any given lesson.

I have not had a ton of opportunities to plan and implement my own lessons so far this semester, as I am just now transitioning into planning lessons without the guidance of my cooperating teacher.  I have often taught a lesson that my cooperating teacher has planned, which I feel I have implemented well for the most part. There are usually small things that I notice while teaching that I wish I would have done better, such as the phrases that I use when instructing students to do something, which I tend to phrase as questions instead of commands. When I teach the same lesson to two different classes, I notice a significant improvement in my instruction for the second class, so I feel that I am recognizing these small things that I often mess up on and learning from my mistakes to make my teaching more effective.

I have planned a few lessons on my own, and for these my cooperating teacher has either given me the learning targets, or I have asked if a specific learning target would work for that lesson. Once I planned the lessons, my cooperating teacher then looked them over and provided feedback for what she thought wouldn’t work well. I have been receptive to her feedback and I feel that it makes my lessons better. I still have work to do on the planning of my lessons and assessments, but I feel that I have come far in implementing these lessons effectively and I hope to continue to see improvement before the final.

Goal 2:    Exercise patience when dealing with students who do not listen well.

I still have a lot of work to do in this area, but I think that I have improved a lot already this semester. Especially in Sophomore English, I have many opportunities to deal with students who do not listen well, and for the most part I have not reacted negatively to these students. I still get frustrated when it seems like the entire class is not listening or responding to instructions, but I feel like I have done a good job of not letting this affect my teaching; I do tend to rant about it after school to blow off steam, however.

The biggest problem I have had so far in this area is having large sections of the class not turning in work.  I know that for a lot of these students, grades are not a motivating factor to get their work turned in on time or at all, and I am working on other ways to motivate students to get the work done. The most frustrating experience for me is when I know that a student knows the answers to the questions, but they do not put in the effort to write them down and turn them in, or the student does the work but just never turns it in because they do not care enough.  I want the gradebook to reflect the effort that students put into my class, but if they don’t turn in their work, I am unable to give them credit.  I have begun adding more grades for participation and classwork so that these students who are consistently on task yet turn nothing in are still getting credit.  I also check up on students who don’t turn work in to see if they have anything ready, and I have recently begun implementing goals for students who have a large amount of missed assignments to help them become motivated to turn work in, but I am still experiencing problems.  I hope to continue to grow in this area.

Goal 3:    Be willing to deviate from the plan when students need specific help.

Even though I am working hard on meeting this goal, I still see myself failing in thinking on the spot to rearrange lesson plans at the last minute.  As I continue to grow in my abilities as a teacher, I hope that I will have more tools to think of on-the-spot changes I can make when students are not understanding.  It is a lot easier for me to plan for time before class starts in which I can help students with their needs than it is for me to deviate from the plan in the middle of class.  For example, earlier this week as I was grading chapter questions for To Kill a Mockingbird, I realized that there were quite a few students in one class who weren’t understanding a lot of the deeper points in which Jem realizes something that Scout doesn’t.  I was able to plan a lesson for these students to gain more understanding, and I feel that this worked well. I have more trouble when I don’t have a day to plan between realizing the deficits and teaching the lesson. I hope to find more strategies for last minute changes throughout this semester, with the help of my cooperating teacher and my own additional research.

Professional Experience Reaction Paper

For my professional experience as a student teacher, I went to a PAC, or Principal’s Advisory Committee, Meeting. During this meeting, other staff members in attendance and I primarily discussed what next steps would be to meet a school goal of more freshman students feeling like they belonged at the school. This was also meant to help students who were failing one or more subject in conjunction with data that showed students who did not feel like they belonged in some sort of group at the school also tended to do poorly in some school subjects.

Staff members shared their thoughts on the goals and topics, and we discussed planning to meet these goals. I was very glad that I went to this meeting, as it provided me with insight on how policy meetings go at the high school level, and what kind of opportunities interested teachers can have in sharing their ideas for how the school can move forward.  Much less staff than I expected attended this meeting, which shows me that teachers have to take initiative in order to have their voices heard in higher policy discussions, but that the opportunities are there if you look for them. 

Volunteer Experience 2

Thank You Letter from 1st Graders

During Spring semester of 2015, I worked with the UM Tutoring Project to volunteer to help students with reading. I was placed in a classroom of 1^st graders at an elementary school in Missoula, where I volunteered twice a week for 1 hour during their “Walk to Read” time. During this time, the students were split up into skill-based reading groups.  One group would do independent work, one group would work with the classroom teacher, and I would work with the third group.  This would rotate during our time, so I would work with two groups each time I was there.  They were comprised of the same kids for the first quarter, and then during the second quarter groupings changed as a result of new knowledge the students had, and I worked with two of these new groups for the second quarter. The groups would read a book out loud together, and then we would work on packets of comprehension questions together.

This experience really helped me as a teacher because it gave me a taste of how learning to read can be, which is much different from the reading to learn set up that older grades have. I also worked with groups of students from various different economic and family backgrounds. This experience really opened up my eyes to the possibility that some kids are never read to at home, either because their parents do not have the time, or the resources. Children who do not have the opportunity for an adult to work with them on reading in a small group or one-to-one setting often do not have the same tools in their belt when they are learning to read at school. I was glad that I could provide some of these kids with additional time being read to or with in a group with an adult, as their classroom teachers often don’t have much time to spend working with students who really need the extra tutoring help.

I think that this experience will continue to help my understanding of students with diverse educational backgrounds, and I hope that it will help my instruction of these children to grow and match their specific needs.   

Video 1 Critique and Lesson Plan

Video Critique

What are my strengths?
I use prompting questions when students don’t know the answer right away, or re-word the question if there is confusion. I also speak loudly and clearly so that I can be heard well even at the back of the room. I appear comfortable in front of the classroom. I provide many different interactive components for the students, and give them opportunities to listen, read, write, and engage in conversation before they are assessed on their knowledge.

In what areas do I need to improve my instructional delivery?

I use sentence fillers (um, er, like, so, ok) often while I am speaking. Sometimes I start sentences with phrases such as “why don’t we” or “how about” while giving instructions, which makes the instructions seem like an option. When I gave directions for students to talk at their table, they responded very slowly, showing that I did not adequately prepare them for that transition.

How will I improve my teaching effectiveness?
When I ask a question to the class and no one answers, I need to either provide more wait time, or call on someone to answer. Sometimes I may need to give more specific instructions, and when I ask students to switch from listening to talking, it would be helpful to give them a few minutes to write down their thoughts first, especially so early in the morning. I would also like to focus on using less filler language and not phrasing instructions like a question.

Pathos, Ethos, Logos in Advertising Lesson Plan

Materials:

• Presentation
• Pathos, Ethos, Logos cards (one set per table) 
• Printed ads 
• Chalk 
• Notecards (one per student) 
• Pathos/Ethos/Logos example sentences for quiz 

Length of Lesson:

• 1 class period (90 minutes)

Activities:

Journal- Students will write in response to the journal prompt: Choose a topic that is important to you. Using a pathos appeal, try to convince an audience of people who knows very little about this topic to agree with you.

Presentation- Teacher will present lesson from google slides on pathos, ethos, and logos, using examples from advertising. This will serve as a reminder of what an author appeals to when using each rhetorical strategy, as well as providing examples for students. After explaining the slide about the three strategies, teacher will show slide with pathos examples, and briefly explain why each advertisement appeals to pathos. This will continue for the next to slides on ethos and logos. (If students are losing interest, show a slide, then have them discuss which strategy it is at their tables before teacher calls on a table to answer and explain why for each advertisement.)

Videos- Teacher will show one video at a time from the last slide of the presentation. Students will briefly discuss at table which strategy they think the ad is using, then hold up a card at the table that says either Pathos, Ethos, or Logos. This will serve as formative assessment/knowledge check.

Printed Ads- Each table will have a small stack of printed advertisements. At their tables, they will discuss which domain (Pathos, Ethos, Logos) they think all of the ads belong to. They will then write down in chalk the domain, and one reason why the ad appeals to that domain next to the advertisement.

Assessment:
Quiz- Teacher will provide students with a sentence. On a notecard students will individually write down the domain and why it appeals to that domain. Repeat for Pathos, Ethos, and Logos example sentences. As an EXAMPLE: "The veterinarian says that an Australian shepherd will be the perfect match for our active lifestyle." So I would write that this sentence is an example of Ethos because it appeals to the authority of the veterinarian, and assumes that vets know a lot about dogs.


Example Sentences-
"More than one hundred peer-reviewed studies have been conducted over the past decade, and none of them suggests that this is an effective treatment for hair loss."
"As a doctor, I am qualified to tell you that this course of treatment will likely generate the best results."
"You should consider another route. I heard that that street is far more dangerous and ominous at night than during the daytime."