Let's begin sharing how you are doing with going into a classroom of your choice to work with student(s) who are not considered typical learners. These students are any child the teacher believes would benefit from working with an adult one-on-one or in a small group setting. They are typically the students that do not respond well to whole group instruction.
Keep us posted how the experience is going for you. Please do not identify the child or school by it's real name but use ficticious names. How often have you been visiting? How are you managing your time? What do you think of the school? Tell us about the child/children you are working with. Ask any questions you have about using this experience for the Design Your Own Case assignment and the Teacher Work Sample assignment? As a community we will grow from your experiences and we can also provide support and encouragement to you along the journey.
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6 comments:
I’ve contacted principal of Myers Elementary in Portage, and received his confirmation to work in a second grade classroom. I’ll be meeting the teacher this Friday and looking forward to this assignment.
I just went to my school today for the first time, and I am working with a student whose parents are both deaf. He struggles with his writing because ASL has a different word order they use when signing and he keeps wanting to use that order instead. I am looking forward to meeting with him again.
I have actually had a really great experience so far. I am actually going to be observing a student who is missing the part of the brain that connects the left side to the right side. Doctors have said that he exhibits many characteristics of autism and they are trying to do more brain scans on autistic kids to see if this could be a possible cause of the disorder. The child that I am observing has to have an aide with him at all times. The more I observe him, the more I realize that this child is truly intelligent, he just severly lacks social skills and the ability to pay attention for extended periods of time. He is not potty trained and actually has a diaper bag brought to school. Today was the first day that he acknowledged my presence and that I saw other students actually try to interact with him. He screamed when a kid told him that they liked his pajamas (it is spirit week), and it is so sad to see this. These kids in his class do not seem to be judgemental at all, and it's too bad that they're too young to understand why he is the way he is.
I am in Pine Elementary, with Mrs. Gano's 2nd grade class. I was originally just going to work with the students that needed help with reading. Now I am going to work with both lower level students and the GT students. For my TWS, I think I am going to work with what seems to be the top student of the class. Her name is Audrey. Working with her will help me to develop an idea of things that the GT students will be interested in learning about and give me an idea of where they are as far as curriculum goes.
My first day was last Monday, and I entirely enjoyed my time in the classroom. I’m working in a second grade classroom, and my host-teacher has been teaching for the past 35 years. I know I can learn a lot from her, and I feel like I already have. I have a freedom of working with the entire classroom, a group at a time, and in one-on-one environment. The teacher let me observe the first hour, and I was able to become aware of a few students that stood out from the entire group. During a reading time, I decided to help a student with his reading, as I noticed that he was working with a specialist when the class worked together. Later on, I found out the boy has a learning disability. We sat down on the floor and I help him with the text. It was very interesting. His mind was sharp on one hand, yet on the other hand, he struggled with other aspects of language arts. He seemed to enjoyed my attention very much and worked very hard. I asked him if he would like to join in with the rest of the group, and we set down in the community circle. To mine (and seemed to the teacher’s as well) surprise he was able to answer a difficult question directed to the entire class regarding the text. The question, although simple, required some critical thinking skills. “What do ants and people have in common?” He said, “they work together.” I was clapping my hands and high-fiving him like a little kid :). After that, he asked the teacher if I can help him with his writing assignment. He struggled with structuring his sentences, but I decided the ignore the punctuation and the spelling, as long as he wrote what came to his mind; he seemed to take a great joy in that. After he was done, I helped him by pointing out how he can improve his punctuation. I also worked on a writing assignment with a little girl who has an ADHD. She was “stuck”, and started to get bored. It was a free-writing assignment, so I suggested to write about whatever she liked the most. I think that would work for anyone, and it certainly worked for her. At the end of the day, I felt great. I love going to the classroom, and I feel like I learn so much when I do. Working with the special need children seemed to have even greater rewards than working with a general group. It was really gratifying, and I am looking forward to Tuesday when I’ll be reading a book to them about President’s Day!
On Tuesday, I watched my second graders work on their AR, and do math problems. The principal of the school has developed work pages for all grades based on the I Steps and Indiana standards. Second graders worked on their pages that included fractions. The concept was difficult to grasp for all of them, especially for those with special needs. I worked with a few of them individually. I took my time and used some techniques that Dr. Feikes and Dr. Schwingendorf had taught us in Math 137,38,39. I have no doubt that the concept of fractions will have to be repeated many, many times before these students will be able to grasp it. I believe that use of the manipulatives are essential in the fractions case especially.
Today, I’ve read the book to the entire class and, I must admit it, was the best time I’ve had in the classroom so far. I also had a few long talks with my teacher about school’s pull-out program, her numerous students that are part of this program, and her schedule that must accommodate these special need students. There are two ESL students. Two of the students need speech; four are specifically LD. One of the ESL students gets assistance from a RR Teacher (yeah, they LOVE their acronyms :0). In addition, I worked with a Title 1 assistant and her three students. There are 7 students in Title I in this class alone. I asked her questions and learned a few things concerning this interesting program. According to the assistant, not all schools qualify for Title 1. The illegibility is based on the financially assisted lunch program. This means if the school has a certain percent of students that need financial support with lunch, the school will be eligible to be part of this program.
I asked my teacher to break down her numbers of special need students and some of the techniques that she uses to assist the gifted and talented children. One of the methods she uses is higher-level basil reading books.
In addition, I found out that Portage school system does something unusual and different from other school systems. The teachers from all Portage schools get together and develop an assessment system that they administer quarterly based on the Indiana standards. They use I Steps rubrics to assess the progress. They choose the target standards from the Indiana list that they feel is the most “proficient” so to speak. I thought it’s a splendid idea! After the year, they get together and check how can they improve their strategies, what works, and what does not.
I think I’ve had a good week. I wish I had more time to spend in the classroom. Assisting teachers “in action” is such a great way to learn.
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