Reflect & Connect 1/5

Dear Revolutionaries,

This week I have returned to 123 Elementary. I am so happy to be back in my second grade classroom. I sure have missed my students over break! UTRPP has brought me exciting new opportunities for the 2014 year. First, I will be experiencing intermediate elementary school. I am paired with a fifth grade teacher at 123 Elementary for two hours a week. My first day I was very nervous, but also super excited to see what teaching an intermediate grade level is like. I loved every minute of fifth grade. My collaborating teacher is energetic, loud, and very passionate about teaching fifth grade. I observed her teaching a social studies lesson, where her and her students were reading along to an article about a woman who helped Colonists during the American Revolution. It was very cool to learn about history with a women in power. This article she was teaching connected to my social studies class from earlier that week. My social studies professor taught us how to teach students history from a different perspective. This is important because it teaches students the unwritten curriculum of our cultures values. For example, I never knew women helped out during the American Revolution. I assumed their only job was to be housewives and have children. Also, in my instructional planning class we read an article by Banks called Curriculum Reform Approaches. This article connects to teaching social studies because it went over how teachers cultures and backgrounds are the perspectives they teach from.

I am very excited to see what else connects in my future classes with my new fifth grade class! Also, I wonder if getting experience in an intermediate grade is going to change my mind for what grade I want to teach. As of now I am set on Kindergarten but my experience in fifth grade might change my mind. We will have to wait and see!

Happy New Year!

Miss Hester

P.S. Here is a picture of the social studies article from a students binder and the set up of a science/social studies/math word wall my fifth grade CT's classroom.