Reflect & Connect 1/27

Dear Teachers who Teach for a Cause,

This past week I learned a lot about myself as a teacher. My internship consists in an urban school district. I have learned through my experience I want to teach in an urban setting when I graduate. I would like to do this for many reasons,  but I learned my true passions during class. For my level II intern class we are learning about teacher inquiry and how to start our own inquiry. We looked at this by reading examples of passions teachers inquire. The passion I connected to the most was social justice. My passion for social justice is to understand how to meet every students needs when it comes to their culture. In my Teaching Exceptional Students class, we watched videos concerning African Americans versus Caucasians when it came to education in America. I learned our education system needs some changes when it comes to teaching minorities. Teachers need to learn how to teach different cultures with their learning styles. As a teacher, I want to be apart of my students community and show them everyday how much I care. I will support my students and set high expectations.

In my second grade classroom, I was struggling with the fact that I knew about how rough life is at home for most of my students and that there is not much I can do to change that. As a teacher I want to teach in urban schools to have my classroom be their safe, second home. I cannot wait to create a safe, fun, learning community environment in my class.

Growing as a Teacher,

Miss Hester

Reflect & Connect 10/7

Dear Flexible Teachers,

This week in second grade, I learned the true importance of being flexible. All of my professors kept mentioning this work in the first few weeks of our classes and implied that you have to be flexible to be apart of the UTRPP. Sunday night I received a text message from my collaborating teacher that she would like for me to take over the class on Monday morning when she will be in meetings all day. I was beyond excited, literally jumping up and down in my room. I felt comfortable enough to teach the class because I have been there every morning since September 3rd. After the excitement was over I realized that I do not know what I will be teaching them. I never make lesson plans with my CT because we plan out the week together on Mondays. She texted me saying that everything would be ready in the morning and I will be using a sub plan. I was very nervous because I am the type of person who needs to have a plan for everything, but when I walked in on Monday morning I was ready to be flexible or whatever the morning through at me. The sub plan my CT had for me was very simple for me to understand, since we were working on one story all past week. I kept the morning routine the same but just added my "teacher touch" into the morning meeting and lesson plan. During the morning meeting I had my students share something fun they did this past weekend and I was so excited to see my shy students sharing their stories. I gave extra time at the carpet so everyone had a chance  share what they did this past weekend. Now that my CT has let me takeover the morning meeting I really would like to add more ideas for the Morning Meeting book that I read for my Classroom Management class.

I love the whole concept and the way morning meetings can change a classroom. The problem that I am dealing with right now is that I am debating if I should incorporate sharing or an activity because I know our time is limited in the morning. We already have a morning message and a greeting but I am unsure if I should add a sharing section because the children are very close with each other since they have grown up at the same school together. But on the other hand I think sharing time is very important to teach social skills and to talk about the children's emotions because most of class time is dealing with academics. I would also like to incorporate an activity to wake the children up and have them be more excited about the school day. If any of you guys have a suggestion please feel free to comment below!

Flexibility is a very important concept to master as a teacher. I feel from the past weeks I have been in the second grade and my USF education classes I have learned how to be a flexible teacher. This has been a little bit of a tough time for me because I need to always have a plan, know due dates in advance, and I want my lessons to go perfectly in the classroom. The perfect planned teacher in me has change to now a more plan ABC teacher. I am flexible to expect things to not go as planned and my CT has taught me to always have a backup plan, (my ABC plans). I took on last Monday with not knowing the lesson plan and the sub told me I did an amazing job. She said she did not have to worry about anything going wrong in the classroom because of how confident I was with the children. This made me very happy and proved that I can be flexible.

Sincerely,
New ABC Plan Teacher

Connect and Reflect 9/9

Dear Passionate Teachers,

These last two weeks I have begun my student teaching journey! So far it is amazing and I love every, stressful minute of it. I love being apart of USF/HCPS Urban Teacher Residency Partnership Program! I realized a lot more goes on behind the scenes, about teaching, then I previously assumed. I thought every teacher has their own one way street teaching with classroom management and the curriculum. These past weeks I have learned from my readings and experience in the classroom, that what I assumed is 100% wrong.

My readings and professors have taught me that research is key in education. I do not know why but this has never crossed my mind before. I always thought that research was only used for science, not teaching. But boy am I so happy that we have so much research in the education field! I feel as if without research teachings would be boring and very repetitive. In the book, Classrooms That Work, they talk about doing different studies to find out how effective teachers are so effective and why their methods work compared to other teachers. Reading chapter 1 from this book made me realize that all of the components of an effective teacher really makes a difference. I connected this with my internship by observing different teachers in different grade levels to see what their difference in teaching styles. From my ESOl I readings, I have learned that every student has their own culture and it is my duty to look into their background to find the best teaching strategies for them to succeed in my classroom. After I finished the reading I went on Google to research the backgrounds of my students. It was really beneficial that I did my research because the next night was open house and there was an arab women who is one of my students mother. I knew when I met her not to shake her hand unless she put out her hand first for me to shake. I knew not to shake her hand because my research shared with me that Arab women have a choice of their own if they do want to shake hand or not. Also, they shake with only their fingers. I decided not to put my hand out for a polite shake because I did not want to make her feel uncomfortable. Now when I am working with my diverse students, I am more cautious of their background and what norms they have. Researching has helped me everyday in the classroom and I am so excited to learn more! To be the most effective teacher that teacher must be full of passion for teaching because I learned there is a lot of research to do and teacher must be passionate or they will not do it. My PRT has taught me that every teacher has their own teaching philosophy. I know what mine is exactly, but I do know I want it to include that latest, successful research for effective teachers.

Sincerely,
Miss Intern