Classroom Confidential Ch. 8 & 9

This week I learned from Schmidt- Don’t neglect the multiple intelligences in your classroom; feed them! Creative and messy learning can be the most impactful, penetrating deep into the students’ minds. The students want to experience learning in ways that are relate-able and engaging (and who wouldn’t!). To do this immersion is an influential tool in getting learners entrenched in the world of the subject or domain being taught. When students are given an opportunity to discover something completely new, it empowers them to make meaning out of their world. Being in PE I have a built-in environment for engaging kinesthetic, spatial, and often visual learners. I thought it was a brilliant and yet astonishingly obvious tactic to get students to practice their classroom academics by incorporating movement. Being a kinesthetic learner myself, I empathize with the students who struggle with retaining abstract or facts and information that seems detached from any type of cohesive structure. Until I manipulate it whether by acting, feeling, performing, etc… such material can be extremely difficult for me to retain or even understand. Although some of the methods of learning that support multiple intelligences may not seem practical in an arena when time never seems to be adequate, they can be a double edged sword, providing opportunities for more authentic assessment.

I love the idea of assessing students with such tools as “Show Me” where each student is participating and highly engaged. Used for comprehension checks, this assessment has kids move, mime, gesture, and use dramatic skills. Of course this assessment may not provide you with objective information you need as students are able to look around and mimic the responses of others. In the gym however, I sometimes encourage this type of behavior. When I want to encourage problem solving, I may ask a student to look around and use their resources to help figure out how to do something. Many times these resources are other students! Then the student has to engage in the process of using a tactic they see someone else doing and figure out how to make it work for themselves.

Lucky for me, most of the assessment in the gym is done in an authentic manner naturally. The learners are given situation activities and asked to engage body and mind in applying the learned content to them. This is not necessarily catering to my learners who have other intelligences such as logical-mathematical or linguistic. One area I could improve on is during our times of reflection or discussion. I have been caught in the position many times of having several students with hands still raised to answer a question but not having time to hear them all. Because the enhanced state standards now require students be moderately to vigorously active for at least 70% of the class period, time is pressed. I would love to integrate more opportunities for authentic assessment. Having students write sport journals, graph or draw game plays and strategies, or even act out stories to begin or end a unit, would all be fantastic ways to have my learners demonstrate their cognitive competence.

Teaching: An Endless Journey of Learning- Week 7

I feel like I spend a lot of my time adjusting. From one lesson, grade level, and child to the next adjustments are constantly being made. It commonly feels as though the amount of time I put into making adjustments is due to an incompetence on my part to perform something correctly the first time! However, as I journey on in my teaching experience I am reassured that teaching is an art not a science and there is constantly room for improvements. Defeated at times I will look to my cooperating teacher to correct me yet each time am surprised at his uncritical comments. In addition to a few minor suggestions, Mr. Park will say that I am performing well. By 'well' I venture to believe he means managing. But he continues on to explain that although my lessons are not flawless, I am constantly on the lookout for areas needing improvement and then adjusting them accordingly. Adjusting practices to meet the needs of each of my students (IPLS 2P) is a continuously evolving component of my teaching. I have found myself searching for ways to make concepts easier to understand for the various types of intelligences. Are my linguistic learners getting this? Have the logical ones been able to work out the structure of the activity? Every day I experiment with big and small practices, adjusting to the child in front of me. If this means I’m failing then I would say failure leads to healthy student centered thinking.

A specific situation arose this week in which I was able to practice my conflict resolution skills. (IPLS 8R) As I was closing a 4^th grade lesson, preparing to transition students scattered across the gym to put equipment away and then line up, a grouping of boys began to yell and throw materials at each other. It escalated seemingly out of nowhere and I quick demanded two of them separate and go to the stage immediately. After finishing off my directions to the rest of the class, I called two more boys who were witnesses to the scene over to the stage with me to a discussion. Emotions were high admits the original offenders. I had them circle up and immediately quieted both as accusations were flying quickly. The following statement was made to defuse tempers and get the students in a cooperative disposition:

“No one here is in trouble or being accused. Everyone will get a chance to speak in order to understand what happened and why.”

As we went around the circle we discovered the entire situation was due to a misunderstanding. One boy had been rolling balls off the court and the other though he was intentionally throwing the balls at him to aggravate him. He then retaliated and the situation grew to the scene I saw. One of the witnesses calmly shared what he saw in an objective way to support the misunderstanding. Having a clear understanding of what happened, I steered away from blaming and condemning and used the information as a teaching tool for why procedures are in place. If the students weren’t moving the balls around in the first place this could have been prevented. In addition, I reasoned why retaliation is never the best answer in solving a problem. The boys nodded their heads and I thanked them for meeting with me, encouraging them to use this type of approach if an issue arose again. Overall, I was proud of how the boys were able to handle the conflict with me. One student affirmed the success of this intervention by turning to me afterward and commenting “you’re a really good assistant teacher”.

This Friday I was also able to participate in another PE Task Force meeting. As Friday was a half day, the specials teachers did not have any classes. Instead the district elementary PE teachers met in the morning to do more curriculum building. With the new enhanced PE standards the teachers have been in the process of revamping their K-5 curriculum. I find it interesting that we are into the academic year and the teachers are still in the process of formulating what will be accessed for the first grading period coming up in November. Then in the afternoon we moved to the high school for a full K-12 meeting. At the high school I gained some valuable insight to what PE is up against in some of the higher administrative levels. The district supervisor for PE said that as educators we are in need of making the school boards understand the value of physical education as a core class. Apparently there are those who wish to see PE become an elective. This was a disturbing piece of information for myself and the other student teacher to hear. However, the supervisor continued to describe how the mission of the K-12 curriculum will help combat this. One of the main trends keeping PE in place in many districts, is its stance in fighting childhood obesity. The objective is to have the students physically active for at least 75% of the period.

Personally, I am rather divided on this stance. Yes I want my students to be active but I also don’t want my “classroom” to be treated like a fitness center per se. My students are learners not clients to train. One way the supervisor explained they would be showing the administrative decision makers the value of PE is by bringing in more elements of our specialty areas that no other domain has. These would include subjects such as kinesiology (the study of human movement), bio mechanics, anatomy, and physiology. My ears perked up at this, and I felt a smile creep across my face. To me learning in PE should be based around teaching our students how to think not only like athletes but scientists and have deeper level understanding of the way their body works. It will be interesting to see how the teaching team addresses this in their new curriculum! (IPLS 9P)
                       
Goals for next week:
1) involve students in self-assessment activities (making goals with fitness testing data!) and help them understand the importance of setting goals
2) try new practices to help students who struggle with learning motivation

Classroom Confidential Ch. 11

After reading Schmidt chapter eleven, I realized there is a lot more to good communication than enunciating your words and speaking clearly. The thought of communication being about enlightenment was something that had never crossed my mind but made perfect sense once explained. One of the main reasons we communicate is to share thoughts and ideas, often in hopes of bring about a change or some action together. In order to do so accurately, however, we must also learn the ways that others may respond and communicate differently from ourselves. In the past, I often presumed good communication was what my dad taught me. As a communications major, he had me practice conversations. I had to look him in the eye, speak clearly and directly, and articulate my thoughts without filler words. As I’ve grown I’ve realized that though I may do all these things proficiently, my communication has not always produced the results I’d imagined it would.

Chapter eleven provides ten essential elements of effective communication.  Many of these things I knew, minus a couple helpful hints such as including co-custodial parents in communication. What really helped me was reading about the different types of cultural communication practices. Well, helped and scared me! At first reading about all the things I could do wrong when engaging my parents left me feeling very insecure. Nonetheless, I realized that these aren’t things I am expected to know now but to make myself sensitive to uncovering if I were to have families of diverse backgrounds in my class.

I feel much more prepared for parent teacher conferences as well, having some tools such as a conference information sheet and preparation packet to help both the parents and myself have a common “road map”. Both the parents and I will feel less overwhelmed and more like allies when we are jointly being enlightened about the other’s world. I’m a fairly confident person but have a driving need to feel and get “prepared” for all the day’s circumstances to really shine my best (whether or not I actually am fully prepared). The idea of walking into situations and being able to say “I’ve put work in to ready myself for this”, is a huge confidence boost for me. The tips in this book will definitely help guide my readiness process! 

Breaking Self-made Barriers- Week 6

I cannot believe it is October already. If feels as though I’ve been teaching forever but when I look at the calendar I’m reminded the year is still in its beginning stages. Like the fall weather my experience has slowly (and sometimes suddenly) been evolving. For one, I’ve begun to not only recognize student faces but also know the personalities that go with them. Attachments have begun to form in my heart towards many of these kids, and it’s strange to think I’ll have to leave them in twenty-two days for another school and another country. Goodness, how hard it is to fathom such a switch!

This week has been yet another tangled web of experiences. Since taking over the classroom, I’ve begun to navigate the waters of who I am as a teacher. I’ve asked, “What is my style when I’m given liberty to teach authentically? What management seems to work for me and these students?” In the past there has been much adopting on my part of the classroom dynamics that are already in place by the teacher. Now, however, I find myself reinventing the way things are done. I daily use phrases like “When Miss Matson teaches…” or “in Miss Matson’s class we…” to reconfigure some of the classroom. Now I’m definitely not overhauling the entire structure of what the kids are used to, but there is a gradual increase of my own unique methods and styling present in the gym.

As these things have taken shape, I’ve started to notice how my own personal perspectives and biases effect my teaching. (IPTS 1F) I began questioning why I was teaching certain ways. Were my choices coming from the understanding of student needs or meeting my own? At the beginning of the week, I was fairly fixated on having the ideal classroom. Learning would be structured, following a planned sequence, and everyone would be highly engaged. Yet as the lessons went by, I began to feel downcast and frustrated. They weren’t looking the way I wanted, and I felt like I was failing. Thankfully by Thursday I had an epiphany of sorts. It dawned on me the only reason I felt like I was failing was because of some preconceived notion I had of how my classroom should look. When I adjusted my focus back on meeting the needs of the individual students in my classroom (IPTS 2P), slowly the feelings of failure ebbed away. From an outsider’s point of view, my classes may look messy. My learners aren’t all in a line, demonstrating perfect throwing form. No, they’re learning. And learning, come to find, allows room for mistakes.

This week I’ve also started taking time to really engage learners in a personal, one-on-one way. Before it seemed like a power struggle between keeping that perfect whole class structure and allowing time to interact with each student. I think I’m slowly starting to understand the balance. As I worked with students, I began to cater my instruction to their needs. I became a facilitator between two students struggling socially, a coach for the student stuck on a problem, and an audience member for the student ready to tell me what they had discovered. (IPTS 5K) In doing so, I felt the environment of the classroom shift as students were given support and not just direction. Not only that but I also felt an emotional shift in myself were I was truly enjoying each period and its challenges! By the last classes of the day I was happily saying to myself bring it on 1st grade (the age that truly intimates me the most!), let’s see what we can do.

Goals for next Week:

1) facilitate learning experiences that make connections to other life experiences and content areas

2) find more ways to utilize students with IEPs with moderate to severe physical disabilities in every aspect of the lesson 

Classroom Confidential Ch. 2

This week was another up and down battle of success, messes, and continued learning both for me and my students. I taught my first edTPA lesson and began officially taking over the classroom. Even though I have been heavily involved in teaching for the past few weeks now, Mr. Park still has had his hand in the lessons some way or another. Some days he may be working one-on-one with students, running his own fitness testing station, or present as a secondary authority for discipline. I felt the transition to head teacher would be extremely fluid because of the way I have been integrated into the classroom. I figured classroom control would be no more a challenge than the past few weeks. I was wrong.

Wouldn’t you know (once again!), this week’s Classroom Confidential chapter spoke fluently into many of my thoughts and ponderings. Chapter two talked about building a classroom culture; my stage of teaching exactly. I’m not here to role play Mr. Park. I couldn’t even if I wanted to. Mr. Park and I are different people and, not surprisingly, the students respond to us as such. When I first read about great teachers building a culture of eptness and tapping into the unique abilities of each student, I honestly thought ‘this author is living in a dream world’. Here I am trying to keep a structured environment so my students don’t kill each other and some fragment of control in my “controlled chaos” remains. Don’t get me wrong, I desperately want to create an environment where my student’s human potential is a highlighted resource, where I’m providing specific feedback and challenging old habits; however, it seems I am trapped solely trying to keep a controlled and safe environment.

As I read further, I realized I was thinking about eptness the wrong way. Instead of thinking it is some added element I have to integrate in addition to classroom management, I really should be thinking of it as an integral part. A culture eptness means my students should be more invested in what they are doing because they are engaged in both role of teacher and student. Their on-task behavior peaks when they feel smart, competent, and a part of the community.

As I continue to teach, I will need to focus more on changing my own behaviors to help this culture blossom. I aim to first focus on expectations. Forming misguided preconceptions or misconceptions of one’s students is an incredibly easily practice to slip into. I will habitually look for the capabilities in all my students, expecting them to surprise me in the most positive way. Secondly, I aim to increase a culture of eptness by becoming a master of effective feedback. Effective feedback is “positive and includes details that help the students appreciate the effectiveness or accuracy of their efforts. With so much going on in the gym, I’ve noticed I will start giving out mindless “good jobs” and “great work” as I try to mentally prepare for my next step in the lesson (along with a million other thoughts). Changing my feedback behaviors means that I will put in the extra cognitive work to remark specifically on what my students are doing. ‘Catch them doing good’ will be the motto of the day.

Lastly, I hope to model risk taking with my students. Last week I taught a lesson and for several reasons it simply wasn’t working. I was frustrated. In my mind, the activity and goals weren’t difficult. They should be getting it. Thankfully, I swallowed my pride enough to ask the students what they were thinking and feeling. Come to find there were several factors that were slightly above their ability level, and they needed some extra support in figuring it out. Being able to step back and collaborate with the students not only offers solutions to the problems but also provides as safe place that says ‘mistakes happen here but we’ll figure it out together’. 

Full time teaching! -Week 5

Week…week…holy cow what week is it!?! Time flies when you’re having fun, running exhausted around a gym of twenty plus students, and trying to get your edTPA rolling! This week, like most, seems to be a blur of every type of experience I could think up. The success and the messes continue. As my first week of officially being the head teacher, I had a fair number of new experiences contributing to the craziness. I expected the transition to be fairly seamless considering I’ve had a prominent role in many of the activities and lessons since week two. However, I soon found out my assumption was more of mis-assumption.

Classroom control. That was the theme I sang in my reflections this week. Suddenly with Mr. Park in the background, the gym was an open playing field and the students were anxious to explore. Little did they know Miss Matson had a different ideal in mind: guided exploration with clear boundaries and protocols to abide by. As the first few classes began with an atmosphere bordering chaos more than control, I quickly realized my expectations would have to be voiced loud and clear and over and over again. At first my frustration boiled a bit after each lesson. I wondered why all of the sudden I seemed to have to be cracking down on the discipline not just once but continuously throughout my lesson. Didn’t my students know I wanted them to spend the majority of the time playing and engrossed in the activities? Then it dawned on me. I am not Mr. Park and even though I have been teaching, I had never stated my personal expectations for them. These students were simply doing what comes naturally to all children, testing the boundaries of something new set before them. Mr. Park could present himself casually to the students and simply give them the “look” to correct behavior. I on the other hand had not built up such a repertoire with the students to do so.     

Thus began the process of creating a learning environment, wholly my own. Every lesson I laid out my expectations and protocols. This included anything from where equipment should be during times of transition and instruction to appropriate behaviors during group discussions. At first I felt like the most horribly doctorial teacher ever. It’s not my personality type to want control or firmly enforce obedience. But I realized we had some ground work to do, and it was imperative for the safety as well as functionality of our classroom that these things be established. Some classes caught on quicker than others. I have to continually remember, although I’ve known these expectations they are brand new to my students. Grace should not be neglected. The goal is that these expectations and procedures become ingrained in the learners so we can spend more time learning and less time disciplining! It’s feels a similar to my discipline I receive as a child of God. At first its rather unpleasant and far from enjoyable, but in the end produces a wonderful harvest. (IPTS 4I, 4J)

Another thing I am increasingly growing proficient in is adapting my lessons…continuously! Because I get to teach the same lesson multiple times, I am offered an opportunity to evaluate its effectiveness and modify based on outcome data and student response. Teaching is a job requiring constant observation, evaluate, and correction of practices and lessons. At the end of the week I asked Mr. Park for feedback regarding any weakness that stood out to him in my teaching. His answer surprised me. First he said if there was something I should be doing differently I would already know because he is not one to hold back. Secondly, he said that although not all my lessons were flawless, I had actually been doing exactly what I should be in response. I was self-critiquing and continuously adjusting things to get them right. Great teachers know how to think on their feet and pun fully intended: I am always on my feet. (IPTS 3D) 

Classroom Confidential Ch.4

I first began to really delve into what it means to celebrate minority cultures my junior year of college after being enlightened during an RA training session. Up until then I felt I was a rather culturally aware and sensitive person. I discovered, however, that I was actually a subject of the mainstream colorblind ideology. I had grown up thinking equality among races meant pretending everyone was knit from the same cloth; there were no true differences between us. As my African-American instructor spoke on life experiences from the lenses of minority populations, I began to awaken to the ignorance in my cultural practices. Cultural equality does not mean treating everyone the same. It’s about acknowledging the differences amongst minority and majority cultures and doing one’s best to equalize access to knowledge, power codes, and influence within the society that we share.

I found myself eagerly consuming the information in this chapter, vigorously nodding my head in agreement to the frustrations and illuminations written within. With psychology being one of my favorite fields, I was drawn to the examples of cultural inclusion that spoke to basic human needs. Specifically I agreed that truly impactful classrooms are the ones where kids are convinced they are safe and valued. Transparency is emphasized, along with a true desire for the well-being of students. The almost too-good-to-be-true example of Rafe’s classroom, explained how he provided his students with the unstated rules of life and externalized his thinking all day long for them. Page seventy-seven describe his students as: “the children he shepherds tenderly and tenaciously toward adulthood”. I found this to be incredibly moving. When serving students, I believe teachers are not called to morph learners into imagine bearers of the majority culture, but rather shepherd them into adults who can think and be independently.

Over the past few years I have grown exponentially in how I navigate multicultural settings. Laying my need to make sense of that which eludes me, I sit at rest with ambiguity at first. Instead of making judgments or speculative assumptions, I can look around and stem my own curiosity. Slowly, my students and others teach me. It can be easily to live color blind and misidentify cultural learning styles as learning difficulties. I hope to minimize the occurrences of misinterpreting such interpersonal responses and teach myself to see differences as something potentially instructive. For I have much to learn. 

Controlled Choas, Fitness Testing, and... Making an Impact?- Week 4

Each day this week has brought with it a kaleidoscope of emotions, jumping from one end of the poles to the other each lesson. I’m exhausted just looking back on the host of experiences that took place. Monday is now a distant blur and Tuesday/Wednesday nearly indistinguishable. Thankfully I have my daily reflections to remind me of important happenings. My first second grade lesson Monday morning couldn’t have gone better, and lucky for me it happened to be the lesson my supervisor came to see. Delighted at what I accomplished (for there was quite a load of fitness testing data to retrieve), I felt the week would be smooth sailing. How dumbfounded I was when the same lesson with another second grade class the next day felt like riding an old wooden roller coaster! With each wave of classes the same lesson plan was taught and different results ensued. I groped for understanding all week. How could the same lesson go so well for one class and seem nearly impossible to complete with the next!? 

I analyzed my instructional practices, the content of my lesson, the layout of equipment…everything and anything I could think of. (IPTS 9J) I’m not saying that my reflections on these areas were fruitless. In fact, as I practiced my ideas for improvement or experimented with solutions, I was often pleased with the positive results. However, the results seemed slight in comparison with the ideal lesson I had experienced Monday morning. I hounded myself each lesson. I had to be doing something wrong. Interestingly enough, as I began reading chapter three of classroom confidential for this week’s assignment my thoughts about my classroom experiences began to change. This week’s chapter was about diversity, specifically cultural diversity. Now my school is rather culturally UN-diverse, but the principles of diversity apply nonetheless. I began to realize how naive it was for me to expect the same results from each class because my teaching routine was consistent. Each class is its own entity, revolving around a solely unique classroom culture. You may have the class with the kinesthetic achievers bursting with pride to show you their athletic poweress. The next is full of competition seekers who push the rules and boundaries vying for titles. The following is flogged with cliques whose main purpose is to share their every thought and feeling amongst a grouping of peers. Of course the classes are never as one-track as this, having a range of subcultures within. Still, why in the world then would I expect my classes to respond some sort of harmonized manner to my teaching!? What a task at hand we teachers have. It is a rather laborious one, though incredibly rewarding: when teachers sensitize themselves to student diversity in all its formats. (IPTS 1B, 1K)

Furthermore, in my week-four adventures I have
come face to face with the difficult and daunting reality elementary PE teachers must face not once but twice in an academic year: fitness testing. What a challenge it is to maintain a classroom of highly energized learners while trying to collect data on each individual’s physical abilities purely through observation of testing and recording results! I has been a huge blessing to be able to co-teach and collaborate with Mr. Park in how best to accomplish this feat. The students would have much less opportunity for activity and learning if it were not for the co-teaching techniques that we have used. We are continuously problem-solving as we encounter new obstacles to this first year of newly mandated fitness tests as well as fitness “challenges” for the first and second grades. Each Tuesday morning I participate in a conference call amongst the six other elementary PE teachers in the district. This past week much of the discussion revolved around best practices in implementing fitness testing. Trials and errors as well as success were shared amongst the group. I realized the amount of time this will take for the other teachers, where co-teaching is not an option, is substantially longer than they anticipated. This week has taught me how effective co-teaching can substantially enhance student learning and the value of collaborative problem-solving with colleagues. (IPTS 8K, 8N)

Goals for next week:
1.) practice and teach first edTPA lesson!
2.) provide more opportunity for students' cognitive growth throughout lesson. Adding critical thinking questions and comprehension checks. Students should be able to tell me what the goal and purpose of the learning segment is at every point. 

Classroom Confidential Ch. 3

This chapter was the perfect read for me this week. The honeymoon phase is definitely over for this teacher as I daily struggle to bring my perfectly written lesson plans to life while a host of hurdles are thrown in my way. As I looked back on my reflections for the week, I realized nearly every single one of them contained something regarding behaviors. Whether it be overall classroom control or individual students who seem to want to derail my patience and sanity, I have found real teaching begins more in the realm of understanding student behavior than understanding content.

As I opened Classroom Confidential to chapter three and began to read on how all of behavior is motivated by seeking pleasure or avoiding pain, my honest first reaction was ‘wonderful, a bunch of information, detached from real life experience, on the psychology of why students in general are the way they are’. Thankfully I kept reading. As I moved on in the reading, I began thinking back to my own experience as a student. I started identifying my student-self in the different examples provided. Specifically in the realm of self-accommodations, I recalled how I often drew in class to focus. I have always been highly visual and kinesthetic in the way I learn. Literally, panic still comes over me when I am given a set of verbal instructions, praying that somehow I’ll remember and decipher what’s being required of me. Schmidt continues to explain the roles students camouflage themselves with to try to hide in abilities to make it through an unpleasant process. Reading about such ploys as the class clown, frequent flyer, and charmer, I started identifying them with my own students. Perhaps the greatest way this chapter influenced me, however, was by reminding me: it’s not the students; it’s you. No student comes into school thinking ‘I can’t wait to figure out all the ways I can totally screw up and fail today’. The factors that contribute to this appearance can be caused by anything from a past trauma to poor support at home. Every day I need to choose to find the kink in their armor, slowly building trust with humor, encouragement, and genuine care.

I think chapter made me think back to one student in particular. Philip always seems to be doing the wrong things at the wrong times and has been completely disruptive throughout each of the classes I’ve had with him. Without even formally realizing I was doing it, I began to us the cheerleader strategy to get through this boy’s defenses last week. He was clearly caught off guard by my persistent encouragement and praise. This week, although caught off task many times, Philip seemed to be a very different student around me. It’s as if that initial interaction, let him know I am on his side. When I ask him to do things now, he responds in what I can only imagine as trust. Schmidt makes a point about extraordinary teaching having a three part formula- “order, challenge, and support”. I couldn’t agree more and have now experience firsthand what industrial strength support can do. 

Expect the Unexpected- Week 3

This was quite an interesting and tiresome week, and it amazes me when I remember that Monday was holiday! Tuesday and Wednesday we had a few classes outside, although rain sent us back to the gym once or twice. Then Thursday and Friday we were kicked out of the gym for an annual clothing sale that uses a portion of the earnings to fund-raise for the school. Needless to say our days felt much less routine than normal. Still, this week brought valuable learning experiences and stretched me to think in new ways about the roles of the students and myself.

It’s interesting, but not surprising, how this break in routine also affected the students. Because they don’t normally go outside for PE, it seemed as if the students felt more like it was time for recess than for class. There were distractions everywhere: other kids on the playground, people in and out of the gym, etc. I love the outdoors and was excited to have class outside. However, I learned very quickly there are several new factors that have to be taken into account to run a successful outdoor class. The noise level can be substantially high when students are out for recess, so choosing a location away from the playground is key. Addressing the students beforehand to remind them this is still class time and all indoor expectations are still in place or perhaps even a little higher because of the many distractions. I hope to continue using the outdoor space but will be addressing the students about their responsibility as learners in both environments.

There also was a lot of learning on my end about the little nuances that make a classroom run smoothly this week. One area I realized I needed to improve on was stating expectations at the start of every class and listing what the sequence of activities will be for the day/lesson. I found that telling the students right off the bat what they will be involved while they are with me, helps transitional periods immensely throughout the lesson! (IPTS 4J) This way very little, if anything, comes as a surprise, and the students are mentally prepared to have to make moves from certain games to instruction, etc. I think at it root this week has been a humbling process for me. It’s not about how well my lesson goes or seeing the success of something I’ve labored to put together. Rather, I’m starting to live in the consciousness that teaching is not about me. It’s about serving the youth that comes through those school doors with a sacrificial love so that they can grow holistically and know without a doubt they matter.

I am continually learning how to adjust my teaching practices to accommodate the various age groups that enter my gym. Whenever a fifth grade class is coming up next I’ve started doing a quick happy dance in my head. I find it humorous that I enjoy them so much, considering they were the one grade that Mr. Park sort of struck some healthy fear into me about. After overcoming my initial hesitancy towards them I think come about an interesting self-discovery! It turns out that my personality and teaching style fits best with this age group because I can use a management style that I am totally enthusiastic about. (IPTS 1F) This is one in which the students take ownership of their learning and share in responsibility of what is accomplished during the class period. As they do so, I slowly become more of a facilitator of their learning; a joyous process to watch. I can address this group in a very real and honest manner, using scripting such as: “this is your class. I want you succeed and enjoy yourselves but to get to this goal I need your cooperation by allowing me time to speak”. After using this type of reasoning I had almost all the 5th graders undivided attention after. Such statements let them know, I understand their wants and desire shared respect among us. Of course when first grade walks through the door right after, such scripting does not have nearly the effective results. Each level of learners is motivated by different things and responds differently! Go figure, a five and nine year old aren’t always after the same thing. (IPTS 2A) 

Goals for next week:

1.)  Embody an enthusiastic cheerleader-type disposition to my camouflaged students.

2.)    Put consistently into practice areas noted in my reflections I’d like to improve on (i.e. stating expectations at beginning of each class, forecasting the day’s activities, etc.) 

An In-depth Experience- Week 2

This week I was able to instruct the 1^st and 2^nd grade lessons with assistance from Mr. Park during the activity. My role for the 3^rd-5^th grade lessons included some instruction as well as I took aside groups of students to educate them on the sit and reach test. Afterwards, I aided the students were needed during their game of “hoola hut knock down”. Perhaps the most impactful part of this week has been learning how to manage the less academic areas that lead to overall success in the classroom. Learning how to speak into specific situations among the students with a servant heart and gage the severity of need while trying to balance other classroom responsibilities is quite the challenge! In the past few days I have had students with nose bleeds, overly competitive boys quarreling over games, young girls crying, bullying, and more. I’ve realized that being a teacher in this environment as so much to do with how you handle yourself in these moments and much less how well I know my content. It’s these type of unscripted moments that make or break the chances for truly meaningful learning and growth in a student.

One instance in particular happened between a new female student and a boy, both the third grade. The young girl came to me complaining that the boy was breaking certain rules. She was clearly upset. Unfortunately, I was dealing with a group of students at the moment and felt torn between helping her and rectifying whatever was making her so distraught and finishing with my group. I gave her some words to say to the student and said I would address him as soon as I was finished. As I finished, she again came over to the stage but this time was in tears. Sobbing she said the boy threatened to throw a ball at her face and was fearful of his taunting her in class. According to her, he was very mean and had a pattern of disrespectful behavior toward her. I tried to help her calm down and ease her fears. Of course I did not exactly know the history of either of these two students and had several questions. Was this girl prone to over reacting? Did the boy have a history of aggression? What can I tell her that would be honest about her safety in the classroom? One of my worst fears was to assure her of protection when it was something I could not reinforce or offer outside the gym. Thankfully Mr. Park came over and his years of experience definitely showed as he used just the right words and tone of voice to appease the situation. I truly do not think I could have done it any better. Afterwards I had a conversation with Mr. Park trying to get a history of the two students and asked about his thought process when he approached such situations. Ensuring a safe learning environment (IPTS 4G) truly is an essential part of being a servant and Christ-like advocate for these students.

The students loved my island themed fitness stations! A part of 1^st and 2^nd grade assessments includes a fitness challenge, recorded in the fall and spring, to show growth. Some of the elements include crab walking, burpees, planks, and push-ups. For my lesson I integrates a lot of upper body fitness stations as that in were many of the students seemed to be lacking based on our experience prepping the 3^rd-5^th grade classes for the push-up portion of the fitness test last week. To make it fun, however, I used a simple and adventuresome theme. I focused on really setting the stage during my engage, connect, launch piece of the lesson. Using lots of inflection and hand motions, I transported the students to a tropical island in which they must travel around to get to a special station at which secret information was awaiting them. The students used the ropes to swing over the gator pond, climbed across the rock wall or “volcano”, collected “coconuts” and tossed them into buckets, road scooter “rafts” up and down the river, and hopped from stone to stone before arriving at station number six. Making my lessons developmentally appropriate in the next coming week will be a bit of a learning process as there is a large discrepancy between the ability levels of kindergarteners and 5^th graders! However, I feel I was successful at creating something to stimulate my students’ creative and imaginative minds while accomplishing the learning objectives. While I was teaching both my lessons and aiding in Mr. Park’s I started to really connect change in student response to the learning environment based on how I presented it as a teacher. Student motivation was influenced far more at this age by my disposition toward what I am teaching than I have given credit in the past. It seems so common sense, but if I want my student to be enthusiastic I have to model that first! Although it takes far more energy, it’s worth it to model the behaviors you wish to see in your students.

Lastly, this week I was able to grow in the collaborative relationships standards. I greatly enjoy socializing with all the teachers at AGS. They are immensely supportive and encouraging towards me. I feel blessed to be in an environment with teachers who build a positive atmosphere even with district changes and immense assessment pressures flogging them. I arrive to school early every Tuesday morning for the weekly PLC meeting and this was my first week participating in the Wednesday morning staff meeting. I learned so much about district initiatives and MTSS planning from this meeting as well as really got a taste for the team environment of the AGS staff! Friday was a half day and there were no specialty classes (i.e. PE, art, and music). All the elementary PE teachers meet at the district administrative building to work through the rest of the 3^rd- 5^th grade curriculum, how fitness assessment data would be taken, and to share information on what’s been working in their classrooms. It learned a wonderful new way to acquire cognitive data through google classroom that I am very excited to use as well! Later in the day I joined my teacher for SLO (student learning objectives) training. This is a piloting program that is being run this year to prepare the teachers for how they will be summatively evaluated based on student growth in the near future. I sat in a board room with the PE teachers, an SLO leader, and another student teacher as they looked through data from previous years and tried to format an attainable growth goal objective. It was fascinating to be in the behind the scenes environment, seeing the thought process and work that goes into what is presented to the students. It really helped me get a broader picture of everything and am excited to dive deeper and deeper into the world of a teacher.

My goals for next week are: 1) use my knowledge of what the district PE teachers are striving for in the future to inform my teaching and practice.

2) Develop a helpful practice to address repeat offences with students who have a history of negative behaviors. Know what they are, what triggers them, and what works/doesn’t when addressing them. 

Classroom Confidential Chapter 1

Although I was not able to read chapter 1 due to a text mix up, I will comment on the concept of multiple intelligences, how I hope to use in them in my teaching, and why. I believe that PE class is one of the most natural places that multiple intelligences can be used because of its dynamic use of spatial, bodily, rhythmic, and linguistic mediums on the day to day basis! Although learning obviously caters to the kinesthetic domain in the physical activity environment, it is easy to emphasize activities in such a way that those who think more analytically or numerically can create meaningful connections as well. Whether its using lists and counting to break down movements or drawing out how a play should be made, there are endless opportunities in the gym to engage all sorts of learners. Sometimes the hardest task is getting the students to believe gym class is more than just performing a skill or winning a game! I hope to use as many intelligences in my classroom as possible because its opens up a gateway to higher levels of thinking and original ideas as the students start to find themes they can build upon or manipulate.

I've always been a huge supporter of the "why are we doing this" question. I love the challenge! Its important to me that students are not engaging passively in something just because "my teacher said so". Its my desire that the know how the lessons can affect them and be beneficial to them if they choose to use it their learning in the outside world. Once you are able to get students in this mode of critical thinking, I feel I have done my job to help them become independent. I cringe thinking of the children who grow up in homes where questioning is not allowed and become overly compliant, blindly following any authority's command. I want my students to be protected from that and get those brains started on the train of autonomous thinking!

Getting My Toes Wet- Week 1

Week one at Gustafson Elementary was a time of getting familiar with the school's overall culture and routine. The students work off of a 4 day schedule, rotating each day between the specialty classes- art, music, wellness class, and PE. Thus, Mr. Park and I only see most classes once a week for 55 minutes. The school meets the Illinois time requirements for physical education by including the students recess periods. I am a proponent for elementary recess time to provide the students with social learning opportunities and creative, independent play. Still, I know many PE teachers in the district feel such limited class time is a waist of their resources as I participated in the Tuesday morning PLC conference call with the teachers.

Moving on, the students at AGS are wonderful. They arrive enthusiastic for class, filled with energy, and are very cooperative most of the time. Mr. Park had been telling the students I would be arriving since Wednesday of last week, and I felt warmly invited by them into their gym time. Starting on day three, I was able to lead the stretching portion of warm-ups. I also assisted Mr. Park in the instruction of proper push-up form for fitness testing and was able to provide feedback to individual students throughout activities.

This week Mr. Park focused on prepping the third, fourth, and fifth grade students for the push-up portion of their upcoming fitness testing. Since fitness testing begins at grade three, the younger grades worked on a refreshment of basic locomotor skills, following directions, and completing fitness tasks instead. Throughout the period, we would pull aside several students at a time to work on the push-up procedures while the rest played a game called “Moving on up”. This game incorporated both health enhancing fitness and mathematics. The students rolled dice with a partner and had to determine which of two numbers was greater than and less than the other. The person with the higher number moved to the next level while the student with the lower number completed an exercise and tried a new opponent. The activity was one that Mr. Park had taught the students before, and they greatly enjoyed playing it with kid-friendly pop music in the background. 

The classroom procedures were also successfully reinforced throughout this first full week. The students were a little slow in their response to the teacher’s stop/attention cues such as “give me five”, and Mr. Park had them redo their lines when exiting the gym if done poorly. I encountered one situation in particular with a student seeking to test my authority as a teacher and role in the classroom. The students name was Alex and was easily recognizable as one who enjoyed testing the rules. If I were to give explicit direction to Alex, he would acknowledge it, then perform an action in contrast to what I requested, smiling and laughing. This situation reminded me of the learning that took place in my ed psych class regarding boundaries. Young children naturally want to test the things around them out of curiosity and a natural inclination for discovery. When Alex's behavior clearly disregarded my authority and presented a distraction to the other students, I approached him saying 'Alex in this room you need to display appropriate behavior if you want to continue participating in our activity'. I said this in a even and firm tone, and Alex immediately changed his disposition toward me and complied to direction much more readily.

One of the biggest lessons I learned this week is that consistency is key with elementary students. Having the same procedures and routines each day in the gym keep things running smoothly in an environment that can easily allow for chaos. The students all have marked spots on the floor for attendance and post-exiting discussion. There is a white board at the entrance they read every day, telling them what to do for the start of warm-up. Mr. Park and I have very similar management styles. Most of his classroom procedures are ones that I would use in my own gym. In addition, Mr. Park aims to have the students moving as much as possible, at least 70% of gym time in moderate to vigorous activity, and keeps his instruction concise and age appropriate. He uses warm-up time to informally assess the locomotor skills of the younger grades to see where any needs are present. The start of their warm-up consists of running around the perimeters of the gym to upbeat music. Every so often Mr. Park will stop the music and have them change movement patterns to skipping, shuffling, etc. This time is perfect for getting the students excess energy out before instruction and allowing them a little extra social opportunity. 

One area of teaching I wrestled with this week was how to address student non-compliance. I often take an teaching approach aimed at aiding the students in taking ownership of their learning. Psychology and developmental studies are some of my favorite academic areas, and I try to use information from these fields to help in the classroom. According the IPTS 2A, "the competent teacher understands theories and philosophies of learning and human development as they relate to the range of students in the classroom". This week one of the students refused to participate and protested loudly that gym is boring and stupid. I first gave him liberty to take a moment to himself since he was highly emotional. When he had calmed down we talked about his feeling towards gym. I told him it was fine to have these feelings but they should not control our behavior. I tried giving him options to feel more in control of his learning environment, but nothing seemed to appease his desire to sit out from gym. Finally I resorted to telling him that his participation is required and sent him out onto the court. Mr. Park handled the student much differently, quickly defusing the emotional charge and firmly stating expectations. The student’s attitude did not change in either approach. I have always envisioned my role as a teacher to be one where I help foster student development not just in content knowledge but character, independence, and other important facets of the whole person. My perspective has begun to reshape as I face the realities of how to accomplish this task in my day to day environment.

In the weeks ahead I hope to discover how to truly make my teaching student centered (IPTS 1H) and understand the balance of when to allow students more autonomy in the classroom as well as how to be sensitive to developmental needs. I think I am making the adjustment from middle school last semester to the younger grades and realizing the higher degree of structure needed. I am wired towards a creative learning environment; however, structure and order needs to precede this in order for young students to be successful. For this upcoming week I aim to develop a stronger relationship with the students and discover what their prior knowledge and experiences are so I may link them to future lessons in the classroom!

Goals: 1. What have been the prior units taught and normal sequencing from K-5
          2.  Find connections to help students who don't enjoy gym be more willing to participate