Week 5 Check-In Reflection

 

You have now had the opportunity to see your mentor teacher teach!  What sort of intangibles( disposition, self-confidence, pacing, attitude) have you gained from this experience and how will you use those to enhance your own teaching practice? Being able to see my mentor teacher teach this week and how they interact with students is something I am very grateful to be seeing. Finishing up the second week of being in a classroom with 6th graders, has really opened my eyes and I feel like I am learning quite a bit from the teacher and their style, as well as the students. After this week I feel as if I have definitely gained more self-confidence when it comes to interacting with students and reminding them that the actions they choose to do could affect others or have consequences, as well as reinforcing the classroom/ school rules. Since an objective this week was to consider how to proactively approach classroom management to avoid disciplinary action, I think that was the objective I grew the most with after being in practicum this week. I worked with several different students this week between periods 2 and 3. These students are usually the less engaged or motivated students, they are also the students who tend to have more behavioral outburst in class. After building a relationship with students in week 1, this week I felt confident when it came to approaching students who needed to be reminded of appropriate behavior, language, or actions. Showing an understanding of self awareness in in students using SEL. Beginnging with proximity and nonverbal communication as a good start to creating a relationship with these students, because outright telling students or trying to pry too much out of them, I can tell would not have worked as well to build a relationship.  The educator is well aware of their students needs and can tell the difference between students who are having outbursts simply because they do not like the assignment or because something else is going on in their lives. I have also noticed that my mentor teacher has not once labelled a student based on their behaviors, and I think that my mentor teacher represents Relationship concepts from the 4 Big Ideas from Creating a Trauma Sensitive Classroom. Not only does my mentor teacher tend to relationships with students in the classroom, but past students that come and see their teacher in the hallway. Mrs. Dyer is always checking in on students past and present. Seeing this, I will remember how my mentor teacher approaches students in the classroom and outside of the classroom. Mrs. Dyer remains professional, yet personable with students. I think it shows how resilient my mentor teacher is as well, after all of these years to continue to not label students as their behaviors.  Several times, I took the time to talk with students and work through what they would be willing to do in class, because the teacher won't just let them do nothing. I have noticed with my mentor teacher that disciplinary consequences such as being written up with a referral is the last straw that they choose to use with students. My mentor teacher gives students several warnings, reminders, and check ins. The teachers classroom management is calm, and what I mean by calm is so far I have never heard anger or annoyance when the mentor teachers raises their voice due to a students actions. I hope to as a teacher, be able to keep out my personal feelings in a situation from being detectable in my tone of voice, as my mentor teacher does. I also hope to be as involved in the school community as my mentor teacher, who is I think a volleyball coach and goes to other students sports games.  What brings you joy? Tell me something great that is happening to you outside of your campus life. Outside of campus life and working on assignments, this past week I have been making more time for myself to get back into reading books on my to be read list. I find that taking time in the evening not being on any technology or thinking about school but just enjoying time to myself and getting back into the groove of reading books for fun is quite nice. Also now that the weather is cooling down, I plan on hammocking several times a week somewhere around campus.