Day 1: Meeting Students and Teachers

• By Nadine Hamideh
• Thursday January 30, 2020

Today was the first day of field experience, it was a little hectic just because many of the teachers had to go to a meeting and so it resulted in me going into two different classrooms. I started the day off in the second grade classroom and they began the day by completing a timed addition worksheet. Once that was done the CT reviewed the answers with  the whole class. The CT also told me that the classroom was divided into three tiers being tier 1,2 and 3. The CT said that this was beneficial in terms of having the students all work together and help one another. The students were also completing a writing assignment and were starting on their final draft of their writing assignment. I was able to interact with some of the students and give them feedback on their rough draft. After writing they had stations, and I learned a lot of new things in terms of getting students to smoothly  transition from one station to another. The CT has hung up the different names of each station. The CT explained to me that he put the station names above each station to allow the students to know which station they are to rotate to without any inclusions. The second grade CT also used class dojo as a way to manage the classroom. By incorporating a points system in which was a way to keep students well managed through the use of positive reinforcement. Good behavior was rewarded, while bad behavior was ignored. The CT also said that they best way to teach is by finding a way to get all the students to reach their academic goals, while there are low leveled students and extremely high leveled students it is important to keep them all growing forward.
For the second half of the day, I went down to my CT and the students were coming out of steam and also worked on a timed addition practice.  I was able to see a shift in classroom management and class structure during my time in the first grade classroom it was mostly whole group/class activities and lessons whereas in second grade it was more station based. I also felt that the first grade classroom was more structured, whereas in the second grade classroom it was more student directed. Throughout this experience I learned a lot in terms of how to manage a classroom as well as have effective transitions. All in all it was a great experience to be able to get glimpse of both a first and second grade classroom as well as the ways that they compare and contrast.
Attached is a picture of one of the reading stations, and a picture of the 5 steps of writing anchor chart that the students used as a guide when completing their writing.