Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Journal Writing #1

Prompt
Reflecting on your CPI teaching, respond to the following questions: What is it like to be a student in my class? What is it like for a student to move through classes in a day at our school? (Use your CPI school as reference)

Reflection
Throughout my six weeks at Oceanside High School, the site for my Clinical Practice One, I learned a great deal about how to teach, how to manage a classroom and how to grow as a professional. Perhaps the greatest knowledge I gained, however, was the image I developed as a student in my classroom. My image came out of what I wanted my students to learn and experience while in my classroom as well as how I wanted them to view the experience as they passed through my classroom during a school day.

When I first sat down with my cooperating teacher he asked me what I wanted my students to learn, beyond the standards and content. I explained to him that I wanted to learn how to enjoy social studies, prove a point to classmates through valid statements and learn to use vocabulary in the world beyond the classroom. From this I learned what it meant to be a student in my classroom in the last quarter of 2011. A student had to be willing to step slightly out of their comfort zone in order to speak about issues being discussed. A student had to be understanding of a classmate’s difficulty with the content. A student had to be willing to learn. Lastly a student had to be willing to enjoy social studies. With this understanding of how it meant to be a student in my classroom I implemented it in the form of expectations. At the end of the six weeks I had learned what it meant for a student to pass through my classroom each day.

As students entered my class they could always count on me at the door greeting them, thus giving them acceptance into the classroom. Students also could count on laughing at some point in the class period as that was a huge priority for me. Further, students could count on utilizing the four facets of literacy (speaking, listening, reading, and writing) each lesson. Lastly, students could count on being challenged each day to learn and experience something new. All of these combined into what it meant to be a student in my classroom each and every day.

No comments:

Post a Comment