April 21st

I was not able to make it to the classroom Friday for tutoring, and because of that I was planning on writing next week during the week that we could make up blogs we missed. I don't have anything to say about my placement since I have not seen them in three weeks. However, I have been working at my new job in Buffalo and that is a Language to Literacy program... I could talk a little about that.

We have started our second phase, in which we started a new book and a new vocabulary list. Although, before we started reading our story we did a cloze task assignment as a group and the children loved it. We had a letter typed out for their parents that had a few blanks that were the cloze tasks. One of the sentences for example was "This week we learned a lot of ____", with the answer being "rules". The kids really seemed to enjoy this and it reminded them of the vocabulary and rules learned the previous week.

I feel as though children really enjoy cloze tasks because they not only have context clues to work from but it shows them how much they know!

I think that in my tutoring placement now cloze tasks would be a really helpful task for some of the children on the lower end of the class, especially since they are ESL and a lot of the english language does not come naturally to them!

This Week/Closure

This week, I have been helping one of the ESL students in my classroom recognize English words in a simple picture book that correspond with each picture. I have been working on having him use the pictures cues to figure out the word that is written below the picture, in English. To do so, I ask him, "What is this?," then follow the question by, "In English." I speak to him in Spanish when I prompt him so that I can better relate to him and ensure he understands my requests. Sometimes he responds in Spanish because he cannot always remember what the word is in English. When this happens, I respond, "Si," and then I tell him the English word. I then say the word in Spanish, followed by in English, and I have him repeat after me so he can make the connection. I have been working on this book for about 4 days now and it seems that he is remembering his English words better than when we started, so that is a good sign he's improving!

Also, the iPads my students use in the classroom just recently got some new math apps downloaded onto them. My students and I have been exploring these apps the past two days. They seem to be a bit more difficult than what the students are used to because some questions asked on the new apps are word problems. My job here is to help students understand the vocabulary used within the word problems, as it can be very confusing for the students to understand. Some of the math is too advanced for my students, but on the other hand, there are a few students who have seemed to grasp what the questions ask of them.

Overall, I am very happy with the improvement of the students in the math and literacy areas, in which I have seen and helped them with. I am happy to have been a part of their learning experiences and I can't wait to do this again next semester!

Things learned

Being in the classroom makes you truly understand what teachers deal with. So many students here at Fredonia are going to school for education and a lot of them take it very seriously and really enjoy it, but I see a lot of other students not taking it very seriously and just sliding by. When I see those people I think, "Oh well teaching must be a breeze someday. All you must do is teach a cirriculum from a book." Well that thought was entirely wrong. From tutoring I have been able to see first-hand all of the hard work teachers do every minute of every hour of every day. They must always be critically thinking incase their plan backfires or the students are acting up.

Another thing that I am in the process of learning, which teachers seem to do very well, is explaining. I have watched my teacher find the best ways to explain how to do addition and subtraction, how to combine two sentences so that you don't plagerize, and much more. I have such trouble trying to explain things to students, but with my tutoring placement I have learned so many things that will be so helpful to me in my speech pathology career. I also gained a whole new aspect of respect for teachers!

I am very glad that I was able to be a part of something like this!

Brief Thoughts

With two weeks off of school, I feel like it has been forever since being in the classroom. I am so excited to go back on Monday; I cannot wait to see the students! I can only imagine how hyper and off-task the students will be after being away from the school atmosphere for so long. They are already a handful when they have a routine! Aside from being in this classroom daily, I am also placed in another school for an after school program twice a week, which I haven't been in because they have Spring Break as well. As nice as it has been to have more free time to get caught up on schoolwork and such, I still miss the school environment. I am still debating when my last week for tutoring should be, especially with the crazy amount of projects I have to do for finals. This reason has made it a much harder decision for me to choose when to end my tutoring time. I can't believe the semester is already coming to an end; I remember my first time entering my tutoring classroom! I am definitely going to miss the students, but I look forward to the many more experiences to come!

Aside from my placement...

My students are on spring break for the next two weeks and because of that I thought I would talk a little bit about my new job that also pertains to literacy! I hope that is acceptable! If not I will surely write another post. Anyways...

I was just recently hired at Buffalo Hearing and Speech as a clinic aide. I aid two speech pathologists in running the Language to Literacy program at a charter school in Buffalo. The children that we work with are children who need some touching up on their literacy skills. I thought that I would talk about this because I find it very neat how they go about teaching the children. I have only had one day of work so far so I don't have a lot to talk about, but it was definitely interesting!

I am not sure how much literacy these children lack because I was not around for any pre-assessments or when they chose which students got to be in the program -- but we began our first class discussing proper classroom rules, and also introduced the initial [p] sound as well as some vocabulary. We didn't go into depth about the [p] sound much, but their homework was to find five items around their house that started with 'p'. Although this seems simple, it allows the children the opportunity to not only think of the labels of objects but also how they are spelled. It is actually more cognitively complex than it seems! The introduction of vocabulary correlates with our class discussion of vocabulary, which is neat! The speech pathologist introduced approximatly seven new words and had each word on its one piece of paper along with a picture posted on the wall. She discussed these words in short and then we stepped away from them for awhile. Later on we started reading the story "Duck in the Truck" in which all of the new vocabulary words were found. When we came across some of the words she would ask students if they remembered the word or definition. These vocabulary words will stay posted on the wall and we will continue to add to the list while we read the story repeatedly for the next few days.

All of the things that we did in this program correlate to things that we have discussed in Reading First from phonics to comprehension, and I find it very interesting to see all of it being used first hand!

Sorry this was so long! (...and I hope it's acceptable for my weekly post!)

Friday Before Spring Break

Since the school district I am in currently has Spring break, I'll discuss the festivities that my students got to partake in on Friday. When I first arrived to the classroom, I helped the teacher aide hide little plastic eggs full of candy all around the gym. At first I thought it was a pointless idea because the gym is too empty to be hiding eggs in, but then the classroom aide and I moved the basketballs, kickballs, pinnies, and other gym supplies all around the gym floor and started hiding the eggs underneath those objects. It seemed like it would be way more fun to go on an "egg hunt" with this approach. When all the eggs were successfully hidden, I went back into the classroom to find that my cooperating teacher had drawn little noses and whiskers on every student so that they looked more like a bunny. They wore bunny ears that they made the previous day as well (in a headband form); it was the cutest thing. When we took the students to the gym, my cooperating teacher told the students that the "Easter Bunny" made a mess when he was hiding the eggs. Then, each student went on the "egg hunt" and had to find 3 eggs each. It was really fun to see how excited they were about this experience. I definitely thought it was a nice break from the week's work. Afterward, the entire school had community members come in and read to different classrooms. I thought this was really awesome that the school incorporated other people from the community right into the classrooms to positively portray reading. I happened to leave right before our assigned reader got to my classroom, but I would have loved to see how the children responded to whomever was reading to them.

Tutoring on March 27

This week in tutoring my first job was to assist two students who were having trouble combining the important things from a few sentences into one sentence with many facts so they wouldn't plagiarize. It was actually sort of difficult for me to do! We would have to combine 2-3 sentences but the sentences were already so short and to the point that it made it very difficult! And anyways, I didn't learn about plagiarism until years after second grade!

Either way - doing all of these activities with children is really helping me learn how to break something down and make it easier to understand for children. As a speech pathologist I am going to need that skill when working with children who need to learn how to make sounds correctly. Luckily, working with speech we have the resources such as our own production of sounds and the actual visualization of our mouth to assist these children. I find it slightly harder as a teacher because with teaching a lot of things that are being taught are abstract, there aren't many visuals to work with. Yes, there are visualizations such as pictures and things, but why do we spell 4 four and for without a 'u'? -- Because we just do! If that's not confusing to a 5-7 year old I don't know what is! Teaching takes such abstract ideas and teachers must find ways around the abstract-ness of it all to help children understand.

Before tutoring I always found myself to be very nervous and uneasy when it came to explaining things to children. I was always second guessing myself. Tutoring has taught me ways around that and has boosted my confidence in working with children and has taught me ways to better teach and explain certain things to children. :)

This Week!

This week, my cooperating teacher has been out sick Monday and today due to personal reasons. On these two days, I felt very privileged to be able to assist the substitutes, since I know the routines and daily schedule of the classroom. It was very encouraging to see how the substitutes responded to my comments and actions, since I am not technically a "teacher" yet. This made me feel more confident as an educator. I was also surprised to see the students behaving and listening to me, since the cooperating teacher wasn't there (usually students act horribly for substitutes). On Tuesday, my cooperating teacher was in school. I assisted her with creating command signs (such as classroom rules and certain times of the day) and classroom job signs, (such as Line Leader, Pencil Sharpener, etc.). We did this using a new program that the school must adapt to, as of recently. Since my cooperating teacher is not very technologically savvy, I figured out how to work the program and created the things she needed for the classroom. Also, while the students were watching a surprise educational film after gym to calm down, I was able to chat with her more than usual. I've never really had the chance to talk to my cooperating teacher personally, so I really felt like I bonded with her during this time. She answered questions I had based on classroom management strategies and gave me many hints as to how to go about gaining management. She was very straightforward with me and honest about her comments that she gave back to me, and I really appreciated it. My cooperating teacher even mentioned that she would love to have me next semester, which is awesome because I plan on taking this course semester as well. So I really hope it all works out!

Bullying

Like I said in the last post, the students in my classes have been learning about bullying. Everything they've done has related to this. THey had their Rskills tests on Tuesday and Wednesday, and all the readings and writing was about bullying. As a reward for their focus on the test, the teacher let them watch a video on bullying on Thursday. The video was 30 minutes long and was based on a true story about a boy that was severely bullied by three other boys in middle school. This video showed reenactments of what was happening and I was having a difficult time holding back tears. They showed the kid being pushed and hit around by these other boys and it was actually pretty disturbing. The bullying goes to far and one point and the boys lock the victim in a bathroom and try to give him a "swirly." They accidentally drop him and he hits his head on the toilet seat, knocking him unconscious and putting him in a coma for a couple of days. The three boys are arrested for aggravated harassment. When the other boy returns to school two weeks later, the school holds an assembly in his honor against bullying. Like I said, I had a hard time watching this. It made me sick to my stomach.

After the movie ended, my teacher turned the lights on and one of the girls was crying uncontrollably at her seat. It was heart-wrenching. I think that maybe this video was too much for the age group, but I'm hoping that it helps in the long run. The students all took it very seriously. A lot of the kids in the class have behavior issues already, and have gotten in trouble for bullying, so I'm hoping this video will help change this.

To me, this was the most important thing that happened during tutoring this week. I think this had a bigger impact on the students than anything else they did.

Poems

In my classroom, for the past couple of weeks, the students have been learning about bullying. This is actually really good for them because they've had a lot of issues with this in the past. I tutor at School 5 and this is the only school in the district with a "break program" or a program that works one on one with students that have behavioral problems. This means that any students that get expelled from other schools end up at School 5. In fact, just today, there was an issue with one of my students bullying another in the bathroom. He has been doing so well lately, too, so this really hurt. Anyway, today they were writing poems and it went over really well!

At first, the students groaned when they heard they were writing poems, but they quickly realized how fun they could be. Some wrote acrostic poems, some wrote cinquains, and some wrote 5 senses poems. My personal favorite of the 5 senses poems was that a student wrote that bullying sounds like "zombies eating brains." They're so creative!

I have also started working individually with students on worksheets along with the oral clozes. In their folders are sheets that describe their benchmark. It then explains what issues the students need help on. I find worksheets that coincide with their trouble areas and work with them one on one. So far it seems to be working, but I'm excited to see how much farther they can get on their benchmarks!

Math with an ESL student

This week, I had the opportunity to work with a new student who has been in the classroom for three weeks now. He moved here straight from Mexico and had absolutely no English language. The student has picked up on many words in the past few weeks just from being in the classroom, which is so exciting to witness. For the past three days, I have worked on counting numbers with this student. He is able to say "1, 2, 3, 6, 9," in that order. I have been consistently working on number order with him by showing him the numbers and pointing out, with number cards, that he skips some (I have him point to the cards as he counts). Seeing his facial expressions, I know that he knows he is skipping some numbers, but he just can't remember how to say them. I gave him hints by saying the number in Spanish and asking him, in Spanish, to say the number in English. This helps the student a lot. Today, before leaving, I asked him to count with me in English. Without any help, he counted from 1 to 10, without exempting any numbers! It was so exciting!

Even though the student usually has trouble counting from 1 to 10 in order, he has been doing great with comparing two different numbers. Most of the class can take a sum of two numbers and another sum, and state which sum is greater. But since the ESL student is at an American Pre-K level, he is not able to do that. Instead, him and I compare only two individual numbers (instead of the usual 4). The student is able to tell me which number is greater, or mas in Spanish, which is awesome for the level he is at. I'm eager to see how well he will improve throughout the rest of the year!

Fluency!

In my placement last week one of the teachers who assists with the class during groups was absent. Because of this I was able to take over her position for the day. I didn't do anything extremely exciting or get to teach the students, but I was excited to be in charge. All of the students in the classroom were preparing to present their country projects for the following day. In my group the students had a sheet that they had to pratice reading so that they were prepared to present it in front of the school. I did not make the connection that this was a fluency building task until I read for class! I was excited to see how well they related. In the text (and in class actually) it discussed that allowing students to reread the same text/story could only be beneficial. It is so true! Time after time of reading they began to feel more and more comfortable reading the story. Some even restated it by memory! I was so proud of them!

Another fluency related story - today my teacher had to call one of the student's parents and discuss their reading response homework. For reading response the children get a sheet that they have to fill out while reading a book. This sheet includes the title, author, main characters, plot, and something interesting that they read in the story. Most all students get sent home with a book to read, and they can choose to read that one or any other of their choice. Anyways, I overheard my teacher on the phone with the parent, who seemed to be complaining that her son did not have stories in his folder that were correlated with his reading level. The teacher then stated, "He can read any book he wants. He can read the same one over and over and over if he wants. Any reading is going to help." I related what she said back to fluency and it is so true. If he did choose to reread one story he might create sight words for himself which may increase his fluency in the future.

Very interesting. It was nice to be able to relate something we discussed in class to real-life examples! :)

This week

This week wasn't too eventful for me in my classroom. My teacher has been asking me to do a lot of creating recently, which I really enjoy, but I miss working with the students. Every day, the students do a brain bonus, which is a question based on language. They write their answers individually on a post-it note and then stick it to the door. The next day, my teacher reads the answers to them, and if the student got it right, they get an x next to their name. Once they have ten x-es they get to pick a prize. Although the idea is good, the students never got to learn from their mistakes. So, my teacher decided to make posters that labeled the issue the brain bonus was focused on and past brain bonus answers will be stuck to them as a reference for a student. For example, if the brain bonus asked students a question about the main idea of a story, they could look for the poster labeled main idea, and past brain bonus answers will be on there for a reference. My teacher asked me to make these posters, and they turned out great! I just wish I could have been working more with the students instead of creating things for the classroom. It did give me a chance to have discussions with other teachers in the lounge, though.

Education... Speech Path

While I've been in my classroom this week the students have spent the majority of their time completing their country projects. This consists of researching the United States and Canada and talking about each as well as comparing and contrasting them. They have been creating posters with fun facts about each. I have found myself walking around and assisting the groups that the teacher asks me to, guiding them and making sure they are on task. I know that this doesn't relate to literacy as much as other student's placements, but I am enjoying the spin mine has taken. I keep thinking back to my degree in Speech Pathology and realizing that if I were to take a position as a Speech Pathologist in a school one my jobs could be to push in to a classroom and work with a student. I would work with them on speech, obviously, but I believe that I would also simply help them go through the motions of the classroom, quite like a teacher's aide.. which is what I sort of feel like now.
I understand that it's not 100% literacy based, but I truly am enjoying the way my placement has worked out. I am learning a lot about being in a classroom setting and a lot about what it takes to be a teacher and have the weight of the world on your shoulders. While I can't implement literacy techniques that I have learned, the truth is I haven't really learned a lot being a non-education major. I feel as though my undergraduate career has been based a lot around language benchmarks that children should be meeting and how to determine if they are at the appropriate language level based on their age. I have also been learning about assessment for those who need speech services. The NEXT step in my education is implementation, unlike education majors who get to experience that in their senior year.
With that said, plain and simple, I feel that my placement suits me and I am content with how it is going!
-Ashley

This Week in the Classroom

This week, the students in the classroom I am in have been performing research methods to find out more information on the country, Italy. They are doing this because the entire school building is having a sort of "Around the World" theme this Friday, where every classroom is a different country. Other students and even parents will be able to view each classroom. Every class gets the opportunity to research information on their assigned country and display it in whatever way they want. My classroom is going to have about three or four different stations. One station will represent the Carnevale, which is a big celebration in Italy. I helped some students make a banner for it. Three girls will dance and show the spirit of Italy underneath the banner. Another station, some boys have created their own home-made boat made of poster paper and it looks awesome. It's pretty big too! They are currently working on painting it. I am not sure what the boat is actually supposed to represent, though, since I was not there in the creation of it. I have also walked around and helped some students as they wrote down some facts on the country, such as jobs, when Italian people work and when they eat their meals. This information will be presented in a PowerPoint station that will be shown at another station. Though the whole "research" aspect of this Italy theme is not all just writing numerous amounts of information for every student, they are still learning how to obtain facts and apply them to what they are trying to show others. I can't wait to see how it all turns out on Friday!

Satisfaction

I was only able to get into the classroom once this week because my school had Monday-Wednesday off, although I was able to be there for 2 1/2 hours today.

The majority of the time I am in the classroom I feel as though they are not doing much literacy either (like marie03 mentioned). Today my cooperating teacher told me to help whichever push-in teacher needed my assistance. Because neither needed much help, one of them just had me sit down and help a group of students cut out pictures of money for the project that they're working on. She said, "Feel free to talk to them, about anything really, because these children need to be immersed in as much language as they can. Talk to them about anything, their life, anything." So I did. Because of their hispanic backgrounds and the culture they are immersed in they talk differently and are at times timid to speak in English in fear of saying the wrong thing. For example, a little girl said "color" but pronounced it as "codor" and I was able to bring it to her attention and she corrected herself. She would also ask me questions that in order to get the answer you must think logically and critically, and instead of telling her the answer I would assist her in finding the answer herself. I feel as though rich conversation like this is not available to these children at home and it is nice to be able to give them such opportunities.

I was also there for math time today. My job during math time is to walk around and help the students who need help with their addition problems. Today I realized how satisfying it is when I can help students figure the answer out on their own and see how happy their faces are to know that they were able to do it and that they made me and the teacher proud.

Although I am not directly focused on literacy and reading I still feel as though applying what I have learned throughout my college education is having a positive impact on the children I'm working with and will benefit the way I approach educational settings in the future.

-Ashley

Scholastic Reading Counts

I'm going to post again today, because I missed last week's, which I'm very sorry about! Also- I'm really excited about what I did in my placement today! In addition to being in charge of the oral clozes, my teacher has asked me in the past to keep track of the students' scholastic reading counts points. They get these by reading books in the classroom, at different levels, and then taking tests on them. Some of the students have 25 points, while others are up to 83. Today, my teacher asked me if I had any ideas that would encourage them to read more. I've noticed that many students in the class are very interested in music, especially Selena Gomez. So, I recommended having a music day and keeping track of their points on an ipod picture. She loved it and let me have complete creative control of the project. I found a picture online of an ipod and added lines to it increasing in amounts of 25 (0-200) to look like a thermometer. Then, I labeled them with their names and laminated them and colored in up to the line of their points number with an expo marker. At the end of the year, if every student has gotten at least 100 points, we will have a music day in the class and listen to Selena Gomez. Ms Kobel, my cooperating teacher, said that any student who completes 200 points will receive new headphones. I got to announce this to the class and they're so excited! I love being able to connect music to reading! I took a picture of the poster that I made and at the end of the semester I'll post another one to show their progress.

Literacy & Math Blended Activities

I haven't been to my placement this week thus far, considering the school district I am placed in had off Monday-Wednesday. So, I'll continue on a bit from last week and address my concerns. I know we're supposed to help address literacy needs and help students grow stronger in the literacy area, but the classroom I am in for my placement is strictly all math at the time I am there. The Reading and Writing block in my classroom is during the mornings, and since I arrive at 11:30, I miss it. As much as I love math, this is upsetting to me because I want to be able to tutor the students in literacy as well, but my cooperating teacher is strict about the math block. As I stated last week, the students rotate through centers and I run the math game center most of the time. Even though my cooperating teacher has certain games assigned for each day, I want to be able to create something of my own some days; not just a math game, but something fun where I can tie literacy in as well. The centers rotate about every 15 minutes and I have no idea what I could do in that amount of time. I feel like 15 minutes is not much time at all. If either of you have any ideas please let me know; it would be a great help! I'm hoping my cooperating teacher will let me do something along these lines!

Placement!

I'm in the same classroom that I was in last semester. It's two classes, actually. One is a 3rd grade ELA AIS class and the other is a 4th/5th grade ELA AIS. Because I've already worked with these students, I know what to expect from them and their personalities, which is awesome. I loved going back because they were all so excited to see me! For some reason I thought they would have forgotten me over the break, but they didn't. Hopefully I'm making an impact!

In the third grade classroom, the teacher does a whole group workshop with them. They start this by doing a "Step up to writing prompt" where they write a short 'essay' or a letter. Then, they have a work book activity to do. After this, they work on the computer for forty minutes. Basically, during this time, my cooperating teacher takes advantage of the fact that I'm there by having me make copies and laminate things for her. I actually kind of like this, because I get bored walking around watching the kids on the computer. I also have gotten a feel for what the faculty does during their free time because the copier and laminator are located in the teacher's lounge. It's cool to hear them talk to one another, and sometimes I'm even involved.

The 4th/5th grade is separated into centers. They start off in whole group, where the teacher does a "step up to writing" with them. Then, they are separated into small group, when they work usually in workbooks, computers, when they do Read 180 and System 44, and independent, when they do independent reading. The latter is the group that I usually work with. Last semester, I would have the students read out loud to me, but now that they know me, and the teacher trusts me, I get to work specifically with students. I do oral clozes with them every Tues/ Thurs. I made them each individual folders to keep track of their progress, and I'm actually hoping to use their success in portfolios of my pre-professional work!

Placement

I have been placed in a second grade classroom with a lot of ESL students. I think it would be safe to say that at least two-thirds of the classroom is made up of ESL students. In the classroom there is also a huge range of ability. For example, during math time the kids are working on simple subtraction. Some kids understand it, some don't. There are two girls, however, who are working on two and three digit multiplication problems. I would say that is a big gap. Also, during reading and writing time, some kids can form their own sentences while some students can't even pair up upper and lowercase letters.

When I arrive at the classroom on Tuesdays and Thursdays the children are grouped into three groups, slightly based on their level of knowledge. There is a reading group, and writing group, and one other group I haven't been able to sit in on yet. During the reading group I assist the push-in reading teacher with her students. My first day I helped to elicit answers from the children pertaining to the project they were working on. Once elicited, I would write the sentence on a white board and they would copy it into their journals. The second day I just helped any student who needed help writing a sentence on "the funniest part in the book" and another sentence on their favorite holiday. During these activities I don't use any specific strategies because I don't have time to plan before hand because I am never sure what they'll be doing. I do use what I have learned in my speech classes to elicit responses though.

My coordinating teacher said that Tuesdays I will be working individually with one child who "uses baby talk but is well aware of it." While Thursdays will probably be devoted to math time. The teacher said that I might work with the girls who are ahead of the class while she works with the struggling students.

Because of her tight schedule I am not finding any time to plan my own lesson or assess any students, but that could change with time. I am enjoying what she has me doing now though and just helping out with any student or sitting down with one and making sure they are on track, because as a speech pathologist I may be doing things of that sort if I happen to work in a school.

Overview of placement

I am in a first grade classroom, containing of mostly ESL students. In fact, one of the students speaks only Spanish; he just moved here less than a week ago from Mexico. At the time I come in for tutoring, it is math time in the classroom, in which the class participates in math centers that rotate every fifteen to twenty minutes. When I am there, I usually help out in two of the four centers, depending on where my cooperating teacher wants me to go. Sometimes, I run the math game center. In this center, there are simple games that can be done in either pairs or done alone. These games always include some form of counting. In one game, the students must add up number cards in a competition to see whose sum is greater. During another game, students must count either heads or tails when poured out on the ground from a cup. A third game includes having a select number of chips in a cup, taking some out, and finding how many are still in the cup without looking. In this center, I help the students find strategies and ways to add and subtract in a way that they could better understand. The other center I run is the iPad center. Here, I give students ideas and suggestions on what math learning games to play for the time block. I like this center the least because it does not involve much of my help; it only promises that the students won't get too out of hand with their behavior. As you can see, I do not do any type of reading activities because of the time I come in during the days.