Reflections

Excerpts from reflections

Reflection dates 4.13.16-4.19.16

I am thinking that I will stay longer at UPCS because of the opportunity to practice lessons. I will see if I can manage the time commitment to polish up any issues with applying for schools and find time to visit other schools. I want to get sense of the issues that 1st year teacher’s encounter so I can plan something in advance. I was talking to Zach who also teaches middle school at Claremont. He deals with a lot of resource issues and behavioral issues so that I can prepare. My classroom culture has gotten to a place that I am pleased with. They are open to talking and more of them are feeling comfortable with participation. I think that seeing what the ideal environment looks like will motivate me to build future classrooms up in the same way.

Reflection Dates 3.30.16-4.15.16

In Wednesday’s class, I decided to introduce the terms related to abiotic factors and give examples and video to help them distinguish the two. So far they seem to be able to get the terms and have new ways of describing the world around them. The challenging part will be to identify different ways that they can assemble the carbon cycle pathways. I am glad that I let them work together first and am scaffolding so that they do an individual project too. I ended up drawing a version of my own and let them critique it and show ways to improve it. I hope that this carries over to their projects too.

The drawing time-lapse was drawn through an iPad app and shared in class.

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