Centres for Math lesson

Since I enrolled in the TAC program, we watch videos in class and the teachers in the videos like to use centres as part of their teaching and learning. I am not quite familiar with this idea of centre approach of teaching and learning. In my mind, it could invite chaos in the classroom easily and I never think of using centres in my teaching because I basically very sensitive to noise and I get easily annoyed in a noisy environment. But now I learnt that students learn better by having more interaction among peers, it can be more beneficial to their learning.



Last week, when I re-read my unit plan again and I found that I was running late in my teaching schedule; therefore, I asked one of my partner teacher Mrs. Bailey for adivce and I did not know why I suddenly asked her, "Should I use centres to teach so that I can cover more lessons?" And she told me that it was a good idea. Then I just go ahead and do it! When I had my students moving around different centres in class and learn about using different kinds of non-standard unit of measure I still have some doubt in my mind. Before I started out this lesson by explaining what to do when they were in that centre, and I spent about 20 minutes on the carpet and I explained it all to my students and I got an hour and a half of that day to teach Math. I was still worrying at first, but when students moved around and I saw that they were really engaged in the activities and I was able to relieve myself a bit because I saw them they were so excited with these hands-on activities and I thought I did a good choice on using centres to teach. Even though it created noise, but this was "good noise". They were not as chatty as before because they knew if they spend time chatting, they would miss their class time. I felt that this lesson had been a successful lesson since it created more opportunities for students to share their learning and understanding. Now I feel more confidence to use "Centre Approach" in my teaching. I did not say this lesson was 100% perfect but at least the Principal gave me the feedback was good. She said "It was a good lesson and the students were engaging in learning activities."

I remember I read a statement in this Grade 2 classroom: " You will never know until you try." Just give it a try, you will see the good things are awaiting for you!



Maria

New Math Lesson & Direct Communication

I have started my Math Unit Lesson with my Grade 2 students and it is a fun experience for me! The unit I am teaching now is Non-standard unit of measure. At first, when I prepared this unit and I did not know where to start. Once I started to plan this unit and then I found that it was way more easier than I imagined. That was a nice experience to have two units planning for this practicum and I enjoy doing lesson planning. Another thing for a new teacher to remember was that when you did your lesson plan, it supposed to be the final product for your teaching. That's mean you have to follow through all the things that listed out on your lesson plan. If you do have to change anything on the lesson plan, either the materials or teaching steps, then it's good to check with your partner teacher(s) beforehand since you are still under the partner teacher supervision!

I have been teaching both Science and Math for this practicum, and I value all the teaching experience that my partner teachers provided me. When time comes along, everyone of us can gain practical teaching experience and apply to our future teaching. One thing that I found is more important is that when working in Canadian Education System, it is a good idea that try to communicate directly to the colleagues around you. Otherwise, problems and mis-communication can happen and you would never have the chance to say and it is not fair for you to be mis-understood because you are trying to be quiet and have the attitude of "wait & see" The Canadian wants to know what you actually think in your head! It not good to have someone speak on your behalf. It is not a good way to show your assertiveness in this culture. Nothing is better for you to present your ideas and thoughts through direct communication!

Cultural thinking -- Canadian vs. Chinese

It was a busy days for me and I am pretty tired right now! But I still want to write something to share with you all.

Today, first thing that happened in the morning science lesson was Sandi came and video taped my teaching. I just did my teaching as normal, but because of the miscommunication among me, Sandi and partner teachers, when I was told they did not know Sandi would come to observe and videotaped me! Oh, MY LORD! I forgot to confirm with my partner teachers yesterday and I felt bad about it! I started to loose my mind and forgot my lesson plan procedure! Anyway, I would re-teach the concepts that I need to cover today in tomorrow class. It's never been too late to mend what I failed to do today. I believe everyday is a NEW DAY and learning new things day after day. That's the reason why we enrolled in this program to refine our teaching techniques. But one thing I still need to adapt myself a bit more in this Canadian Culture is "To Ask Questions All The Time." Before that, my previous practicum was just a 360 degrees turn around practice. The partner teacher I worked with was very considerate and she would remind me every minor things she could think of! But in Canada, you have to be more assertive to find out and figure out what you want to know! That's a "Culture Shock" to me.

Whenever I finished any lesson, either Math or Science lesson, there are always things that my partner teachers told me were the things that should have told me when they review my unit plan before I started out to teach that Science or Math Unit. In my thinking, I thought I would feel fair and make sense to me if these were their expectations. I probably have to do from now on, I have to take the initiative to ask and be more assertive because the Canadian Culture was not as considerate as Chinese Culture! This is my feeling from heart! (P.S. I did met with some Canadians that were very considerate and thoughtful, thank God for being so nice to make me meet with these people and we became good friends.)

One thing I should remind whoever read my post today, PLEASE REMEMBER if you deal with Division I, don't call them "My babies" because if the kids went back and told their parents about it, the parents would come over and complain about it, because in Canadian Culture this means to belittle the kids and lower their self-esteem even if you don't have this intention!! Just a friendly reminder for you. In my culture, this is mean to be "My love one" or "My sweetie". When I knew this meant something different in Canadian Culture, then I would not use it.

Have a great day in your practicum!

Starting my Science Lesson

Today is the second days for my practicum this week and I took a day off for my Chinese New Year, and I will make up one more day to do my practicum on next Monday Feburary 2, 2009.

I am so excited to start my science lesson with these Grade 2 students. They behaved so good and I really love to teach them. Normally, they were all response well to my questions and actively engaged in all the in-class activities. Every day, when I started my science lesson, I would state my expectations clearly so that they all knew what I expected from them and the purpose of the lesson. I was consistent with my rules and they were all conform to the rules that I set out for them. Today, we did an out-door activity. This time they were required to do the activity of measuring different places around the school building and compare the temperatures they recorded. Overall, it went well and the students were so excited to do this activity, but the only thing that I did not take into account that this activity actually took more more than I would have expected. Some of the thermometers provided by school were not working! Next time, I think would be good to do a pre-test on the thermometers to see if they were working and make sure they were all workable when doing experiments/observation. Next Monday, I will continue on todays lesson, since I planned at least 3 - 4 classworks for students but somehow because of the out-door activity took longer time than I expected! Hopefully, I could finish the rest of the observation and in-class worksheets on Monday!

After Monday, I would conduct my first experiment for the Science lesson. This will be the lesson for getting these Grade 2 students to build a thermometer. I think they would be very excited and want to do it, I believe!

Classroom Management

Time went by so fast and I already did my practicum at Rosedale for three weeks now, I love the Grade 2 class, partly because they are the Grade I love to teach and they are very cute little angel to me. When I was in the class, there always have incidents that made you feel so enjoyable and laugh about. Overall, I love this Grade 2 class and I can say they are all adorable and you will never want to leave the classroom when these little kids were in the class learning. You can always see them so eager to learn and seem to have ever ending questions to ask and inquire about, once in while might make you feel a bit annoying, but that's alright..... because they all want to learn and always motivated.



In Grade 2 class, I found that if you have clear expectations of their behaviors in class, they are willing to show their good behaviors most of the time. Some of the little tricks that I tried were when I said: " I want to see that you all show me how good you are and I am going to pick the best student of the day." All of a student, even they were all chatting and would become quiet just in a few seconds. They were all response well to me when I made my rules and expectations clear. Sometimes they are so excited in engaging in their in-class activities, once you said "HOH", then they would all put their little hands on top of their heads and listen. I found this management trick is quite useful and they all show respect to me and they love to be with me. At least, I feel that way! Now I found that even my partner teachers were both out for doing something and I was the only adult in class, they would not hesitate to ask me questions or ask for help from me. I think part of this was that my two partner teachers had put a lot of efforts to train this Grade 2 class and these children were exceptionally obedient. I found that one of the main reason was that my partner teachers were very experienced teacher and they let the students knew that I was the teacher in their class and should always treat me as their teacher.

So far, I found that in order to be successful in Classroom Management, teacher should build a good relationship with students and make your expectations clear and easy to follow!

Interesting Science experiment at Rosedale

This was the second day of the second week of practicum at Rosedale Elementary. I really wanted to write about the last two days that the Grade 2 students did on Tuesday and Wednesday. I remember yesterday, they were doing an experiment of how to make the floating thing to sink in water by adding rods on top of it. The students were required to add one rod each time and record how many rods can make that floating thing sink in water: styrofoam plate, plastic container, tinfoil plate and a plastic lid. I saw that all the students were having fun and all participating in the learning process, I found that when they successfully made it sank, they became so excited and when I circulating around the classroom and they raised their hands and asked to look at their finding. I thought children are all naturally love to share their experience and this was an effective way to give students the opportunities to participate in an active learning process and sparked their interesting in learning about science.

And today, they had another experiment and were required to design and build a boat by using placsticine (playdoh) and had to make it float. They had to draw the design on the booklet that their group member created; after that, they did the experiment by putting their boats on the surface of the water and see if it was going to float. Finally, they need to record their findings on the observation sheet and this experiment was quite interesting.

My Practicum at Rosedale

I just finished my first week of practicum at Rosedale Elementary School and I worked with Grade 2 kids. The class size is managable with 25 students and they knew their daily routine very well. I could find that the two teachers were good teachers and they trained the students so well behaved all the time. I have two partner teachers who worked with me and they were both nice person. The Grade 2 class has a strong focus on Early Literacy. Some of the students have really advanced reading and writing skills at Junior High level. During the first week, I was helping in doing some read aloud activities with individual students and I was amazed that the students were all eager that I would pick them and read the book with him/her. They were all good reader and they read stories based on their reading skill levels and they got their own book box. I also checked students' writing and I was impressed by the students' written work and they were all very good at their age and some of them wrote pages and pages. I found that some of the students were very creative. I love to read their writing and I anticipate to be with them again tomorrow.

Another thing I would like to share is that we were very delighted that Darlene and Sharon came to our class and talked about Assessment for students learning and I felt that they provided excellent resources for all of us and their presentative were well planned and organized. I like the in-class activities and it provided hands-on experience for us. I liked the way how they engaged us in the learning process while they still took the responsibilties of instruction. They are experienced educators. I feel so lucky to have them in class and hope to have another opportunity to attend their worksop. Overall, I think this was a rewarding learning experience.