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This video represents an approach to teaching that I hope to improve on in my second placement. I hope to give my students more experiential learning opportunities that allow students to conceptualize material through an engaging way. Not only do students learn more when they are engaged in a certain subject, they also learn other skills when they are in a experiential learning setting, such as cooperation.

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Student-Centered Learning – In the Middle School

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One lesson that stood out to me during my placement was a historical perspective lesson that I watched my AT do. During this lesson, my AT would pull up a powerful historical image for the class to see and ask them what they think is going on in the image. Students were very interested in this lesson and almost every student in the class put their hand up at least once. I think this activity was particularly effective because there was no right answer (well there was) so students had no problem coming up with answer. Even though students provided some far off answers, it got them thinking about historical perspective without even knowing it. It really got me thinking of different ways I could include engaging activities in my lesson that allow students to engage with material without necessarily knowing it.

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In this lesson, I tried to emulate some of the aspects from my cause and consequence lesson to get the same level of class engagement. I knew that lecturing students and trying to get them to answer questions is boring and doesn't fit into my teaching style. So, I used group-work strategies so students could engage in the material and do so in a fun way. I had students collaborate in their groups about the different things that make an event historically significant, as well as come up with examples of historically significant events that occurred during their lifetime. This actually led to a rich classroom discussion about the Russia Ukraine conflict, which was not a part of my lesson plan, but definitely should have been considering the amount of interest my students had in this topic.

For an assessment of this lesson, I had my students create their own historical time line with at least 10 events that are either historically significant or significant to them. I thought this was a creative way for my students to think about history in a critical way. I think the structure of the assignment was great, in terms of reflection and consolidation of the material. However, the application of this assignment did not go as smoothly as I thought. More specifically, students had a difficult time thinking of historical events and tended to only included personally significant events. Students also took a lot longer completing this assignment than I thought, which was an important take away of the level that my students are at. If I were to change this assignment, I would of allowed them access to computers so they could research different historical events.

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I had several literacy lessons that went very well, in which I taught my students about the features of literature and writing. Although this content can be very dry, I was able easily able to get the attention of my students by telling them that they will be using these features in their own scary stories. Although, these lessons were relatively short, I felt like my students grasped the concepts well. It was also beneficial that my associate teacher pitched me the idea of having them create scary stories for Halloween and provided me with lesson ideas building up to this assignment that could be beneficial for improving their writing skills. I felt like this really helped me with my lesson plans and showed me how to group lesson plans together to progress towards summative assessments.

It was motivating as a teacher to recognize the improvements in your students work. This was the case for these lessons because even the less motivated students did well on this assignment. My associate teacher and I were pleased when we compared their scary stories to their previous assignment in language. Most students incorporated the concepts we talked about in class and the stories themselves, were very fun to read.

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First time teaching intermediate history

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First time teaching intermediate history

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My first lesson provided me with quite a few take aways because I taught the exact same lesson to two different grade 7/8 classes. When I taught my cause and consequence history lesson for the first time, I actually taught a different 7/8 class than the class I was normally in. I felt as if the students were not that interested in the material, therefore it was quite challenging to get them engaged in my lesson. Furthermore, my lesson plan lacked creativity and was more so just me lecturing the class about the different types of cause and consequences. I provided them with examples and had the class come up with different types of examples, but only one or two students were actually putting their hands up. It was discouraging as a teacher to see little interest in your students, but I knew what wrong and I where I could improve my lesson.

So I went home that night and totally changed my lesson plan for the next day. I knew I needed more opportunities for my students to engage in my lesson, but I didn't know exactly how to do so. I ended up creating an interactive activity that allowed the whole class to engage with the cause and consequence material and I found that this was an effective method to get my students interested in the material. Now that I had the attention of my students, I needed to maintain this throughout my lesson and I did so by coming up with historical examples that were more relevant to my students. I had my students collaborate in groups and come up with different causes and consequences of covid-19 and then I had the groups tell me some of their answers so I could write them on the board. Compared to the last class, my students were much more engaged with the content and I felt that the lesson went much smoother. I think it also helped putting students into groups to discuss their answers as opposed to me trying to get answers from the whole class. This allowed me to break up the lesson so it's not as overwhelming to the students and allowed them to participate with their peers as opposed to just listening and responding to my questions.

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Prior to my placement, I was emailing back and forth with my associate teacher and he mentioned how his approach to teaching was laid back and student-centered. I didn't think much of it at the time, other than the fact that me and my AT were probably going to get along, but I would soon realize that my approach to teaching would very much resemble his teaching style.

Following my placement, I feel that I have a better understanding of my teaching style and what teaching strategies work well with my style. To me, student-centered teaching means that students have a voice in your classroom and they have opportunities to talk about what their learning. This approach focuses on developing lifelong skills and creating lesson plans that not only reflect curricular goals, but also develop skills that are transferrable to real life. At the intermediate level, I think it's important for students to have strong problem-solving skills so I would incorporate independent assignments that allow students to take on challenges on their own. I also think working in groups is an important life skill that can be applied in the classroom, so I'll often include opportunities for my students to work in groups and collaborate with one another for bigger projects. I think a balance of activities that demonstrate different lifelong skills is an effective way approach to teaching because not all students are at the same intellectual level, therefore incorporating activities that allow collaboration and problem-solving will also foster social development.

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First time coaching middle school soccer

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First time coaching middle school soccer

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During my practicum, I was lucky enough to take part in coaching the boys soccer team, alongside my associate teacher. I informed my AT that my knowledge of soccer wasn't that great, but I could definitely help out with the team. In terms of my role as a coach, we decided that I could be there for morale support, whereas my AT would take on most of the coaching role. This was actually a great experience for me because I got to see first hand what it like coaching a middle school team.

The season only consisted of two away games and two home games. As it turned out, our team lost both of the away games, but won both of their games at home. We played against a team of Mennonite boys on their pitch and our team got absolutely destroyed 8-1. There must have been something in the water, because those kids were honestly built different.

Nonetheless, coaching soccer was an eye-opening experience for me because I got to see sports from a totally different perspective. As a coach, you have to put the needs of your players before those of your team because at the end of the day, it's all about having fun. Coaching taught me that it's better to give everyone the opportunity to play as opposed to only playing your best players even if it causes you to lose the game, it's worth it.

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Visual Representation of my first week of gym class

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Visual Representation of my first week of gym class

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Following my introduction on my first day of placement, my class had gym first thing in the morning. I didn't even get the chance to learn the names of my students before I got tossed into a game of dodgeball with them. I learned pretty quickly which students were engaged in gym class and which were the ones that goofed off. That didn't take away from the fact that my students were going to give up a chance to throw a ball at the new guy's face. I caught a couple of them off guard with my curveball and no-look throws, but it's safe to say the class got the best of me.

It was a really great learning experience for me because I got to learn a lot about my students just from that gym class alone. I also felt like I was a part of the class (which is why I used a Billy Madison gif) and I think this was an important moment in my practicum because it allowed me to step into the classroom as a teacher and work with these kids that I had never met before.

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This describes my practicum experience because I was taken out of my comfort zone. In a way, I grew my wings as a teacher and figured out what my strengths are within the classroom. As a teacher, I became more comfortable employing interactive strategies and engaging my students with activities and classroom discussions. Teaching felt much more natural for me when I employed these strategies because it allowed me to control the rhythm of the class and ensure that students aren't falling asleep in my class. Furthermore, students were excited to participate in activities I had prepared for them, which I found beneficial for myself (as a student teacher) and for the classroom as a whole.

As you can see from the gif, the bird is spreading their wings and trying their best to fly, but it still needs more practice. This relates to my practicum experience because I still have lots of to learn as a student teacher. I look forward to my second practicum placement because my associate teacher and I have a similar outlook on teaching and I feel that I can incorporate more feedback from him to improve myself as an educator. More specifically, I would like to learn more about how he designs a history unit plan for a grade 7/8 class and how he incorporates geography into his weekly plans.