Reflection 3: Observation at McDaniel

Cre’Shawn Owens

First Teaching Experiences

6/12/13

Today, when I went to Mcdaniel Elementary School, I really didn’t know what to expect. Nervousness was running through my body, because I always had bad experiences with Special Ed students. They would always be yelling, screaming, or running down the hall, and that would always kind of scare me a little. I can actually say that it was different.

When I first walked into the school, it was kind of dark because usually when you walk into a school the lights are very bright. It seemed like we were welcomed into the school. The first class we went to was the preschool class. There was only two kids in there at first. The first thing I noticed was that the lights were covered; I was really confused about that. In the middle school class the lights were not covered. There were two teachers in the preschool class, five teachers in the elementary classroom, and three teachers in the middle school classroom. The classroom was really colorful like a typical preschool class would look.

While sitting in the class, I saw that the students were not in the right stage they should be. In every class that I went to, the students all had to learn certain things in a different way than the other kids, not that it was a problem, but it was challenging for the students. Bobby, one of the preschool students seemed to be at the stage that he shouldn’t be at anymore, which was called the “Theory of Cognitive Development” by Jean Paiget at Stage 1. Meaning that’s when Babies and Toddlers begin to interact with the environment. This is not the stage he should have been at; he should have been at Stage 2 when the child begins to represent the world symbolically. In the elementary class, there were five different groups going on at the same time. The students were just now learning how to read. None of the students in the elementary class knew how to read fluently. As soon as the teacher told them to start working on their math, it was like math was so fun and easy for them. That was kind of confusing because usually people struggle in math and not in reading or English. Those subjects usually tend to be called the easy classes. I was watching two different students work on math. They both had different methods to help them. One of them had a number line and the other one used his fingers.

        The teachers had different methods for each student to help them try to understand what they wanted them to learn. For teachers to see what students are learning was to quiz them to see how many they get correct. The teachers were always patient with them, they never showed their anger towards the student. Having that kind of teaching job, you would have to be understanding, patient, caring, and know how to talk without hurting their feelings because, they are very sensitive. To keep the students organized they had timers, so they can make sure everyone gets a turn to do all the activities.