Accomplishment of Goals

I feel that I have done an alright job at completing my goals. They all turned out to be harder than I expected. Looking back through my researcher journal, I noticed that I worked towards my goals, but never succeeded in completing them as much as I wanted to. I got to know some students, but I still do not know some of their names. I think this is because I only see each class once a week because I go Tuesday mornings and Wednesday afternoons. My tutor year, I went 2 days a week and saw the students twice a week, so I was able to get to know them a little better. I know that during my Intern year I will be able to get to know all of my students and I will feel a lot more comfortable while teaching them. I feel like I have tried to learn names, but it is just really hard considering the amount of time I see them each week. Also, I have not been able to go to as many extra-curricular activities as I wanted to. I had so much stuff going on for my classes and my job, I just did not have the time. I was really disappointed that I was not able to complete this goal. My last goal was about classroom/behavior management. There is only one class that gives me trouble when I teach. Sure, every class has their moments of being rowdy, but two of the classes are very well behaved. The class that gives me the hardest time also give the other teachers a hard time, so it is not just me. I think it is worse with me, however, because I am not there as often as the others. I will have to continuously tell them to stop talking when I am talking. They will listen, but 10 minutes later is gets loud again. Overall, I feel that I have done a good job at managing my classroom, especially since I have not had any classes learning about it.

Goals For This Semester

This semester I have set some goals for myself to complete in the classroom. I felt I could do more in the classroom, considering I am there more often than I was when I was a tutor. I wanted to feel more connected to the students. Sometimes, I think students do not see Benedum students as acutal teachers, so there may be a lack of respect. I have not noticed this a lot this semester, but I wanted to be sure that I would show them that I was there to help and I needed to be treated like a teacher in the classroom. I wanted to get to know the students on a personal level and learn all of their names. I know this is a hard thing to do, but I wanted to try. I also wanted to attend extracurricular activities, which would help me be more connected to them. I remember when I was their age, I was happy to see teachers go to the sporting events, especially the ones I participated in. One last goal I had was to work on my classroom management skills. This is a major thing I am currently concerned about. When young teachers enter a classroom for the first time, the students can see that the teacher is nervous and they he or she is not much older than them, especially in a high school classroom. I wanted to be sure I could get their respect in order to operate a smooth classroom.

Federal Court System

The 3 levels of court systems are district courts, court of appeals, and the supreme court. Most cases are heard by the district courts. There are 94 district courts. If someone is not satisfied with the ruling of the court, they can go to the court of appeals. This court does not hear trials, but reviews the case. They can do one of three things: agree with decision, overturn decision, or have the lower court retry the case. 1, 2 or 3 justices can make this ruling. The highest level of the federal court system is the supreme court. This court has the right to rule things unconstitutional. They hear the major court cases in the country. This court has 9 justices who are appointed for life.

Blogging Reflection

I think that this blog is a good way to keep track of experiences that I have had in my PDS. It was interesting to look back to what I wrote during my first semester as a tutor. I didn't post a lot, but I think what I did write helped me keep track of how my year went.

It is important to keep in contact with my blogging partner, small group facilitator, and PDS faculty because these people can give me feedback on my experiences that can be helpful to me as a grow as an educator. I think having a blogging partner is really helpful because she is in the same stage of the program as me and it is beneficial to compare my experiences with hers. We both will have different experiences and it is interesting to see how different some of them can be.

I think reflecting on the changes in the classrooms we are in during our time in our PDS as a participant would be good to reflect upon. As participants, we all will be in the school a lot longer so we will be able to see more things and compare the differences with our tutor year experiences to see how much we all have grown.

Hope-  Has your time in your PDS been what you expected it to be?

Learning Goals

One of my learning goals is to be more involved in the classroom during the lessons. Last semester, I did mostly observation. I was very reserved because I was in a new place with people I did not know. They were only 6th graders, but it was still intimidating to go into a new classroom.

So far this semester, I feel that I have fit in with the class a lot better. I've been around the students for a while and they have warmed up to me and will ask me for help during class time. I taught a whole class lesson which really helped establish myself in the classroom.

I look forward to teaching more lessons and contributing more during class time. I think I have improved a lot this semester and I have enjoyed my time in my PDS so far.

Digital Storytelling

I work with the students one-on-one a lot during before-school tutoring sessions, so I think my experiences with those sessions would be good to include in my digital story. I think that it would be good to share my experiences with others and hopefully receive feedback to see if my peers have similar ones. Also, I would want to include my experiences from each lesson I teach this semester.
I think stories about the students would be interesting to listen to. Learning about the diversity of students in each PDS would be beneficial to everyone listening to the story.
I plan to use images, text, and possibly videos in my digital story. Images help the listeners get into the story and it makes it more interesting. I plan to use text to help the flow of my story. I think using videos would be helpful as well, but it depends on what videos I find and if they flow with my story.