Short Lessons

Sometimes, a lesson that takes the whole 90 minutes for one class period won't take very long at all in another.  Luckily, with FL, we teachers have a lot of quick and easy review games that we can play.  If we have an extra 15 minutes, we can play "matamoscas," practice with whiteboard, play the slap game, pictionary, charades, etc.  In general, shorter lessons haven't really been a problem for us.  I think that it would be harder in an English or Social Studies class but for us, it's no problem at all.

Classroom Interruptions

With Thanksgiving being just next week, students are DEFINITELY showing that they're ready to be out of school. They seem to be more antsy, they don't really want to do anything and they've kinda had this idea that since it's the week before break that they don't have to do anything. Well... that's obviously wrong.  Mrs. Hastings and I are no strangers to classroom interruptions.  We have one difficult class in particular.  It's really hard to explain the class atmosphere to someone without them actually just coming in and seeing it.  There's one student in particular who, well, is VERY attention hungry.  He starts singing or humming randomly in class, stares at other students, makes inappropriate comments, makes the other students feel uncomfortable, plays imaginary drums and, recently, decided that we was going to stand up, stretch and then lay down in the middle of the floor and take a nap... Yea... All of his teachers have been struggling with him.  Generally, if there's a negative classroom interruption and students aren't willing to bring it back in to the lesson, I remind them that we don't have to do fun activities in games in class and have on several occasions reminded them that they can copy their vocabulary lists twenty times for the rest of class.  I hate being the bad person and there are some classes where I just always have to have a strong hand.  I don't think they always realize that the class could be so fun and easygoing if they just went along with what we did and I didn't have to keep bringing them back in line... It's pretty frustrating...

Who I *Hopefully* Influenced

This prompt is a little tricky for me. I generally don't think of myself as some big motivational person.  Don't get me wrong, I always try to get students to do their best but I just don't like to think of myself as an inspirational person.  However, if I had to pick a student that I think I influenced, I would pick my student "Fidel". During the first weeks of classes, he had a really dry sense of humor and was very sarcastic and cynical (not always the best combination).  Mrs. Hastings wasn't originally sure how well she and him were going to get along, however I have friends that are very similar to him and I knew that he was really a sweet kid, but he wouldn't want people to know that. Over the semester, we've had a really good relationship because we can joke around and if another student in class says something about how "stupid" and activity is, he's been quick to defend it in his own way.  It's really cool seeing that we've gotten on his good side and I've really enjoyed having him in class.

Team Teaching

For the most part, I do the majority of the teaching in class. Mrs. Hastings is always there to help and support students if I'm working with someone else, however, she generally lets me take complete charge.  There have been a few occasions where I wasn't sure how to present a certain topic and I would ask her to step in for a while so I could see how she would present that material.  It's very beneficial for me because I get to stand back and see what she does and how the students respond to it.  I also think the students like to mix it up a little and have Mrs. Hastings do an activity with them for a while since they always have me teaching them.  We don't have a Special Ed. teacher or other type of aid in our classes so it's always just Mrs. Hastings and I and I'm just fine with that. We have a really good relationship and similar teaching styles.

La Comunidad de la Escuela

The school community for MHS is very diverse.  Firstly, it's located in Morgantown which is, obviously, where WVU is located.  There's a strong connection between MHS and WVU. A lot of the students have parents that work for the university and most also plan on attending one day.  One of my students last year was even President Clements daughter! Families in Morgantown span the entire socioeconomic spectrum.  There are a good bit of international students, however the majority tend to come from Middle Eastern families.  I have noticed in my time here that there is not a very large Hispanic population which makes it hard to show students how they can use Spanish in their community.

Parent- Teacher Conferences

Last week we had our first round of parent-teacher conferences.  I was a little nervous about them but Mrs. Hastings told me there was nothing to worry about.  We set up four desks in the front of the classroom for us to use and printed out the progress reports of the students we knew had parents coming in.  We had about 5 conferences and they all went really well. The parents were nice and receptive to what we were saying and Mrs. Hastings told me that she wanted me to have just as much say as she did in the conferences so I also got to comment on the students.  We made sure to use the "compliment sandwich" with the parents: say something good about the student, say an area they could improve on, and then finish with another compliment. Overall, I think it was a really good experience and I'm glad I finally got to participate in my first ever parent-teacher conferences.

Mi Relacion con Otros Profesores

So far I've developed a really good relationship with the other teachers at MHS. I think one thing that they like about me is that I don't try to act like I know everything about education and I never complain.  I also treat them like my superiors and not my coworkers because, honestly, I'm not REALLY a teacher yet and they are above me. I eat lunch with my mentor teacher, my PDS coordinator and a couple other teachers every day and I really enjoy that.  I get to hear their interpretations of things that went on in their classrooms and how they handled things.  Overall, I take it as a learning experience being in there. I'm going to go to a conference with the other FL teachers so I'm really looking forward to that.

Looking back, the first couple days I was with the students was a little nerve racking.  I wasn't sure how they were going to react to a student teacher and I wasn't entirely sure how well I would handle being THE teacher of a class with my own students.  Although Mrs. Hastings was always there to support me, she allowed me to take complete control. She ensured that we were both seen as the teachers with equal say in what happened in the class room and I can't thank her enough for giving me that responsibility.  The students were really receptive to us.  We had a couple awkward moments when I maybe just wasn't sure what to do in a certain situation, however, Mrs. Hastings and I can communicate in Spanish so I can ask her a question without the students knowing what we're saying and maybe seeming like we aren't sure about a certain thing.  I think they also think it's really cool to hear us speaking in Spanish to each other because they always want to know what we're saying.  The students have definitely gotten more comfortable with me and I with them.  I think that the rest of the semester will be a great one if we can keep going in the direction we're going now.

After-School Activity

So far this semester, I have attended an MHS football game.  My students really wanted me to come because it was a big game for them (although they told me that they knew they were going to lose).  A friend and I walked down to the stadium and got our seats.  The first part of the game was really good and I saw a lot of my students there.  Unfortunately, I had to leave early though because there was a huge storm coming and we didn't want to walk back in the pouring rain.  I'm sure that I'll be attending another game in the future and I would also like to go to a play or choir concert that the students put on. 

Mi Relacion con mis Estudiantes

Reflect on your rapport with the students:

I believe that I have a very good relationship with my students. They feel comfortable in the classroom and coming to me with problems. They also like to tell me stories about things that happened to them in their personal lives when we have free time at the end of class. Although they like me, they still see me as a teacher and an authority figure and therefore have shown me respect.

Evaluaciones Alternativas

Reflect on your use of alternative forms of assessment such as: portfolios, sociograms, journals, inventories, individual and group conferences, direct observation, teacher-made tests, standardized tests:

For our class today, we watched a video about why students should study a foreign language. I then took a survey of the students and they had to write down 2 ways that they could/will use Spanish and why they chose Spanish as their foreign language. The responses were very insightful and I gained a better insight about my students' attitudes toward Spanish and foreign languages in general.

El Estilo de Manejo de mi Mentora

Reflect on your school’s or mentor teacher’s classroom management system:

My mentor teacher has a very good style of classroom management. She is able to laugh with the students and maintain mutual respect, yet she does not tolerate class disruptions and stops poor student behavior as soon as it begins. I'm learning a lot by watching her.

Mis Actividades de la Semana

Review your activities for the week and then select and describe three that are good illustrations of elements included on the Intern Rubric:

I have maintained a professional relationship with students, I have worked with students from diverse audiences and reflected on my professional role outside of the classroom.

My students respect me as their teacher yet I have also been maintaining a laid back atmosphere so students feel comfortable talking with me.

I have students with diverse backgrounds such as ESL, behavior disorders, students with autism, etc. I change my approaches to the student based on what I think they need.

I maintained a professional demeanor outside of the high school when I ran into a student and his family in Wal-Mart and I introduced myself and made small talk with the parents.

Las Fuerzas de mi Portfolio

Describe strengths of your Year 4 Portfolio and plans for your Year 5 Portfolio:

I believe that my strengths in my year 4 portfolio were: my PRAXIS scores, my letters of recommendation and my writings. I feel like writing is one of my stronger points so I'm glad I got to include some artifacts.

For my year 5 portfolio I would like to include some clips of me teaching to really make my portfolio more personal. I also am looking forward to include my inquiry from this semester.

Celebracion de Preguntas

This was my second time attending the Inquiry Celebration and this time went much more smoothly than last year! Last year I got lost and I'm pretty sure I was in the wrong places and didn't take much away from the sessions. However, this time around was a much better experience.

I attended the first two morning sessions which was nice. It was hard for me to select a session to sign up for because none of the inquiries really relate to my content area. This is mainly due to the small amount of foreign language teachers, however, I wish there were more opportunities to see inquiries that related to my studies better. However, I observed Evan in the first session. He is an intern at my PDS Morgantown High School. He discussed whether or not having daily quizzes was helpful or not for students. He decided that it was helpful but he wouldn't recommend doing them for too long of a time or a full year.

The second session that I attended was a female intern who stated that she wanted to bring cultural understanding and empathy into her classes. I thought that this would be a very good session to attend. She taught social studies and wanted to incorporate cultural understanding and diversity into her classroom however the only research she discussed was that she put her classes into circles for socratic discussions. She never mentioned how she brought in cultural diversity or understanding into her classes, just that she like putting her class in circles for socratic discussions and used "QTIPS." Her findings were inconclusive and I think that it's because her research didn't match her inquiry.

I liked Evan's presentation however I'm not sure that I would use daily quizzes unless I thought that it was necessary. I would have liked to have gotten something from the other girl's presentation however I thought that the study was irrelevant. I'm nervous for next year when it's my turn, however I'm also excited that it'll be my turn to present. I'm also looking forward to doing something that will be specifically tied to foreign language so that the other FL students can see something that will relate to them.

Dos Más Caracteristicas de una Maestra Nueva

For this blog, I decided to focus on Characteristics 4 and 10. Characteristic 4 states that the novice teacher should be a facilitator of learning for all students. To me, this means that the teacher should have a desire and passion to teach students with any type of need to disability. The teacher should also be ready to make specific accomodations and modifications to meet the needs of the students. For this characteristic, I would most likely add a lesson plan from my SPED 360 class with Dr. Aronin that contains the UDL format and allows options for all students.

Finally, option 10 states that the novice teacher should be liberally educated. I believe that liberally educated means that the teacher is open to new experiences and opportunities that will increase their understanding of their content area and also pedagogy. I believe that it is also means that a teacher goes beyond just the required classes for their majors. For this characteristic, I would consider adding assignments from my classes that I will be taking this summer in Spain.

Dos Caracteristicas de una Maestra Nueva

     In our latest seminar, we discussed the characteristics of the novice teacher and discussed ways to apply them in our time at our PDS's, as well as what kind of artifacts we could use for our portfolio later on. Two characteristics that stuck out to me were numbers 5 and 6.
     Number Five requires that teachers have an in-depth knowledge of pedagogy. Of course this is important for a teacher because this is essentially the ground work for our entire future careers. I believe that a good artifact for this characteristic would be my Language Teaching Methods Unit Plan. For this class, we each had to make a 5-day long unit and incorporate all of the different teaching methods that we used, such as immersion, TPR, teaching to different learning styles, etc.
     Number Six states that the novice teacher should also have an in-depth knowledge of content. I believe some good artifacts for this characteristic could be examples of essays and critiques that I have written about in my Spanish classes. I will also be participating in  a study-abroad to Spain this summer where I will be attending a university for four weeks. I am sure that there will also be some nice artifacts that I will create over there that I may use later in my portfolios.