THE FIELD OBSERVATION ASSIGNMENTS

My field observation was done at Silverado high school and my cooperating teacher was English
teacher, Ms. Lori Notaro. Ms. Notaro teaches ENG 10 Honors, and AP ENG LIT & COMP 12.
ASSIGNMENT #1 (Observation)
Question #1
My first impression of the classroom environment was “wow, this is a very traditional, well lived

in classroom.” I felt this way because it looked as though Ms. Notaro had been in this classroom

for years. It was traditional in the sense that there were seven rows of six desks arranged on

carpet that needed a good shampooing. Along the back of the room there were cabinets with

supplies and books in either corner. In the middle of the room on the back wall there was a table

for students to put there “non-water” drinks on during class. There were outdated pictures of

Japanese women hanging on the back walls and other posters that had no significant meaning

and looked as though they had been there for years. On the far-right wall there was a table

stacked with student notebooks. Ms. Notaro’s desk is in the front of the class in the right corner

and she speaks from a lecturer that is located more in the front/center of the room. She does not

use a white board, she uses a…… (the name escapes me right now, but you put the paper under

the lamp, and it shows on the board).

On the front the school’s mission statement is blown up and reads:

“Our mission at Silverado is to provide a safe, supportive, and challenging environment
in which students will become active, reflective, and creative learners who accept
responsibility for learning, have pride in their community and are prepared to contribute
in a culturally diverse world. Skyhawks strive to be prime examples of honorable,
accountable, well-rounded, knowledgeable, and successful students.”
On the board on the left side of the room, the weekly schedule is outlined for English 10 Honors

and AP English Lit & Comp 12. A copy of the block schedule was in the middle of the board

and a little further down the board is a long list of class and CCSD rules and posters pertaining
to; bullying, dress code, and expulsions, weapons, cell phone use, ditching school, no

skateboards, etc.

Question #2
The student make-up of second period (Silverado is on block schedule and this was a B day)

ENG 10 Honors class is approximately 30 students of which two are African American females,

one African American male, two Hispanic females, one Hispanic male, and three Asian males.

The student make-up of fourth period ENG 10 Honors, a bigger class of about 40-45 students are

only 3 African American females, three Asians and the rest are White students. The student

make-up of the sixth period ENG 10 Honors class was out of 27 students, there were four

African American females, and the rest of the class consisted of White students. There are not

any ELL or special needs students in any of these classes. These are honor and AP classes only.

None of the students have physical challenges.

Question #3
The posted class rules are as follows:
No skateboards
Follow Dress Code:
No strapless shirts; no hoods or hats; no muscle shirts; no pajama pants or slippers
No graphic T-shirts; no short shorts
No electronic devices/cell phones during instruction
No eating or drinking in class (except bottled water)
No bullying/This includes cyber bullying “Words hurt too”
Ditch School; Ditch Your License.
Question #4
The posted rules are not fully enforced. There was a kid sitting to my left with a skateboard at his

side. Ms. Notaro did not say anything or ask him to take it somewhere else. One young lady was

completing a vocabulary lesson during her cell phone while another male student went to the
back of the classroom and plugged in his phone to charge it. Another female student had a coffee

drink, but Ms. Notaro did ask her to put it on the table in the back of the room. However, she did

not say anything to the other “non-compliant students. There were no rewards or consequences

for the students who were compliant or noncompliant. They were not disrespectful or rude and

the vocab lesson on the phone was done during independent study time.
ASSIGNMENT #2 (Classroom Layout):
Diagram
ASSIGNMENT #2 (Classroom Layout):
Question #1
The workflow of the room in my opinion was very uncomfortable. I don’t feel the space was

used efficiently. The space was overused. There was too much “stuff” in the room carried over

year after year. The room was never updated with new pictures, posters, or ideas. The room did

not reflect different cultures and was not diverse at all.

Question #2

In my opinion, the physical arrangement of the room could be improved by eliminating some of

the clutter. The pictures and posters in the room need to be updated and reflect diversity. Perhaps

adding some shelving for books and turning cabinets so that they are in the corner and not

straight across the back of the room. Maybe something hanging on the wall that is colored coded

like the pockets that you might hang shoes in (but a little bigger) to put student notebooks in, in

an organized fashion on the back wall. Not just in a disarray, stacked high on a table. Also, in an

English literature classroom, I imagine an area, (if space permits) however small, in the back

corner of the room with maybe 3 or 4 small chairs or bean bags and a rug where students could

gather and read and/or discuss in a small group a story or poem that we are discussing in class

during group day.

ASSIGNMENT #3 (Instruction):
Question #1

Ms. Notaro, I observed teaches English 10 Honors AP English Literature and Composition 12.

The weekly schedule for the ENG 10 Honors was as follows:

*Turn in Essays via Turn it In

*Essays will be returned in class

*Vocab lesson together in class

*Class time for Essays

*New Homework assignment is given

*Free time to work on essays in class

*Free time to work on HW for this class or other classes if done with essay

The weekly schedule for the AP ENG LIT & COMP 12 was as follows:

*Review poem by Sylvia Plath

*Review All The King’s Men up to now

*Read and annotate passage together in group

*We will together work on developing a thesis statement

*Work individually on developing your thesis statement for your essay

*Class time to continue reading All The King’s Men

*Class time to work on essay

*I will give you your next reading assignment

Question #2

Instruction is delivered to both the tenth-grade students and the Seniors as a group initially. Once

they separate into their smaller groups (if they do that day) Ms. Notaro will address them in their

group or individually if they work individually if they need her help a she walks around the

classroom.

Question #3

My cooperating teacher’s teaching style is very teacher-centered. She is very traditional in the

works that she selects and even in the way that her classroom is arranged. She stands at the front

of the room and lectures to rows of students. They take notes and take turns reading and

answering questions. The students have no choice in what they will learn or what books will be
selected for them to read. In this sense my cooperating teacher has an Essentialism teaching

philosophy which “focuses on core curriculum of traditional academic topics and traditional

American virtues.” (Sadker and Zittleman, 2016, p.175)

Question #4

Ms. Notaro incorporates the sensory modalities (learning styles) by using overhead presentations

and asking students to physically stand up and highlight key lesson points from the readings. By

doing this she is engaging the visual learners (who learn by seeing) and the haptic learners by

allowing them to move around and learn by being “hands on”. She also goes down each row

during vocab lessons and asks each student to read the word and give the definition from the

book or worksheet. There are also times that she will have students read certain passages from

the stories or poems that they are reading. By doing this she is engaging the students who are

auditory learners. Auditory learners focus on conversations and lectures and they learn by

reciting as well as listening. This helps students to develop strong language communication

skills. (Sadker and Zittleman, 2016, p.35)

Question #5

The 12th grade AP ENG LIT & COMP class was very engaged in the lessons presented. They

were very prepared and read the material ahead of time and were able to participate intelligently

in the conversation. I found this to be the case during each class period. The first class period of

the morning was a little lethargic but they start at seven in the morning. But even they were

engaged after about thirty minutes or so. The tenth grade ENG Honors class was a little bit more

immature but many of them participated with a bit more nudging and questioning from Ms.

Notaro. A lot of them did not have their essays done in advance but a lot of them did do their

vocab lessons. The seniors raised their hands and were more willing to participate voluntarily,
whereas the sophomores did so only when Ms. Notaro went row by row and forced them to

participate.

Question #6

There were no students isolated from the rest of the class in the ENG 10 Honors class. In the AP

ENG LIT & COMP 12 class, there was one student that I found to be isolated. A tall, thin young

man with a fifties hairstyle that looked as though he walked off the set of “Happy Days.” He sat

in the last seat in the last row and did not comment on anything much. Ms. Notaro asked how

everyone was this morning. Then she said it was early and what would it matter if school started

at 8am rather than 7am. “Mr. Happy Days” sat straight up in his seat and said in a loud voice,

“yeah, what would it matter, what would it really matter?” Then he sunk back into his quiet

mode of self. Other than that, he read quietly to himself and didn’t seem to be on the same page

with the rest of the class. He didn’t engage in the lesson or participate in a group when it was

group time. A group of three or four girls gathered in front of him but he stayed solo. The girls

said something, and he snickered slightly, never looking up. The girls made another comment

and I heard him say, “you can break the rules when you understand them Amber.” I think he is

probably very independent, very mature, self-motivated and intelligent. Ms. Notaro left him to

work on his own and never bothered him. I figured he must be that way all the time and she gets

him.

Question #7

Ms. Notaro handles transitions from subject to subject by simply saying, “okay, now we are

going to move on to vocab, etc.” She lets them know if they have more time at the end they can

go back to the previous lesson or they can come in before/after school if they need more help
with a lesson. Her transitions are very effective, and she is never met with any opposition. I think

it is because she gives enough time for each lesson.

Question #8

The 4th period ENG 10 Honors class was the largest and most talkative/disruptive class of the

two days that I observed. The attention getting command used by Ms. Notaro was effective. She

would just stop talking, stand directly in front of the student or students who were being the most

disruptive and look directly at them. After a few seconds to a minute a silence would fall over

the room and the students would stop talking and Ms. Notaro would continue with her lesson. I

didn’t think that such a simple transition would work, but for this teacher it was very effective.

Question #9

The only behavior issues this teacher must deal with in her classes is excessive talking. This is

only in her fourth period ENG 10 Honors class. Again, she would just stop talking, stand directly

in front of the student or students who were being the most disruptive and look directly at them.

She did tell me later that if she was met with a more serious behavior issue, she would take that

student into the hallway and talk to that student one on one. But I did not witness any specific

behavior issues other than the excessive talking by the tenth grade class. She handled that in the

manner that I described above.

Question #10

One procedure that hindered instructional time (but was positive) was when the AP came around

to announce to the Seniors to bring in their financial award letters so that they could be

acknowledged at Senior night. This was done during the beginning of each class period. It took

about ten minutes away from instructional time, but it was positive and necessary. Another

school policy that hinders instructional time is during third period when the Pledge of
Allegiance, thirty seconds of silence, and the school announcements are made. This takes about

ten minutes off instructional time, but I don’t see it as a hinderance either. The Pledge of

Allegiance and 30 seconds of silence teaches t he kids respect and Patriotism to the flag and

Country. The announcements are necessary for them to gain useful information about what is

going on in their school and community. Ms. Notaro does shout outs at the beginning of each

class which takes about five minutes which hinders instructional time but helps to encourage her

students and makes them feel good. She goes to plays and sporting events, etc. during the week.

She gives shout outs to students who participated in extra curricular activities. I thought this was

cool and it made the kids feel good.

ASSIGNMENT #4 (Culture):
Physical Characteristics

Question#1

The school, Silverado High School is one of the older school buildings in the city, but it is a well

kept school. It is an outdoor school meaning when you enter the school yard, a portion of it is

outside when going from class to class or building to building. The school grounds and athletic

fields are well groomed and well maintained by the school gardener. The school building is

painted in the school colors of purple, teal, and white. The teacher parking is in the front of the

school in a fenced in area and the student parking is in the front in an unfenced in area near

visitor parking. The parking lot is hug with lots of parking. There is also additional parking in an

adjacent parking lot on the side street across the street from the school. The morning traffic is of

course busy but flows well. The school buses enter in the parking lot in the back of the school

and don’t interfere with student drop offs in the front of the school. From the parking lot to the

school I did not notice clearly marked cross walks, but maybe I just did not notice. There is clear

signage in the front of the school to direct visitors to the front office which is located at the front
entrance to the school. To the left of the front entrance is the theater. If you turn right and go

down a little way down is the gym. In the middle area is the courtyard which is open to the

outside (but is located within the inside of the school grounds). This is in front of the cafeteria

and is where the kids gather before school and at lunch time. To the left of the entrance is where

the classrooms begin. The English and special Education hallway is where I spent my two days.

Upstairs is the library and Deans’ office and other classrooms. I didn’t get a chance to visit all of

it. Silverado is a big school. A campus monitor was on duty outside of the front of the school as I

entered. The atmosphere felt comfortable and safe. The students and staff were friendly and

greeted me as I walked passed them. The students also looked comfortable in their school

environment.

Question #2

The interior of the school is purple, teal and white Skyhawk theme of Silverado High school

continues as you enter through the security gate which is opened in the morning for student, staff

and visitor entry. There is plenty of adult supervision as the school day begins. The front office

consists of all the offices in one. In the school where I work the office are separate. But at

Silverado all offices are together except the Deans’ office. The registrar, Principal’s office,

Curriculum, attendance and activities office are all located in the main office and their

secretaries. The Athletic office and Deans’ offices are the only exceptions. The carpet and paint

are all in the purple, teal and white themes and the staff wears the shirts with the same theme.

The front office receptionist is in the front/middle of the office. The counselors are also in the

front office.
Culture of the school

Question #1

The school’s mission statement is:

“Our mission at Silverado is to provide a safe, supportive, and challenging environment in which

students will become active, reflective, and creative learners who accept responsibility for

learning, have pride in their community and are prepared to contribute in a culturally diverse

world. Skyhawks strive to be prime examples of honorable, accountable, well-rounded,

knowledgeable, and successful students.”

This mission statement means that Silverado is dedicated to making students feel safe at school,

supported at school and challenged. They want them to be active in all aspects of school life, to

be thoughtful and inspired by learning and take pride in their education and in the community.

They also want them to be accountable for their own education and learn how to get along in a

world with other people who are different from them. The school motto is “Excellence in

Action.” I think this means as the students enter high school and grow into adults they are

changing and growing and seeking to achieve excellence. The school mascot is the Skyhawk. A

Skyhawk is a cartoon super hero bird and it is also the name of a military fighter aircraft. So, my

guess is the Skyhawk represents strength.

Question #2

The staff and student interactions that I encountered from my initial contact until the final day of

my observation were all very pleasant and positive. The office manager was helpful and friendly

as was the front office receptionist and my cooperating teacher. My initial cooperating teacher

had to go to New York with a student group, so she referred the me to the 2nd teacher. Our email

interactions were very friendly and engaging as well. We even joked and emailed one another
several times. Visitors are required to sign in and receive a visitor’s pass or wear your CCSD

badge if you have one. Everyone that I encountered seemed happy to be there.

Question #3

Student to student interactions were typical of teenagers. They laughed, talked, and/or totally

engaged individually in their phones or in the adoring eyes of their girlfriends or boyfriends

before/after school or during lunch. They gathered in the courtyard, cafeteria, hallways or

classrooms before classes.

Question #4

The front office is located at the entrance to the school. The front office is central to the

organization of the rest of the school. To the left of the front entrance is the theater. If you turn

right and go down a little way down is the gym. In the middle area is the courtyard which is open

to the outside (but is located within the inside of the school grounds). This is in front of the

cafeteria and is where the kids gather before school and at lunch time. To the left of the entrance

is where the classrooms begin. The English and special Education hallway is where I spent my

two days. Upstairs is the library and Deans’ office and other classrooms. I didn’t get a chance to

visit all of it. Silverado is a big school. There are classrooms on the east and west sides of the

school, and they are divided by subject. Math, Language, CTE, Science, etc. classes typically

share the same hallways. Each Hallway is clearly marked with the number or name of the office.

Question #5

Silverado has an extensive athletic program offering basketball, baseball, soccer, football,

swimming, track and field, tennis, volleyball, cross country, and softball. They have clubs like

robotics that compete all over the state, DECA, ROTC, language clubs, a cheer team, a student

council, a theater club and a band, choir and orchestra that performs as well. I did not really get a
chance to explore their artifacts, sources of community pride, or community partners. I did view

their extensive trophy case full of trophies for sports and robotics, etc. I was told that they

traditionally have assemblies to commemorate spring dances, Senior prom, the beginning of the

school year and the end of the school year. Spirit week with different themes are common the

week of an assembly as well.

Culture of The Classroom

Question #1

Ms. Notaro expects all her students to succeed in her class. This is evidenced by the amount of

time and effort she put into making sure they understood how to write a proper essay. They were

going to be taking an assessment on essay the following week in the library. This week was a

short week with Friday off. She made herself available to them before and after school and on

her prep period for any students who may have had an open period. She said she would go home

and work four hours to grade essays so that she could return them before Thursday so that they

would know what they needed to work on to pas the assessment next week. She reiterated to

them that outside of any computer malfunctions she would be unable to help them when they

tested on the essays.

Question #2

I can honestly say that outside of “Mr. Happy Days,” in the AP ENG LIT class, there was not

one student that was not willing to participate in Ms. Notaro’s classes. If they did not willingly

participate, she went down the row and called on them and they participated that way. In the

Senior class, she pulled a popsicle stick from a bag with a name on it, and they would have to

participate if their name was called that way. For the most part, no one was unwilling to

participate. The level of student participation in all her classes was above average.
Question #3

The interactions between Ms. Notaro and her students is very positive. They have a good rapport

and the students respect her. Ms. Notaro’s personality is laid back and she speaks in a clam but

firm manner. The distribution of power is clear, she is in full control of her classroom and the

students understand that. She never raises her voice or gets upset. The students know when it is

time to talk and when it is time to get serious.

ASSIGNMENT #5 (Cooperating Teacher Interview):

Question #1

Ms. Notaro had a degree in Human Resources Management, and she became bored with office

work. Her husband’s job took them to Seattle, and she decided he wanted to work with children.

It was then that she decided to work on her master’s degree and teaching certification. That was

the primary reason she became a teacher in her mid-thirties.

Question #2

Ms. Notaro’s states that there are several challenges she faces as a teacher. But among the main

challenges she faces are; finding books and supplies for her students, integration of ELL students

in regular classes, and teacher responsibility of F grades. At first, she found student cell phone

use in the classroom very challenging as well.

Question #3

When students are engaged in learning and she can see she has made a difference in their lives,

Ms. Notaro feels that this is the best part of being a teacher.

Question #4

At the beginning of each school year, Ms. Notaro assigns seats in alphabetical order by last name

with the student’s picture attached to the name. This way she can learn the names, and this also

assist the subs should she need one. Then she will change the seats each quarter. If enough
students agree that they want to change seats. The Seniors were fine with their seating

arrangements, but the tenth graders asked about changing seats.

Question #5

In order to select members of flexible groups, Ms. Notaro will put a “high flyer” with a kid that

is struggling a bit and they will teach one another. She will also put together kids of mixed skill

levels or kids who don’t know each other very well.

Question #6

The main reasons the Ms. Notaro will interact with parents in person is for parent teacher

conferences, open houses, and AP open houses. Most of her parent interactions are by email. She

always keeps written documentation of parent interaction.

Question #7

The amount of grading Ms. Notaro completes on a daily/weekly basis varies because she teaches

honors and AP classes and there are a lot of essays, papers and journals to grade. She said she

used to make a lot of detailed comments which took hours. The comments would be both good

and bad. Now she limits her comments to one word phrases like yes, good, right, etc. She will

just detail what needs to change on other parts of the essay. Sometimes she works 2-4 hours a

night and on weekends grading papers. She has around 140 students and it may take as long as

two weeks sometimes to return papers. She devised an essay comment legend to combat this

problem. She hands it out at the beginning of the year and explains it to the students. Each

comment is numbered so she just puts the number and they can refer to it from the sheet. Foe

example #10 = good point. Ms. Notaro was kind enough to give me a copy of her legend for my

own use. I have attached it below.

Question #8

When Ms. Notaro first started teaching it literally took her hours to prepare lesson plans. She

second guessed herself and it was such a mess. Experience has changed this for her of course.

All the English teachers have the same prep periods, so they get together and prepare lesson

plans together. They co-teach lessons or as one teacher is teaching one lesson, she is teaching

another lesson. This way they can share books because there are never enough. At the beginning

of the school year they get together and plan lessons. Over the summer she goes to consortiums

that help her with lesson planning as well. Ms. Notaro feels that lesson planning is her strength.

Question #9

Silverado High School has a block schedule, which is beneficial in helping Ms. Notaro maximize

her instructional time. Each class period is an hour and fifteen minutes. This way she can split up

the class into instruction, go over future assignments, past assignments, and give time for

individual or group work. This also gives her time to grade papers and record grades.

Question #10

As positive reinforcements for this age group, Ms. Notaro gives shout outs to students at the

beginning of class to students who participate in extracurricular activities that she attends. For

example, this week she gave shout outs to students who participated in the Guys and Dolls

performance. Not only the performers but to anyone who worked the lights or took tickets or had

anything at all to do with the production of the show. The behavioral consequences that she finds

most effective with this age group is taking an individual in the hall during class and talking to

them. She says this embarrasses them and then she will follow this up with a parent phone call.
Question #11

Ms. Notaro has not had a class with a co-teacher. She said if she did, she would have to go back

to that resource teacher for help with resources and ideas. So, to date, she has not had to involve

specialist teachers in her instructional planning process.

Question #12

Ms. Notaro has been teaching for 18 years. She is observed three times per year and evaluated on

a standard NEPF short. Every April she is evaluated on a longer form and rated with a one on

one conference.

Question #13

Ms. Notaro has never had an unfavorable evaluation, but she believes the consequence would

probably be several more observations if this were to happen.

Question #14

Ms. Notaro said that she was most surprised about teaching as a profession when it came to

grading papers as a new teacher. She had no idea how to do this when she first got out of college.

She realized this when she began to nit-pick every detail of every paper and a lot of parents

complained. She realized this was something she did not learn in college.

ASSIGNMENT #6 (Observing a student):

During third period AP ENG LIT & COMP 12, the class reviewed Sylvia Plath’s poem Cut. By

popsicle method, students were selected to go to the front of the room, use the over head

projector and point out specific passages of the poem that explained the character Jack’s view of

Spring. Troy was very excited for his opportunity to go to the front. From the reaction of the rest

other class, I think that Troy is always excited to present. The rest of the class kind of shrunk in

their seats with that “oh know there he goes again” look on their faces. Troy was very confident

and well spoken. He called Plath’s poem very “underwhelming and compared Jack to a soldier
who suffered from PTSD. He applied some of his psychology lessons to the poem in order to

analyze the character jack Burden. His learning style was very hands on and drew from other

lessons that he learned in other classes and connected them to his AP LIT class. Good stuff, I

enjoyed watching Mr. Troy in action. I observed Troy even before he went to the front of the

room. He always had a smile on his face, and he was very engaged form the time he walked into

the room until the time he left. Ms. Notaro said he is a good student and he is always like this.

ASSIGNMENT #7 (Summary):
The field observation experience helps to tie together various concepts from the textbook. For

example, the section on teaching styles, student learning modalities and educational

philosophies. The way I feel about my own educational philosophy being a mixture of

philosophies is even more of a reality to me after this observation. Watching the diversity in the

classroom and seeing how some teachers ignore that diversity is interesting. Some of my fears

about entering the teaching profession have been realized and confirmed as well. The issues of

discipline in the classroom and student cell phone use and the lack of parental support are all real

concerns and fears of mine. They are not enough however for me to shy away from the

profession. Preparing lesson plans is a scary part of teaching to me as well.

On the upside, there are a lot of amazing, experienced teachers out there and I will not have to

reinvent the wheel. I look forward to student teaching and I hope I am paired with a very patient,

creative, experienced teacher who is willing to impart a lot of very useful tricks of the trade upon

me. I will remember to include shout outs and positive reinforcements in my classroom. I hope to

be able to come up with a classroom set-up that is comfortable and inviting yet conducive for

learning. I want a classroom that is inclusive and diverse and changes with the times and student

population.
At the same time, the observation has taught me that there are a lot of things that don’t change

about the teaching profession. Once you have a system of grading and preparing lesson plans you

can carry that over from year to year. I also realized that students’ welcome structure and if you

are firm with the rules in the very beginning and demand respect as well as show respect, they

will respect you. As a teacher you must model the behavior that you expect from students.

Another thing I realize about teachers is that the good one’s love what they do and are dedicated

to their student’s success. Good teachers put in a lot of hours and it is not about the pay it is

about the amount of personal satisfaction they receive when that light bulb goes off and their

students finally “get it.”

I also realize that teachers face a lot of challenges with the lack of pay increases, overcrowded

classrooms, ELL students, being evaluated based on SLG, etc. Those are the downsides of the

profession, but they do not outweigh the upsides of the profession. Educating and preparing

young minds to become fully functioning members of a diverse society. To me, being a teacher

is like being a painter with a blank canvas and a fresh palette of brightly colored paint and brand

new paint brushes. Ready to see what type of masterpiece I can create for all the world to

experience!