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Summer Burns

Dr. Nolte

English 419

22 February 2020

Becoming Comfortable within the Environment:

Reflection on Week 1

When coming into Spring Valley, I was in slight shock because of how many students

were within the school, and automatically assumed that the classroom size would equally reflect

my perception; however, I was quickly mistaken because my class size averages about 20 to 23

students. This week was a shorter week because of the holiday that students received on

Monday. While I have a shorter week, I still would like to address a vast amount of information

within my reflection. Within this weeks reflection, I want to focus in on classroom management,

the learning that takes place, learning outcomes that seem to be guiding learning, the technology

being used, and some of the doubts, issues, and concerns that I have found within the clinical

experience thus far.

Classroom management is different than what I am used to primarily because of the

relaxed disposition that Mr. F takes when dealing with the students. The first day of my clinical,

I was informed by Mr. F that he has a harder time managing the female students than he does the

males because the females tend to maintain a complex of superiority (my paraphrasing, not his

own words). During this day, I dealt with Mr. F’s 2nd period class and his PLC (Professional

Learning Community) class. One female argued with him during his 2nd period, and instead of

maintaining a no tolerance disposition, he argued with her until she got the last word in. In my

opinion, his ability to maintain his classroom is little to nonexistent unless some larger issues
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occur. By this I mean that on Friday, there was an incident within the school that had all the

children stirred up about hypothetical scenarios. Mr. F was firm and in command with the

students by getting on to them 3 times, and then offering to send the next person to the office

who decided to speak on behave of the incident. Aside from the specified scenarios, Mr. F also

attempts to maintain control by keeping his room in rows instead of groups. This works for all

but one class period. The 3rd period students still yell across the room, and will argue with him

argue if called out on it. One aspect of his management style that I do like, as of this point, is his

idea of making students download documents needed for classroom work and homework that

way students cannot use the lack of internet as an excuse for the incompleteness of their work.

Learning is an interesting topic within this class because of the style in which curriculum

is delivered. To begin, students are given additional time to complete work, but are expected to

be on top of themselves for completion of the work. For example, students have context clue

words that they receive every Monday. On the following Monday, students are to take a quiz on

the words without any additional reminders given to them throughout the week. The only

downside to this, is that the quizzes are only considered for extra credit because of the lack of

individuals who prepare and participate. This type of learning is mainly implemented across all

9th grade classes as they are attempting to keep students in good standing, and to help with their

transition, from middle school to high school. Reading wise, Wayne County schools do not get

novels supplied to their classrooms, so Mr. F only teaches one novel a year which is what the

students are working on currently. I don’t prefer this type of learning because of how much I

believe reading should be focused upon, but I can understand the lack of control that Mr. F has

within this situation. Additional learnings that students participate in are the “Weekly Reading”
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from Kelly Gallagher’s website, quote of the day activities, and a Bell Ringer every morning.

Mr. F maintains a routine in order to assist with the students transitions.

Learning outcomes and technology that is used within the classroom is very similar to

that of the learning: it is very routine and stays the same on a daily basis. Technology that is used

within the classroom is the student’s laptops, their phones, and the smartboard at the front of the

room. These items are used daily because Mr. F used Schoology for all of the student’s

assignments, and the smartboard for all of the critical learnings. I believe that this would be a

great idea for a classroom, but the students take advantage of the laptops. Many students are

caught cheating on assignment, playing games instead of working, or working on a different

class’s homework. The smartboard is affective because it cuts down on the paper being used

daily and makes sure that all students could get their work done even if they forgot their laptop at

home. The learning outcomes that seem to be used revolve around expansion of vocabulary,

reading comprehension, and low stake writing assignments.

I have a few concerns about this clinical this semester, primarily because of the lack of

control that Mr. F has with the students. Throughout the past 4 days, I have heard students cuss

him without being sent to the office, had students intentionally do things he asked for them not to

do without being acknowledged by him, cheating that goes unnoticed, students (and Mr. F) on

their phone throughout the entirety of the class, and yelling that is typically only warned once or

twice and then is forgotten about for the rest of the period. One aspect he said he doesn’t tolerate

was arguing, but after observing the classroom, I saw no difference with his way of handling the

situation. My last concern is that Mr. F doesn’t have me assist with anything in the classroom.

He has me set off in the back corner and said the only time I will really interact with the students
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is during my time teaching. While he is very friendly, I fear that the students won’t take to me

teaching since they have had no interaction with me up to this point.

Week Two: Understanding How Curriculum is Taught

Since my first day, Mr. F’s classroom has maintained a routine pattern for the students in

order to assist them with knowing what is going on each day and assisting kids with being

prepared. A prime example of this is through their context clues assignments. Every week,

students receive ten new context clues. The way that this works is that the first Monday they

receive ten words, and the continue this trend every Monday until the students receive forty

words. This is repeated from the beginning of the year to the end of the year. I really like this

best practice because it demonstrates the repetition students need in order to grasp the concepts

that are having to deal with and produce more concrete knowledge within them. Another best

practice I have learned from my teacher is the use of the “Article of the Week” by Gallagher. I

really enjoy this practice because is forces students to work with analysis, the creation of

summaries, provides them with time to work on their MLA, and students must learn to provide

opinions that can be supported with a text. I believe this does more for students than most papers

do, but students also get the chance to practice voicing their opinion in a respectful way.

As far as my perspective of the classroom, it has gotten better since my first week;

however, I am still concerned about how the students will respect me when I go to teach. The

only reason I am still leery about this is because of their inability to acknowledge me when I try

to help them in class, and their inability to even respect the teacher they have. They can be really

great kids, but I just feel like they aren’t accepting of learning to hardly any extent. Another

question I have is, am I the one who is supposed to get onto them if they are behaving poorly, or
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does my host teacher step in on that? I just want to be prepared. I know that I most likely will

have no issues, but I would rather know how to respond in case something happened and I

needed to.

Assessing The Classroom: Week 3 Reflection

Assessment within my 9th grade class is a regular occurrence and one that seems to be beneficial

to some extent. The way in which my clinical teacher has the classroom set up is that if you at

least try (or make an attempt) then you will pass the class with a C. the way in which he does this

is by making all of the assignments worth a good chunk of points, and by providing students with

roughly 700 points per every 6 weeks. This means that students are assessed regularly and hardly

ever come out of class without earning a grade for the day. Some of the assessments that he does

consists of “context clues”, “article of the week”, “a summative test at the end of each 6 weeks,

and small participation assignments. The first two assessments that I names are things in which

he does weekly. Every Monday, students are given new context clues and a new article of the

week. They are given time at the end of every class period to work on the items, but they are

ultimately things that the students have to be responsible for. Both of these items combined are

worth probably 50% of the points each 6 weeks. By saying this, it is also important to note that

the 50% is broken down in to 6 “article of the week” and 6 “context clues” with 1 “context

clues” quiz. The article of the week assesses students on their ability to be objective when

looking at a text, forming opinions based on your understanding of the text, and developing

strong MLA utilization. The context clues help students strengthen their vocabulary, understand

meaning based on the words surround the one they don’t know, and asks that students recall the

words they learn each week to apply them to a quiz. All of these components combined do assess
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what students are learning; however, the students are learning the same thing each and every

week. They maintain a routine, so students are never going past the development of the basic

skills being taught.

When looking into a situation that occurred within the classroom that I didn’t like, I would have

to discuss the situation with the substitute teacher. The Friday of my second week there, Mr. F

was absent which meant that we received Mrs. C. for a substitute. She was a retired teacher who

only continues to sub because she knows there is a shortage of substitute teachers in the county.

What had happened was that during my 3rd period class, the students got this substitute talking

about things not pertaining to the class work at all. The reason this was upsetting to me was

because during this discussion, one of the young ladies (student C) got Mrs. C talking about

children born out of wed lock, a movement in the 60’s or 70’s that had women burning their

bra’s, and Mrs. C allowed student C to tell another student that they looked like a transgender.

The last incident spiraled out of control causing student C and student Z to curse at one another

back and forth, all while Mrs. C stood beside them listening. This incident happened all because

Mrs. C had made the students believe that she was the cool substitute who was going to let them

play on their phones all period. If Mrs. C had stuck to the plan provided by Mr. F then the entire

situation could have been avoided, and the bickering would have been nonexistent. I think what I

learned the most here is that you can’t allow students to see you as their friend. You are there for

them, but you are their teacher first and those boundaries need to be maintained. Throughout the

whole incident, I just wish I knew my place a little better because I felt like I should have said

something to student C and put an end to it myself, but then I would’ve been crossing boundaries

of respect with Mrs. C.

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Week Four: Understanding Public School

Public school is a wonderful experience and a tough spot all wrapped up into one. For

teachers, public school can be seen as restricting and rewarding. Looking into the perspective

that the public school teachers I have met this semester maintain a perspective of stress when

looking at school. For discipline, the teachers hate it because they feel like they receive no

support regarding their rules for the students. My teacher, in particular, had a hard time sending

students to the office because he said they typically just get sent back with a warning. Continuing

the route of discipline, teachers often struggle with getting parents to support them for when their

student has acted up, not submitted any assignments, or is in trouble for a larger issue. Mr. F said

that he picks and chooses which parents to discuss issues with because many of them take the

side of the student regardless of severity of the issue. Another issue with public schools is the

fact that you have to meet the standard of the state while also meet the requirements for the

school. I know that during my time here, Mr. F had to have a touch meeting with the principals

and other English teachers because they wanted to take away reading all together for 9th grade

students, and instead make 9th graders partake in grammar activities.

Switching over to the student outlook, public schools are a luck of the draw. Some students are

able to get great teachers from the beginning and some not so much. If students are fortunate

enough to get a good teacher, they can succeed. If students aren’t so fortunate, they can

sometimes slip through the cracks. Two students within my 3rd period class are examples of

students who slip through the cracks. All of there teachers believed they wouldn’t succeed

because neither of them have done a single thing since the beginning of the school year;

however, student C and student J surprised everyone on Friday. I gave the students the

assignment which was to take the point of view of one of the characters within the short story.
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These two students didn’t want to join a group, so I didn’t make them; instead, I let them do it on

their own and just provided them with more attention. They ended up winning the point of view

debate based on Mr. F and some of their classmate’s vote. These students had been slipping

through the cracks because they got by with it, but the second someone didn’t let them get by

with it, they were incredible.

Technology within the classroom has been extremely overused to the point that students are told

what to do, and then turned loose on their laptops for the remainder of the period. However,

students actually hate technology in the classroom. Throughout this week, I kind of took the

technology away from the students to see how they could perform without it. They surprised me

to the point that they were happy to be off of it. Students actually told me that by the halfway

point in the day, their heads are hurting because they are on their laptops in every class. While I

do think that having a laptop for students is important, I also believe that the overuse of it makes

it to where students are being taught my documents on a screen instead of by their teachers. I am

not at all claiming that Mr. F doesn’t teach his students because he does, but there are days when

there is little to no contact between the students and him. I do think that with the corona virus

happening, the technology has been a blessing to the students because with it, they are able to

still complete their schoolwork and keep themselves caught up without fear of falling behind or

forgetting what is going on. As far as concerns go, I actually don’t have any from this past week.

My students did great with my teachings. Mr. F hasn’t had any negative feedback for me

regarding my performance, and my supervisor only had the complaint regarding my explanation

to the students. I finally felt comfortable within the school, and I felt comfortable with the

students.