Kelly Johanson

Student Teaching Reflection

May 3rd, 2020

Fred Assam Elementary

During my senior year at Dakota State University I was privileged to be placed in the Brandon

Valley school district for a full year of student teaching. I student taught in a 1 st grade classroom at Fred

Assam Elementary with my cooperating teacher, Mrs. Brandy Brakke. The classroom consisted of 22

students and a Walk to Read classroom which once consisted of 26 students. In the classroom, it was

one of my main goal to create positive relationships with the students and build rapport. As the year is

coming to an end, I do believe I reached my goal as I do feel as those 22 students were my kiddo’s and I

care deeply about each and every one of them. As distance learning is still taking place, I am continuing

those relationships via SeeSaw and other ways and plan to throughout the summer.

I learned a lot and have grown as an educator during my student teaching year. I learned how

important is to be prepared but also to be just as flexible. There were many times that something came

up that would make us have to switch around what we were doing. For example, a last-minute

assembly; I learned that things will not always go as planned and that’s okay. I also experienced having a

lesson that you prepared not go so well. It was a math lesson and they were looking at me like I was

crazy; I quickly had to think of another way for the students to understand the lesson. That was

something I am very glad I experienced. Lesson plans are not always going to go as well as you expected

but it’s so important that we learn from that and keep pushing and helping your students succeed.

The next thing I learned is the importance of a schedule. I have never realized until my student

teaching year how important it is to have a consistent schedule. That just falls in place with classroom

management and will make the classroom flow so much better. I have also experienced the importance
it is to the kids. One of the students was so set on that, and if something were to change, it was a little

bit of a struggle for him. It’s very important to include your schedule in your morning messages so kids

are prepared for the day.

The next thing I learned was the importance of creating engaging lesson plans. The students

want to get up and moving, using manipulatives, not just listening through a lecture. When I was

creating my lesson plans, I always tried to have some sort of manipulative or visual so they could

physically see and touch to enhance learning. Kids also love to learn through technology; I am always

researching ways that students can be learning on the iPads to deepen their learning. I have learned that

formative assessments are very important to ensure we are filling any gaps before we move on. A lot of

the times there were the same group of kids that would struggle. For that, I would do a whole-group

lesson and then when students would move onto their work, I would move to a small-group with those

struggling kids for furthering instruction. That seemed to help those students as they were able to have

more one-on-one instruction.

Fred Assam had a block of time called, “Walk to Read.” With Walk to Read, students were

placed in different classrooms based on reading scores and their abilities. My Walk to Read classroom

was the strategic group; so we were right in the middle. I liked having Walk to Read because although

students were already placed in a group based on their skills, we were able to further place them in

groups where they had similar needs and were really able to help them succeed in phonics and reading.

During Walk to Read, students were completing Daily 5 stations while teachers were doing guided

reading groups.

One thing about Brandon Valley that I liked was that they have the “Lynx Way.” This held

students accountable for being safe, respectful, responsible, kind, and an active learner. Not only did we

help students be successful in the classroom, but also creating a path for them to be successful outside
of the classroom as well. That is something that I will always take with me wherever I go as that’s

another goal of mine; to create kind, caring human beings.

Lastly, I wanted to talk about classroom management. I learned a lot about classroom

management, and to create a smooth-running classroom takes lots of practice within the classroom. The

first couple of weeks was spent practicing routines in the classroom, I couldn’t believe how fast it went.

While practicing classroom routines it is also important to have the students practice it exactly how you

want it to look before moving on or else the students will not do it how you wanted/pictured. I learned

the importance of being consistent with consequences and rewards. You can’t give one student a

consequence for something, and give another student a different consequence for doing the same

action. I give lots and lots of praise, so again that’s something I will need to be consistent with.

There were many things I’ve learned during my time at Fred Assam Elementary to help me feel

confident and ready to run my own classroom. I am so happy that I was placed in Brandon Valley to

reach the high expectations the school district sets. In my future classroom there will be positive

relationships formed, a structured classroom management setting, consistency, and students being

successful in and out of the classroom.