Weekly reflection – October 25th to October 29th

Difficult to believe just how fast things have moved by this semester. Every week is feeling like

its evaporating! Over this practicum, Phil has really preached to me the values of being proactive

with the amount of work you do in the now to save yourself time in the future. This applied more

specifically to the practice of report cards, which I’ll get into later. However, since I have run

into a lot of issues that stemmed from a lack of planning on my part during the first month of my

practicum, I really have tried to stay a few days to a week ahead since. The difference in both the

quality of my activities and my lessons has been astronomical. My activities are much more

articulately planned out, but the most noticeable difference has been the amount of time I have to

fix things. Planning things at least a few days in advance gives you more time to look things over

and make any necessary last-minute changes. Before, I was noticing mistakes mere hours before

handing my students materials (or even worse, after I had handed my students their materials).

Now, I have much more time to fix things and work that is riddled with mistakes is not being

handed to my students.

Writing report cards was honestly a really enjoyable experience. It was a lot of work, but it was a

great opportunity for me and Phil to actually work closely in a one-on-one setting – something

we haven’t had many opportunities to do. Coming up with comments that can apply to a broad

range of student strengths and weaknesses can be difficult. However, I felt that because I have

built a good rapport with all of my students, I was able to personally tailor every single one of

the students report card comments.