Michelle Nitchman

EDSP 200

Community Engagement Project

Throughout this semester, I was able to work between two English Language Learners

who were in my field placement class. These two boys are both quite the character, energetic,

and unbelievably smart. I cherished my time working with them individually and am grateful for

the impacts they have made on me and my teaching. As a teacher, I learned first-hand the

benefits of building great, personal relationships with students prior to presenting them with any

content. We must get to know each student as an individual, discover their strengths and

weaknesses, understand their interests, and meet their needs before they will be ready for

instruction. The relationships I made with these two boys from the beginning of my field

experience, made our time together so effective.

I feel that our sessions were very beneficial and fun, while remaining on task and helping

them achieve learning goals. The only thing I would change would be to have more regularly

occurring sessions. Since I was only in the field two days a week, I believe that the learning was

not maximized. If we had been able to meet daily for a scheduled period of time, the consistency

would have helped immensely. Especially in terms of identifying letters and their sounds, which

was a main focus for these English Language Learners, improvements would have been much

more drastic and noticeable if we had met more frequently.

I have never viewed students with disabilities as an inconvenience or in a negative light.

It can be challenging, but it is so worth the extra time, effort, and patience put in to teach these

students with different abilities. I believe that students with disabilities are capable of achieving
to the same level as their general education peers, and they should be given those same high

expectations. I know that giving disabled students extra time and practice with various content

helps them to become confident in their abilities.

This experience showed me how much patience is required when working with students

who have disabilities, while showing me how rewarding it is! Nothing made me more excited

than when the boys would give me a huge high five with the biggest smile on their faces, proud

of their accomplishments. We would celebrate together, and I enjoyed being able to experience

these milestones with them. This experience helped me improve my ability to work with

disabled students by igniting that passion inside of me. Prior to this experience, I had never

considered focusing my degree towards Special Education. Though my heart still lies in Early

Childhood, I am very eager to work with students who have disabilities in my future classroom

and get some more involvement with them!

The two boys I worked with continued to amaze me every day. Though there is a

language barrier, I did not let it interrupt their learning or become an obstacle. I was surprised at

how much Spanish I remembered from my high school and early college years. I finally got to

put it to use in the real world and know that the two boys were surprised that I knew their home

language. I was able to use this skill that was in my back pocket to differentiate the delivery of

content and maximize learning for these boys. I was also surprised by the constant positivity and

desire to achieve in these young children. On days where we worked on harder concepts or if

they could not quite remember a color we talked about during our previous session, the boys

never gave up. I was shocked at their motivation and persistence, even when they are faced with

challenges in communication with myself and the rest of the class.