Entry Nine

     I've decided to continue working towards becoming a professional teacher. I feel I've come to learn much more about what teachers do and what is expected of them. I really respect teachers who put in the effort to fulfill their roles and even go the extra mile for their students to make it an enjoyable experience for them to learn and to grow academically and as a person. Especially my Service Learning teacher, during my hours with her I feel I've learned a lot from her from my time spent in her classroom this semester.
     I feel that this is the career path for me because I really enjoyed getting to work with the kids, mainly one-on-one, and try to help them to succeed. I just loved getting to see their excitement whenever they accomplished their goals. So I would definitely have to say that Service Learning has helped to influence my decision. I just loved the time I got to spend in the classroom and see what teaching is like and gain ideas, or techniques, that I would like to use in my own classroom one day.
     My next steps would have to be to work on strengthening my weaknesses to help me to become a better teacher one day. I do struggle with being shy and I have been trying to work on overcoming it. I feel that I am slowly making progress and that Service Learning has helped me to overcome some of my shyness and helped me to open up a little more these past few months. Finally, another step would be to get the most I can out of my classes for the next two years, as I am going to be starting the Elementary Program, so that I can apply what I learn to better help my students to succeed academically and help them to have a happy and successful future of their own.

Entry Eight

     I feel that I have been making connections between course topics and my Service Learning. It's been helpful to take what I've been learning online and actually observe it in a classroom. I've also noticed when I am learning and when I understand what I'm learning due to the many online recourses throughout the course and the experience that Service Learning has given me.

    Blogging has been helpful to make connections between what I have been learning and seeing within a classroom. It's helped me to think more and to actually look for the connections. Finally, I feel that one area of learning that I've had since the first post is having a greater understanding of how important it is to have your classroom be an engaging learning environment, that students feel safe both physically and emotionally within the classroom, and to have multiple recourse, or teaching strategies, because students don't all learn the same.

Entry Seven

    Since I am doing my service learning in an English Immersion Program I see more evidence of standards for English. I know that one day during class the teacher I work for told her students and gave them examples of what she expected from them when it came to their quality of writing, or for their speech, because of what they've already learned from first grade and from their current school year so far. Then later that same day she addressed some standards that I remembered reading from our module on standards and accountability such as being able to identify the main purpose of text (Reading: informational text standard 6) and on capitalization, punctuation, and spelling (Language Standard 2).
    There is definitely more emphasis on the English standards. English is only taught because the class I am in focuses solely on English for half the day until the class switches teachers and then focus on the other subjects, such as math, for the last half of the day with a different teacher. I think this is for students to better get the help and attention that they need for each subject by having two teachers who work with them each day on different subjects and meet the standards.

Entry Six

    Since we are not able to ask about specific information I can assume that there are racial, cultural, and religious diversity based on my time volunteering at my service-learning classroom. There are probably a few others among my service-learning classroom that are not as easily known or seen. One way that the teacher is addressing them is through the student of the week where students are able to share about their lives which introduces the rest of the class to both their similarities and differences when it comes to each of their backgrounds in a positive and uplifting fashion. I can only assume that some students have learning disabilities based on how the teacher makes time to give those students extra one-on-one, or sometimes group, activities to better help them to succeed in a way that they understand. 
    The teacher always uses multiple strategies for teaching her lessons. For example, when it comes to the weekly spelling words she will have students write them down on their own after telling them the words and provide them with imagery if two words sound alike, but are spelled differently. Another way is she provides nine fun and easy activities each week for their spelling words of which they can choose any three to complete as homework. One activity might be to write consonants in blue and vowels in red for each word. Also, she has the class come together to figure out the alphabetical order of the spelling words and to use each word in a sentence with a partner.

Entry Five

   I would have to say that I definitely see support for English learners because I am doing my service-learning in an English Immersion Program. This program is all about helping students to better learn English. The classes I am working with focuses solely on English and get support through one-on-one fluency readings, small group readings, and individual and class activities.
    I would have to say that some of what I see in my service-learning classroom is a result of Brown v. Board of Education, a variety of other court cases, and the No Child Left Behind Act. I can tell due to what appears to be a somewhat wide range of race diversity within the classroom, but the main ones being Caucasian, African American, and Hispanic. Along with having multiple races I am more than sure each has their own religious beliefs. 
    Each student is given an equal opportunity to learn with no bias by participating in the same activities as everyone else. Although those who need that extra help in learning English are given more one-on-one activities to help prevent them from falling behind and not learning.

Entry Four

     I'm not sure if I can name three examples, only two, of how my cooperating teacher engages the learners in meaningful ways. This is mainly because I have been given the opportunity to work with students one-on-one so I don't always get to see what is happening within the classroom. Although one way she does engage them, that I enjoy, is that while learning, or introducing, new words she has the students gather on a square rug and for each word they pair up with the person next to them and use the word in a sentence. They also write the words out using their finger on a person's back or on the floor in front of them.
     A second way that she engages learners is that she has the class take turns in groups of about five to use the computers that are available in the back of the classroom to help with their English. Although I am not entirely sure what the specific activities are, but I know the students look forward to having their turn to use and practice on the computers daily.
     Finally, it was hard to think of one example where the instruction was not particularly engaging. This was because I feel like she has been very engaging with the class. One lesson I suppose could change would be the worksheets for their new spelling words that they fill out on their own. I guess she could have them work in small groups together instead of individually. Instead of having them doing just a worksheet, certain physical activities could be included into it. One activity that could be used was shown in a video clip in an earlier module where students are given a certain amount of cut out letters to form their words as well as others.

Entry Three

    What I have noticed while doing my service-learning is that when it comes to making students feel loved I noticed on my first day that she has a student of the week where each student has an opportunity to make a poster all about them and students get to ask them questions. 

    She also has it so when it's a student's birthday the class sings to them, they get to tell the class what they are wishing to get for their birthday, and their classmates each write them a birthday wish that they hope that they get, which is then given to them. 

    When it comes to recognizing students' skills and encourage a positive classroom community she points out what a student has done right to the class and usually gives them class money. Also, to establish a positive relationship she gives each student as many positive and remarks as she can whether it's to the class as a whole, working with a small group, or working one-on-one. 
    She usually puts a lot of focus on what students were able to do whether what they weren't able to do and give them inspiration to try harder and keep doing what they're doing. She will also reinforce her comments by giving students fist bumps, telling them to give themselves a pat on the back, or gives high fives.