Last semester we were introduced to the FEAPS which has six areas of focus for the quality of instruction. This semester, I chose one goal from the instructional design and lesson planning section, the instructional delivery and facilitation section, and the assessment section. From the instructional design and lesson plan section I chose (a) aligns instruction with state-adopted standards at an appropriate level of rigor. I picked this goal because I was always interested in how teachers design their lesson to fit the standards they need to teach. I also would like to learn how to adjust my instruction to fit the needs of my higher level students and my lower level students. The goal I chose for the instructional delivery and facilitation is (i) support, encourage, and provide immediate and specific feedback to students to promote student achievement. I chose this goal because it is something I believe I need to improve on. I find it easy to support and encourage students, because I believe they can all achieve, so it is easy for me to show. I also want them all to feel confident in their abilities because in order to achieve, they have to believe in themselves, so I always try to provide the encouragement they need. But I have trouble providing specific feedback to the students on their work. I do not know how much feedback to provide before it becomes too overwhelming for the students, and I do not want to have them feel discouraged because I have them too much instructional feedback, so this is something I need to improve on. My third goal from the assessment section is (c) uses a variety of assessment tools to monitor student progress, achievement, and learning gains. I chose this goal because I know there are many assessment tools we can use to monitor students and I want to learn when it is appropriate to test students and which tools to use for the testing purpose. A variety of events have happened in my classroom this semester and last semester that have also influenced my decision to choose these goals.
This semester, I have taken on the responsibility of teaching math, and I am really enjoying it. I tried a lot of different methods to teach, like using the marker board and the overhead. I did not like using the marker board because I felt like I was blocking the board when I was writing and that I had my back to the students to much. The students also said that it was hard to see some of the writing on the board, so my CT decided to use the overhead. Using the overhead allowed the students to see the writing better, and I liked using the overhead better, but I had one problem. Our overhead was in the back of the classroom and when I was teaching, I could not see the students and they could not see me. This did not allow me to see their faces to see if they understood the material or if they were getting confused. I talked to my CT about this issue and she said she would look into fixing the issue.
Another event happened in my classroom that pertains to classroom management. On Thursday, I go into my classroom in the afternoon after my students come back from lunch, and when I walked into the room, my CT had rearranged our classroom. The guided reading table is now near the windows and the library is on the left when I walk into the door. As it turns out, my CT rearranged the room while the students were at lunch, so they were just as surprised as I was. I asked my CT why she decided to rearrange the room and she said it was because she felt that it was time for a change. She said she used to have the guided reading table near the window years before, but she had to move it due to weather issues. But since the issue got fixed, she was able to move the table to where she liked it, near the window in the light. Along with this change, my CT is also thinking about assigning new seats to our students. We both think that the students are in need of a seat change because of some behavior problems. We think that changing seats may reduce some of the problems we have been having, plus it will give the students opportunities to work with new classmates, enabling them to form new friendships within the class.
In my Integrating Exceptional Students class, we read an article called People First Language by Kathie Snow. This article was about using person first language when talking about people who have disabilities. Instead of saying the autistic boy, you would say the boy who has autism. People First Language emphasizes recognizing people and their characteristics first, not their disability. There is more to a person, like their kindness, or funniness, than just their disability. Using this language takes away the harshness and hurtfulness of calling someone a diabetic or autistic, which fails to recognize the person’s qualities, instead of someone who has diabetes or someone who has autism. My professor said that even calling students such as RTI students instead of students who are in an RTI program can be damaging to the student. This language fails to recognize the positive qualities in the student and just places emphasis in the fact that they are in an RTI program. I honestly never realized, or thought to use language like this around my students, and I wonder the kind of effect it has on my students. I also don’t hear a lot of person first language at my school which now concerns me. I wonder if this has any effect on our students. After reading this article, I will make an honest effort to use people first language.