veinteuno

Today’s class time was spent taking a quiz. The role of a teacher is to help guide students along a path of learning. Teachers are supposed to help students to think in ways that they wouldn’t normally think and help them to grow intellectually and as a person. In the first half of the class period the class is entirely freshmen. In the second half of the class period there is one sophomore and the rest are freshmen. About half of the class actually cares about actually learning, the rest just want to get through the class. No specific management techniques stick out.

20

The lesson was reviewing for a quiz. The students all were engaged because they had to respond verbally. The teacher expects that when she asks to put everything under their desks every student will comply. The teacher threatens a referral if a student misbehaves. This hardly ever happens though so it isn’t a very effective threat. The 100% strategy is used and when a student misbehaves the teacher calls them out on it immediately.

19

The lesson today was practicing conjugation of different
verbs. The teacher monitors learning with tests and by asking questions and
having students answer. Students do work sheets, answer questions, and play
games. There is no differentiation between different students.

19

The lesson today was practicing conjugation of different
verbs. The teacher monitors learning with tests and by asking questions and
having students answer. Students do work sheets, answer questions, and play
games. There is no differentiation between different students.

18

Today’s class period was spent taking a test so there was no
lesson or differentiation. Teachers let students pick different projects.
Teachers also let students pick whether or not to work in a small group or a
large group or by themselves.
I can keep the students in mind, not just the lesson. The
lesson is worthless if the kids don’t retain it. So I’ll get to know my
students and teach accordingly to how they learn the best.

17

The lesson today was reviewing for the test that the class
has tomorrow. The teacher differentiates by doing a different sort of lesson
everyday. Today for example was spent reviewing by playing jeopardy. They were
allowed to work in teams which helped the students to work together to
understand the material. The teacher first goes over the bell ringer and
culture fact everyday, then they review homework or passes back work sheets.
The lesson for the day follows and then she hands out homework right before the
bell rings. The teacher plans what day she wants to have the test by and the
quizzes and then goes through and picks what she wants too have them know by
each day. How can you plan out lessons for everyone? How can you plan it out so
that the students are challenged but don’t give up?

16

The lesson today was reviewing question words and teaching
the students a song to help remember them. It was to the Gilligan’s Island
theme. I know from my classes that using songs in language classes helps the
students to understand and remember different concepts. The students are being
assessed today by the teacher asking questions and then either answering them
or working together to answer them. There’s about 10% of the class spent on
direct instruction and 89% on cooperative learning with the teacher asking
stuff and the students answering. There is no independent learning in class and
minimal discussion. The teacher’s very good at fixing misconceptions and
correcting them. There are no exit slips or anything like that ever.

Quince

Today the period was spent first going over homework and then going over the test that they took yesterday. My ideal school would have a block system. I like the block
system better for Spanish because more can get done in class. With the block system
reviewing homework wouldn’t take up half the period so you’d still have time to
go over homework answer questions and then go over new material and start on the
new homework in case the students have issues. I believe that it’s easier to
absorb the language with block system because you’re dealing with it for a
longer period of time. With the period split like it is right now for Spanish right
about when your brain gets used to the language again the class period is over
and that’s rather useless. I’d like a principal that cares about the students
and cares equally about all aspects of learning. The 100% technique is used
sometimes but that’s really it. Most techniques are not used at all which makes
me wonder what the class would look like if they were used.

14

Todays lesson was ensuring that the students understand the vocabulary from the new chapter and have ways to remember them. I feel like the thing that has reaffirmed I'd like teaching is that it's never boring. It's most definitely not just a desk job and there's never a dull moment. Every single class is different and unique and they're different EVERY day. I really like that because I would not be content being in a job doing the same thing every day. The thing that has made me question teaching is I don't know how I'd handle a crazy class. Often in class when stuff gets out of hand the teacher either doesn't get it back under control or yells to get them to pay attention. I don't think I'd be okay with either of those strategies so I don't know what I'd do. The teacher teaches for different learners by using different ways to teach lessons every time, switching it up.

trece

The lesson today was over adding 'isimo' to the end of adjectives to have it mean very ____. The rest of class was spent reviewing for the test tomorrow so they played jeopardy with vocab, ser and estar, culture and sentences as the catagories. Important dates are written up on the board so the class knows when their quizzes and tests are. Also every day there's a DO NOW. The 100% strategy was followed, she waited until all students had paper on their desks and nothing else. Technology could be used to play review games online, take notes on the computer. As a review the teacher could have a fake test online and have the students see how they'd do so they'd know what they need to focus on. Student's are partially engaged, they're doing individual teams so everyone is on their own team so everyone's listening but there's not much insentive to do well and pay attention. If there were prizes for winning I think the class would be more engaged. When I was in Spanish the teacher would either have candy, pencils, stickers, or weird random things like silly putty. Another option would be awarding extra credit to whomever wins. This keeps the students more involved and excited about learning and doing well. Cooperative teaching is in use today with the teacher asking questions and the students answering.

12

The lesson today was reviewing estar versus ser and also using emotional words. The learning goal was that all of the students would be able to complete the worksheet with accuracy to show that they understood the lesson. The teacher used the hundred percent technique minimally but it was effective. When she asked the students to take out their stamp sheet and their homework the students all did so immediately, 100% compliance. When asked to clean off their desks some of th students did not do so immediatlely, and others placed their items next to their desk instead of underneath them. The teacher reminded the class what they were supposed to do and waited for them to comply. Most of the time the 100% is not tested, the teacher does not wait or ask for students to do something before she started talking. It seemed to still work well though because when she did ask something or say something even if the kids were talking they did what was asked. The DO NOW technique is in use but doesn't work well because the kids just mess around. The fast transitions works well, student's do it automatically and with minimum time lost. However, during transitions the students are usually still talking which gets them off subject. The student's asked why they'd use ser in the sentence for the homework. The class asked each other how to best answer the questions on the work sheet. 100% compliance is necessary because otherwise the authority of the teacher is put in question and classroom order is lost. If student's don't think they HAVE to do what the teacher asked then they mostly likely won't. If student's don't do what the teacher asks then they might as well not be there, nothing will be accomplished or learned in the classroom.

11

Today's class time was spent going over homework from yesterday over the verbs ser and estar this took about half of hte class period. The rest of the time was spent playing a game. Cooperative learning was used because the student's had to work as individuals and as a team. They played with fly swatters and had to go up to the board and hit the correct tense of the verb. The bell ringer is still used every day as one of Lemov's strategy. Student's were assessed in the game by whether or not they could quickly identify/identify at all the different tenses of the verbs. There wasn't much positive reinforcement that went on, some of the students blatantly said "i don't know this, so you better just go fast and get it" to the person they're competing against. One team had 4 and the other had 0 points at one time and so there was positive reinforcement from the winning team but the other team thought they sucked. The teacher didn't really encourage the students.

diez!

Today's class period was spent reviewing for a quiz that they have tomorrow. The only learning that happened was the teacher would call out words and hold up the cards and the class would repeat them. There was a DO IT, which she calls a bell ringer where the students every day come in and translate the sentence from spanish into english. Student's are being assessed as a class. The class was pretty hectic today and it didn't seem like the teacher had a lot of control.

9

The lesson today was just reviewing for the vocabulary quiz
that the class has on Thursday. Everyday the class comes in and sits down in
their assigned seats to do the “bell ringer” and write down the culture fact of
the day. This is important because it sets a habit that the class knows to do
everyday and gets them focused before class starts. This isn’t actually as
effective as it should be though because they know the teacher will just tell
them what it means so they don’t usually do it before class starts. The teacher
tries to do things that keep the class involved because they don’t focus very
long but the call outs get a little hectic. For this class I would try to put
in more hands on activities to keep them more focused.

Siete

The lesson today was learning new vocabulary and working on grade reports. Student engagement is half and half. The student's are responsible for being open minded and ready to learn and be engaged. The teacher is responsible for drawing the students in and causing them to think, be engaged, in the lesson. Miss Noble is really good at engaging students in her class, she connects ancient history to what is happening today in the world. We worked on higher order thinking in History class a lot because we'd talk about what happened and how it affected the world today, and how the world would be different if something else had happened. Being able to apply what you're learning to your life and looking at the big picture is really important when learning because it helps you not only to remember but to be able to apply what you're learning later on. I would like to teach a lesson on Spanish in America. To get students involved I would let them do research projects on different aspects of Spanish and America, history, culture, present etc. One of the questions they'd have to answer would be how their lives would be different if they were born in a Spanish culture and the affects that Spanish has had on our country. The most challenging aspect of teaching is that the classroom is never the same from day to day or period to period to deal with this I will be flexible and relaxed so I don't get stressed out when things don't go as planned.

Seis

Today the class was assigned a project that is used to apply what they've learned. They have to keep a list of what they eat and how they exercise and write it in spanish and organize it into a chart. Todays classroom was based on going over what they already know and how to apply it into their writing project. The learning goal is that the students will understand what to do on their project's. There weren't really any specific learning strategies used, it was the teacher explaining the project and then the class asking questions if they have any.

Cinco

Today was mostly remembering. The class had to remember vocabulary. They repeated words in spanish and then translated them as a class. Instead of everyone yelling out at the same time the teacher could do the random picking of a student to answer the questions to make sure everyone's participating and to see if a student is struggling with a certain word. Then the class stood in a circle and passed a ball around the circle to spell out the vocabulary words. The teacher would say the word or phrase like "i'm thirsty" then the class would say "tengo sed" and then pass the ball around and each student would say one letter and spell it out as a class. The students weren't allowed to tell each other what letters to say but they all say together what the vocabulary word is so it didn't help with vocabulary review just with how to spell the words. The good thing with the activity was that when they mispelled the word the teacher wouldn't say what they messed up only that they messed up so they'd have to correct the class and other people would spell the word. The bad thing was that the class got really into it so there was a lot of pressure on the individuals if they weren't good at spelling. I'd say the learning goal was that the class would all be able to comfortably spell the vocabuary words by the end of the period.

Observation 4

The strategy used today was the one where the teacher asks the class did I do this right? and the class corrects it. This was used today when learning how to apply adjectives. The students were kept engaged by yelling out nouns and adjectives to put into the sentences on the board. Also before they took a quiz Miss Roloff was at the front of the room reviewing the vocabulary words, she'd hold it up and the kids would yell out what it means in english. If they didn't want to review as a class they could review individually. I would like to know what different standards colleges have for people who want to become teachers because all teachers do things very differently and obviously some are good while others are horrible. So I'd like to know what qualifications they all had to pass. Also I'd like to better understand how you plan out lessons because each of your classes are going to be different so what works for one class won't work well for another.

Observation 3

The first class is quiet and nobody's talking but the second class today is full of energy and ask each other questions on the homework. The bell ringer today was "comemos muchas naranjas," the first class only one person answered and it was very quietly while in the second class period everyone tried to answer the fastest. The culture fact today was "in coasta rica the phrase 'you're welcome' is 'con gusto.' The first class was really quiet with no energy but the second class ad a lot of energy but immediately got off subject talking about hair cuts. To begin with Miss Roloff passed out a new stamp sheet and informed the class that they'll have homework tonight. Then she read out how to answer the whole back of the homework because it was more difficult. The first class two students asked questions when going over stuff but most just stared at their papers. Miss Roloff tried to get the first class to participate by having them finish what she's saying but they didn't answer. Then she went over the important dates which are now posted on the board. After that Miss Roloff stood at the front of the room with flash cards to go over vocabulary, she'd say it in Spanish then the class would repeat and then translate it. The first class wouldn't really participate so she had them get up and to jumping jacks. The second class participated but it got a little hectic. In the last two minutes of class the class got out their note sheet on irregular verbs to take notes but they got antsy and you could tell they weren't focused. The lesson today was reviewing vocabulary and then direct instruction on how to conjugate Ser. The first class today it didn't seem like they really learned anything because everyone was quiet and not involved, but in the second class they were TOO involved, everyone talking over each other etc so it was also not the best learning environment.

2

The energy for the both classes started up high but then when the teacher got to the front of the room the first class got quiet while the second class continued to talk over her. To get the classes attention the teacher uses a "Bell ringer" which is a phrase in Spanish that she reads out loud and then the class has to translate. Today's bell ringer was: "A Rodrigo le encanta nadar." Rodrigo loves to swim. Then there's a culture fact which today was: "Pura Vida" a commonly used catchphrase in Costa Rica.
The lesson was on new vocabulary today, the class is learning about foods and meals. Miss Roloff passed out a vocabulary list and had the students get books to go through and find definitions for themselves. Then she went through and read the list out loud in Spanish and had them repeat the word, then she would say the definition and give the class time to write down a way to remember what the word means. I'd say that today the lesson was taught by the students learning the words and then the teacher re-affirming the words.
It was very interesting to see the difference between the two classes, while the first class was quietly working and barely participating; the second class was never quiet even during work time. For the first class they obviously were not involved in the lesson and they were just doing busy work. The second class could not be kept on track and were talking about random things the whole class period. The other thing I noticed is that the teacher did not correct the student's when they did not pronounce the words correctly. Also today at least she did not help the student's to learn the information she simply gave them time to learn it themselves.

Rigor and Relevance

Rigor and relevance are important in classrooms because they keep the students engaged. Rigorous learning means that the class is going at a fast enough speed that students aren't bored. This was neglected with the 'no child left behind' policy because it made it so all students had to go at a slower rate to be at the same pace. Relevance is very important in teaching because the students are in the class to learn about the subject, and if you're not able to relate what you're talking about to the subject you're supposed to be teaching then you're just wasting class time. Relevance also means that the students are able to relate what they're learning to their lives, this causes the material they're learning to stick. Also relevance is important because the point of school should be to help prepare students for the real world and relevance ensures that the students will be able to use the information they're learning later on in their lives.

Personality Test

My personality type is ENFJ which means that I am extraverted, intuitive, feeling and judging. This personality type says that it's the Teacher personality type because it means that I care about others and like to think and encourage learning in others. I'm people focused which is important with a teacher and I'm able to express myself easily even in larger groups. The description says that I'm organized, which is not true and will be a problem with teaching since I don't always keep things orderly.