Residency - Weaver Lake Elementary
Today was my first day at the school in-person. I was very nervous leading up to this but Judi is a comforting person and definitely calmed my nerves. She showed me all around the school and told me what she does prior to the students walking into the classroom for the day. She sets out bellwork for the kids and gets the classroom all prepared and her materials ready for the day. After the kids finished their bellwork, we did a fun exercise to get them motivated and awake for the school day. The kids played freeze dance to educational songs. For in person learning the school day is a little different. They start with math, then science, gym/music at 11:30, social studies, lunch at 1, then reading at 2:30, and anything they didn’t get to earlier to end the day at 4. Today for science class the students got to do Virtual Reality which is a headset that you put on and you can be in other places while still being in the classroom. They went on a field trip into a brain to learn about it more and see it in depth. It was cool to see the use of new technology like this in school especially during covid times when they can’t go out on trips.
Judi is constantly walking around when she isn't in the front teaching to check on the students and to see how they are doing in the lesson. This is beneficial for her teaching so she can see what they know and can lead them in the right direction with her teaching if she needs to change anything in the lesson. Covid is requiring students to do more things on their own and listen more carefully because teachers can't touch or be there to help if online. The students overall seem to be working with this change nicely, they are learning to be more independent and it definitely shows. Judi does encourage students on what they are doing well but I think we could change a little by instead of saying good job, tell them what they did right and what they can improve on. Don't praise one student, it makes others feel like they aren't good enough. Judi did mention to me while the students were at lunch that when you start with a new class you should start stricter and as you go through the year get looser on the rules. She told me this cause some of the kids were getting in trouble at recess or were blurting out stupid answers in class. After recess the kids were still a tad crazy and wound up so Judi decided to change course after class in order to calm them down. We were going to be doing a geography website but she switched to reading a book instead to relax them a bit. At the end of the day we made clay brains to go with what they are working on in science right now. It was a fun way to end the day for the kids. Judi and I discussed the catchphrase project and decided that this week we are going to plan it out together and make it happen soon.
