Crystal Clapp Reflection

Over these past three weeks, I have had the opportunity to observe and help in Mrs. Lana Thompson’s second grade classroom at the Colman-Egan School District. Mrs. Thompson and her students were very excited and welcomed me into the classroom, which helped me feel even more comfortable. Observing really helped me get a feel for students’ behavior, classroom management, and how lessons are usually run before I dive in and teach one. I absolutely love being able to go into a classroom and seeing what it is really like!

While attending South Elementary School in Marshall, Illinois, I have learned a lot about the daily life of working within a school from interviewing two different teachers. I have never realized how much work goes into being a teacher no matter the grade being taught. I am so glad that I got the opportunity to participate within this program and getting to talk to these teachers. It has made me realize even more that I have chosen the right career path for myself.

During the Spring Semester of my sophomore year at The College of New Jersey, I was placed at Maurice Hawk Elementary School in West Windsor Plains Burrow for my practicum experience. My practicum partner, Gwen, and I were placed in Mrs. Jones’ 3rd grade classroom. This portfolio is an accumulation of different lessons and activities we observed and participated in, both in Mrs. Jones’ classroom as well as in other classes held at Maurice Hawk. The portfolio is just a snapshot of all we did and learned, but it serves as a reminder of various learning theories and application of teaching practices in a real classroom.

It has been many years since I have been back in the classroom fulltime after raising my kids, substitute teaching, and working part time as a science consultant. My background and experiences have prepared me for this specialized and unique position to be able to effectively work with many teachers to provide strategic and differentiated instruction for their diverse students.

One aspect of my lesson that I felt went well in the implementation of my lesson was the information being grasped by the learners. Before I began my lesson, I asked the learners some questions about the fun phonics letter. I started off by asking the children if they knew what the fun phonic letter for the week was, then I asked them to tell me some words that begins with the letter “Dd”. Next, I read a story called “Harry the dirty dog”. Throughout the story I asked some questions to keep the learners engaged. I asked them questions like “what words that begins with the letter “Dd” did you hear?” I can tell they were engaged because their answers were never off topic. The learners were so excited about the end result of their letter “Dd”

Each and every student plays a vital part of the classroom as a whole. The classroom acts as a community of learners who respect and care for one another. We are all different, but yet all alike, and that is what makes us very special. As a future teacher I strive to foster a class that will become a family whom trusts and maintains relationships with each and every other person. All will feel acknowledged and heard. This leads to a safe and warm environment that will develop into a fun learning experience. When I think about teaching in grades preschool to third, I greatly look forward to making a significant impact early on in every student’s lives. I hope to instill interest and motivation in the students and have them appreciate the joy of learning. I believe Montclair University’s P-3 MAR program will further enlighten and assist me to better understand all the standards within the portrait of a teacher.

The children would slowly fix the parts of what they have acquired to form the big picture at the end of the day through repetition in various topics and settings and verbal discussions. For example, teacher can model to students on how to make visualizations of images as they listen to the story and students will follow suit after some practices.

As I entered the classroom of Anum Presbyterian School, the children stood up abruptly and chanted in unison “Madam, you are welcome”. The classroom was filled with joy. The girls and boys had huge smiles and were so excited to see me. My grandma had told me that I was going to be an assistant teacher in a kindergarten class. However, to my dismay I found out that the teacher had a meeting to go to, which meant that I would have to teach fifty five kindergartens by myself without any lesson plans. I took a deep breath and told myself that everything would be okay. After All, if Miss Comfort teaches everyday so can you.

During my student teaching experience at Jefferson Elementary School, I had the pleasure of observing two sixth grade classes. I was able to learn from Ms. Much while observing her social studies lesson about Greek Mythology. In Ms. Hartman’s class, I got to observe the collaborative math curriculum. This experience opened up my eyes to how rewarding teaching sixth grade is. Before observing, I was hesitant as to whether or not I would have the knowledge and qualifications to teach an upper elementary grade. After working with both of these wonderful teachers, they showed me that I would truly enjoy teaching sixth grade.

Before beginning my lesson, I was very nervous on what type of activity to perform with the students. I was worried about something being too complicated or too boring. Once I decided to show the Disney Pixar’s short film “Partly Cloud”, I then had to figure out how I could teach a lesson about the film. Luckily, I decided that writing a summary on a white board and then having the students draw a picture of their favorite scene would be a sufficient lesson.

Thank you for the compliment and interest for reading my post. It was rare, rewarding experience and witnessed the drastic weight loss of my patient. I apologize that I did not add the other medical conditions and the other treatment that he was receiving. My patient was receiving a feeding tube before he came to our facility. He has multiple medical history such as cerebrovascular disease, dysphagia, congestive heart failure with severe lymphedema. I addressed the lymphedema and intensive exercise. The dietician, nurses and attending physician were monitoring him carefully. He was on a restricted calorie fluid intake and was receiving a fluid pill and multiple medications.

This was the moment I had been waiting for the entire summer. My first moment as a “real teacher” in charge of a class full of students. Even more exciting was the fact I was teaching kindergarten! As an incoming first-year Teach for America Corp member in Las Vegas, we had heard about the Achievement or Opportunity Gap all summer and I felt that I was given a special opportunity. I determined in my mind that my students would not be behind but be ahead by the time that they finished kindergarten. I spent hours preparing seating arrangements, organizing my library and centers, going over the standards and lesson planning with people on my grade level. There was no doubt in my mind that the students in room 29 would accomplish great things.

The teaching experience I had a Blackmon Road Middle School was a very good experience that was eye opening. The 7th graders of Dr. Latta-Won class were excellent, shy but a very interesting group of students to teach. With this experience I gained a plethora of knowledge. On November 17, 2016, I was the lead teacher who taught the lesson “The Reflection I Am”. After teaching the students a lot of things were observed and some good and bad things came out of the overall lesson. In this lesson there were some intended content and activities, the actual teaching experience was more different than I thought it would be, and the students work has led to a revision of the original lesson plan.

I really liked the book “Thank You for Arguing” because the book is so engaging and at the time, each chapter of the book is talking about daily life tricks and activities. This book is a good asset for all the students to have with them and learn from it now and in the future. Because it is talking about our daily life challenges and how to come out of those challenges. Overall, the class was a great experience and each chapter of the book I read, I felt like the book is just written for me and sometimes even I doubted that probably the writer of the book “Thank You for Arguing” knew about my personal life. I already knew almost all of these values that I have in myself, however, I did not know that how to express them. Luckily through this class the fear I had and most importantly the embarrassing and shy feelings most of the time I had, I do not have that feeling anymore. Because through this class we talk about them that how to get out of that negativity and embarrassing feelings. This book is one of the book that I will keep it in my home library and will teach it to my children in the

Becoming a primary school teacher is something I want to pursue. I am inspired to bring my knowledge to the classroom and make a difference in children lives. Over the course of three months I’ve had the opportunity to sit and see a third grade classroom. Observing this class, opened my eyes to the Common Core Curriculum and the different techniques teachers use to engage their students.