Field Experience
Field Experience is time spend out of my college classroom, and in a K-12 classroom with teachers and students. Observing the teacher is one of the most important things I should look at because everyone teachers differently. Working in a classroom with different children, and a teacher that I don’t know can help me build confidence for when I have my own classroom. This is a good step towards making the right decision in my life and figuring out if teaching is really for me. It can also help me chose a way that I might want to run my own classroom someday.
Spring 2012
Burk Elementary School
Music Class Grades: K-6th
Hours: 32
Ta Ta TiTi Ta, TiTi Ta TiTi Ta, these were rhythms that the students were taught at Burk Elementary in my placement class in
Gilbert where I assisted in a general music class. Last semester I was placed in a 6thgrade classroom. Being placed in a music class was a plus. I was able to see every age group ranging from kindergarten to 6th grade. To see the different lessons that the older students have to
the younger students is interesting because it’s much harder to get control over 17 kindergarteners matched to 21 5thgraders. It was also very entertaining to see the younger students really getting into the music they were learning and singing so loud with a smile on their faces, compared to the older students’ who are kind of embarrassed and don’t want to sing out loud in front of me or the teachers. My mentor teacher let me grade some of the students on the key boards they played in class, and she let me sit with the students’ so I got a better feel of the classroom environment. From this out of norm experience, I have learned much about the different age groups and how to handle the younger students compared to the older students and how quickly students learn new lines of a song just by taking the song piece by piece and how quickly they pick it up and start singing and enjoying the class.
Burk Elementary School
Music Class Grades: K-6th
Hours: 32
Ta Ta TiTi Ta, TiTi Ta TiTi Ta, these were rhythms that the students were taught at Burk Elementary in my placement class in
Gilbert where I assisted in a general music class. Last semester I was placed in a 6thgrade classroom. Being placed in a music class was a plus. I was able to see every age group ranging from kindergarten to 6th grade. To see the different lessons that the older students have to
the younger students is interesting because it’s much harder to get control over 17 kindergarteners matched to 21 5thgraders. It was also very entertaining to see the younger students really getting into the music they were learning and singing so loud with a smile on their faces, compared to the older students’ who are kind of embarrassed and don’t want to sing out loud in front of me or the teachers. My mentor teacher let me grade some of the students on the key boards they played in class, and she let me sit with the students’ so I got a better feel of the classroom environment. From this out of norm experience, I have learned much about the different age groups and how to handle the younger students compared to the older students and how quickly students learn new lines of a song just by taking the song piece by piece and how quickly they pick it up and start singing and enjoying the class.
Fall 2011
Burk Elementary School
Grade: 6th
Hours: 21
If you’re good, then I’m good. This was the phrase my service learning teacher at Burk Elementary school would say after every lesson to make sure before he went on that all his students understood what was going on. I assisted in a sixth grade classroom at Burk Elementary; this placement was a very good experience for me. I was able to see how a male teacher goes about teaching his students and I was able to see a teacher who reminds me of myself in action. During class time I was able to be actively engaged in assisting students with work like math was something students always needed help with so I would walk around the classroom and sit with the students, and also with a big history project. I was able to see the transaction from an exciting activity a BMX crew came to the school and did a bunch of tricks for the students it was wild. Once it was over the students were able to jump right back into history where they left off. This all ties into my classroom relationships class, the main one that I thought was the most important was how well the class was able to go from such an exciting out of class activity, then right back to math. It was amazing, and it showed me how well the students respect their teacher and how good the relationship the teacher has with his students. From both service learning and my college class I learned that relationship and management is very important to have with your students because it can make class time that much more easier to transaction from one subject to the next.
Burk Elementary School
Grade: 6th
Hours: 21
If you’re good, then I’m good. This was the phrase my service learning teacher at Burk Elementary school would say after every lesson to make sure before he went on that all his students understood what was going on. I assisted in a sixth grade classroom at Burk Elementary; this placement was a very good experience for me. I was able to see how a male teacher goes about teaching his students and I was able to see a teacher who reminds me of myself in action. During class time I was able to be actively engaged in assisting students with work like math was something students always needed help with so I would walk around the classroom and sit with the students, and also with a big history project. I was able to see the transaction from an exciting activity a BMX crew came to the school and did a bunch of tricks for the students it was wild. Once it was over the students were able to jump right back into history where they left off. This all ties into my classroom relationships class, the main one that I thought was the most important was how well the class was able to go from such an exciting out of class activity, then right back to math. It was amazing, and it showed me how well the students respect their teacher and how good the relationship the teacher has with his students. From both service learning and my college class I learned that relationship and management is very important to have with your students because it can make class time that much more easier to transaction from one subject to the next.