I have been working a lot recently, which of course pleases me to no end. The classrooms I have been working in have student teachers who are doing their solo teaching. This makes for an easy day for me. I tend to establish myself outside of the classroom, so that the student teachers don't feel like I am hovering - one less pair of eyes watching their every move. But I am always close by so that they can poke their heads out of the door and call me in for help as needed.
Anyway, I have been doing some reading assessments for teachers. These are required by the district at the start and end of every year, and are supposed to show growth in reading. It starts with a running record (the student reads aloud, we note every error, and it is timed), and then we include a summarization and ask a few questions about the passage. (Yes, there is more to it than that.) I have done these for the past four years, using a couple of different programs. (Not Rigby or DIBELS).
So yesterday, my mentor teacher said she had a combination stopwatch and calculator. I realize this doesn't sound like anything much, unless you're a teacher who does reading assessments. Fountas & Pinnell, the reading goddesses, have developed what I call the "stopulator": it times the student, then you input the number of words read, number of errors and self corrections, and it calculates out the words per minute and the accuracy rate. SO COOL! No more looking up the equation for figuring this stuff out - YAY! I used it yesterday and flew through the calculation piece quickly and easily. Love it.
If you do an online search for "Fountas and Pinnell stopwatch", it will come up on Heinemann's website. It runs about $25, but is well worth it in saved time.
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
Sunday, May 15, 2011
The Work Week
Yay! I worked last week. I spent 4 days in classrooms. One day I spent applying for positions, which is still work, just less enjoyable than teaching.
Monday I worked for my mentor teacher. She is trying out a great reading assessment program that I was able to read up on and use with her students, one at a time. Using it to analyze student progress and ability is terrific practice.
Tuesday I worked at the last minute for a 4th grade teacher who had 31 students in her class. Now, 14 of them were ELL students, another 5 of them were SPED, and 3 more of them were on daily behavior plans. They were pretty good kids, and certainly helpful when it came to questions about how they did certain things. And then we got to the math lesson. It was a Bridges (curriculum) lesson that was a continuation of students understanding the patterns of add and even numbers. Then there was this graphing activity. I could not make heads nor tails of the lesson - and I had the teacher edition! I finally gave up trying to teach it and ensured that the previous lesson had stuck. I don't think I have ever not understood how to teach a lesson from a curriculum. This one just made no sense to me. The rest of the day went alright, but I went home so frustrated I couldn't figure out that one lesson. It still nags at me!
Wednesday was the day I spent cruising the 'net for jobs and writing essays. I guess it's good that I am finding jobs to apply to, I just wish they were more local... although a couple were in districts in the area, so that was nice.
Thursday and Friday I worked for a teacher who had a student teacher in his classroom. Evidently they had gone on their Lewis & Clark field trip to Astoria the previous day and it had poured down on them all day. Yes, an authentic Fort Clatsop experience for the kids, but miserable, too. So the plan was for a pretty quiet, nothing academically new, day. The student teacher left just before math in the morning, and the classroom has the lowest ability group. It was thankfully small, and the kids were supposed to cut out a bunch of pre-printed arrays. There was an instructional assistant in the classroom as well, and evidently she was unwilling to allow the students a simple day of cutting without any learning... so she stopped the cutting and insisted on teaching the kids a word problem - that they did not understand, and then had to do for homework. Huh. The rest of the day went fine, and the following day, the student teacher returned, feeling refreshed. I mostly sat in the back and read a book on teaching persuasive writing, and then created a unit lesson.
It was a satisfying week. I will be receiving a paycheck. I was given the opportunity to try out a reading assessment and make my own observations. I was reminded that I don't always know how to teach a lesson, so I had to improvise. I taught a day, and I spent a day doing the other thing teachers do: plan with thoughtful care and focus.
OK, so it wasn't perfect - because I wasn't in my own classroom - but it was as good as I can hope for, at least for the time being. And yeah, I still want to teach in my own classroom. these experiences just confirm that.
Monday I worked for my mentor teacher. She is trying out a great reading assessment program that I was able to read up on and use with her students, one at a time. Using it to analyze student progress and ability is terrific practice.
Tuesday I worked at the last minute for a 4th grade teacher who had 31 students in her class. Now, 14 of them were ELL students, another 5 of them were SPED, and 3 more of them were on daily behavior plans. They were pretty good kids, and certainly helpful when it came to questions about how they did certain things. And then we got to the math lesson. It was a Bridges (curriculum) lesson that was a continuation of students understanding the patterns of add and even numbers. Then there was this graphing activity. I could not make heads nor tails of the lesson - and I had the teacher edition! I finally gave up trying to teach it and ensured that the previous lesson had stuck. I don't think I have ever not understood how to teach a lesson from a curriculum. This one just made no sense to me. The rest of the day went alright, but I went home so frustrated I couldn't figure out that one lesson. It still nags at me!
Wednesday was the day I spent cruising the 'net for jobs and writing essays. I guess it's good that I am finding jobs to apply to, I just wish they were more local... although a couple were in districts in the area, so that was nice.
Thursday and Friday I worked for a teacher who had a student teacher in his classroom. Evidently they had gone on their Lewis & Clark field trip to Astoria the previous day and it had poured down on them all day. Yes, an authentic Fort Clatsop experience for the kids, but miserable, too. So the plan was for a pretty quiet, nothing academically new, day. The student teacher left just before math in the morning, and the classroom has the lowest ability group. It was thankfully small, and the kids were supposed to cut out a bunch of pre-printed arrays. There was an instructional assistant in the classroom as well, and evidently she was unwilling to allow the students a simple day of cutting without any learning... so she stopped the cutting and insisted on teaching the kids a word problem - that they did not understand, and then had to do for homework. Huh. The rest of the day went fine, and the following day, the student teacher returned, feeling refreshed. I mostly sat in the back and read a book on teaching persuasive writing, and then created a unit lesson.
It was a satisfying week. I will be receiving a paycheck. I was given the opportunity to try out a reading assessment and make my own observations. I was reminded that I don't always know how to teach a lesson, so I had to improvise. I taught a day, and I spent a day doing the other thing teachers do: plan with thoughtful care and focus.
OK, so it wasn't perfect - because I wasn't in my own classroom - but it was as good as I can hope for, at least for the time being. And yeah, I still want to teach in my own classroom. these experiences just confirm that.
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