Free Choice Journal Topic - Teaching Reflection on Challenges, Breakthroughs, and Harsh Realities in the Teaching Profession

 ***The following is a reflection on the teaching practice that I wrote right before beginning The Great Gatsby. I find it interesting and even intriguing to be able to look back on an earlier reflection like this one and see if my thoughts and attitudes have changed or developed in some way considering that I am now entering in to my final week of student teaching. -->

                Maintaining a positive demeanor is so incredibly critical in the field of education. After a full week of bickering between teachers and administrators, complaints regarding standardized testing procedures and teacher grading policies, and various other fiscal, personal, and student-related issues that seem to plague the teacher’s lounge day in and day out, it isn’t hard to find one’s self caught up in this drama while losing sight of the one thing that matters most: the kids. Almost all educators (there are, of course, some unfortunate exceptions) enter in to the field of education as optimists who really do wish to make a change in the lives of their students. However, life in the “real world” has a nasty tendency to strip away this warm and comforting sheet of educational idealism and pedagogy and replace it with a heavy suit of armor, locking in various frustrations and stagnant ideas and shutting out new concepts and many of the joys that often go unnoticed or undervalued in education. This past week, while obviously full of its own frustration and doubt, has also come with a few pleasant joys, which have reminded me of why I love the field of education so much.

            In the beginning of this week, my students were given a final assessment on the play Macbeth, a work they have been reading and discussing for nearly two months. Many of my students struggled greatly with this text while many others were predominantly uninterested in the text as whole. While we as educators are not necessarily keen on the idea of giving final, formal assessments to students, the current state of education has not yet reached the point of granting a teacher autonomy in the classroom and thus, we are still forced to have a minimum number of formal, summative assessments in our quarterly grade books. This became a primary issue for me as an educator because, for many of my students, a poor final test grade could spell disaster for their final third quarter grades. I administered an assessment that I spent a great deal of time creating and ensuring would be both fair yet challenging for my students. The results, which I were originally expecting to be sub-par given the student engagement and investment I have seen over the past three and a half weeks, were far better overall than I had expected. Initially, I was skeptical and checked my math and answer keys multiple times over. The writing of the students however, simply doesn’t lie. Many of my students responded far more articulately and thoughtfully than I could have hoped for while many others provided meaningful quotation examples and superior close reading analyses that left me astounded. Granted, just like with every assessment, there were failures peppered in with the pile of exemplary work, but I must say that as a whole, my students’ performance was a pleasant surprise that left me feeling accomplished. Many of my students may not have seemed engaged, but their knowledge of the content and their critical and analytical performance on my assessment was proof that I must have done something right.

            In addition to this small and unexpected victory, I also experienced a valuable yet subtle breakthrough with a particular student in my period seven inclusion class. This particular student has often struggled in various classes before in the past. However, based upon multiple conversations I have had with this student, I have come to understand that he is far from unintelligent. In fact, this student is quite bright. Motivation and student-teacher rapport has often been this student’s greatest issue, yet he has opened up to me and shared a great deal of his own personal beliefs and goals. I have also learned that this particular student is extremely interested in literature. During a conversation with him, he told me, “Yeah, Macbeth was awesome. It’s so messed up! I’m really excited for The Great Gatsby though too. I heard it’s really good.” While this seems like minor or unimportant commentary, it is music to the ears of a literature lover like myself who has struggled the past few weeks with encouraging student motivation and participation. A student, who initially was extremely apprehensive to even speak in class, was now telling me about how much he loves reading and how interested he is in moving on to the next text. These minor connections and victories are what keep me, along with all other good teachers, going. Each day must be taken one at a time and even small breakthroughs like these help remind me of why I have chosen to enter into education in the first place.

My Pintrest Specifically Geared Towards Teaching and Education!

Interactive SMART Board Presentation

The above are some sample slides from a SMART Notebook presentation that I prepared for my seventh grade students during my last placement. Student could come up to the board, manipulate objects, annotate text, and drag and drop objects to reveal answers. Younger kids with plenty of energy especially love this!

The Great Gatsby Comic Strip

The above is a comic strip depicting one of the most famous scenes in the novel The Great Gatsby. This scene takes place in Chapter Seven, at the point when Gatsby finally confronts Tom Buchanan regarding his and Daisy's mutual love for each other.

Introduction to The Great Gatsby: 1920's America Glog

This is a short introduction I am planning to present to my students when we begin the next unit on The Great Gatsby. I love the concept of the "glog" because instead of using a sequential PowerPoint presentation, I can jump all over the place with the glog format. Plus, I think it is a lot more aesthetically pleasing.

Journal Entry #4: How can I develop more effective questioning strategies?

Questioning is, first and foremost, one of the most important tools a teacher has when conducting a lesson. Questions however, like all good lessons, must be carefully structured and planned so as to be highly effective. I have come to understand, through actual teaching experience, just how valuable a properly structured question can be and, conversely, how wasteful and even counterproductive a poorly structured question is. Throughout my journey as an evolving teacher, I have been working tirelessly at creating more valuable, effective, and meaningful questions that I know will elicit thoughtful and appropriate responses form my students. While I can safely say that my questions have improved since I first began my student teaching experience a couple of months ago, there is still plenty of more room for improvement. For example, according to Bloom’s Taxonomy, there are multiple levels of questions. The lowest forms of questions lie within the “Comprehension” or “Remember” category, in which the teacher may ask questions that require students to simply regurgitate memorized material. The higher categories of the taxonomy however, require a great deal more critical and analytical thinking. Questioning categories like “Evaluate” or “Create” on Bloom’s Taxonomy require students to do far more in order to effectively answer any given question and these are the categories I strive for in every lesson. Obviously, not every question that I ask my students can possibly fall in to these higher categories, nor should they. The most important thing to remember regarding Bloom’s Taxonomy is that the teacher should utilize every category, from “Remember” to “Create” and everything in between. What I try to avoid, and what any good teacher should try to avoid, is spending too much of my questioning time in the lower categories of the taxonomy without ever really breeching the higher levels of questioning and thinking.

            In order to improve my own questioning strategies, I always make sure to plan at least a great deal of my questions for the lesson while lesson planning. I have found that my questions are often far more effective when I have spent time before the lesson constructing them carefully rather than always coming up with them on the spot. I also make sure to use certain words in my questions that I know will help elicit more meaningful responses from students. Every category on Bloom’s Taxonomy has certain key words that often appear in the questions that fit in to that particular questioning level. For example, questions that fall in to the “Analyze” category often have words like “analyze,” “compare,” “contrast,” and “infer” within the questions themselves. I am always sure to consult my list of key words and questioning levels when constructing questions, so as to ensure that the actual wording of my questions is helping accomplish what I am setting out to accomplish. Another incredibly important procedure that I am constantly trying to improve is wait time. Essentially, wait time is the amount of time a teacher chooses to wait for a student response after asking a question. While a teacher’s first impulse is often to quickly move on after asking a student a question, adequate wait time ensures that the teacher is giving the student enough time to first construct a meaningful response before answering the question. As I continue on my journey as a teacher, I hope that I may continue to improve my questioning strategies with the help of a few of the aforementioned techniques discussed above.

Journal Entry # 3: Why are critical thinking skills so important to impart to my students in a democratic, diverse society? How can I help students to acquire critical thinking skills, content specific literacies, and problem solving techniques required for college and career readiness in multiple disciplines?

As is blatantly clear, we live in a world that is far from black and white. All of the simple questions that we remember from our respective childhoods like "do I want chocolate or vanilla ice cream?" or "do I want to go play with my friends after school or watch a movie with my family?" have been replaced with questions like "what can I do to find a career in an unstable economy?" and "what rights do I truly have as a citizen in a democracy that is currently in a state of unrest and fluctuation?" These kinds of questions haunt adults, both young and old, every single day. However, another perhaps even more important question we teachers should be asking ourselves is "how do I begin to prepare my students for a life in a world full of grey uncertainty?" One of the best answers to such an intimidating question as this is simply, to promote high levels of critical thinking in the classroom. "Critical thinking" however, is a term often thrown around a lot these days, but, in its simplest form, critical thinking is really just the ability to apply acute reasoning to any situation or assertion and then evaluate that situation or assertion by figuring out how true or false, favorable or unpleasant said situation or assertion really is. While most of us do this everyday without even thinking about it, our ability to carry out this critical process of reasoning did not necessarily come naturally. Rather, this critical thinking process is something we acquired over the course of our lives and it is a process that is incredibly important, particularly in adulthood. The questions we often face are no longer the "yes" and "no" questions that marked most of our childhoods. We are constantly forced to evaluate situations or assertions (How much money could I put down on a new car? Who is the better candidate in the election and why? Is he really looking our for my best interest or is he simply using me for his own personal gain?) and the ability to do this effectively could make or break our future as critical and informed members of society. The question however, still remains: How do we teach our students this skill?

A few of what seem to be the best answers to this question all lie with processes many teachers are familiar with. One, for example, is simply modeling critical thinking skills in class. We have learned and continue to learn much of what we know through first watching someone else do it and then imitating the same action ourselves. If we as teachers incorporate critical thinking skills in to the classroom everyday, we are, in effect, modeling those skills for students. Allowing students to watch a questioning strategy the teacher uses while approaching a question or text for the first time for example, is a great way to model critical thinking skills. After all, questioning is one of the keys to truly mastering critical thinking. Another example of how to teach critical thinking skills and, more generally, problem solving as a whole, can be found in introducing real-world scenarios, current events, and relevant information to students in to the classroom.  While students can undoubtedly learn from an algebra problem or a novel, it may be much easier to model an effective critical reasoning strategy when applying it to real-world or real-life events. This idea can be expanded in to a third category. The Common Core National Standards have begun to push teachers to introduce more content-specific texts in the classroom so as to increase literacy all across the board. Conveniently enough, "literacy" is really just a critical process of thinking. Individuals who are truly "literate" in a content area can approach any situation that arises within the content area with a critical response. Therefore, introducing more content-specific texts to boost literacy and critical thinking skills is crucial. These content-specific texts may be non-fiction articles about the state of the subject area itself or perhaps pieces of literary criticism. Any kind of text that not only deals with the subject area, but is also able to take the subject area to new and exciting contexts that students have never interacted with or thought about before is key to boosting both literacy and critical thinking skills.

Basic ELA-Style Essay Design Popplet

The following is a concept map, which I created on Popplet, that breaks down the writing strategies specifically associated with the New York State ELA exam. My seventh grade students found this to be extremely helpful while we were discussing long response layouts and writing format.

Journal Entry # 2: How can I balance planning, grading, researching, etc., with the demands of daily life?

As my student teaching experience marches on, I have come to discover a very unexpected speed bump. Namely, I would have never considered the vast amount of responsibilities outside of the actual teaching itself a problem before I began my experience. Most of what pre-service teachers learn while training to become teachers involves the specifics of creating, structuring, planning, and carrying out individual lessons and units. While, on the surface, this appears to be the bulk of what teaching really is, I would posit that this is only about ten to twenty percent of the career of teaching. The amount of time I spend each day grading assignments, meeting with students for extra help, chasing certain students down to ensure that they make up the work that they missed, and organizing myself for various responsibilities in the future both inside and outside the school is truly astounding. Unfortunately for young teachers like myself, things of this nature aren’t typically “covered” in educational classes.

            While the first few weeks were a struggle in terms of trying to balance all of the responsibilities of a teacher (everything from running to the work room to make copies to consoling a student who is upset about a grade and everything in between), I have begun to finally get the knack of it all. A helpful practice I learned early on was trying to get as much accomplished as possible during my prep periods. Grading assignments, beginning lesson planning, sending important emails, and any other time consuming activity can usually be accomplished during the vital periods in between my classes. I have also continued the habit of setting aside a few hours every evening at home to work on what needs to be accomplished. Initially, one may assume that after one leaves the school for the day, one’s job is over. This is simply not the case. I have just as much “homework” now as I had while I was taking a full time college class load. Buckling down and remaining on top of what needs to be accomplished is simply the only way to tackle all of the extra stuff a teacher needs to accomplish, especially young teachers who are starting most of their lesson planning, unit planning, and material collecting from scratch.

            In addition to student teaching, I have also chosen to pursue an honors thesis with the Hofstra University Honors College. This thesis began last semester and has carried over in to this semester. The extra work can be daunting to say the least, but I feel that it is a rewarding experience that will add to my feeling of accomplishment after my graduation. Even on the most stressful of days, I have learned that squeezing each day for every second I can get is truly the only way to stay on top of my work. Time saving strategies like cutting back on some leisure time (which was almost non-existent to begin with) and utilizing every second during the school day can be demanding, but undoubtedly worth it.

Garrett's Picasso Head!

My Picasso head! I did not share this with my students, but I think that it's a pretty good depiction of me. It came out looking a bit on the sad side (notice the frown) but realistically, I am a happy person!

Conversation With My Cooperating Teacher Regarding Classroom Management and Organization

Question #1: If you had to sum your classroom management style up in a short sentence, what would you say? How would you summarize what you do in terms of classroom management? What's your "style"?

I usually work on one, basic premise: everyone respects everyone including his or herself. This is my only real, concrete rule in class. I don’t agree with the idea that teachers should establish multiple lists of rules. Too many rules will confuse a group of students, especially younger students. There is no real need to get too specific and I’ve never had to. If a student is respecting his or herself and respecting others, including the teacher, then the class can run smoothly.

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Question #2: What are some mistakes you've made in the past in terms of classroom management and/or classroom organization? How did you both learn from these mistakes and then go about fixing them?

The biggest problem that I have and continue to have with classroom organization is collecting too many things for grading. Assessment is important but unfortunately, I used to make the mistake of trying to grade ALL of the work that the students complete. This is not really necessary. I’m still constantly trying to remind myself that it is not necessary to grade everything, just the most meaningful assignments. Too many things to grade can lead to an unorganized classroom and this can be counterproductive.

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Question #3: Does your classroom management style vary depending upon the class you have or do you have a universal, "one size fits all" approach?

My classroom management style absolutely depends upon the class I have. No class is going to be exactly the same and you have to adjust to the class. I’ve learned that you can never give anything back. What I means is, you have to start out the year stern and conservative. Then, over time and after learning about the class, you can start to give a little more leniency. Once you’ve given too much away however, it’s all over. You can give a little more to classes that can handle it and you can tell which classes you need to be stricter with fairly quickly.

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Question #4: What is the biggest issue you regularly encounter in terms of keeping your classroom organized and functioning both smoothly and properly? How do you go about correcting this issue?

Keeping track of student progress can often be a big organizational problem if not handled properly. However, like I said before, you have to find a balance between keeping justified and effective feedback/assessment from students and becoming overwhelmed by too many assessments and feedback. I’ve gotten much better at this over time as a teacher.

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Question #5: If you could provide one piece of advice to a new teacher regarding classroom management, classroom organization, or both, what would it be? What is something you wish you knew when you first started teaching?

When I first started teaching, I wish I realized that all kids couldn’t necessarily achieve the same things. Some kids can work and work all year long and still not get it exactly while others can get it very easily. Success really varies from student to student. Also, I didn’t realize initially just how much baggage kids can bring with them from home in to the classroom. At first, I saw some kids as simply “behavioral issues.” Later on however, I learned a lot about the home lives of some of these kids and I finally came to understand why they behaved the way they did. Honestly, it makes sense.

Another really difficult thing for me to get was that you can’t solve all of the worlds problems. As a teacher, I can only do so much for my students. When I first started teaching, I used to take all of my students’ problems home with me every night. I learned after some time that I simply can’t do that. There has to be a line. One last thing: No arguing with students ever! Even if you win the argument, you still lose because you have lost that student forever. In the same way, never embarrass a student in class. While embarrassing a student may help with classroom management in the short term, that student will never want anything to do with you from that point on. Once again, I think it all comes back to the “respecting” rule which I talked about earlier. We all need to be respectful, both teachers and students.

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Question #6: What is one example/story you have of either a classroom management or organizational nightmare and then how did you manage to get through it? (Real stories are appreciated!)

I have to say that I’ve been extremely fortunate because I really can’t think of any terrible or standout management issues from the past. It’s just a problem I can’t remember encountering all that much. I do remember however, a time during my first year of teaching where I became overwhelmed with student work. I had an enormous pile of ungraded, unchecked student work on my desk and this was during the time when I still had trouble with trying to grade everything. Finally, I became so overwhelmed that, one day, I went out in to the hallway, I made sure no one was around, and then I threw out all of the work. I simply couldn’t get to it all. It was too much!

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Final thoughts:

-Remember, only send a kid to the principle’s office as an absolute last resort. A student will never take you seriously again if you can’t handle the problems in your class on your own. Things will only get worse.

-Also, remember that both respect and being genuine all the time are keys to really being a great teacher. Don’t try to fake sincerity. Kids can tell immediately if you’re full of it.

-One last thing: never “fake it.” If you say that you’re going to do something, you must follow through with it. For example, if you tell a student that he or she will get a zero if his or her homework is not in class tomorrow, then you have to give that kid a zero. There are no exceptions. It’s really difficult to always stick to your guns but you have to if you want to be taken seriously.

English Literature and Writing Buzz Words Wordle

The following image is a wordle, which is made up completely of English Language Arts "buzz words" that students will often come in contact with throughout their experiences in English Language Arts classroms. I did not use this in my own classroom, but it is definitely an interesting and potentially valuable word web.

Journal Entry #1:Why am I teaching what I am teaching? To what extent did my own school experiences reflect the larger purpose of teaching English?

I have been asked many times throughout my preservice teaching career why I decided to teach English language arts. "Why not one of the sciences?" others would often inquire. "That's the stuff that's really important." My answer as to why I decided to teach what I am now teaching is simple and probably very similar to the answer most other teachers will give when asked the same question regarding their reasoning behind choosing to teach their subject area: this is the topic that has left the longest impact on me. English language arts and literature have been friends of mine since my own middle school experience and as I have grown, developed, and learned, this subject area has never left me feeling disappointed or uninterested. Doing well in the subject area as a student is not the only reason that led to my fascination with the subject and my eventual decision to pursue the subject area further (I performed exceptionally well in other subject areas as well like history, biology, and chemistry). My true reason for deciding to teach English is far more deeply-rooted in my past. I have been an avid reader since I was ten years old. The notion of being able to take a personal passion of mine (reading and literature) and then having the chance to both expand upon it and share it with others was incredibly intriguing. Mark Twain once stated (and oh how fitting it is for an aspiring English teacher/literature fanatic to live by the words of a beloved writer) that "the secret to success in life is to make your vocation your vacation." Teaching English has allowed me to do just that. I could have chosen to teach another subject area, but had I decided to do so, I know that I could never truly be as content as I would be teaching (and learning) about a subject area I love dearly. 

From the time I was in high school, and later, in college, English literature and language arts opened up doors for me that no other content area would have been able to do, save perhaps, philosophy, which, if one delves more deeply in to the subject area, one would find that literature, philosophy, and the humanities are undeniably, intrinsically linked. I, unlike many of my fellow students, looked forward to reading assignments, written reflections, essay tasks, and close readings. Questions I would have never been able to even consider prior to my study of the subject area began injecting themselves in to every single aspect of my life. In simplified terms, English allowed me to not only see the world through a new perspective, but it also allowed me to consider multiple perspectives from both the past and the present, compare and contrast these perspectives, and then evaluate the bearing these perspectives have on my own life, society, and existence itself. If my reasoning behind choosing to teach this subject area is not yet clear, consider the following statement from famous American writer, lecturer, and philosopher Joseph Campbell: "Follow your bliss." I am certainly doing that.