Katie+S.+Practicum+Blog

__ Welcome to Miss Katie's Practicum Blog __ "‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍A good teacher is like a candle - it consumes itself to light the way for others." ~Mustafa Kemal Atatürk ‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍

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__Monday September 26:__ Today was my first day in my practicum classroom. I am at Shady Lanes Preschool of 3,4, and 5 year olds. The teaching team consists of Mrs. Robyn, the leader taecher, and Mrs. Heather, the assissant teacher from the Waston Institue. There is a total of 11 children, although one has not started yet, 4 of the students are on the Autistic Spectrum and one is diagnosed with Adapation Disorder. They start off their da‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍y with grossmotor, which is unusual, at least for what I have seen. ‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍They play outside come inside for snack, then go to centers. After they finish centers the children gather for a short circle time as lunch is prepared. They sit down for lunch and then it is quiet time. The room is so comforting, warm, and calm. It is covered in pieces of colored material. There are no big lights, ceiling lights, it is lit with christmas lights and lamps spread around the room. It was a whole new enviroment to me I have never been in a classroom designed like that. I am very excited to go back next week! __Monday October 3:__ This week was so much fun. I was able to be more involved with the children since I was more comfortable with them and they were more comfortable with me. When I got to school it was rainy outside so we stayed inside for gross motor in the morning. One of the boys showed me a trick he learned this weekend. He can whistle. I asked him if he was five, cause I though only five year olds knew how to whistle. I worked on a puzzle with a few of the children they were so excited to show Miss Robyn when they completed it. When we got back to the room the children had snack then went to centers. The children have been reading goldilocks and the three bears for the past two weeks, so this week in house keeping Miss Heather brought out a gold wig and helped the children act out the story. It was amazing to see how well they knew the story to say all the lines without prompts and how they changed their voices and actions for the different characters. I was at the light center watching the children build a princess castle for goldilocks and a trap for the bears.‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍ One of the children built me a scrapper to scrap things. I asked him about each part and as he told me what it did he would say it wasnt finished and he needed to add another part to it. By the time he was done it was a foot long. ‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍ Last week one of the students had a rough day. He is diagnosed with adjustment disorder which from my understanding in similar to oppisitional defiant disorder but he doesnt do things because he doesnt trust people rather than just not wanting to do them. I was in block area with him last week, and lets just say he was using unkind words in correct context so I had to remove him from the center. I had also witnessed him raise his fist to multiple children and actually punch one child in the eye. Before I left he has a meltdown right before rest time and had to be moved to the hallway until he calmed down. This week I saw a whole new side of him. He was so engaged in playing goldilocks and the three bears. He spent the whole time in housekeeping. The best part was when Miss Heather left and let them play by themselves, he became the narrator of the story. But he rapped the story instead of just saying it. In between the bears sitting in their chairs and going to bed they had a dance party and he kept rapping, "Go goldilocks, go goldilocks, go goldi go goldi." It was the funniest and cutest thing ever. He had so much fun and so did the other two children playing in that center ith him. Music seemed to really engage him he is deffinatly musically intelligent.‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍ It makes me wonder if there is something we can do with music when he is having a breakdown to calm him down and bring him back. ‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍

__Monday October 17:__ Today I prepared and did my first lesson with the students. This week is fall themed so I decided to incorporate the theme and do a math lesson in the block area. I bought little pumpkins, different gords, and baby indian corn. I put the fall items with the blocks, and as soon as the children saw it they all wanted to play there. One of the children went up to Ms Robyn and said, "I am going to eat all my snack and not talk, clean up fast and get my picture so I can play with the pumpkins and blocks with Miss Katie." I was planning on having the children see the weight and height and introduce capacity to them, by having them build a tower and see how many fall items they could place on the tower. ‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍However we made a house and a school. We did discuss capacity when the fall items rode the bus(dumptruck) from the house to the school. All 6 indian corn could ride together, the pumkins went 2 at a time and the gords went either two or three at a time depending on their size. It was it was interesting to see the children automatically separate the items into categories, which was fine. They separated the indian corn then divided it into orange red and yellow indian corn. They did this with each the indian corn, pumpkins, and gords. The lesson did not go how I had planned but I knew that would happen when I decided to teach the lesson through play. The lesson may not have gone as planned but the children showed me what they know and also learned a new concept. Pictures coming soon!!!! :) ‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍









__Monday October 24:__ Today the children continued the theme of fall. Ms Robyn said the children have played with the fall items I left last week all week long. She had put them in dramatic play hoping one of the children would make pumpkin pie, but one of the little girls continuously brought them back to the block area reinacting my lesson. Hearing that made me really excited, even though the lesson didnt go as planned it had an impact on the children they really enjoyed and choose to do the lesson again on their own which is great they can learn so much more when reinacting play that was once facilitated by a teacher. This week the children got to play with a pumpkin Ms Robyn cut the top off and placed differnt mr potato head pieces along with spoons tongs and bowls to see what the children would do with it. Most of the children used the tongs to get out all the seeds and cook them. In the block area the children pulled out the biggest blocks to build a space ship, that seemed to be the theme of the day with the children. E and A played in the block area and started building a spaceship they made door steering wheels traps for anyone trying to get in, secret hiding spots for them ti hide. It was incredible to see them build this huge structure and put so much thought into building it working together to decide what to build which blocks to use. In housekeeping J and D were also playing spaceship, they were using keyboards to control the ship and asked me to join. J was feeding a baby doll that was sick he had a fever so J made him some soup. D and I controlled the spaceship with our keyboards. D spelled his name using the keyboard and asked me what certain keys said and what they meant, enter, backspace, escape, etc. The play of a preschooler is so incredible,<range type="comment" id="129265"> I work with children ages 2-3 a lot at Carlows ELC and their play amazes me but a preschooler has so much more complex and imaginative thinking. The problem solving skills they show while playing are mind boggling. While we were outside in the morning E and A were pretending to be space ships. A got a chair and set in on a few big rocks in the center of the play ground he then got three helmets; one for his head and then he put one on each arm as elbow pads. E saw A do that and brought me over three hemlets to help him put them on, then he went into his spaceship (a wooden bench is built around a big tree in the playground he sat on the ground between the bench and the tree). I often feel when I am there that I would rather just watch them asking a few questions but not at all intervene in their play unless it is necessary. JM had a surprisingly good day, he is diagnosed with adjustment disorder and often has violent behavior and foul language. There was only one incident, he walked past me when I was sitting near the light table he was singing, well rapping, and he said the n word, the f word, and the b word.<range type="comment" id="959800"> I quickly stopped him and told him I know he was singing and singing is fine but we do not use those words at Shady Lane, he may continue to sing but he needs to skip those words and not say them. Ms Robyn asked what he said and told me I did a good job correcting him. It just amazes me that words such as those are apart of his everyday vocabulary. Its sad but eye opening to see the difference in children and only imagining and wondering what their home lifes are like.

<span style="color: #e11414; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">__Monday October 31:__ Happy Halloween!!! Today was an exhausting day. I am not sure what happened at home this weekend but one student imparticular was out of control today. He was swearing at friends and teachers, raising his fist to hit people, threatening the teacher, biting friends and teachers, kicking and throwing things at teachers, and exposing himself to other children. It was just overwhelming today for everyone, including the children. At one point one of the girls said, "I don't want to play with J when he is being mean to friends." I think the hardest part is trying to teach him a lesson after he has done something wrong because he gets defensive and shuts down. He bit one of the girls and when Ms Robyn pointed out that she was sad because he hurt her, he started yelling saying "shut the f*** up I don't want you to talk to me I don't like you." Its sad that nothing that he does surprises the teachers though, but today I was taken aback by something he did. O<range type="comment" id="239306">ne of the girls was in the bathroom changing into her pull-up she was just about finished just putting her socks and shoes back on when one of the went in to go to the bathroom. Soon after J went in to go to the bathroom, I walked past the door and saw J with his pants at his ankles and him shaking his private in the girls face saying you like that. It makes me wonder what his home life is like, where is he learning these behaviors? What tv shows is he watching, apparently it is not spiderman! It is almost sad how much he craves negative attention and how much he resists love. Ms Robyn tried talking to him this morning when he first came in she put him on her lap and talked to him he sat there maybe 2 minutes then got up. Ms Robyn and Ms Heather are meeting with his parents next week hopefully they will figure out some way to help him.

<span style="color: #0c6a1f; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS',cursive;">__Monday November 7__: Today was a good day. I got to talk to the teachers a lot to discuss last weeks parene not teacher conferences, especially about one student who has had alot of behavior problems. It was all brought to moms attention at the meeting and also the fact that other children are begining to show the same behaviors and other parents are not happy. It has come to the point that other parents are telling their child not to play with this child. Mrs Robyn said the meeting went really well everyone is on the same page with a behavior plan and from seeing him today it seems to be working. He had a terrific day following directions and making good choices. On the few instances where he was being inappropriate, he is redirected. The teacher asks him if he just say an unkind word or if he was was not being gentle, he answered and then when asked what happens next he tells them he has to sit. He goes and sits for 2-3 minutes, a teacher asks him why he was sitting and asks if that was a good choice then he goes back to playing. It seems to be working he has a little more control in the situation he will sometimes decide how long he should sit. It was nice to see him being so positive and cooperative rather than defiant. It was also nice to just talk to the teachers and laugh about the students. One of the little girls has a lot of sassiness for a 3 year old and when the one boy J starts to get loud and be mean she gets right back in his face telling him what he can and cannot do where as most of the other students back off, she gives him a run for his money.

<span style="color: #800080; font-family: Verdana,Geneva,sans-serif;">__Monday November 14__: Today I did my integrated lesson and read a story. This week we are talking about thankfulness, and what it means to be thankful. Mrs. Robyn has students do a marble painting with her then they had to ask a friend to do it with them. I did my activity at the circle table I had pieces of white fabric and fabric markers. Before I let the children start drawing I told them we were drawing a special picture of something you are thankful for. I then asked them if they knew what thankful was, some of the students said things such as people being nice and kind. I told them being thankful was being happy or glad about something someone did or something you have. I then told them to think hard in their mind what they are thankful for, what are you glad you have? Once they told me I let them start drawing. <range type="comment" id="235724">I am going to sew all the pieces together like a quilt and in the center it will say thank you world for.... I was really excited that the children were excited about the drawing and the special project that I am going to make. At circle time I read the story //Thank You, World//, it is a book of people all over the world being thankful for the same things. The pages of the book look like a quilt which is where I got the idea to make the quilt for the room, it is also a nice gift to leave behind for them to remember me. I cannot wait until it is finished! Ill post pictures of it when its all done :)

<span style="color: #603ef9; font-family: 'Lucida Sans Unicode','Lucida Grande',sans-serif;">__Monday November 21__: Today we had a special visiter from the library come, his name was Evan. The children absolutely loved him he was so animated and did different voices for all the characters. It was also planning day so I sat in the library with the teachers as they planned for the next two months. It was nice to sit in and see what activities they were planning for the children. Also during planning time the teachers discussed an incident that occured on friday after Mrs Robyn had left for the day. One of the students J was acting out in appropriate behavior with one of the girls, he was redirected many times that the behavior was innappropriate and when his mother was told about it she said it was the girls that were making him behave that way. He was pulling the girl on top of him and trying to kiss her in a way that was way to old for him, when redirected he took her to the couch and when the teacher checked on him he had his shoes off and was laying down trying to pull her on top of him again and kiss her. Now Mrs Robyn has to have another meeting with J's mother about this. On a more positive note I presented the students with the quilt I made for them using the pictures they drew of what they are thankful for. The teachers and children absolutely loved it. <range type="comment" id="647033">The children asked me where their picture was and then told the class what they were thankful for. The teachers hung it up right away and thought it was wsuch a good idea, I am very glad they like it and it is something they will keep with them all year!