Talk

Talk Talk Talk

Talk can get you in trouble. Well, talking too much or saying the wrong thing to the wrong person can get you in trouble. It can also help you. Talking helps us communicate thoughts, feelings, information, etc.

Self-talk can help us organize lists, or plan out ideas. Talking to other people can help us spread news, or ask questions to get more information. I think talk is very important in classrooms. Teachers talk all the time in order to get information to students. However, I was told last week that students ask about maybe 10 questions a year. TEN QUESTIONS? How do they get any answers? How do they search for deeper meaning? How do they find out what other classmates or their teacher think?

I believe that students should have the majority of talk time in the classroom. The teacher should pose questions that force the students to think and talk about. The students should be challenged to talk amongst themselves and explain their answers no matter what grade. I think students should also be given an avenue to talk out their feelings. Kind of like a "soap box." I know something like that could easily get out of hand, but I think if the students were given clear rules and limits, they could handle it. They should be able to speak out about a given topic, or pick topics to talk about. School isn't always about learning material. It's also a place for learning how to express yourself and how to conduct yourself when others think differently than you.

Listening...

Listening...it sounds so easy, but it can be so hard. The ability to hear is something that most of us are born with. The question is, are we born with the ability to Listen? Some people make a profession out of listening to people. They are psychologists, operators, doctors, etc. Listening is an integral part of everyone's life. Teachers listen to their students. Students hopefully listen to their teachers. Employees listen to their bosses and hopefully bosses listen to the needs of their employees.

There are a couple different types of listening and how you listen is determined by your purpose for listening. I think many people take the ability to hear and listen forgranted. Listening allows us to gain knowledge from other people's ideas and opinions. We are able to perform tasks by listening to basic instructions. Just hearing the information isnt enough. Having the ability to focus on the information, take it in, and remember it, is a very important skill.

Propaganda is a large part of our everyday life and it plays on our ability to listen. We are subjected to the opinions of many different people trying to persuade us to believe one thing or another. Propaganda has been used for many, many years. I think it is something that teachers tend to leave out of their lessons, or just cover once a year. I think there is valuable information in commercials or ads that can be used by the teacher if he or she is creative enough. Posters can be turned into history assignments, math problems, etc.

I enjoyed our propaganda activity last class period. I think it was a good way for us to learn about the different types. Not only did we get to pick examples of each type, we were able to include examples that we liked. Being able to share our examples with the class was important because we were able to show the class our accomplishment while also showing them something about out personality.

Field Experiences

I've been placed with my mentor teacher for going on 2 semesters and I will stay with her through student teaching. When I was notified about my placement, I was not happy. I had always said I wanted to teach 1st grade and applied to get placed in a 1-2nd grade class. I decided to keep an open mind because I had heard that Ms. Holloman was a good teacher. Her class began to grow on me and now I am in love with fourth grade.

I have had a really good experience in Ms. Holloman's class. I learn more each time I go. Not only do I observe lessons that are being taught, I learn about discipline and organization. Being organized is really important in how well a classroom runs. I've learned this by being in many different classrooms. Teachers that had to take time to get things together have more problems with students' behavior. Teachers that has everything ready to go and transitions smoothly from one thing to another leaves less time for students to disengage.

My favorite visit was one in which the students were taking part in a mock-trial. They were working on point-of-view and were really excited take a part in the court trial. They worked so hard to analyze the story they were given and pulled the tinyest details out to prove their back up their arguments.

I'm not sure I have had a least favorite visit. Even a visit where the students we taking a math assessment was interesting. The students had to write out explanations for how they solved the problems and why they did what they did. I think that was a good idea because most of the time, if you can explain how to do something, then you understand it.

I'm looking forward to more time in Ms. Holloman's classroom and I am nervous, but looking forward to student teaching. I know I have already learned a lot from my mentor and will continue to learn.