About the Tot Spot

I decided to choose this place because when I first toured the facility, they seemed to be very invested in their student's education. They take the time to carefully plan out their lesson plans and make sure everyone is getting taught a little of every subject. They teach the kids math, science, art, music, and even physical education! They made their education a priority, and by the time they've graduation preschool, some students even know how to add with double digits. This place has truly impressed me and motivated me to become a better teacher. Having the opportunity to work here has also allowed me to some people that are in all kinds of fields and has allowed me to expand my network. I truly am grateful for the opportunity to work here and loved every bit of it!

Prior Experience

A connection I have seen in my coursework and in my engaged learning is learning how to deal with “difficult” students. Something we talk about in class is that most of the time, these students are doing these things for a specific reason. I have learned in class that it really matters how you approach these students and the tone you talk to them in. It’s important to crouch down to their level and let them know that we’re here to help and want to hear about what is going on. A lot of the time, these kids are either hungry, didn’t sleep well last night, or just haven’t been getting enough attention from their parents. This is why it is important to talk to them first and see what is specifically bothering them instead of getting them in trouble the first chance we can get. 

There was a specific kid who didn’t listen to the teacher at all and just did what he wanted to do. I took this as an opportunity to practice what I have been learning in class. When the kids went outside, the student stuck around to help me cleanup, and I got a chance to talk to them. I concluded that this student didn’t get much attention from their mom because she was always busy at work and worried more about her older son. Once I was finished with this conversation with them, we went outside, and it seemed like their behavior changed in an instant. That conversation and this engaged learning really put into perspective for me how important it is to just sit and talk with our students. It has also helped me work on my patience and getting to know that sometimes it takes time for students to open up to us, but that doesn’t mean we should give up on them. 

Community Connections

I have always believed that working with different cultures other than our own is very important and necessary. I am learning in my classes right now that it’s vital for us to teach students about other cultures and ethnicities, so it won’t be foreign to them in the future when they’re in school or when they have their own job. The learning center where my engaged learning is located is predominately white, so I find it more important to engage them with other cultures. Since I don’t know if they’re in any other extracurriculars where they might be exposed to diversity, I always try to teach them something new about a different culture whenever I’m with them. As a person of color, I never gave much thought about diversity since I was always around it. Taking these classes and working at this learning center has made me realize that is not the case for everybody. I have always believed that if you make an activity fun and engaging for a student, they’ll think learning is fun and will want to keep doing it. This belief has strengthened ever since working there. The students have fun learning about different cultures and look forward to it every week. 

New Skills and Lessons

As I have mentioned before, my engaged learning took place in a preschool learning center. In these centers, they are required to have outside time and there are only a certain number of students that are allowed in a room with a certain number of teachers. For example, in a preschool classroom (which I’m in) there can only be a maximum of 24 with 2 teachers. If one of the teachers is sick and the other teacher must be alone for the day, there can only be 12 students in the class with her. This is just some background information so you can get an idea of how many students we need to be taking care of if we are alone or with another teacher. On this particular day, I was with another teacher, and we took the kids outside so they could run around and get their energy out. The other teacher I was with had to run inside very quickly to grab something, so I was left alone with 24 kids. 

This typically isn’t allowed, and I was stressed because I had to watch 24 kids alone and anything can happen in those 5 minutes that I was alone, and she was inside grabbing something. As I was watching the kids, I turned and saw 2 students on the ground, one on top of the other. I rushed over there because I didn't know if they were fighting, or if something was actually going on (even though play fighting isn’t allowed), which made me rush over there even faster. It turned out that they were actually fighting and the kid on top had his hands around the kid on the bottom (basically choking him). Luckily, I got there in time, so he wasn’t on top of him for too long. As a future teacher, I know I will be alone in my classroom with 24 or maybe possibly 30 kids so this experience has really helped me prepare for that. I’m always watching the kids, but I know I do have to work on being able to focus on multiple things at once. For example, if a student needs something, I should be able to help the student with whatever is needed while still watching the rest of my class.

My Impact

This engaged learning experience had a huge impact on my career because it gave me a feel on what it will be like in the future when I have my own classroom. I learned that it’s not always calm and for the most part, it can be quite chaotic. I ended up bonding very well with the classroom I worked in and the kids were always very happy to see me. They always took me around the classroom and showed me what they had made while I was gone and were eager to explain what I had missed out on. The population also did have an impact on me because I was not used to working in that environment/community. During our field experiences at IUPUI, we work in an urban setting, so doing my engaged learning here was very different for me, but I love both! I believe it was very eye opening and necessary for me to have my engaged learning in this community so I could see the pros and cons of working in it. I used to think that I wanted to work in an environment like where my engaged learning was at, but after experiencing both places, I would love to work in either one. I came to the realization that no matter where I find a job, I will want to leave a positive impact on all my students.