Winter 2023 - 4th Year

Goal: My goal for facilitating learning in my final practicum is to incorporate more cross-curricular and multidisciplinary inquiry projects that will engage students and provide them with some choice and independence in the direction of their learning.

Growth: In my final practicum, I designed an inquiry project called "Over and Under the Snow" that covered subject areas such as math, science, writing, indigenous perspectives/social studies, and art.

I chose this because cross-curricular inquiry projects integrate multiple subject areas, which encourages students to see the interconnectedness of different subjects and how they relate to one another. 

This inquiry project also encouraged collaborative learning through researching together, creating a classroom fact wall, and giving each other feedback when building their dioramas. This helped students develop teamwork and communication skills while working towards a common goal. 

Winter 2021 - 2nd Year

For my Teaching ELA course this semester, I created a bank of resources that corresponded to certain PoS outcomes, described lessons they could be used for, and provided evidence as to why they are effective strategies. Creating a resource bank helped me to use some of the pedagogies appropriate to the discipline (P5) including comprehension strategies to help students make inferences while reading. I was able to work through ways in which I may facilitate lessons in the future that pertained to a variety of different grades and focus areas of ELA.

Goal: My goal is to continue to add enriching resources to my bank and find different and more engaging lessons to incorporate into ELA.

Winter 2020 - 1st Year

My field placements school motto is "learning takes place in everything we do".  Which has proven to be true and I am able to immediately see in the students. This semester, the school implemented a weekly activity called "inspiration nation". This is essentially when the students receive 1 hour a week of non directed time in which they may choose what they want to do - as long as it is productive and purposeful. Providing students with choice allows them to better self-differentiate their learning and make it more appropriately challenging. They are also able to better cater to their own interests which sparks engagement. 

This activity follows along nicely with the Montessori philosophy of being individualized and more autonomous. This also plays into Gardners Multiple Intelligences where each student is now able to showcase their skills and capabilities in more ways than just an intellectual capacity. For example, some students brought in instruments to learn, some were practicing dance, while other were practicing cooking (with supervision).

Goal: My goal is to further my knowledge on the benefits of choice in the classroom and different ways to implement it.

Fall 2019 - 1st Year

Facilitation is a key component to a well functioning and successful classroom. Having a good culture to support quality learning is essential, as well as the delivery of the lesson itself. 

 Being in a Montessori school, I quickly became familiar with the idea of Montessori materials. Experiential learning from the materials can help with problem solving and the development of a concept. A frequent favourite of the class was using the smart board in an interactive matter; incorporating a kinetic aspect to the lesson as well as technology. The interactive nature of these materials is one example of inquiry based learning, the cornerstone of the Montessori method. 

Goal:  I want to further my knowledge on the different Montessori materials that exist and the individual benefits they provide. Regardless of whether I end up working in a Montessori program, these are valuable resources.