Shadowing a High School Student

As a part of the Dialogue Project, I had the opportunity to shadow my partner in one of her classes. Under typical circumstances, I would have had the chance to visit her school in person and spend the day shadowing A as she went about a normal school day. However, we adapted this portion of the project to accommodate both of our virtual schedules, and so I only shadowed A in her environmental science class. I joined the Google Meet room and had the opportunity to introduce myself to A's classmates and let them know that I was just there to watch and learn. I wanted to ensure that my visit was the least disruptive to the normal class routine as possible so that I could gain a sense of how an average virtual classroom (outside of the ones I visit each week) functions.

As noted in my field notes from my observations below, this was a very interactive class. The teacher utilized Pear Deck, a program I had never seen before that allows students to interact with the lesson slideshow. The students could anonymously answer questions through the Pear Deck website, and the teacher would share them aloud. There was also time allotted for students to share thoughts and questions out loud if they preferred. I noticed that not many of the students had their cameras on and presumed that this class did not make cameras a requirement. This is something I have been paying attention to in all virtual classrooms I encounter and hear about as it has become a debated element of student participation: Should students be penalized for turning their cameras off even if they are actively participating in activities and chats? In this case, as in many I have seen, students were still interactive with the class, even without showing their faces. After the initial discussion, students were given 30 minutes to complete a virtual lab in which they calculated their carbon footprints. After the lab, students returned to share their results and discuss how their carbon footprints have change during the pandemic.

The most valuable part of this shadowing experience for me was getting the opportunity to observe a STEM class, as I have only ever observed and participated in English classes as a student teacher. I was surprised at just how differently the class functioned virtually in comparison to my 7th grade ELA classes. In my cooperating teacher's classes, most of the activities are dependent on collaboration and connection between students. As I will speak about in the next section of my portfolio, much of our work this semester has focused on building empathy amongst students. Class materials are used as guides to connecting to others' stories and building analytic as well as social-emotional knowledge. In the science class I shadowed, there was greater emphasis on independent work and analysis followed by supplemental conversation. I noticed that both subjects, however, put great emphasis on examining content in context with the world and surrounding society. Students are not learning in a vacuum, which is a reassuring thread across disciplines. It was incredibly helpful to shadow A in a class that I most likely would not have had experience with otherwise. It is easy to forget how much students do and learn each day when you are only teaching one subject. I think it is valuable for all teachers to remain mindful that students partake in much more each day than we see; there is always more going on for students than we see in our individual classes, and that is something I have been reminded to keep in mind as I plan and teach classes.