Teacher/Student Evaluations:
One evaluation and piece of feedback I received from the students on field trips was that many of them already had learned about animal forms from other teachers or at Outdoor School. Because of this, some of the students were less engaged because of their previous knowledge. However, I was able to make animal forms fun for the students who already knew about them by allowing the students to teach each other. Students with previous experience learning about animals forms taught their peers about deer ears, owl eyes and fox feet. Deer ears center around engaging your hearing, owl eyes have the students practice their peripheral vision and fox feet encourages students to walk quietly, like a predator does. One student knew a lot about fox feet and was excited to share what they knew. So, I had the student share about how foxes walk quietly because they are predators and have to sneak up on other animals. The students who had previously knowledge were more engaged when they got to demonstrate what they had already learned to their peers and got to become the teachers themselves. The students that already knew about fox feet got to practicing demonstrating how they work as well. Through feedback from the students that they already learned about animal forms, I was able to adapt my teaching in the following weeks so these students could be better engaged. With the adaptations, the students were able to listen more instead of being bored and tuning out.
Community Partners (Madison Meadow) Evaluations:
At Madison Meadow, Susan Jerde is on the nonprofit board and was our main point of contact. Susan helped us learn more about plant identification at the meadow. One piece of feedback from her was that we needed to double check what the plant species was before teaching the students about them and identifying them. For example, I thought one tree was an Oregon white oak when it was really a Bigleaf maple. With Susan’s help, I was able to better identify the native plants and trees at Madison Meadow. Susan also liked our plant identification activity, so with her help we were able to incorporate this into our third grade lesson plan. We had students in third grade write on popsicle sticks what the plants, trees, and shrubs were and then stick them in the ground near the plants. This allowed the students to engage with hands-on learning and learn more about ecological identification, with plants like the Bigleaf maple, Oregon white oak, Ponderosa pine, Douglas fir and more.
Project Head and Project Manager Evaluations:
With feedback from my project manager and professor, I was able to take the positive teaching skills I was utilizing and continue to apply them on later field trips. On one field trip, Katie told me I was doing a good job connecting environmental stewardship with our restoration activity to Earth Day. In my mind, I was just talking about Earth Day because I enjoy celebrating it. With Katie’s help, I was able to better connect the restoration projects where we removed grasses from native trees to the importance of looking out for your home and the planet around you. Through this feedback, I was able to better include environmental stewardship in my lesson plans. I also received feedback that if disciplining isn’t working, try distracting the students instead. With one of my third grade students, he was off track a lot and wanted to talk to his friends instead of participating in the activities. However, during his quiet nature observation time, he discovered six slugs on the tarp he was sitting on. We then took time to use this positive distraction as a learning opportunity during story sharing time with the whole group. I learned from this piece of feedback that it’s okay for students to be distracted if it helps them learn more or brings about new things for them to be excited about. I also had one group that really liked looking at mushrooms on the group. So, we took time to go on a mushrooms walk, even though it wasn’t written in the lesson plans. This came from feedback from our project managers, Meredith, that we need to be adaptable during our trips. Altogether, I was able to better incorporate feedback by adapting the lesson plans and add time for new activities, such as observing slugs.