Facilitate Learning
Year 4
Goal
My goal for my Year 4 practicum is to try out different teaching strategies in order to engage learners in rich learning experiences. I want to continue to develop hands on- activities for students and incorporate additional place-base learning opportunities into my facilitation.
Year 3 Practicum
Goal
My goal for my Year 3 Practicum is to implement technology in a meaningful way at least twice in my lesson plans (FL, 2).
Growth
I grew a lot in this goal during my practicum. I realized that I was using "meaningful" in the wrong way. At first I believed that meaningful use of technology meant students using technology themselves to learn. During my practicum, I understood that technology can be used meaningfully in a lot of different way. I utilized technology almost every day in various capacities. I used the loftboard as a way to record answers from students during discussions that they could use as references for learning, I played videos and songs that related to certain concepts that were being taught, the loftboard was used as a tool to put visuals up so students had something to refer back to, especially during math, I used it a lot during the unit on time that I taught because the interactive clock was such an excellent tool to show examples for students. All of these were meaningful ways of utilizing technology because it offered students with different ways to learn.
3rd Year Practicum Final Presentation
WINTER 2023- EDUC 2375
Goal
My goal for this semester is to improve my pacing in my lessons in order to give my students more time to reflect and provide proper closure to the lesson.
Growth
During my Three Connected Lesson Plans, I was able to practice my pacing. The first and second lessons were paced well. Both lessons finished on time and allowed the students to work on their exit slips and come back for a closure where the students could reflect on their learning. My Mentor Teacher uses a timer in their classroom which helped me keep my pacing and gave the students a visual reference for how much time they had for a task.
FALL 2022- EDUC 2371
Goal
My goal for next semester is to work on the pacing of my lessons in order to include time for students to reflect and have closure to the lesson.
Action Plan
I plan to work on my pacing by monitoring the time more effectively and limiting the amount of unnecessary discussions through classroom management. I want to implement some new tactics that I have learned in order to curb students asking questions that are unrelated to the topic that we are discussing.
Artifact from Fall 2022
The learning centers that were set up in the classroom changed regularly. Some were group focused while others were done individually. This demonstrated using "a variety of teaching strategies to engage learners in rich learning experiences" (FL, 2).
WINTER 2022 - EDUC 1233
Goal
My goal for this semester is to use the different learning strategies that we are learning about in our Education 1233 class in my field experience and find ways to enrich learning experiences. I hope to engage in inquiry based learning and promote high level thinking amongst my students.
Strategy
My strategy is to work with my mentor teacher to come up with ideas on how to incorporate different strategies for when I facilitate the lessons in my field experience. Using strategies that we've learned in class such as direct instruction, drill and practice, questioning and answering or discovery learning offer new approaches to facilitating learning that help create more engaging learning experiences.
Growth
I was able to teach multiple lessons this semester that greatly improved how to facilitate learning. I used different techniques with the kindergarten classroom that helped promote higher level thinking. I found that the question and answer technique was very useful for kindergarten as it engaged the students in our conversation. The students were eager to respond to the questions with well thought out answers that fostered greater discussion within the classroom. I also learned that direct instruction was essential when it came to certain activities as it made it easier for students to follow.
Students and myself engaged in discussion in the classroom.
FALL 2021 - EDUC 1231
Goal
My goal is to learn different teaching strategies that will help facilitate learning.
Strategy
My strategy will be to work with mentor teachers to find what works best for them and observe their ways of communication. I will pay attention to how they pace their lessons so that students can stay engaged and ask questions. I will ask questions as to how their assignments are relevant to the learning goals.
Growth
I learned a lot about different teaching strategies from my mentor teacher. Using different teaching strategies keeps students engaged in learning. Due to COVID, she was unable to make learning centers for her kindergarten students but she adapted in order to give them the best learning opportunities that she could. She used resources like virtual community helpers, where someone from the community such as a dentist would have a virtual call with the students to talk about how they help the community. She also incorporated songs and poems into her lessons to make them more engaging for young students as well as play-based assignments that included crafting.
Students performing poems to their parents during Halloween (left) and Christmas (right). The poems were used to promote memorization and patterning and the students loved them!
