Weekly Log #1 Student Teaching Weekly Log Libby Bouma Week 1 1/27-1/31

1. How did you spend your time this week? What responsibilities did you have? My first official day in the classroom, I spent the majority of the day reading through IEPs as well as observing Mrs. Kluesner teaching. This allowed me to get to see her teaching style as well as learn more about students. I had been in the classroom the week prior on two separate occasions so was able to match faces to IEPs. During my first week I attended two trainings. The first training was a half-day training on the status of special education in the West Des Moines School District as well as new information on the Written Prior Notice and the R form. The second training of the week was a training on the new supplemental math curriculum, Number Worlds that the WDMCS has recently purchased. Mrs. Kluesner encouraged me to jump in and help students when needed. I was also able to help out with grading math probes and unit math tests. The majority of my time this week was spent taking notes, reading curriculum books to learn more about what I will be teaching, getting to know the students, and observe Mrs. Kluesners teaching. I had a tour of the school the week prior, but have been able to learn more names with faces among the other teachers. 2. What were your most satisfying and challenging experiences? The biggest challenge this week was getting my own personal routine down. I have had a full time job prior to grad school, but had become familiar with being a full time student and holding two part time jobs while in school. Being at the school at the same time each day was different, but a welcome to my previous hectic schedule. So far I have not experienced any challenges in the classroom. My most satisfying experience this week was just being in the classroom. I have dreamt of being a student teacher for the past two years and it is still surreal that it is my time. I truly enjoy being able to be at Crossroads every day and getting to know the ins and outs of a special education classroom. 3. What are the plans for the upcoming week? I am writing this well into my second week, but I knew that going into the second week I wanted to learn more about the curriculum and the routine. I had not been in the classroom consistently with the trainings and late start, so was looking forward to more time with the students. I also knew I would begin working with a 2nd grader on her reading and was looking forward to lesson planning and working with her.

Weekly Log #2 Student Teaching Weekly Log Libby Bouma Week 2 2/13-2/7

1. How did you spend your time this week? What responsibilities did you have? This week I continued to spend my time observing Mrs. Kluesner and was also afforded the opportunity to begin teaching small groups. This week I started working with a first grade boy on his writing. He comes in at the end of the day to receive 15 minutes of direct instruction in his writing. I also worked with two 2nd graders during their reading instruction. I had the opportunity to meet with three 2nd grade students outside of their classroom to work on reading instruction and sit with them during their core reading instruction with their general education teacher. My responsibilities increased in that I began writing learning targets and lesson plans for the groups I have taken over. I also had the opportunity to start some of the lessons for the 4th grade writing and reading class and 6th grade math class. Thus far, I have had an opportunity to help out with every group except the 5th grade readers, as they have not been down in our classroom the past two weeks due to presentation in their general education classroom. Mrs. Kluesner has modeled progress monitoring for her groups and this week I was able to help facilitate some of these on Friday. 2. What were your most satisfying and challenging experiences? My most satisfying experience this week was during my work with a 2nd grade student during reading. During our lesson on Thursday, we were discussing what we had learned in the previous two lessons. She was able to engage in this conversation and retained the information. Not only did she retain the information, she was able to apply it to the new information being presented in our lesson that day. Another satisfying experience was on Friday afternoon when Mrs. Kluesner had a meeting and had me work with the 4th grade reading and writing groups as well as work with a 5th grader in his classroom on his writing and end of the day routine. The most challenging experience this week has been during my Reading Mastery lessons with two, second graders. The lesson is scripted and moves at a fast pace. I stumbled a little while going through the lesson the first couple of days. During the reading portion, the girls read together while I tap my pen on the table. The girls are to read at the pace of my tap. For some reason, their reading is off. I spoke with Mrs. Kluesner about this and I think I am concentrating on their reading and trying to match my tap with it rather than tapping consistently and having them match my tap. Mrs. Kluesner assured me it just takes practice and that she will teach this lesson again so that I can observe and watch how she teaches the lesson. 3. What are the plans for the upcoming week? On Monday, I will be joining Mrs. Kluesner and Miss Jones to a training with Anita Archer, a teacher/researcher who has helped develop some of the content Mrs. Kluesner and her literacy group have been learning. Mrs. Kluesner has shared some of the content that she has learned during her literacy group and states that it is useful information to know while teaching.

This upcoming week I will continue to teach the 2nd grade reading groups and 1st grade writing while adding spelling work with 2nd graders and the 4th grade reading group. I am excited to continue moving forward in my teaching and learning more of the curriculums being used. Weekly Log #3 Student Teaching Weekly Log Libby Bouma Week 2 2/10-14

1. How did you spend your time this week? What responsibilities did you have? This week I continued to spend my time observing Mrs. Kluesner and paying extra attention to specific details on how instruction moves forward. By paying attention to key details, I can take what I have learned during my time at Drake and what I am observing and apply them to my own teaching. I continued to work with the 2nd grade reading students and the first grader with this writing while adding a couple of groups. This week I started teaching the 4th grade corrective reading group with three students. Each lesson spans over two days with the first day focusing on a word attack lesson and reading the story. The second day focuses on check-outs where students demonstrate fluent reading with little to no errors. They are also timed on how many words per minute they can read which is then recorded in their progress monitoring. I also started teaching the first ten minutes of the 2nd grade spelling instruction for two students. These students are working with the Spelling Mastery curriculum. This has been a great transition, as next week I will begin teaching the second half of their time in writing. This week I also began working with a 5th grade student in his classroom at the end of his social studies instruction to help him with his writing. We then move into his home classroom where we go over what he needs to have written down in his planner and what homework he needs to be working on for the week. He then comes into the special ed. room for support with his homework until the school day is over. I had opportunities throughout the week to help get groups started with their lessons and as an additional support to them during their work. I also continued to help grade assessments and administer progress-monitoring assessments such as DIBELs and math probes. As we are moving into the 4th week, I am feeling more comfortable with the routine and schedule. This allows me to pay special attention to specifics in instruction. Mrs. Kluesner has been a great mentor and has given me a lot of opportunities to help in her classroom. She is also wonderful with answering my questions. 2. What were your most satisfying and challenging experiences? My most satisfying experience this week was getting the routine down for the 2nd grade reading students during their Reading Mastery group. I watched Mrs. Kluesner at the beginning of the week and noted key pieces I felt I was missing. I also continued to work with the 4th grade corrective reading group. They really struggled during the first lesson I instructed with them, making a lot more errors than they had been making with Mrs. Kluesner. Both Mrs. Kluesner and I spoke with the students about their errors and how regardless of who is teaching them, the errors are not acceptable. The students did exceptionally better the second lesson I taught. My most challenging experience this week has been preparing myself to teach 6th grade algebra. I was a terrible algebra student in high school and it still seems crazy to me that they are

teaching it in 6th grade. I observed Mrs. Kluesner begin the lesson and it has been helpful to see her again use concrete representations (balance pans) to teach the basics. Seeing Mrs. Kluesner helped ease my concerns and going over the problems ahead of time to practice has also helped prepare my lessons.

3. What are the plans for the upcoming week? This upcoming week I will be taking over two new groups. The first is a 6th grade math group is with two students. I have been working on the algebra and inequality lesson plans, which will begin Monday. I will then also support them with their unit assessment at the end of the week. The second group I will add is the second grade writing. I will begin instructing them on how to write stories that tell more. I have also started looking up icebreaker activities to do during a school-wide bullying prevention event. It is my understanding that students are taken from different classes and grouped together to help create relationships between students and activities that help them get to know one another. Weekly Log #4 Student Teaching Weekly Log Libby Bouma Week 4 2/17-2/21

1. How did you spend your time this week? What responsibilities did you have? This week was an odd week, as we did not have school on Monday and an early out on Thursday due to the weather. This week was the last week spent observing and teaching as I move into bell-to-bell teaching next week. The plan was for me to start teaching 6th grade algebra on Monday, but it was pushed back to Thursday morning due to a day of review being needed on Tuesday and both girls not having class on Wednesday. I have learned that students are greatly affected when they miss instruction and that it becomes more difficult for them to generalize learned information on previous days. Students also become extremely distracted when they know that they will be leaving school early for the day. On Wednesday I was able to be a part of a school meeting where the reading specialist discussed the new state mandated Early Literacy Intervention Expectations for K-3 and how teachers will be affected. I was also able to sit in on the schools leadership meeting. The team discussed unpacking reading and math standards as well as Miss Jones and Mrs. Kluesners Literacy Group and bringing what they have learned to the school. My responsibilities increased this week as I began teaching 2nd grade writing. Our unit is on telling more and we started the week with reading a couple of fiction books where the author is descriptive in their writing. After reading and discussing how an author tells the reader more, I began modeling my writing about my pet and how I can tell the reader more using descriptive words. The second day of modeling I began asking students ways in which I could tell more by having them reflect back to the books we read aloud and how the author told the reader more using descriptive words. On Friday we had a workday where I was able to have conversations with Mrs. Kluesner about teaching bell-to-bell and taking over the 5th grade reading class. I was able to complete my lesson plans for this class and looking forward to teaching this group of students through their

inferring unit. Friday afternoon, I attended a Literacy Group training provided by AEA. We also discussed the new Early Literacy Intervention Expectations, close reading, strategies on how we as teachers can help close the gap on students achievement, and looking at a case study. 2. What were your most satisfying and challenging experiences? My most satisfying experience was also my most challenging experience. On Thursday morning I taught the two 6th grade students a lesson on algebraic expressions and providing more instruction on inverse operations. I felt prepared throughout the lesson as I had a detailed lesson plan and had worked through all of the practice problems to familiarize myself with any questions/errors that may arise during instruction. During the lesson, I quickly realized that although the students were eager to try algebra on their own, they stumbled through the problems. I felt confident in my teaching, although after the lesson, I was able to reflect back on some possible side instruction moments that should have occurred on how to add and subtract positive and negative numbers as both girls continued to struggle with this concept during instruction.

3. What are the plans for the upcoming week? This upcoming week I am looking forward to teaching bell-to-bell. I have worked through most of my lesson plans and will finish up the 5th grade math lesson plan on Sunday. I have also sent an email to Mr. Cameron inviting him to come and observe me during my two weeks of bell-to-bell teaching. I am looking forward to experiencing a full day of teaching and the insights I will further gain. Outside of my classroom expectations and responsibilities, I plan to finish my applications and continue working on my e-portfolio. Weekly Log #5 Student Teaching Weekly Log Libby Bouma Week 5 2/24-2/28

1. How did you spend your time this week? What responsibilities did you have? It is very hard to believe that it is already the end of week five as time has flown by in my student teaching. This week I started my first week of bell-to-bell teaching. It was also the first week of school where I have not had any trainings, early outs, or school cancellations due to weather. Going into the week I was prepared to teach nine different lessons/groups of students, ranging from first grade writing to sixth grade math. Prior to the week, I spent a considerable amount of time lesson planning making sure I was prepared to teach those content areas. I was a little leery of how my 5th and 6th grade math classes would go, but over all they seemed to go well. Mrs. Kluesner was helpful in giving me guidance on specific strategies and what she has done in the past as well as feedback for the future lessons. This week my responsibilities included the lesson planning, creating learning target goals, instructing, and helping students who came in before and after the school day for help in math. I also conducted writing and math probes for progress monitoring. Conferences are coming up next week and I was able to help enter in data into IEPs. This allowed me some time to learn more about the online IEP system and making the

connection between the hand written data versus the computer graphed data. I appreciate the blue binders the students have so that they can monitor their own progress. A lot of the students become excited to see their data moving upward and try to beat their previous highest score. If I teach in a special education room, I will most certainly use this strategy as I see the benefits it has on the students for them to be able to see and track their progress. I also attended a literacy group meeting on Wednesday evening. 2. What were your most satisfying and challenging experiences? My most satisfying experience this week was the simple experience of teaching bell-tobell. While I knew teaching was exhausting, having experienced it first hand is a different appreciation and understanding. I felt prepared for the week and each day and it was a satisfying experience overall. My most challenging experience was on Friday for the simple fact that I did not feel well at all. I had a sore throat and sinus congestion, but knew I still needed to move forward in the day. I knew I was not 100% myself, and this was a good learning experience on the fact that there will no doubt be days when I am teaching full time when I do not feel well, but that my students still look up to me and depend on me for their learning. 3. What are the plans for the upcoming week? This upcoming week I look forward to my second week of teaching bell-to-bell. This previous week has given me some insight on the things I did well and the things I can grow from. As I work on my lesson plans for the upcoming week, I plan to reflect on the lessons I did and how may I need to adjust some of those lessons. Outside of my classroom expectations and responsibilities, I will be partaking in the mock interviews on Tuesday night, plan to finish my applications and continue working on my eportfolio.

Weekly Log #6 Student Teaching Weekly Log Libby Bouma Week 6 March 3-7, 2014

1. How did you spend your time this week? What responsibilities did you have? This was my second week of teaching bell-to-bell. I went into the week feeling even more comfortable with the schedule and the lessons I had planned. I continued to teach the unit on inferences with my 5th grade-reading group. I taught 6th grade math working on probabilities and 5th grade math working on adding and subtracting negative numbers. I also started a new non-fiction writing unit with my 2-second graders. They enjoyed reading about an animal and writing about the animal they selected. This week our 4th grade-writing students prepared to take their Iowa Writing Assessments on How-Tos. This included some review with them and then monitoring them during their assessment. I had the pleasure of attending a couple of IEP meetings. Crossroads Park had their conferences this week, which I was able to observe on Thursday evening. It was interesting to see the different ways in which general education teachers go over information with their

students. I also enjoyed being able to observe the information that Mrs. Kluesner brings to the meeting with the students IEP goals and showing parents their childs data. 2. What were your most satisfying and challenging experiences? My most challenging experience also turned into my most satisfying experience this week. Mid-week I taught a 5th grade math lesson on subtracting negative and positive numbers. I had reviewed EDM and had my lesson planned out, but it was not connecting with my students. I attempted a couple of different ways of explaining the problems to my students, but it still was not connecting. After my lesson, I spoke with Mrs. Kluesner about my struggles and to get some guidance on why it was not connecting with the students. She did a wonderful job of explaining how to solve the problems and it made perfect sense after her explanation. I readjusted my lesson for the following day and used the wording that Mrs. Kluesner explained to me. It went over well with my students, as they were responsive and understanding of the content. 3. What are the plans for the upcoming week? This upcoming week I am scheduled to observe the three different first grade classroom at Crossroads Park. I will also be going to Westridge on Tuesday morning to observe a Level I special education classroom. As this is my last week at Crossroads, I will not be teaching bell-tobell, but have discussed with Mrs. Kluesner continuing to teach six different classes. This will be a good way to phase out, but still remain connected with the students and continue to learn more through direct instruction.