NOV 23

This week was focused on looking at adaptability and classroom management. Every Monday,
there is a 20-minute gap between the beginning of class and announcements, prayer, and
singing O’Canada. Mrs O. in this time chose to learn about the student’s weekends and ask
about their lives rather than start Religion as a type of cushion activity as she waited for
students to filter in and for announcements to start. She also went over the class schedule and
any important information for the week so that the students knew what was happening and time
wasn’t being wasted. There was also the use of a classroom strategy called pose-pause-
pounce-bounce that was used in religion. Giving students time to think allows them to do higher-
level thinking questions.

Math involved reviewing the important concepts from last week and making sure that students
are up to speed with what they are learning. Math is a very game centred and allows students to
enjoy their learning. Constant repetition of instruction was also used to help students
understand processes and reminders of how the classroom runs. Questions always start easy
and get progressively harder. This allows for a level of differentiation along with giving students
individual aids or challenges depending on their ability. The class is very self-policing and able
to call each other out on behaviour issues.

I taught Language Arts on Monday and we worked on Storylines. Using the student’s knowledge
of different movies helped them to understand the components of a story and how stories can
be organized. My classroom management was low and I struggled with blurters so in the future I
will give reminders of hands-raised as well as ignore the blurters while giving positive
reinforcement to the students who are following the proper processes.

Science involved differentiation and having students with lower abilities doing 2-3 definitions
rather than all 8 at the beginning to overwhelm them. There were also copious instructional
repeats and time reminders for the class. Positive re-enforcement was given for students who
were ready to go and had the correct items out. “K is ready to go, Z is ready to go...etc”

There is often flextime related to teaching and so I want to look at different ways to fill this time.
What will be my flex-time filler? Mrs O. does Riddles and Mad Gabs. Other teachers have
different options. I want to come up with my type of flex-time filler.

NOV 24
The beginning of the day is often spent doing process reminders. Reminders to have masks on,
stay in seats, pull out correct papers. Is there a way that the students can self regulate this? The
constant need for reminders is fine but are there ways to circumvent this?

Language Arts has been a novel read-aloud. Mrs O. will stop throughout and ask questions to
predict what comes next or to review. Also to define large words.

I taught Art with L’s class. We tried a new game that I made up and overall they got the concept
really well. The students were engaged and enjoyed the game. I need to (again) work on my
classroom management. There were moments of shouting out and spoiling the answer that I
should have patiently waited to die down before continuing the game. For next time I will try to
lower the level of the disruptions before continuing.

I taught Science back-to-back with L’s and O.’s class. L’s class got the idea, were very
engaged, understood, and showed genuine interest in the topic. We chatted after about Space
and went deeper with our understanding. O.’s class did not go as well. I don’t know if they just
didn’t care as much about the material but they didn’t overly care so I didn’t go into as much
depth as I did with L’s class about background information and extra knowledge. Time
management is hard for science so I should have used my art game again as flex time with L’s
class as we were waiting for social to end.

NOV 25
Religion was a game today. To make sure that all students could play, Mrs O. read out the
questions and options for the slow readers. She also paused every so often to gauge
comprehension.

I taught Math and it was Lesson 3 of patterns. I re-evaluated from last week and decided that
we were going too fast. I went over the basics of a pattern, what a pattern rule is, and how to
find pattern rules. I got the students to give me a thumbs up, thumbs down, and thumbs
sideways depending on how they felt about each aspect. I also create a flowchart to help the
student figure out pattern rules. I was able to slow down and make sure that the students really
got it before I moved on. It was probably my best lesson so far. Classroom management went
well and students were engaged and respectful. Partly this was due to a certain student not
being in class. He is very advanced especially in Math and sits right next to where I teach and
vocally reminds the class that he is bored. I do not yet have a strategy for how to deal with this
and I find that it leads me to rush as well as pushes the class as a whole to listen less.

Art with L’s class went well. We started our lesson on Warhol Pop Art and they got creative and
have come up with great ideas. I also did better at ignoring blurters and positive re-enforcement
of hand-raisers. The only thing I would switch is that I would get them to divide their paper into 6
spaces first for the ease of colouring the background.

Science was independent work on their definition booklet. L’s class is really good at working
independently so it went very smooth. Mrs O. left to do copy and I was with a sub. The students
were very comfortable coming up to me and asking for clarification or just showing me what they
have done.

NOV 26
Religion started with instructions with an example on creeds. Each question was readout for the
class and students could choose the answer. There were time reminders given and students
were given a heads up to what the brief would be for their next project.
I taught Math today and it flopped a little bit. The beginning went well where we reviewed the
worksheet questions but after I had created a lesson with patterns and codes. The students
were involved but the student was back and the whole class was a constant fight to get him not
to speak out or complain or ruin it for others. The students were all involved but we ran out of
time to properly finish and conclude the lesson so overall it didn’t work great. Next Wednesday
when I teach Math again I might try to start off with coded patterns again to see if the students
can conclude last weeks lesson on their own.

I taught LA last period and had to quickly change my lesson plan for timing but we just took out
the Daily 5 rather than a key component. The beginning half went well, looking at and reviewing
storylines and then looking at a folktale from another country. The reading was clear but the
students needed to be reminded during about what they were supposed to be doing as well as
after. I also should have stopped and asked comprehension questions along the way. After I
finished reading and we were creating our storyline, I should have reminded students to write
down the parts of the story. Kevin suggested that I have the students go up to the board and fill
in the storyline so I will try that for Monday when we look at conflict in stories.

Next week, I want to continue to focus on classroom management and also find ways to involve
our K’s, Q’s, N’s, B’s, and K’s who don’t like to participate or try in anything.