Running Head: EDU 202 ASSIGNMENTS 1

EDU 202 Field Observation Assignment

Itzi I. Garcia Contreras

College of Southern Nevada

EDU 202 – 1001

Professor Christensen

May 02, 2021

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Introduction

I am Itzi Ireri Garcia Contreras, and I chose to do my 10-hours of field observations at

Marvin M. Sedway middle school. I chose this school because it is close to my home and

because my little brother currently attends this school. Sedway MS is an innovative school (also

called “turn around” school) and this means that this school has a lot of low-performing and low

achieving students, but its main goal is to produce gains in student achievement in the years they

attend the institution. I was given the pleasure of observing Ms. Paula Perkins’ virtual math

classroom. Ms. Perkins is the current head of the Math department at Sedway MS and she

teaches both 7th grade math and 8th grade math fundamentals.

ASSIGNMENT #1

1. From the pictures online, the school looks to be a decent size. It is surrounded by

homes and a couple of (what appears to be) businesses. It has two tennis courts, four outdoor

basketball courts, what I believe to be four volleyball courts, and two softball/baseball fields

surrounded by a large plot of grass; this entire section makes up a little less than half of the

school grounds. The only fencing that I can see surrounds the section of the school that is

outdoor-sports-related. The landscaping looks good, no spot of land looks weird, misplaced or

elevated, and the school has multiple entrances. Because the school grounds are flat, the building

looks very accessible especially for people in wheelchairs, crutches, etc. There are a few small

trees around the outside of the school and, to my surprise, some indoors by the open sky

(quadrangle/quad) areas.

2. I was not able to walk around the school, but I was able to look at Ms. Perkins’

classroom through her classroom’s webcam; her classroom was very colorful, a sunflower
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yellow color was painted on the walls. There was a large TV on one wall and directly adjacent to

the TV was a wall of white boards. Rows of desks faced the wall of white boards. To the left of

the same wall where the TV was located was a window and in front of the window was her desk.

This was all I was able to see from the view the camera was giving me.

Culture of the School: Read, listen and/or observe to determine the climate, values, and

atmosphere within the school.

1: My first impressions were mostly positive. My brother attends this school, so I had an

idea of what to expect. According to usnews.com, there are about the same number of students

per grade level, around 450 students in each grade level (usnews.com, Enrollment by grade

section). I am not sure about graduation rates because it is a middle school. Greatschools.org

says on their website that of the students at Sedway MS, 13% scored proficient at math and 23%

scored proficient in reading (greatschools.org, Test scores section). The student/teacher ratio is

25:1 (greatschools.org, Student demographics section).

2: The school’s population is 56% male and 44% female. The demographics, from largest

to smallest population, are as follows: Hispanic, Black, multiracial, White, Asian, and Pacific

Islanders (usnews.com, Enrolment by gender and enrollment by diversity section). There was not

much information on students with disabilities or ELL students. The school is an innovative

school, so a majority of the students going into the school are high-risk and in dire need or

remedial classes. Most of the students also come from impoverished backgrounds.

3. Marvin M. Sedway’s mission statement focuses on giving a voice to their students and

community; they also mention they want to inspire their students to succeed in life. The school’s
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motto is, “Hard work equals fun times,” which means that the fun of success is achieved through

struggle and dedication. The school mascot is a raven, it does not seem to have a name.

4. Sedway, before COVID, would also hold special events for high-achieving students

such as bowling outings. The school also has a rewards system called Raven Rewards where

students who behave well get points and they can redeem those points for prizes. One thing that I

think helps bring the community at Sedway together is the band, orchestra, and guitar concerts at

the end of each semester; parents are welcome to (and encouraged) to attend these concerts that

the students at Sedway put on.

5. Since the school year was mainly distanced learning, the website has a slides

presentation introducing all of the teachers, staff, administration, and their roles in the school.

The slide show could be improved if it included pictures of the actual school instead of stock

images. The school also hosts virtual meetings often, the recordings of the meetings are posted to

the school website. The website also offers the school schedule for both in-person and distanced

learners; Wednesdays are half days and the school day is purely virtual because the school is

cleaned every Wednesday.

Culture of the Classroom: Each classroom has its own culture and way of life.

1. Ms. Perkins expects only the best from each of her students and makes sure to take into

account what personal achievements/advancements students make in her class. To keep students

focused, competitive, and on their toes, Ms. Perkins will sometimes offer prizes to students who

finish in first place on online synchronous games. Ms. Perkins also expects students to speak up

and ask for help when they are struggling in class or have a question.

2. There is a heavy lack of student participation. Ms. Perkins explained during the

interview that because Sedway is an innovative school, students will lack motivation and drive to
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participate in class. I was present during different times and days, so I rarely was in the same

class period more than twice, but there was only a handful of students who ever stayed on task in

each class, regardless of placement level. It was difficult to tell if students were working because

every time I observed the classroom, no student ever had their camera on and the camera angle

that Ms. Perkins provided did not give me a view of any student. Even with programs that

notified the teacher of which students were on and off task, few mentioned whether they were

online or offline, not if they were actively working. Usually the high-achieving students were

more likely to participate than the low-achieving students, but again, participation was minimal.

3. From the first day I observed her classroom, Ms. Perkins made it clear that she

respected her students and cared deeply for them. I remember how excited she was to see her

students participating during the game she included in her lesson, Time to Climb, and how she

was enthusiastic about handing out prizes to the people who came in first place. I think that

lesson, even with the slight technical hiccup, was one of the best I had seen in the 10 hours I

spent observing. The reactions Ms. Perkins made also helped encourage class excitement for the

lesson. Ms. Perkins is kind, she has a very strong personality and portrays herself as the

classroom leader, I think this combination is a big reason as to why her students were so

respectful towards her.

4. Students were rarely shown interacting with each other so I could not tell how they

acted towards eachother. However, one interaction I did witness was after the Time to Climb

game, the student who placed in first congratulated everyone for doing their best through the

Google Classroom chat. Other than that, not much interaction was present, especially in the in-

person setting since everyone was socially distancing.

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ASSIGNMENT #2

1. I think there is always a sense of intimidation going into someone else’s classroom not

knowing what to expect. However, I was quickly reassured by the positive energy and spirit that

Ms. Perkins brought into her classroom. Ms. Perkins is a very organized teacher; she has a very

strong presence and knows exactly what she wants from her students and classroom. Even in a

virtual classroom setting, Ms. Perkins did a great job at making sure her students felt comfortable

and welcomed in her classroom.

2. It was difficult to pinpoint the make-up of the class because all of the students’

cameras were off during the entire time I observed the classroom. The students did not have

pictures of themselves as their profile picture so I could only assume the make-up of the

classroom based on the names of the students, but I would not feel comfortable stereotyping

names into ethnicities, genders, etc. From what Ms. Perkins told me, she did not have any ELL

or special needs students in any of her classes this year.

3. From what I could see, I did not run into any rules, granted, my observation took place

in late April so I’m sure the students had the rules engrained into them. However, Ms. Perkins

did post the daily agenda every day and made sure that students knew exactly what they were

supposed to be doing. In the daily agenda, Ms. Perkins established a routine by always starting

class with a Google Classroom post saying, “ATTENDANCE TYPE “HERE” READ

AGENDA, THEN JOIN MEET.” She also expects students to be working on Mathia for the first

20 minutes of class after typing “Here” under the Google Classroom post.

4. Yes, Ms. Perkins needs to take attendance every day, she tries her best to remind

students to reply with “Here” on her morning posts to Google Classroom. She also checks to

make sure students are online and working on Mathia by using a program called GoGuardian
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which allows teachers to see students’ screens if they are using school issued computers. Ms.

Perkins also uses an option on Mathia which lets her see if students are online, offline, working,

or inactive. From what I could tell, verbal praise was the only reward students got for being on

task. Ms. Perkins usually did not directly address the students who were off task, she thanked the

students who were working in hopes that the praise would push/remind more students to do their

classwork. She also mentioned that classroom management was very simple in virtual school

because if students ever misbehaved of were distracting the class from the lesson, she could

easily kick the student from the meeting.

5. Ms. Perkins’ classes are very similar to each other; she teaches 7th grade level math

and 8th grade math fundamentals, which is essentially 7th grade math. Because of the similarities

within her classes, she tends to follow the same schedule for both subjects. Looking at some of

the screenshots I took, the daily agendas for these two classes are nearly identical.

6. Ms. Perkins tries her best to motivate her students, but she knows the difficulty of

getting students excited about school. Virtual learning has made it hard to inspire students,

especially during such hard times the world is facing.

ASSIGNMENT #3

Take screenshots of the learning management system used by the teacher (Canvas, Google

Classroom, Seesaw etc..)

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1. The workflow in online environments is pretty fast paced; because the teacher cannot

see the students, it is easy to go through the lesson quickly and students who may have been

confused or not paying attention could feel intimidated to ask questions through their

microphones or in the chat box. Moving around cameras and other technical equipment can be a

time consuming and tiring process but it must be done in order to provide the best view of the

classroom a teacher can offer to their students. I would say that since class may go by a little

faster, teachers have the opportunity to spend more time going over topics they think their

students need help on. During the last 10-15 minutes of class, Ms. Perkins would do SBAC

practice with the entire class and would allow students to share their answers if they wished to,

though few did.

2. I think asking students to turn on cameras could make a big difference. I know at the

beginning of the year a lot of teachers required this but as the school year progressed, it became

an option to turn one’s camera on. From experience, I was a lot more alert in the classes that
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required me to have my camera on; I was more awake too because I had to spend a half hour

before class getting ready. In my classes where I don’t have to have my camera on, I will often

wake up 5 minutes before class and doing so can make it difficult to concentrate. I also think that

placing the camera at a different angle would be better and make the classroom feel bigger. The

angle that Ms. Perkins had was crooked and the camera was in the center of the room which gave

a great view of the whiteboard, but it felt like looking out of a window facing a brick wall. I

think playing around with camera placements (such as in a corner) during parts of the lesson

when the board isn’t needed can provide visual appeal to an otherwise empty or boring

perspective.

ASSIGNMENT #4

Observe any instructional time with your assigned Cooperative Teacher, and record your

observations when presented with the questions below:

1. Ms. Perkins teach her lesson to the entire class and she would alternate between this

type of instruction and independent work/practice where the students only got help from the

teacher when they asked for assistance.

2. Ms. Perkins has a very logical way of teaching, I would say her teaching philosophy

follows essentialism, as with many math teachers I’ve had in the past. She has a very technical

and traditional approach to teaching. She would often stand at the front of the classroom and

explain the lesson and give written examples on the white board.

3. Ms. Perkins, from what I saw, mainly focused on Auditory and Visual learning styles.

While possible, having a more kinesthetic (hands-on) lesson would not be then best considering

COVID restrictions and the tedious clean-up process. Ms. Perkins would show educational

videos to her students that went along with the day’s lessons; the videos she showed provided
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great visuals (such as showing how numbers are moved and cancelled out in an equation) and

excellent explanations to follow along that broke down the topic into bite-sized pieces.

4. Due to COVID and full-distance learning, the online students were hard to assess

because they never had their cameras on. There were a handful of students who had begun in-

person hybrid lessons but due to the camera angle Ms. Perkins was using, I could not see those

students either. Ms. Perkins would ask her students questions and they would rarely respond; if

they did, it was a short answer through the Google Classroom chat box.

5. There were many students who did not participate. Thanks to the screen that Ms.

Perkins was sharing with me, I could see which students were working and which ones were not.

Ms. Perkins explained the issue with students in full-distance learning logging into their

assignments so that they show as “online” or “working” but then walking away from their

computers. I also remember observing a lesson where, of the 20+ students in class, only a

handful joined the Time to Climb game that was a part of the students’ test review. Even when

students joined the game, some (as shown in the screenshot above that shows a student with 0

points by the end of the game) did not play the game.

6. There is no specific way that Ms. Perkins handles absences. She usually takes

attendance a couple of times just to make sure students did not forget to type “here” under her

Google Classroom post of the day or were having technical difficulties. Usually, she will ask

students to do work that they were not able to complete during class (for whatever reason,

absence, tardy, etc.) as homework.

7. If the students are doing independent work, Ms. Perkins will usually give students a

heads up a couple of minutes before she moves onto the next section of the lesson. If she is

moving from activity to activity, she will usually say, “Once you’re finished with that, we’ll be
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starting this in a couple of minutes.” I think these transitions are alright and the announcement

she makes a couple of minutes before the next activity can help students ground themselves; it

also serves as a good way to break class-time into sections rather than jumping straight into the

next part of the lesson.

8. I don’t recall Ms. Perkins ever using attention getters, I feel like the phrases she used a

lot in class were “Once you’re finished with that,” and something along the lines of, “Start

wrapping up whatever you’re working on and come back to the video call.” I think they were

effective, but again, I could not tell because I could not see the students and participation level

was usually low.

9. Ms. Perkins mentioned that she had to deal with random people joining the video

meetings. She said that dealing with misbehavior is pretty easy in an online setting because she

has the power to kick students from the meeting; she explained dealing with undesirable

behavior in person is harder because she often has to deescalate the situation.

1. While I completely agree with the COVID guidelines surrounding the sterilization of

used classroom products, I think it takes up time that full-distance students did not have to lose.

ASSIGNMENT #5

Discretely observe one student in your assigned classroom during direct instruction.

1. I chose to observe this student because her first name seemed unique and her last name

reminded me of one of my favorite TV show characters.

2. During all 10 hours of my observations, every student had their cameras and

microphones off, the day of my secret observation was no exception. The student I observed

seemed to be doing her mandatory 20 minutes of Mathia at the beginning of class. However, she

did not participate in the Time to Climb review game Ms. Perkins had set up which made me
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question whether she had actively worked on Mathia in the beginning of class or just left her

computer on the assignment and walked away.

3. Lesson Given: The day’s lesson started off like all the other ones: Students had to type,

“Here” in order to be counted as present for class, then students had to work on Mathia for the

first 20 minutes of class. After the 20 minutes, Ms. Perkins called her students back and gave an

oral dictation of the daily agenda along with projecting the schedule on screenshare for her

students to read along. Since students had to take a quiz this day, Ms. Perkins had the students

review by watching some BrainPop and Mathantics videos on YouTube. After the review,

students had to head over to Canvas where their quiz was located; they were not allowed to use

notes or do any research, they could only recall information from memory. After the quiz,

students had to continue working on their daily lesson assignments along with any missing work

they had. Nearing the end of the class period, Ms. Perkins did the daily 15-minute SBAC review

on Edulastic; students were allowed to share their answers using the microphone or chat box.

Student response: Some students have not gotten into the habit of typing “here” to take

attendance, so Ms. Perkins has to remind them every once in a while. During the 20 minutes of

Mathia, there are always a couple of students who do not log into the math program to do their

classwork. There are others who do log in and do work and there are some students who pretend

to work, this is when GoGuardian comes in handy. Students are given the option to watch the

YouTube videos with the class or go straight to the test and daily lesson assignments. During the

SBAC practice is when student response becomes apparent. There is little to no interaction

between the students and the teacher. Ms. Perkins continues to ask students if they have

questions and no one speaks up or types in the chat. Sometimes students will share their answers

to the SBAC review questions through the Google Classroom chat box.
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4. The students were not visible through the classroom camera and none of the students

had their personal cameras on so assessing behaviors was difficult. From the minimal interaction

through the Google Classroom chat, I garnered that students lacked understanding and or interest

in the lesson.

5. Sedway MS is an innovative school and, as Ms. Perkins explained, students lack the

motivation to be invested in their education. The lack of interaction was shocking and I feel like I

got to witness a lot of the negative aspects of teaching. I feel like a lot of the students in this class

could benefit from individual attention and instruction. The students seemed to be on different

learning levels as well, with some showing understanding of the topics by continuously sharing

answers and interacting with the teacher to some students not even logging in to do any of their

assignments.

ASSIGNMENT #6

Arrange for a convenient time to interview your cooperating teacher either on the phone or by

video conference. Ask the questions below. Include any school document, handouts, etc. the

teacher provides.

1. Ms. Perkins has a family background in education. She also found education to be very

important for her children when she was a stay-at-home mom. Ms. Perkins has had other careers,

but she settled on teaching after her divorce; she gained more interest in education and because

of her past experience helping her children through school, she felt a sense of familiarity with

teaching.

2. COVID-19 has been a major change and struggle for a lot of teachers, but aside from

that, the most difficult thing was getting a license to teach. Ms. Perkins did not go the traditional

route, rather, she attended an Alternate Route program to teacher education. She had to start out
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teaching in at-risk schools and she has found herself in this environment nearly all of her career.

Being in a school that is at-risk, a lot of parents and students do not value education and because

of this, it can be difficult to motivate students in school.

3. The best part about being a teacher is reaching the students who want to learn. There

will be students who are eager and motivated to learn and seeing them grow is a wonderful

experience. It is also amazing when students participate in class and are engaged in the lesson.

Ms. Perkins is also the Dance Line coach at Sedway, knowing that students have something to do

in school that they enjoy and look forward to is rewarding.

4. Because of COVID-19, all teachers must follow the seating guidelines for in-person

students. Students must be seated 6 feet apart from one another.

5. This question was confusing, but Ms. Perkins said that in terms of breaking students

into groups, students can head into break-out rooms in Google Meets and they each have their

own tasks: Time Keeper, Participation Tracker, and a student to make sure everyone is working

together. In person, Ms. Perkins tries to group students of different learning levels together so the

ones in higher-learning levels can help the students in lower-learning levels.

6. Sedway is an Innovative School which means that most interactions with parents are

not derived from students’ positive actions.

7. Grading online homework through programs like Canvas can be easy because a lot of

assignments are self-graded upon completion or once the deadline is reached. Normally, Ms.

Perkins spends about 2 hours a week grading.

8. Ms. Perkins’ classes tend to intersect with one another because she teaches 7th grade

math and 8th grade math fundamentals which is just 7th grade math; because of this, she can

usually use similar lesson plans. Ms. Perkins is also experienced; she has familiarized herself in
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lesson planning. It also helps that she is in the school’s tech committee. An added bonus comes

through the fact that teachers will share lesson plans online, so, when all of these factors are

taken into account, Ms. Perkins spends less than an hour a week planning lessons.

9. Classroom management plays a big factor in maximizing instructional time, this

includes building a classroom routine and teaching the classroom rules.

10. It is tough to give positive reinforcements through an online setting. At the beginning

of the 2020-2021 school year, students were sent care-packages and prizes (she called this PBIS),

but it did not work out and so the school stopped doing it. Carnegie Learning (which is where her

students do daily Mathia assignments) has been useful in showing teachers what students are

keeping up with their work and which students are not. Consequences come easy in online

settings; at the beginning of the year, class-bombing (a random person joining the video meeting)

was common but this was easily solved by kicking the person out of the meeting. Programs such

as GoGuardian that allow teachers to view students’ screens are valuable and very helpful in

pinpointing which students are on task and which need to be reminded that they have work to

complete. Ms. Perkins said that delivering consequences in person is harder because teachers

have to deescalate the situation first.

11. Ms. Perkins usually does not work with specialist teachers because she does not have

special needs students, ELL students, etc. in her classes.

12. Ms. Perkins was actually being evaluated one of the days I interviewed her! She says

that her classes are observed online through Google Classroom. Newer teachers are usually

observed more frequently. For observations, there is usually a pre-observation and post-

observation meeting.
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13. Admins will usually write things like “needs to be improved” followed by a list of

what needs to be worked on and what a teacher’s strengths are. These lists are visited yearly and

if the teacher has not improved then they might be put on probation, but Ms. Perkins said she

wasn’t 100% sure if that is what happens.

14. The complete lack of motivation. Ms. Perkins said she was shocked at how students

didn’t do anything in school. This is a lot more pronounced in at-risk/turn-around schools.

15. There will usually be a planning meeting at the beginning of the year. Sedway has

adopted Carnegie learning and is now following the standards placed by Carnegie.

16. Ms. Perkins does not work at a Nevada Charter school.

17. Ms. Perkins does not speak any other language besides English, but teachers are

given online resources for ELL students and translators are available. Support systems are also

available at the school. She does know that ELL students take WIDA tests.

ASSIGNMENT #7

I learned a lot of valuable things from my 10-hour field observation. I watched how Ms.

Perkins was able to engage her students while using a new game for the first time. I learned how

difficult it is to maintain students’ attention and get them to participate in class. I realized that

teaching is not only about the fun and engaging moments, but also the sad and defeating

moments. I found it very interesting that Ms. Perkins became a teacher to an Alternate Route

program; the class read about these different paths to teacher education but I did not know I

would so quickly meet someone who had gotten their license this way. Sometimes it feels like

teachers forget what it was like to be a student, even for just a little bit, I think it is important to

remind students that teachers have been in their situation and they understand that the topics they

teach may be hard but that is the reason why they are teaching: to facilitate learning and instill a
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positive connection within students for learning. While I could imagine that there were post-

evaluation meetings, I did not know that pre-evaluation meetings were a thing. The field

observation has prepared me for the time when students may be un-motivated and or disengaged

with the lesson or class. While I, as an educator, should try my best to engage students, I have to

know that sometimes it is not my fault and an unmotivated mindset can be hard to change. As

mentioned previously, I got to observe a teacher who has gone through an alternate route

program to teacher education, I also caught onto some techniques Ms. Perkins used to get

students to pay attention: Praising the students who were working on their assignments and

periodical reminders to do work rather than directly calling out students for being off task. I’m

the type of person who feels bad or gets overwhelmed when I realize I’m not capable of helping

someone and those types of emotions have the potential to affect teaching abilities; I need to

remember that when something goes wrong, it is not always going to be my fault (such as I saw

when Ms. Perkins had technical issues with her lesson) and sometimes accepting and going on

with the lesson however possible is the best course of action. Remembering to step back, assess

the situation, and quickly find a solution to the problem will help me later on in my classroom.
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References

Great Schools. Marvin M Sedway Middle School. greatschools.org.

https://www.greatschools.org/nevada/north-las-vegas/622-Marvin-M-Sedway-Middle-

School/#Students

U.S. News. Marvin M Sedway Middle School. usnews.com.

https://www.usnews.com/education/k12/nevada/marvin-m-sedway-middle-school-

265653