The More We Work Together...

Today's lesson in English was interesting.

We are just about to come to the part of A Circle of Silver when the main characters get kidnapped by members of the Odawa tribe. So I thought it would be interesting if I kidnapped the class...and then I wondered how I would actually pull that off, so instead I modified my original plan slightly and kidnapped their chairs.

After lunch, my students came back and all their chairs were missing. We started the lesson, having the students sit on the floor and "make the best of this situation", asking before we began "does anyone know what happened?" and "who did this?" - after a few student presentations, my AT interrupted the class with a note she "found in her mailbox", which was a ransom note, saying that the class had to work together as a team to get their chairs back.

I was actually shocked at the outcome of the class. I planned two co-operative learning games that I had used at camp years ago to get the group to work as a team. The first was creating a human knot and then having the group untangle themselves...it was a successful disaster in short. I think they learned a lot, but it took a lot of yelling, arguing and angry students to get there. The next game we played was human scrabble. Each student got to write one letter on their hand and then they had to answer questions themed from the novel using only the letters they chose. The second game was a little more successful than the first, in that they were actually working as a group, but it was fascinating how much tension these games brought up. It is hard for 12 year olds to work as a group. After I gave them their chairs back, we sat in the "community egg" (because it never really looks like a circle) and debriefed what we learned today.

My eyes are wide open to how important cooperation is and how vital team building is in the classroom. The more we get together, the happier we'll be!

Thoughts so far

It is amazing how quickly time goes by. It really does feel like the experience started yesterday and we're already well into the 3rd week of the practicum. It shocks me to realize that this time last semester, NEXT WEEK we would be wrapping up our lessons. In many ways I am grateful for the extra week of teaching - it is challenging to teach a full unit in just five weeks. But maybe that's just me, or maybe that's just this class. Regardless, I am happy for the extra time.

My AT gave me a great piece of feedback. She suggested that I try to incorporate some kind of hard / physical assessment in every class - so that after every class you have physical evidence of who got it and who didn't. I really liked this suggestion and have been incorporating this especially into my math and history lessons. I've even decided to have the students mark / evaluate each other's work at the end of the class to save me from having to do it. The more experience I get with teaching, the more I am learning how to be creative with the time I am given and to use my time as wisely as possible.

Another thing I am doing in this practicum is allocating time for myself after the school day is finished. Whether I am going out for dinner with a friend, meeting someone at an art gallery after school or just going to a yoga class, I am doing a better job at balancing my life, which I think is benefiting me big time in the class room. I feel more rested, more happy and more excited for the school day to start, which is only a good thing.

More to come!

It almost feels like I am a game show host and I am trying to sell the prizes in as interesting and flashy a way as possible. When the students are smiling, so am I and when the energy drops down because we are reading from a textbook together, my energy slumps too. Keep them entertained, keep them smiling and keep them engaged. It is hard work to do and I am forever grateful for my prep periods and my time in the evening to dream up new ways of teaching math and history.

I had a great idea of using Facebook to create historical character profiles to assess their understanding of New France – but after having a conversation about using the multiple intelligences in assessment practices, I think I am going to curb the Facebook idea for another class (I guess I don't have to use EVERY great idea right now) and use another assessment for the New France unit. We have 4 guiding questions in this unit: Can two sides win a battle? Was it a good thing the English won the Battle of the Plains of Abraham? How did co-operation affect the development of New France? What is the significance of studying New France? And everyday, they have been adding to these questions and we have been using these questions to inspire our lessons. So, instead of creating an assessment that is so far detached from the whole unit, I thought it might be cool if the students created their own assessment (established by a contract), incorporating these 4 questions and their responses.

I think it is a wise idea for the students to say what kind of learning they want to do and in a gifted class, it is an option that can be explored fully and can be used to its fullest potential.