Change For My Organization

I think that while my organization is working quite well, one of the things that I would like to change is the chaos around the way in which the children switch around classrooms. The kids move around for science, social studies, and reading, but have their particular place for their homeroom. Every day when they are to leave for the subject of topic, they are supposed to grab that book, go and get their binder for that class and then go. But, they all grab things so fast, make a huge mess around the room and some even forget certain things that they are supposed to grab. So, while the children are learning social studies, a kid will come into the classroom, interrupting, to grab their binder or book that they forgot for their other class. In my mind, I think it would be so much easier if things were better organized. Perhaps, the teacher that has science, leaves all the science books in her classroom. Also, the science binders that the kids need should just stay in the science class that they need to be in. There could be a binder that the children bring for their homework binder only. If they need anything to take home that night, put it in that one binder. This binder applies to all classroom activities though, and all your homework from every subject would go in that binder. The information and books that they need for social studies, science and reading all just stay in the classroom where these things are taught for each child. Things get too chaotic and the children interrupt class time and I have always just thought this was not the most productive way of doing things.

Interview

I enjoyed conducting an interview with my sponsor of this internship. Over this whole experience her and I have become close, however this helped me know her on an even more personal level. Not only did we discuss her struggles with the job but also how it plays into her personal life.
First, she loves her job more than anything. She teaches fifth grade, with most all subjects. However, her passion is teaching social studies. She is lucky enough to be able to teach all of the fifth graders this subject. She finds that teaching fifth grade students is the perfect fit for her. She started as being a teacher’s assistant to disabled children in the same school where she is a teacher now. For a personal reason, she decided to go back to school and get her teaching certificate. She has now been a teacher for the past eleven years and she has loved almost every minute of it. The fifth grade students are the perfect age for her. She explained how they are young, are still at the age where they enjoy their teacher and yet are on their way to being adults.
Some of the difficult parts of her job are things that I had sort of assumed. One main one is the pay. She says it is often a struggle, especially at times now when the economy is poor. She is working more, doing more extracurricular activities for the district, but with no extra pay. Also, the pay has always been something that she struggles with. Although, it is worth it to her. Also, what it hard is having to take pounds of grading home every night and every weekend. She says often, people do not realize how much work a teacher does outside of the class room. Another thing she struggles with are aggressive parents. My sponsor is such a sweet, soft spoken person. While she gets the job done beautifully, being soft spoken people often believe that they can take advantage of her. She says that gets difficult. Another struggle is attempting to reach out and make a difference to all the kids, and having some not reciprocate that back to her. It is hard for her when she tries and she sees that what she is doing is just not working for a kid. One of her favorite things about the job is that she makes a difference in their lives and they remember her always as their fifth grade teacher. Yet it is difficult if by the end of the year she hasn’t made that impact on a child. There are three teachers in the fifth grade. She says that one difficulty is that there is not enough students this year to have four teachers, but the classrooms are pretty full with three of them. She has thirty two in her homeroom class, and the others have twenty eight and thirty. This is the first year that one of her colleagues is at the school, teaching fifth grade. My sponsor told me that the transition has been an easy one and that all three of them get along better than she ever expected. One challenge that may arise is they may bring on another teacher, having four fifth grade teachers next year, due to the size in the fourth grade. My teacher worries that she may lose being able to teach all the students social studies, which is her passion. But, she will see when the time comes.

Shadowing The Teacher

The individual that I chose to shadow was the main teacher that I work with on a regular basis. I shadowed her for the entire school day. Normally, I arrive around the time the children arrive and I leave when the children leave as well. But this day, I went earlier and was there when she arrived. The first thing she does when she gets there is to organize the class room and set it up for the day. She writes the daily schedule on the chalk board and arranges everything in a way that will be useful for the day. She then meets with the other two fifth grade teachers and discusses the plan for the day. In this school, the fifth grade children rotate around between the three teachers. While they have their home room teacher, where they learn math and writing, they move around to the different teachers for reading, social studies and science. So, they teachers met this morning to discuss what the children would be learning in the different subjects. They also discussed certain problems with particular children and how to change things for this child. I think that the way they rotate around and work with one another is a great way for the children to feel a sense of being an adult and to learn responsibilities. Anyways, after the meeting was over, the children were almost to arrive. She went down to the office to check her mail box and then went back to the room, waiting for the kids to arrive and begin teaching. Once this occurred, it looked like a normal day in the class room for us. However, during lunch I typically stay in the class and allow her to go to the office and do the things that she needs to do. This time, I went with her. She had to go talk to the principle and then we went to the Teacher’s Lounge to eat lunch and visit with a few of the other teachers. I realized how quick the lunch break was and she came back to the class to do some grading for the rest of the lunch. She also had to look over emails and respond. One thing I learned and had not thought of before was that all the fifth grade parents can contact her through email. She did not complain about this, however I can only imagine. When I was in school, my parents were not able to email the teacher on a regular basis. Today, parents can email the teacher about a homework situation, or any other problem. While that could be helpful, it could also be some sort of a nuisance. After lunch, we went back to teaching, watching what I normally do. I then learned that after school is over, she has to leave quickly; She grabbed a lot of papers to grade, and had to go. She is also a tutor three times a week and goes to meet her students right after class. I enjoyed shadowing and learning even more about the day in the life of this particular fifth grade teacher.