Oct. 12, 2016
What a fun, busy, and joy-filled day!
Today was my first day of pre-internship in the Catholic School System in Regina. I had never worked in the Catholic system prior to today. It was much different from my experiences growing up in the public system, but I enjoyed it.
We began the day by walking across the street to the Catholic church to attend their Rosary service. It was something I had never experienced and am thankful that now I have! After this, we returned to the classroom and the students separated into learning designated centers. I joined some of the students who were on iPads using Razz Kids (What a great site!). I was amazed by how well these students were so well behaved, even though they were away from their teacher’s eyesight. My co-operating teacher said that this was something that she had had to work on with them for about two weeks, but it proved well worth it.
In the morning, with my partner, we took down a bulletin board in preparation for the class’s new them, while the teacher taught a math lesson. For lunch, we stayed in the classroom and watched some of “The Wizard of Oz” with our students. After recess with our kids, my partner and I did our introductory lesson, which I think went well. We showed the students photos of who we are and what we enjoy to do. Then we all played an introductory game (toss a ball around the room and answer the question where your thumb is on the ball), and we ended with an open question time.
The afternoon consisted of a different teacher coming in to teach Social Studies, where the students learned about “Rights & Responsibilities” and how that relates to classroom rules. After that, our teacher continued by doing full class reading of phonics poems, while the students traced the sentences with their fingers. We ended the day with a film of what the Rosary means.
A few classroom management and behaviour management strategies that I noticed my co-op display were:
-Bum, bum, da, da, dum, dum… Bum, bum (teacher sings, then class answers).
-Hands on you head, eyes on me.
-Traffic light at the front of the classroom (Red= No talking, Yellow= Whispering, Green= Normal speaking volume)
-“Smartiepants Glasses”- I loved this idea! At the front of the class was a bin full of fun giant glasses with the lenses popped out. If a student displayed good listening or positive behaviour, the teacher would give the “smartiepants glasses” (they can be taken away, earned again, and have more than one pair). In addition, the whole class would cheer for the student(s) who received a pair of glasses. This could be used with other items such as bracelets or medals.
Other observations:
This school is in a very nice neighbourhood and seems quite wealthy. One thing that I noticed right off the bat was the lack of diversity within my classroom. There are only three students who aren’t Caucasian in my classroom, none of which are First Nations. Yet, I was so pleased to see the integration of First Nations content around the school. The students had participated in Orange Shirt Day and there were bulletin boards filled with First Nations content.
jocelyn smart 