Friday, May 29, 2009

I've had a couple days to reflect on my experience at AMY. I've read over the critiques that my kids wrote for me several times, I've talked to friends and family about my time there, and I've done a lot of thinking by myself. So here are some last thoughts.
-The seventh grade sections are all inclusive. This means that they are not separated according to ability, but the learning disabled are in a classroom with the exceptional learners. I was thinking about how this makes a difference in the classroom. During one of my lessons I had the students read silently. I saw some students really into the book, moving ahead at full speed. I saw some trying to read but disinterested. I saw some who were pretending to read but doing something else whether staring off into space or drawing a picture. And I saw some who didn't even pretend to read but just slept. So I'm trying to figure out how to reach each of the students at their different levels. I'm thinking specifically of one table. At this table is a girl who is probably the top of her class, a boy with a slight learning disability who is at a lower reading level, a smart girl who really cares about her grade, and a boy who doesn't care about school. The top-of-the-class girl and boy-who-doesn't-care can't stand each other; much of the class is spent with them throwing words back and forth. No one at this table is gaining from this set up, even though one of the theories about inclusion is that the exceptional learner will build up the disabled learner. Not always true, as exemplified by this table. And probably the best solution in this case would be to switch up this table, but the problem still remains: how do I make every lesson applicable to different types of learning?
-A lot of the kids wrote on my critiques that I need to be more strict. It's really interesting that they wrote this because though I thought that I was being strict, I do see situations in which I wasn't strict enough. I see how I need to be consistent and follow through on punishments - or even threaten punishment which I didn't always do. I feel like I gained rapport with a lot of the students, but I also understand that part of rapport, and especially with the city kids, means that they will still respect me (and maybe even more so) because I punish them.
-These kids need loving. One of my favorite little boys told me about how we watched someone being shot and choking on his own blood. He's 12. I don't want him to go down that same path, but the door for it is wide open. With my whole two weeks there I had several bad classes and several necks that I wanted to wring. These bad classes made me question my teaching ability and if I wanted to go back. But I realized during these two weeks that what they need is consistency and reliability. I want to still be there with them to offer it to them.

It's funny to think back to a couple weeks ago when I couldn't understand why I had signed up for urban practicum. It was a great experience, but I am honestly so glad it's done.