Week 6: Highs, Lows, and Buffaloes

I recently learned of a game/activity called Highs, Lows, and Buffaloes. This is something I have encountered outside of the classroom, but could see it being incorporated into my classroom. If you have ever heard of Happy Crappy or Highs and Lows, it is basically the same thing. In small group settings, each member goes around and shares something about their week (or day or experience) that was a high, low, and buffalo. A high would be something that was a highlight or brought the joy. A low would be something that they struggled with or was difficult. Lastly, a buffalo would be something awkward or really anything else they want to share that does not fall into those two categories. Each participant's story is different, and no two are alike.

The same goes for my student teaching.

No two weeks of my student teaching experience are alike. In fact, no two days of student teaching are alike. Each week, each day, and each subject may contain consistencies, yet so many variables remain. There are high, lows, and buffaloes.

Let's start with the Lows since I would rather end on a high note.

Disciplining is something that is necessary, but not something that I enjoy doing. This week, I caught one of my students plagiarizing on an assignment and gave him a detention and wrote him up because of it and because of the rules/consequences that are already put into place for this type of misbehavior. I met with the student and talked with him calmly, asking him what he thought was wrong with his assignment, why what he did was wrong and why plagiarism is wrong, and what the consequences were. During that whole time, he did not say a word.

Another particularly low moment of this week was grading and the results of that grading. I had a lot of online grading to get done this week. As I progressed through my students' assignments, I was extremely disappointed with the lack of effort put into their submitted work, particularly in their vocabulary. The assignment was to define the word (which we did together) and then create your own sentence using that word. Each word contains the type of speech, yet in a majority of my students' sentences, they used the wrong type of speech. Some of their sentences did not even contain the vocabulary word. For some students, this was done out of pure laziness, and for others, it was done out of compete misunderstanding. Because of this, I have recognized the need for changing the way that this vocabulary is taught and learned. Illinois Teaching Standard says, "The competent teacher has foundational knowledge of reading, writing, and oral communication within the content area and recognizes and addresses student reading, writing, and oral communication needs to facilitate the acquisition of content knowledge." Using proper grammar and English conventions in writing is something that so many of my students struggle with, and it shows in their other class work as well. I had a chat with my whole class about the issues that I have been seeing in their vocabulary assignments. Rather than having vocabulary tacked onto the end of assignments, I am now taking more class time to discuss the meaning of words as a class more in depth and review what each type of speech means. Although they have a long way to go, I have seen some improvement already.

Next, we'll move to the Buffaloes.

This one is less serious, and can encapsulate a variety of instances this week in which odd, random, or embarrassing things happened. For example, I taught a science lesson with basketball hoops around the room (which the students loved!) but the basketball hoops kept falling off the wall when the students would shoot. In other instances I posted the wrong assignment, and on one occasion I tripped in front of half the school during an assembly, but that's a whole other story.

A few other random things that happened this week. I was able to have a conversation with my class about hallway behavior, and since then, their hallway behavior has dramatically improved. I was also able to be the teacher for the day on Monday since the school was short on substitute teachers and my teacher went and taught in a different room for the day. This was another memorable experience, and it is these days which make me all the more confident in my abilities for having my own classroom someday.

Despite the lows and buffaloes, I had many Highs throughout the week as well.

This week, I had my final observation from my supervisor, which went well and sort of signified an end and an accomplishment, making me feel more ready to move onto my next placement in less than two weeks! Another high for me was teaching a math lesson that the students finally seemed to catch onto right away. As I have said before, math has been a struggle lately, and the students just did not seem to be grasping the concepts. They took a test on Monday, so we started a new unit this week, and right now, it seems to be going well.

Like last week, this week was a tough one and a tiring one. There were low moments were it seemed so difficult to reach the students or even see that I was having any impact on their learning, but there were still moments that made up for all of that. I saved my highest High moment for last. At our class Valentine's day party on Thursday, one of my students gave me one of the sweetest cards that I could receive and one which I really needed to hear....

Dear Miss Lins,

You are doing an amazing job at being a student teacher and helping all of the class with their weird questions that they ask, and on February 11, 2019 on keeping the class together and working productively. You are the sweetest ever and you have the slowest temper ever. You and Mrs. C work so well together. I thank you for all that you have done to help all of the class and do all you can to keep a class of 24 11-12 years old boys and girls. I give you full credit to all you do in all of the classes that you teach. Hope you have a good Valentine's day. 

Sincerely, 
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Classroom Confidential: Great Teachers Are Drama Queens
"The arts are ways of knowing" (page 189). I loved this quote because it highlights the way that art can find itself weaved into the learning processes that occur in the classroom. Often, we refer to knowing as answering questions on a test or in a discussion, when it could also take the form of art. Art gives us ways to communicate with each other without even speaking or writing. I could see this being especially helpful for my English Language Learners as speaking and writing are more difficult for them. There are times where they understand, but they do not know how to express it.

I also loved the section about movement. I have a tendency to think movement is dance, but they are two related yet very different things. One activity that stood out to me was the Galloping Grammar. First, it just sounds like a lot of fun (since I love grammar), but I also think my students would find so much value in this since grammar is something that they struggle with. I could use examples of student work that was done incorrectly, and we could correct it by showing the galloping grammar movements. I also think the Thesaurus Game would be especially helpful to use in my class because the students could use a little more spice to their writing. Right now, they use very basic words, even for sixth graders. They would be able to expand their horizons in writing and be able to communicate with more specific words.

One specific authentic assessment that I saw in this chapter was the students "show me" instead of "tell me." In this method, students can show an emotion, draw a picture, or represent any question without using words, but rather showing it. So often we ask a question in order for students to tell us. With this method of assessing students, you can see how well they understood/are able to answer the question. I could use this in my classroom during our reading times during times that we have a whole class discussion.