Zoom Class Discussions

Thursday, January 28 Class Reflection

I found this class’s discussion to be particularly interesting, especially the discussion surrounding teacher talk. In my personal experience, I have always learned best when teachers called for more student participation or “student talk”. It was interesting to hear the differing experiences of my classmates where some felt they had more teacher talk in high school and some felt they had more teacher talk in college. I definitely feel that I had more teacher talk in high school than in college; especially now in the online, Zoom based environment. While my general education courses were more of that traditional lecture style, my TCH classes are heavily reliant on group conversation and collaboration. I have found this to be more effective because it requires me to be an active participant rather than sitting back and zoning out.

In my own past experience as an English Language Learner student, the most successful lessons were always those that allowed me to practice English instead of just being spoken at. The Levine and McCloskey text has written multiple times of the effectiveness of collaboration amongst students, and it is a principle that I plan to follow should I find myself teaching a classroom of ELLs. Even a classroom of native English speakers would benefit from increased student talk time as it allows for them to interpret and digest the information they have learned in a way that personally makes sense to the student. Student talk time also often grants students the opportunity to explain concepts to other students, which benefits both parties. The student explaining processes the content at a deeper level as they teach it to other students who may be benefitting from hearing an alternative explanation.

I overall very much enjoyed this day’s class because it cemented the importance of student focused teaching. Instead of focusing on the strategy that is easiest for the teacher to implement and teach, we are focusing on making sure that our teaching is accessible to all of our students and working as effectively as possible. Oral language development is incredibly important for our students because it is the foundation for their participation in the classroom and the world beyond.

Thursday, February 4 Class Reflection

I really enjoyed this class because of the opportunity to engage in the Conga Line activity. I have unfortunately only had the opportunity to take one TCH class in person, and it was in the Spring of 2020. The online, Zoom format of all of my other TCH courses has left me feeling disconnected from the strategies and techniques that we discuss because only reading about them doesn’t really allow for an immersive experience. I was personally skeptical about the Conga Line activity until we did it in class, after which I realized that it was actually an enjoyable activity. While its effectiveness was somewhat hindered by the limitations of Zoom, it was still well modeled and I can definitely envision myself using it in my future classroom.

I also enjoyed the discussion about the benefits and downsides of using activities like Conga Line in the classroom that followed. I think that it is very important for us to recognize that no activity is ever going to be perfect, but that there are modifications that can be made in order to strengthen an activity and make it suit the needs of our classrooms better. For example, the Conga Line activity is introduced as an activity that should be used to study and review, but I could definitely see it being used as a fun way to introduce background vocabulary words. If it was used as an introductory game, it would relieve some of the pressure that the game creates because the expectations are lessened. I could also see using it in the middle of a lesson to re-energize bored students. It’s a very versatile activity and I believe that us practicing it during class allowed for me to think about it in a greater depth and in more detail than I would have if I had only read about it.

I thought it was very valuable to have the practical experience in doing something that we had read about, especially considering that all of my other classes lack that aspect. It was significantly more memorable and also allowed for more interaction with classmates. I believe that it is very important for pre-service teachers to have practical experience doing the things that we will one day be modeling in our classrooms as it gives us time to reflect on the activity and better plan how to implement it into our classrooms.

Thursday, February 25 Class Reflection

I really enjoyed this day’s lesson because I thought that the information around defining objectives and preparing for learning was incredibly valuable. I am only in my second year of the education program, so I have unfortunately not had much practice with the technical work that goes into preparing a lesson and teaching it. Therefore, I found it very exciting to learn about the foundations of beginning to plan a lesson. Leading questions like “What specifically do I want my students to know?” and “What specifically do I want my students to be able to understand?” retrospectively seem obvious, but I never considered building a lesson based off of asking those questions.

I found a lot of value in discussing why Social Studies can be challenging for English Language Learners. Social Studies is one of my content areas and in a perfect world, I will hopefully have a job teaching ELLs Social Studies. It is important that we, as future educators, be aware of these challenges and help our students overcome any obstacles that they may face. I am also taking TCH 248 this semester, and I have learned much about how tests are often not only testing ELLs on the content area, but also on their understanding of English, which is unfair. These obstacles are ones that we must work on dismantling in order to achieve equity in our schools.

I also really enjoyed learning about the various tools and resources that we were given in terms of activities that we can integrate into our classroom to track student learning. As a student, I always enjoyed when my teacher would have the class engage in learning activities that required you to get up and interact with other students. I can actually remember doing many of the activities that we discussed like Carousel Brainstorming, and I look forward to integrating them into my classroom. In this course, we have learned about the effectiveness of giving students many different ways and opportunities to interact with their peers and practice their skills. Activities like Carousel Brainstorming and Corners provide students with the opportunity to work with their peers and strengthen their knowledge, and tools like Semantic Mapping and the K-W-L Chart are also incredibly helpful in helping students track and grow in their knowledge. The discussions our class had around these tools helped me when it came time to cultivate activities and strategies for my portfolio, as everyone’s thoughts and experiences helped me pick out the activities that I thought would be most helpful for culturally and linguistically diverse students. It’s clear that one of the most valuable tools for aspiring educators is a listening ear because it allows us to reflect on the experiences of many different individuals so that we can best serve as many different and diverse students as possible.

Thursday, April 1 Class Reflection

I found this class to be one of the most interesting classes we had all semester. Educational policy (and politics in general) are some of my biggest personal interests, and I always am disappointed when my fellow education majors say that there is no point to keeping up with politics. Being a teacher is political, and if one doesn't care about the personal impacts that it has on them (like their pension), then they should at least care about how it impacts their students. I am a proud member of Student IEA and plan on joining the teacher’s union as soon as I land my first job, and this is primarily because of the amazing advocacy work they do for students. I enjoyed the opportunity to read about how teachers can advocate for change at a national level as it has to do with language policy and other policies that involve English Language Learners.

I found the most value in reading about school level policies that can positively impact students, as that is the level where I can personally create the most change. The change doesn’t have to be big to have a huge impact; I personally really like the concept of allowing the parents/guardians of students to also utilize the school’s library to check out books with their children. Libraries are one of our greatest resources, and allowing them to be utilized to an even greater extent will only benefit students and the community. Other changes, like adjusting the extra-duty assignments of teachers who are translating letters and making sure that primary-language instructors are socially integrated with the mainstream staff, are relatively simple to make, but send a powerful message of the value that the school has for languages other than English.

I overall thought that this day was very important in showing how many different things are impacting the education that teachers are giving and students are receiving. Teachers cannot just keep their noses down when it comes to politics, both local and national, because there are many individuals out there making huge decisions on education who have not stepped foot in a classroom since they last graduated. We must use our collective voice to advocate not only for ourselves, but for our students, so that our education system can be reformed and made into a system that works for the students and not some other interest. No one knows students and what works for them like teachers do, and a generation of empowered teachers has the potential to make substantial change.

Tuesday, April 13 Class Reflection

I thought that this class’s discussion around middle schoolers and homelessness was absolutely heartbreaking, but a conversation that was necessary for us to have. I am someone who is incredibly fortunate and privileged in that I have never had to worry about where I am going to sleep or if I am going to have access to food. I will never understand the pain that accompanies being houseless, but I can educate myself on how I can take steps as a teacher to help students who are in that position.

One of the most important takeaways I had from this discussion was the importance of compassion and flexibility for students who are in the position of being houseless. Even just simple acts like allowing a student to sleep through your class or keeping snacks and items like pads and tampons on hand in the classroom can alleviate some of the stress that they’re undergoing in their life. Additionally, advocating for these students to other adults and maintaining a constant sense of interest in their lives will help these students feel a greater sense of belonging within the school. When I was reading Matthew Moulton’s “The (un)Muted Voices of Middle Grades Youth Experiencing Homelessness”, Mr. Jam’s role in Kyrie’s life immediately stuck out to me. By checking in constantly, Mr. Jam showed Kyrie that his presence was valued in the school. These check-ins also allowed Mr. Jam to have a more impactful voice when advocating for Kyrie to receive a lesser punishment for almost getting into a physical altercation. A multiple day suspension could have had a permanent impact on the way Kyrie was perceived by his peers and teachers going forward, further alienating him from school.

For students who are facing houselessness, there is no easy solution that teachers can provide. However, while we can’t give students a house, we can give them leniency so that school is not another stressor in their life. We can give them compassion so that students know they are wanted at school and loved. We can give them information so that they can seek help from agencies who have more resources to help. Most importantly, we can advocate for them so that they know they have someone on their side other than themselves.

Being prepared to teach culturally and linguistically diverse students doesn’t just mean being prepared to teach students who are English Language Learners; it also means being prepared to teach students who aren’t having their basic needs met. Teachers should be advocates for their students not only when their students are inside the classroom, but also when students leave the building at the end of the school day. I’m very glad that this is a topic that we touched on in this class and that my peers feel similarly about the importance of advocating for every single student.