Mylan Park Elementary Blog 10.25-10.29.2010

This week was another wonderful week at Mylan Park Elementary School! Throughout the week I taught once again the majority of the day and enjoyed every moment. I was extremely proud of my math students in the morning group; they did very well on their unit test on time and money which the results averaged in the “A” range. Also, throughout the week I worked with students in the reading groups teaching each group what their word sound was for the week and enforcing those sounds and spelling patterns within their spelling words. Through all of the spelling activities that we did this week with the students, many of them did poorly on their spelling tests on Friday due to not studying them at home. My mentor teacher, Ms. Walker and I continuously reminded them every day to study; however, their parents did not reinforce it at home which is a shame for their child’s grade suffers. For the students that did extremely poorly, we will provide a retake next week providing them with one last chance to re-study the words.


For my Action Research this week we read “The Popcorn Shop”. Before we jumped into the story, I reminded my students’ that while we read, we create images in our minds of what is occurring throughout the story, we visualize while sequencing the scenes, and to keep in mind that we will shortly be bringing the story to life. Also, I had the students look at the cover of the book and flip through the pictures in the book and try to predict what they thought the story would be about. This week I popcorn read with the students. They absolutely loved this method and it began to ease them into them just conducting the reading next week in the group without me being involved and reading aloud too. Throughout the story I promoted a discussion period asking them questions according to the text, pictures, as well as asking self-to-text connections. Once we completed reading the story, I told the students to make their paper into a comic strip and illustrate the main scenes that could provide the beginning, middle, and the end of the story. When the students completed their illustrations, I then asked them to place popcorn on their pictures that showed the amount that would be appropriate for that particular scene. For example, a little bit of popcorn should have been in the beginning, a massive amount of popcorn should have been in the middle scene for all of the popcorn exploding throughout the town, and finally, maybe one or two pieces at the end to show that there was really none left in the town. When the students completed this activity, I then cleared the space so that we could implement movement into the classroom bringing the story to life. I reviewed with the students the low, medium, and high levels that we use in movement, as well as walking patterns that we use and space awareness. I had the students close their eyes and visualize in their minds the story that we read, the sequencing of the story, and to put themselves in the shoes of a piece of popcorn. I then asked the students to pop like the popcorn would in the beginning of the story, the middle of the story, and finally the end of the story. Once they were done moving through the space like the appropriate scene as the popcorn, we then discussed the levels and the emotions at those levels connecting their movement to the text. I feel that my action research was a great success this week and the assessments that I did were excellent for seeing what they comprehended from the story, and how expressing the story through artwork and movement allows them to gain a better perspective for visualizing the importance of sequencing and becoming active readers.


This week I also was able to attend a PLC meeting. This meeting was beneficial for me for it discussed different methods that the school uses to benchmark students as well as programs that the school uses and interventionists use in order to increase students reading and math scores on a whole across all grade levels. The one program that they strongly enforced for teachers to use that increases fluency and comprehension is the “Reads Naturally” program. My teacher and I have already begun using this program and feel that it is an excellent way to influence students reading abilities.


Also, this past Friday was all of the Halloween festivities and parade for the school. It was a wonderful experience to take part in. I took many pictures and was excited to see how creative so many of the costumes were. I also thought that it was nice that families came into the students’ classrooms and the teachers created a family activity before the parade. For families that could not come into the school, the teachers made sure to pay extra special attention to those children and make that day a wonderful one for them. All of the teachers had to dress as superheroes in the school that resembled the seven habits and or promoting respect, manners, etc. and I dressed as Captain Kindness.


This week was a wonderful week at Mylan Park Elementary School and I am really looking forward to the upcoming weeks ahead!

BLOG 9- Week 9 Mylan Park Elementary School

This week at Mylan Park Elementary School was another great week! I taught throughout the week pretty much all of the groups that come to our room besides three. My first group we reviewed money and coins and I provided them with their first test with me. They did okay on their tests; however, I wish that they would have done better! After I graded the tests, I discovered their trouble areas and have been reviewing them each and everyday since the test. I have done a review with them everyday before we move on to learning all about time. They will be having a test with me next week on the unit of time as well as money. So far, after a lot of hard work, they are doing pretty well with it; however, we still need to work more on quarter to and quarter past the hour.


I have also continued to work with all of the reading groups. We have been working on “oi” words as well as words with “e” in them. Along with practicing the words, we also have been reading from the Journey’s books and having the students answer comprehension questions after the reading is complete.


I have begun my Action research this week and it has been quite successful. On Monday, I read to the students “When the Relatives Came”. We discussed the sequencing of the story as well as the “who,” “what,” “where”, “when,” and “why.” Also, I had my students write in their journals a self-to-text connection as to if they ever traveled and who they traveled with and where. They expressed their thoughts through writing as best as they could. On Wednesday, I allowed my students to express themselves through the fine and creative arts. They had to illustrate a picture of who they were traveling with and where they were going. They also had to create out of clay an image that they saw that woke them up at night. For example, one student made a train for at night that wakes her up; just like in the story all of the unfamiliar breathing wakes up the relatives at night. Finally, I had the students create their own steering wheels that they would use for the movement segment on Friday. On Friday, I introduced to the students movement and expressing the story through their bodies. We went over low, medium, and high levels, as well as fast, medium, and slow paces, and finally space awareness. Once the students understood all of that, they became the travelers within the classroom using their steering wheels driving up and down the mountains; the students were the sleepers waking up at the right cues within the music with imagining what was waking them up at night; and finally, the students were the huggers and hugging at all of the levels. Since half of the group was absent on Friday, they will have to take the quiz on the book on Monday right before beginning the new book for the upcoming week.

Also, I had to provide my students this week with the Acuity Tests in both reading and math. This took up a large portion of the day on Wednesday and had to continue for some of students onto Thursday. This test was very hard for many of my students due to them being way below their grade level and being unable to read the text or effectively answer the math problems.


I feel that on a whole this week was a wonderful week and that I learned a lot from teaching this week! I am excited for the upcoming week ahead and for the Halloween Parade on Friday! My teacher has been a wonderful mentor and am looking forward to learning from her and my students this upcoming week!

Blog 8- Week 8 Mylan Park Elementary School

This past week was another wonderful week at Mylan Park Elementary School! Each and every day I am able to learn more and more from my mentor teacher, Ms. Walker, as well as from my students. Throughout this week, Ms. Walker allowed me to teach the majority of the day within the classroom which I enjoyed thoroughly! I taught this week two students about money and coins. I have to say that it is very rewarding when you teach students something that is very blurry in the beginning to them, and clear and understandable after a few days! Along with the money unit that I created, I was also able to teach the students reading and comprehension skills from their Journeys books, reinforce their weekly spelling words consistently, and assist during the collaborative math time within the computer lab. On Wednesday of this week, I was able to participate within the Egg Drop by measuring how far the students eggs landed from the target, and whether their egg cracked or was okay. This was an extremely exciting event and is great to see how creative so many students are with wrapping their eggs in order to stop them from cracking.


Also, throughout the week, Ms. Walker was kind enough to assist me with finding books and talking out my tentative timeline for the implementation of my Action Research within my classroom. I also was able to collect baseline data this week from my students that consisted of two different passages. The first passage I read to them, and then they answered questions. On the second passage, they had to read on their own and then answer questions. When I scored all of my students, the majority of them were most certainly struggling with the comprehension questions. The group that is struggling the most is going to be my target group. I plan on implementing my Action Research within the classroom three days a week; every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Monday I am going to read the story aloud to the students and create a discussion period; Wednesday the students will create an art project that will allow themselves to express the story; and Friday I am going to have the students bring the story to life through movement. I feel that implementing movement and the fine and creative arts within the classroom is really going to help students open up their minds, think in a new manner, and become more engaged and active readers that begin to show improvement with their reading and comprehension skills. I am excited to implement my Action Research within the classroom throughout the next six weeks!


One other activity that I was able to take part in this week was the parent-teacher conferences on Wednesday evening. From being apart of the conferences, I feel that I learned more background information on my students and their support system at home. I feel that the collaboration between teachers and parents is extremely important; however, I wish that more parents would become active in their child’s education and be better influences for them.


I am already looking forward to another exciting week at Mylan Park Elementary School! I feel that each and every day I learn how to become a better educator and to provide the best education possible for my students!

Blog 7- Week 7 Mylan Park Elementary School

This past week was my second week back at Mylan Park Elementary School. I had the wonderful opportunity this week to progressively begin to pick up teaching different groups within my classroom. I was able to provide students with their spelling words and give their spelling tests on Friday, worked with the reading groups working on comprehension and fluency, as well as had the chance to help students with their math work that included addition, subtraction, multiplication, adding decimals, and working on adding calendar months and weekdays.
I feel that this week I have also had the chance to get to know my students much better, learn about their specific learning needs, and ways on how I will be able to help provide them with engaging activities in the upcoming weeks to enhance their academic progress within the special education classroom as well as within their general education classrooms.
This past week I also learned that by rewarding students for their positive behavior and/or having my Benedum Collaborative Photograph Consent Form signed by their parents or guardians and brought back to school made them enthusiastic to bring the paper back to me and to make sure that they did not lose it. I was extremely impressed that almost all of my students brought back their forms signed due to being excited for a positive reward the following day that I provided for them.
Also, Ms. Walker is an excellent educator and I am trying to absorb everything that she does with her students. She is very organized with her lesson plans, has excellent classroom management skills, and always promotes a positive learning environment. I am very happy to have had Ms. Walker at Mylan Park Elementary School and Ms. Rengers at Morgantown High School for my teaching internship; I feel that I am learning from the best! I am really looking forward to the upcoming weeks at Mylan Park Elementary School; I love being a part of the Patriots!

Blog 6 Week 6 Mylan Park Elementary School

This past week was my first week back at Mylan Park Elementary School and I must say that it was a wonderful one! Since this was my first week in Ms. Walker’s classroom, I had the opportunity to observe all of her groups that consist of students in third, fourth, and fifth grades who come to her throughout the day for vocabulary/spelling, English, writing, math, and reading, as well as observe the collaborative fifth grade mathematics classroom where Ms. Walker co-teaches with Ms. Brown. The twenty students that are assigned to Ms. Walker’s classroom throughout the day are diagnosed as having Learning Disabilities. Along with all of the learning groups that Ms. Walker teaches, she also has morning hall duty as well as lunch duty. I really enjoy both of these duties for the teacher is able to interact with a large amount of students throughout the entire day and get to know the students better throughout the entire school as opposed to just within classroom. Also, another wonderful and therapeutic addition that Ms. Walker has within her classroom is a Guinea Pig named Tiger that is the classroom pet. The students absolutely love the Guinea Pig and have been able to pet it, hold it, and observe its variety of different behaviors. I feel that having a classroom pet is wonderful because it exposes students to animals and the needs that animals have in comparison to humans.

Along with observing Ms. Walker and her students this past week, I had the excellent opportunity to go on the first grade field trip to the Western Maryland Scenic Railroad. This was my very first time to ever be on a field trip as a teacher. I learned on this trip how important it is to remain stern with students in order to keep them altogether and safe, as well how great field trips really are in order to expose students to educational places that are outside of their school community and/or environment. The trip was long for first graders, however, in the end, it was all worthwhile!

I have learned quite a bit this week from Ms. Walker and her students and am really looking forward to being able to teach them soon! She is an excellent teacher that understands the importance of the students receiving a good academic education and is extremely patient with them while they are learning within the classroom. I am very happy to be back at Mylan Park and am looking forward to the upcoming weeks in Ms. Walker’s classroom!