University of Puerto Rico – Humacao English Department
Luis R. Torres Cotto Prof. Nilsa Lugo EDPE 4018 – 001 Weekly Reflection #1 18-22 of August, 2014 My first week at practice teaching was one of much stress, pressured and adaptations. My first impression was literally what I got myself into. My practice teacher don’t seemed to like at first and on the first class I observed the first time was scary since the students were been scolded. First thing, I was greeted at the director’s office by a shady director and an angry cooperating teacher, my mind was already frozen. Afterwards, the first group was the fifth grade, I observed almost thirty students cramped in a hot classroom at eight am scared and working quietly. One thing I notice on this first group and the rest of my observations is that there are a lot more students with special education needs that I imagined or we are prepared for. On the next period I saw a whole different dynamic, the teacher was way happier and the group were more manageable. There I officially greeted my teacher and get to know her. This time, I got to know and understand how she felt and ended up liking her. I am not happy about going for lunch and returning for one more period, but I’m happy because I met my “favorite group”. They are not the smartest, nor the best behaved ones, but they tried their best. The next subsequent days were a storm, I felt very pushed into looking for information. Those days I hated my practice teaching, this is because I don’t like rushing people into helping with information but I had no other choice, also I needed more time to assimilate to the environment. By the end of the week I felt a bit more incorporated in the school.
University of Puerto Rico – Humacao English Department All this events had a toll on my emotions, regardless I still learnt a lot from this first hit. I was able to learn and notice differences between each class and their students. I have learnt that, by visiting different teachers, there are no straight lines of teaching as long as your students think. In my observations I have seen classes in which both teacher and student are kind to each other and other times in which they are a bit more disciplined. Both, love and discipline are needed in order to have a good environment for learning. On my first week of practice teaching I have learn many new ways of things I should do and how to be proactive in the classroom. First of all, it is too never judge a book by its cover and always has hope in our students. I have seen that good explanations are needed on a task and so I need to explain and model the exercise with them. I need to treat my students how I know they work and never compare them. This are things I have learn to do contrary to what I have seen, meaning that although things were a bit rough in my opinion, it affected in a positive way in what not to do. I as a teacher now know how the students feel and how to be encouraging but at the same time demand from them. This experience changed some thoughts I had regarding methods, seeing how discipline is needed but I should combine it with love and positive feedback. For the future, I will be considering my experience of what I believe I didn’t found appropriate, how the students felt and what I will do to countermeasure that defeatist behavior. In the end my time at school is getting better with each passing day, I still need to cope with it but I eventually will. I love my cooperating teacher in such little time she have taught me so much from both bad experiences and good experiences. These experiences I wouldn’t change them because they taught me a lot and formed me to be a better teacher.
University of Puerto Rico – Humacao English Department