Nucleus study 2014

Clemente |1

I.

Background Information 1. Educational Region - Humacao 2. Regional Supervisor – Ivette Trujillo Muñiz 3. School District – Las Piedras 4. Regional Director Assistant – Julio Díaz Caraballo 5. School – Second Unit Pedro Rivera Molina 6. Grades Taught – Kindergarten to Ninth Grade 7. Level- The level of the school is divided in elementary and secondary.

8. The school has fallen into the stage of Focus (Plan de enfoque) this year after being in Transitional last year.

9. The School was transferred to Colegio Corazón de Maria in Juncos (town) on august 2010 because of the remodeling of the 21st Century School. On September 21, 2012 they had their very first opening and usage of the school.

10. School Director – Yadira I. Torres González a. Yadira I. Torres González has a B.A in Special Education with a concentration in Communication Impediment (Impedimetos Comunicológicos.). She also has a Master’s degree in Management and Leadership which gives her the requirements to qualify as a school director.

Yadira was a teacher of Special Education and Restraint classroom for over 15

Clemente |2

years. Mrs. Torres has been the director of the Pedro Rivera Molina School for 5 years. When she was asked to describe her school she explained how her school was the best school in Juncos. but she believes that her personnel, students and community are much compromised with the school and that is what makes it the best. She feels a lot of pride and has a great conviction towards her school. Mrs. Torres explained how the school has many goals and challenges this year and of course one of them is to improve the “Pruebas Puertorriqueñas de Aprovechamiento Académico” (PPAA). Almost every teacher was surprised with the results of the test taken by the students. She explained how our school was in the Flexibility Plan last year.

The stage we are occupying is in the third stage which is Focus Plan. The goal is to reach the Transitional Stage which is the second one in order to be with where the majority of the schools are in Puerto Rico. The last step is to be with the pros that are in the superior quality which are the Excellence Stage.

The main priority is to level up and keep it that way. Still, the faculty is questioning why the school fell to that Focus Stage if the last year they were in the Transitional Stage. The director explained that the school has the highest student enrollment in all Juncos. She explains that it has many excellent students but also about 200- 215 special education students which open a breach, not with the intention of prejudice but reality of it having an effect on the tests. But, she clarified that some of the special education

Clemente |3

students are in the honor role so it’s a factor that may affects but it’s not necessary the core of the problem.

The school is a 21 First Century School and the classrooms were built to contain only 26 students and it’s not the reality. So, the impact is not as effective when there are fewer students in the classroom for the teacher to focus on and reach them. Therefore, this is also one of the possibilities that could have affected the tests. It’s a matter that it’s still under investigation.

11. Cooperating Teacher- Sonia De La Rosa a. Mrs. Sonia De La Rosa Mrs. Sonia De La Rosa has been working in the public school system for almost 20 years and in addition of being an English teacher she is also certified to teach Spanish and to be a cooperative teacher. Mrs. Sonia De La Rosa has a Master’s Degree in English as a Second Language. But, what really levitates De La Rosa is Science and she is also an Occupational Therapist but she failed the validation and lost her motivation to try again. She has worked in the private school system for 13 years as an English teacher.

She is also a K-3 certified teacher.

12. Practice Group 1-2 (Doki) a. This is a very special group, but as I discussed with the home teacher only a few of them are ready to take over the first grade. Almost all of them are not prepared to be in the first grade, but still we try to push them in order to obtain

Clemente |4

results in different areas. The group has potential students, but they are still blooming and it’s hard to reach them and capture their attention. Only 3 students are fluent in English and I would say that only 3 understand pretty well what is being taught. The rest of the students are floating, disinterested, distracted (except when it comes to singing and fun exercises) in the class.

The students don’t like to write and adding to the equation not every parent is aware or compromised with their children. As a teacher of this group I will be facing a challenge to reach them and being able assess their learning. There is one particular student that is making the process more difficult, but with strategies of behavior modification I’ve been able to control a little bit more.

I’m generating ideas in order to capture more of their attention and impact them as we go along.

I.

A. Content

1. Introduction The purpose of this Nucleus Study is to acquire information about the school I’ll be doing my practice teaching. The information includes the school structure, the personnel, student enrollment, curriculum programs, sports programs, diagrams and others.

This information will help me familiarize with many important details that will help me keep up with how the school works and why. It will help for the better understanding of the environment and with what I can and can’t count with. It’s important for me to know my school and to take ownership in the same because I’m

Clemente |5

part of it now, therefore is my school. If something is asked about it with this information I will have the certainty to orientate and answer others about the school, but most importantly know everything there is to know about it.

Mission Assurance of a free and non sectarian education, that develops the abilities and talents of all the students for them to become independent citizens, life learners, respectful of the law and environment, and capable of contributing to the well being of all citizens Vision The Puerto Rican school should be an effective instrument for the building of a fair and democratic society. It should be a social experience, capable of integrating the willing for the collective well being, but working according to the reality of the community. The educative process of every school should respond to the necessities and talents of the students, diversifying the academic offer and evaluation in regular and extended schedule. It is necessary to assist the student formation in all dimensions and give importance to the knowledge development and academic competencies in

Clemente |6

harmony with emotional, physical, social and physiologic development. In turn, this will bring a peaceful, camaraderie and collaborative environment between the school and the community . *See appendix #1

2. Areas of Observation a. School Organization

Director

Support Personnel Counselor and Social Worker

School Counsel

Secretary

Teachers

Special Education Facilitators

Librarian

Clemente |7

Special Education T1’s

Lunchroom Employees

Speech Pathologist

Guards

Special Education Teachers

Janitors

Volunteers

*The school has no secretary at the time.

b. Curricular Programs The school’s curriculum program consists on: English, Spanish, Math, Social Studies and Physical Education. It also offers electives such as Industrial Arts, Music, Health(right now the elective of health is without a teacher therefore there’s no one at this time instructing it), Home Economics and Body Movement (Dance). The school

Clemente |8

also works with a project called ECO- STEAM which focuses on robotics, astronomy and environmental topics. I have work for this company for over 7 years so I was proud to know that the school where I’m doing my practice teaching its participating with the program of G Works Inc. company. c. Sports Program -

Volleyball Team (Girls and Boys)

-

Track and Field (Girls and Boys)

d. Facilities The school has 44 classrooms. Those classrooms are divided in 26 academic classrooms, 2 Kindergarten, 1 Health classroom, 1 Visual Arts classroom, 1 Dance Studio, 5 Resources Classrooms, 1 Restrained classroom (contenido), 3 Therapy classrooms, 1 nursery, 1 Industrial Art classroom, 1 Technology classroom and1 of Family and Consumer. The school also has a 1 library, 1 director’s office, 1 Social Worker’s office, 1 Faculty Room, 1 Counselors Room, 3 other offices, 1 court, 1 elevator, 1 ramp, and 1 cooperative called “El Coqui”. (See appendix #2)

e. School Diagram *See appendix #3 f. Supervision

Clemente |9

The school has one director who’s Mrs. Yadira I. Torres. It also has an Eco Steam Administrator who’s basically the director assistant (sub director) Miguel Piñero. If none of them are present the Support Personnel (Social Worker or Counselor) take control over the school’s supervision. g. Personnel There are 39 teachers, 1 librarian, 1 social worker, 1 counselor, 4 janitors, 7 office personnel and 7 lunchroom employees. *See appendix #4 h. Students There are about 740 students in the school and almost 215 are from Special Education. Most of them come from Juncos, Las Piedras, Gurabo and San Lorenzo.

Only a few come from Yabucoa and Humacao. It’s kind of hard for the students to share different levels. Many younger students are intimidated by the old ones.

Older students sometimes take advantage or play pranks on the little ones and the little ones are messier than the big ones so there are certain challenges on both levels.

The attendance of students is high even though there are exceptions for those who are absent for many reasons even if they are not justified enough. When there’s bad weather, parents pick them up early or they don’t send them to school as a normal protective parent would do.

C l e m e n t e | 10

III- Reaction 1. School’s Strengths The most important strength of the school is the compromise the community and faculty have within the school. While interviewing the director she explained how there were no divisions in her school. It was a place of harmony, team work and comradeship. Almost everyone is compromise to take the school to another level. That is the most outstanding strength of the school.

2. Areas of improvement The primary goals are to improve the PPAA and to have a successful semester. Another goal is to implement strategies and activities to retain 100% of the enrollment and success of the students.

C l e m e n t e | 11

IV- Conclusion The purpose of this nucleus study was to investigate and learn more about my Practice Center, the teachers and other personnel that can and will contribute to my professional development. It was also to understand a little bit more of how the school works and what I can expect of it. Getting to know how some members of the faculty are ready to take on the challenge to improve student’s development really surprises me. I’m still getting to know the teachers because I’ve only met a few, since time never seems to be enough. After informing myself through the nucleus study I understand that the environment will help me develop my skills as a teacher and as a coworker.

The environment seems to be healthy in many areas and still there’s more to discover. It challenges me more because there’s a lot of work for a very short time. I haven’t encountered a hostile environment which actually surprises me. Usually, schools are divided because of indifferences and constant resistance towards other’s ideals (of course remitting to the cliché of other schools). The disposition of many of the teachers really feels like I can count on them as professional educators and coworkers showing me the ropes in this new journey. But, since nothing is perfect and we live in a world filled with realities I do feel that I can be discouraged by some teachers.

A great number of teachers have been in the system for many years. This means that they are tired and exhausted of the way the system works. The levels of motivation aren’t as high as fresher teachers (not all of them). Some of them, question if I’m sure of what I’m doing, of course, in humorous way. But, as well as they explain the bad things I can expect and will

C l e m e n t e | 12

receive in this journey they have also explain how gratifying is to see your students level up and change every time becoming more than what you received in the beginning.

My professional development will also be affected by defining if this is the level I really want to continue teaching (I already know I want to teach older students, but still I love elementary students. What a contradiction!). It will guide me better towards my passion. The school will help me question if I’m really up to the hard and extra work plus all the conflicts the PRDE provides freely for us teachers. This practice teaching will define if I’m ready to sacrifice a lot of time, work, patience and more in order to at least impact a few students. It will help define if I want to continue with the public system (which I honestly don’t think will happen), private system or educational proposals (like ECO-STEAM).

These types of proposals give me the opportunity to be free and creative and provide me with all the materials and resources in order to reach every student individually. The experience of working at this Practice Center also lets me explore more areas of concentration that I may aim for. Being able to establish my style and techniques it’s also something that I will discover.

Proving the limits I can have as a teacher but most importantly as a person will also affect my professional development.

C l e m e n t e | 13

References Berríos, N. M. (2012, January 27). Retrieved from My Practice at the Elementary Level: http://missymarrero.blogspot.com/ Education, P. R. (2014-2016). Plan Comprensivo Auténtico. Las Piedras: PRDE. González, Y. I. (2014, August 22). Personal Communication. (A. C. Vázquez, Interviewer) Piñero, M. (2014, August 20). Personal Communication. (A. C. Vázquez, Interviewer) Rosa, S. D. (2014, August 18). Personal Communication. (A. C. Vázquez, Interviewer)

C l e m e n t e | 14

Appendix