Week 3

In class this week we listened to a story about an 11 year old girl who was telling us all about her birthday. I really enjoyed the rich, descriptive language that the writer used to describe everything, however I really felt sorry for the girl because she was getting made fun of by many of her classmates. I remember that was a hard time for me too, just because it was a time where you realized that you were growing up and that people who you grew up with and knew from school all of your life started changing and deciding who their "real" friends were.
We also began our field experience this week. I was so excited to be immersed in the classroom, and I am excited that I have the unique opportunity to help in the 4th grade classroom. Two of the fourth grade teachers and the librarian are working together so that they can help their readers to get the most out of their language arts time. The classrooms switch and get mixed around, and because the librarian is taking some of the students, the groups for each teacher are smaller, which means more one-on-one time for the students and teachers.
One teacher works with teachers who are low-level readers, one is working with students who are at grade level, and the librarian is working with the high achieving students. I sat in with the librarian this week and she did a really great job with the students. She is implementing technology into reading by having each student read a part of a story using their best character voices and turning this into a youtube video that they can share with their classmates and their parents. She chose some really interesting poems for the students to read aloud which really helped them to connect to the text by using different voices. For instance, she read a book about different dogs, and she passed the book around and let each student read the story in the voice that they thought the dog would have. It was really fun and engaging.
The fourth graders also go to their specials during the time that we visit the school, so we get the opportunity to rotate and see literature in art and music, and we also get to observe gym class. I just really enjoyed my first day in field experience and I can't wait to get back in the classroom!