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Over the course of the term I have learned a lot about what to anticipate as a new teacher. I
learned about the many different governing entities involved in the school system, and what each of
them entail. I learned about how to set myself up for success, and find the right fit when getting my
first job. But the best part of the course was the field work I was able to do with the Boys and Girls
Club.
hile not focused on the classroom or on teaching content, the Boys and Girls Club has
elements to its program which pertain to most of the intrinsic instruction I will do as a teacher. !his
program teaches its students how to be better citi"ens, and how to think more universally, outside the
confines of the building and of their own young lives. #ost of them were of a very low $%$, and in
fact a majority of them lived in a homeless shelter with one parent and one or more siblings. $ome of
them were in foster homes. It was appalling to me at first, and very upsetting, to think that they didn&t
have a physical place where they could belong, or ever find some 'uiet time to themselves, and that for
some of them the Boys and Girls Club is the most stable thing in their lives.
!he initial surprise to me was that I care more about the kids than I think I will ever care about
the content I am teaching. (fter about two hours with these kids it suddenly occurred to me that by the
time I&m )* I may very well have ten foster kids. I really, really wanted to scoop them up and give
them better lives, but I know that is not the way social work accomplishes its goals. !hey seemed so
starved for individual attention, and those who were acting out at first became calm and engaged and
happy and sweet as soon as I was able to acknowledge them, which is all they were looking for. hen
I had the opportunity to actually talk at length with any of them, or work through a problem with them,
they completely lit up, and their sweet dirty faces were no longer set to defend themselves against the
world, but smiling and giggling like happy children. !hey needed to know that they mattered, and that
someone was listening to them. I plan to continue my time with Boys and Girls Club, as the kids have
won over my heart. I now know that as a teacher my primary goal will come down to making my
students& lives better in whatever way I can, under the framework of science instruction, yes, but first
and foremost to let them know that they are important and that I think they are great.
!he field work taught me that structure is the key to classroom management. !he staff of the
Club had defined rules and rituals for enforcement which were endearing to watch the students engage
in. One woman would stand in front of the rowdy group and say +clap once if you can hear me., !wo
or three kids up front would clap once loudly. $he&d then say +clap twice if you can hear me,, to which
more and more students would respond, until the cue of clapping informed the non-clapping.still-
talking students what was going on, until she got up to about five claps and everyone was 'uiet and
now engaged. !he students already knew this routine, took pride in it, and the instructor was able to
effectively 'uiet down an entire room by using a small voice and engaging the students in the process.
Genius, I thought to myself. !here were many e/amples of this type of method for management.
!here were no opportunities for assessment in my field placement, but we did go to the
community garden one day and I was able to witness fairly comprehensive instruction about growing
vegetables and managing pests organically. !he kids, of course, just thought they were out there
having fun, but because they were walking through the garden beds, looking for bugs and identifying
different plants, they surely will remember it and how it worked. I believe that every one of them
would have been able to e/plain what they learned to a parent that night, which is itself an informal
mode of assessment.
!he field work helped me prepare my teaching demonstration by reminding me that children
are really curious about the natural world, and that finding a way to make it fun for them to learn more
is essential to their garnering a further interest in it. I was able, in my teaching demonstration, to teach
a 0 year old about fossil formation, and I could see the lights turning on in his mind as he assimilated
information and synthesi"ed it with what he already knew. !he kids at the Boys and Girls Club gave
me this first clue about instruction- that blending what they already know with what they don&t yet
know makes them feel smart and involved and engaged in their own learning.
(s stated above, I was surprised to find that when actually in the field with the kids, the idea of
e/plicit curriculum became secondary to the implicit lessons the kids would learn. !rue, I was not
actually tasked with teaching them anything, let alone an entire school year worth of %arth $cience
instruction, so I imagine that when I do have my own classroom the content will hold e'ual weight.
But here is where my own biases and assumptions were challenged. 1rior to this e/perience I thought
that %arth $cience itself was the most important thing in the world. I wasn&t really concerned with what
grade level I would be teaching, as long as I could teach geology and astronomy. I figured that a
suburban school would probably best fit my needs, so I could get down to the nitty gritty with students
and parents who cared the most about their education, and that together we could go far in science. But
it is now of greater importance to me to be a positive person in the lives of kids who desperately need
it, than to merely share my passion for science. I am happy for this change and the job suddenly feels
very personal, instead of just seeming like a good fit.
I look forward to more field e/periences as I continue to progress in my teaching courses. !his
course has taught me to think about the many ways this job can be done. !here are a lot of facets to a
teaching career, and a lot of 'uestions to be continually e/plored, like whether or not teachers should be
offered tenure, whether we should be paid based on performance, or even how that performance should
be measured. #any believe that teachers& job security and benefits are a big pull factor to get people in
to the profession, and that with the low pay considered, eliminating these perks will make teaching less
attractive to good candidates. But many people, inside and outside of the teaching profession, believe
that bad teachers staying in their positions are as much a harm to the system as anything.
I don&t have an answer to these 'uestions, and I can only start my career by setting my own
compass on a course to high achievement. I want to earn as many accreditations as possible and set a
very high standard for the profession, to which I will hold myself and others accountable. I would
embrace continued assessment throughout my career because I want to do my job very well. (s I
spend more time in formal classrooms I will learn more and more about myself as an educator, and
about learners and learning. I will also be able to hone the other elements of my portfolio2 my
philosophies of education, classroom management, and teaching in general. I look forward to earning
my degree, and to approaching my new career as a professional, always learning and developing along
the way, and remaining open to what new surprises I may encounter about myself, my students, and my
job as a teacher.