Week 3 reflection

Second Week of Kindergarten

The second week of kindergarten has been very busy. We have a full schedule and the students are still having some trouble remembering some things. They forget to raise their hands, follow directions, and to be respectful to each other and their teachers. The first couple weeks are hard on everyone. It is a big adjustment for these five year olds. However, they seem to be doing pretty well so far.

This week I taught my host teacher's, lessons plans. I taught each day (Tuesday-Thursday) during our literacy station block. On Tuesday, I worked on classifying and sorting objects by one color. For some students this was an easy concept but for others it was rather hard. I noticed that some students were having trouble understanding how to sort the objects into the sorting trays (that we provided for them to use). They would watch other students in order to figure out where each color should go. About half way through my first group, I noticed that they were only putting one color in the tray because they did not see any other colors in it. They had trouble with the realization that they needed to put "one bead" of each color in each slot. This was a hard concept for them. Overall, they did a good job figuring out where the objects (beads, blocks or bears) go.

On Wednesday, I taught the meanings of the words: top, middle and bottom. I first started by showing the students the toy shelf. I pointed to the top, middle and bottom shelves. Next, we used blocks to manipulate the positions. Some of the students were confused on the order (they were flipping top and bottom). I also noticed that some students would take the same color blocks as their peers so that they could listen to their friends answer when I asked, "What color is on top? The bottom? The middle?" I decided to then tell each student that they needed their own colors. Most of the students did very well with this concept. I was impressed!

On Thursday we discussed how old they are. The students drew a picture of themself and told me how old they are in a sentence. They said, "I am _ years old." This was a pretty easy concept for them. They did extremely well.

This week was a very productive and successful. I learned alot more about my students. I was able to complete a pre-assessment on being able to identify and name "the names of shapes". I completed this pre-assessment for my action research project. The students did an okay job, but I can now see which shapes that I am going to need to stress and work on with them. The assessment was very beneficial.

I also had a short meeting with Mrs. R concerning how to help one of the students in our classroom. He is having behavioral issues and I felt that I needed some guidance on how to help him. She is a great mentor and gave me some great tips on how to successful motivate him (allow him to be a helper, assisst me with projects, be my line leader, etc.). I felt that I learned alot of information from discussing this with her. She is truly a wonderful teacher.

Overall, this week was a success. I learned much more about my students in this first two weeks then I ever thought I would. Each one of them is unique and special. I am excited about going back to Woodburn tomorrow.