Week Two: School and Community: You will become familiar with the school environment, the student, teachers, administrators and other staff members as well as the community.
Core Questions:
Who are the people in your school? How would you describe the school and surrounding community? What and who do you see as creating the links between school and community? Have someone take a photo of you standing in front of your school to add to your Professional ePortfolio. Check out the school website to become more familiar with your school community.

 

To start of the afternoon, my partner and I got to watch the Grade 1 music class. They were clapping along to different beats and played games related to music and dance. It was so much fun to watch the kids dance and just be themselves. They were so carefree and seemed to have so much fun. After music class, we went back to the classroom and the teacher had the students read to each other in partners to work on their reading abilities. This relates to the community idea as the students were working together to become better readers. I sat with two students and listened to them read and also helped them sound out words they were having trouble with.

In gym, the students first ran a couple laps before re-grouping in the center of the gym. The students also did some stretching and balancing. Then they got to play a game where they had to do different locomotion’s to get to a new hula hoop. They did movements such as running, skipping, hopping on one foot, and crab walk. The students really enjoyed their time in the gym. Next the students had recess and my partner and I got to talk to the teacher.

The teacher spoke to us about parents and relationships with students and parents is key. She said relationships are very important with every student, but especially important with students who have learning disabilities. The teacher has a conversation book with some parents in which they write back and forth to each other and she lets the parents know how the student is doing, says any positive things the student has done and accomplished, and if the student had a rough day, she writes that as well. This is one way the teacher establishes community. It was cool to see a strategy for communicating with parents as well as how she establishes those relationships.

The school and the surrounding community seem to be welcoming and safe. The area around the school is all homes and is nice. The school as a whole seems to be a good community. Everyone greets each other, both students and staff and everyone in the school is very friendly. The EA’s are all very friendly and welcoming as well. All the students are cheerful and kind towards each other which contributes to the community idea. For example, in the classroom we are assigned to, a student accidentally pulled his drawer out of his desk and everything fell out. About four other students quickly got up and started helping this student clean everything up. It was very sweet to see that even students as young as Grade 1 have a sense of community and are willing to help their peers.

To end the day off, the students were drawing and coloring rough draft ideas for what they want to paint onto their pumpkin for the next day. The students all had creative and cute ideas and many students discussed with each other about what their plan was and also complimented the other students work. Although I was not able to be in the school while the students painted their pumpkins, I am excited to return to the school next week to see how they all turned out!