How to handle abuse and neglect

Chapter 9 of Grant and Ray's text talks about how teachers should deal with students in their classroom who are being effected by abuse and neglect within their homes. This issue is a very serious problem that teachers must be aware of and always be alert to. Teachers have the responsibility of reporting abuse if they suspect that it may be happening tpo one of their students. It is a crime not to report it. Grant and Ray also talked about using corporal punishment within the classroom. They said that teachers need to think about whether or not it is ethical to strike someone else's child. I personally do not agree with it, even if it is legal to do. I think that there are better ways to deal with discipline issues than using corporal punishment. Grant and Ray quoted the NAEYC's code of Ethical Conduct and Satatement of Commitment which says, "Above all, we shall not harm children. We shall not participate in practices that are emotionally damaging, physically harmful, disrespectful, degrading, dangerous, exploitative, or intimidating to children. This principle has precedence above all others in this code." I think this statement clearly defines why we should not use corporal punishment to discipline children. I have never seen a teacher use it in any classroom that I have been in, nor was it ever used on any of my classmates. I know that I will never use it in my own classroom.

My Second lesson on Field III

I taught my second lesson to the kindergarten class at SES last week. I thought that it went a lot better, classroom management wise, than my first lesson. I took the advice of my cooperating teacher and worked on developing "the look," that I needed to give the students when they were misbehaving. I found that the students really responded well when I did this, and I was able to easily regain control of the class. I taught a writing and math lesson to the students. The writing lesson was a journal writing lesson in which the students practice drawing a picture about a story they would like to tell, and then they must write a sentence about it.
My math lesson was about using the terms "less than, greater than, and equal too " when comparing the numeric values of 1-10. Students participated in differentiated groups in which they participated in a variety of sorting and sequencing activities in which they had to determine which sets of numbers were more than, less than, or equal too other sets of numbers that other students in their groups had. The lesson was a great success. For my transition activity that I used in between the writing and math lessons I taught, I had the students play Simon Says. It was a great way to get the kids moving and get ready to move onto the math lesson.
In the Grant and Ray text, I was reading about transitions, such as a move or a big change within the life of a family such as a divorce and the effects it has on children. I thought it was interesting that research shows that children who move tend to make lower grades or have more of a chance of being held back due to the move. There is a new student that just joined Ms. Patte's class 2 weeks ago. Grant and Ray said that it is important that teachers give special attention to new students who enter into the classroom during the school year. Teachers need to be sensitive to the fact that new students may be unfamiliar with the curriculum that the school uses and the teacher needs to take the time to help the student catch up to where the class is academically. Ms. Patte has done an excellent job orienting the new student in her classroom as it seems like this student is caught up with his other class members.

My first lesson in Field III

I taught my first lesson last week at SES. It was a writing lesson in which I had the students practice writing in their journals. The students are practicing how to write sentences. I noticed that some of the students can almost write full sentences, while others are still working on writing one word. For the journal writing exercise that I taught, I focused on using Humpty Dumpty as my topic. Ms. Patte always models the journal writing technique by first telling a story of some kind to the class, and as she tells the story she draws a picture about it. Since the class is focusing on telling stories from pictures, I found a picture of Humpty Dumpty and showed it to the class as I told the nursery rhyme story about it. As I spoke to the class, I drew my picture of Humpty Dumpty sitting on the wall, and I made sure to reinforce the fact that I needed to use at least 5 different colors in my drawing, and I needed to make sure to use as much detail as possible in my drawing . Creating details in the pictures the students draw is always something that Ms. Patte really focuses on during journal time. After, I finished my drawing, I told the students that I was going to write a sentence in my journal that matched the picture that I just drew. I asked the class to help me spell out the words in the sentence I wrote above the picture in my journal. By enunciating the letters in each of the words "Humpty Dumpty had a great fall," the students were able to help me spell out the words in my sentence. Next, I asked the students to draw a picture using as many details as possible and write a sentence that matches the pictures they drew in their own journals.
Overall, I think my lesson went well, however, the students tended to talk when they were not supposed to during my lesson. I think that I would have had more control over the class if I would have stopped the lesson completely each time they talked and waited for them to acknowledge that they should not be talking at that time. This is something that I will definitely focus on the next time that I teach. I think that Lemov was correct when he wrote about the 100 percent technique. It is important that the teacher makes sure that she has the attention of all the students instead of just the ones who always pay attention. In my next lesson, I will focus on maintaining the attention and obedience of 100 percent of the class by continuing to monitor what is going on in the classroom while I teach, and addressing behavioral issues appropriately when needed.
I continue to enjoy, and I look forward to my next experience in Field III!