Surprises


 * Surprises in the Practicum **

 ****Student Backgrounds - Amy K.**** **I think one surprising thing that happened was finding out about the students’ backgrounds. One student had been kicked out of his family and was living in a halfway house. Another was very poor and her family did not have the money to send her on the school grad trip, so teachers were putting in money to send her. The fact that students have different backgrounds is not surprising, but that the backgrounds are so diverse in the same community is surprising. It was also surprising that my AT used candy as a reward and he said that you would not survive in intermediate without something like that.**

One surprising story I experienced was how disorganized the administration at my school was. On assembly day we were given notice that the memo sent out before was incorrect and the times for the assemblies were all switched. This caused absolute chaos. My AT and I both had planned for the morning and had an idea of what we would do in the afternoon if in case this normal disorganized natural of the administration came through. But the phrase my AT used to describe the situation was “you feel like you’re a chicken with you head cut off”.
 * Disorganized Administration - Girthiga**

**Misleading EQAO Scores (Steve H**) My class all have a really hard time with reading comprehension (there are a rare few that read and write at the appropriate level or higher but the majority cannot). Their ability to read and write is so low that my AT was trying really hard to find ways to pull it into every single subject (geography, math, etc.). The strange thing is that their EQAO scores were way above the provincial standard. I think what happened was that they crammed for the test and then after it was over, they just decided that it wasn’t worth holding on to the skills.

The one thing I was surprised about was at what age students are identified as having a learning disability. There was one student in particular in one of my rotary classes, who, until this past week, had not been tested for having a learning disability, and yet she is now in grade 7. It was estimated, before the testing, that she was reading and writing at a grade 3 level. For me, I was shocked to see that students can go for so long without receiving any additional help – teachers and parents must have noticed in previous years so why did it take so long to get the appropriate help for this student?
 * Testing for Learning Diabilities - Michelle K**

During my lesson about being safe and secure online, I was using Facebook examples and asked the class to offer a few stories of their own problems they have encountered. One student shared with me a story about how people are always trying to add them on Facebook and their profile pictures are of them in nude and lucrative poses. Other kids agreed that this happened to them regularly and it made me wonder why they were allowed to have Facebook in the first place if these types of things happen or if the parents are even aware of this type of thing. I talked to the teacher about it later and he said the parents were notified about these types of issues and it was put on them to decide how to treat their child’s online persona. In the end, I told them they should always report those types of people because by doing that, even if they know not to add those people, they could be saving other kids who aren’t as aware of the danger.
 * Facebook - Chris Nelan**

I found during recess and lunch time the student councils are permitted to stay in classes without any supervision and nobody was uncomfortable with that. Apparently we have rules and apparently we can play with the rules if they are good students, the problem is: if I were one teacher in that school, should I keep quiet as the other teacher or address it in some way? One nice surprise was that I got a beautiful binder from the class and the grade 8 teacher. One poem was written on the first page and many pictures were taken and showed on the second and third pages called precious moments. Many students even wrote many nice and touching words after to show their appreciation. That's really something I would love to keep in my life.
 * Unsupervised Stundents - Yana **

A student whose Father died in grade 7 was having difficulty still adjusting to a classroom environment. He was continuously have behaviour problems, but not the obvious ones, rather being a student who drew in class, instead of a student who listened. So, my AT told me to give him some special attention, but I already knew he was a student who needed some attention. So during my lessons, I would encourage him to participate, and he towards the end of my placement, he would do it willingly. The last week of school, I gave 2 tests and 1 quiz, and to my surprise, he received one of the highest marks on 2 of them. I knew I was trying to help him, but what I didn't realize was the difference I made.
 * Special Attention to Students - Rubina **

One of the students in my class came in with her mother one day and they were very upset and wanted to talk to my AT and I about what was going on in their lives. Turned out that the student's father was diagnosed with cancer and going for a bunch of tests and other procedures. There was a lot of stress in the family and they wanted the teachers to know what was going on. I felt so bad for this student, and her mother, and was very impressed with how well the student was doing in the class considering her situation.
 * Grade 8 - Surprising Story Jess **

Also, I had a very difficult class to manage (according to my faculty advisor, they were the worst hes seen in 20 years)...my AT did quite well, for the most part, to keep things in control however the main area I noticed that was the most difficult was that you could not say anything 'jokingly' or give an example of something that was somewhat off-topic because the students would go off on crazy tangents that had nothing to do with the topic and it was very hard to bring it back. (e.g. talking about perimeter and area in math and my AT gave an example about a fence to keep the bunnies out, and the class blurted out comments about bunnies and started having full out conversations about bunnies!! It was ridiculous and totally unnecessary and they thought it was hilarious...this happened ALL day long and was very frustrating!

Got a sub one morning. He had a different style than my AT. The big surprise was that kids were very good, unlike all the scary stories about kids misbehaving with subs. I can not believe how long it takes students to complete any sort of in class work. I gave them a little math quiz with 4 questions that took me 3 minutes to finish, so i figured it would take the students around 20 minutes at most. Some students took 40 minutes!
 * Surpise #2 (doubling as inspiring story) (Doina)**
 * Grade 7 - 8 Students (Nadine)**

During my dance class, I was very surprised by one of my IEP students. In class, he shows no initiative and only does work willingly when it involves drawing or colouring. However, in dance, he took on a leadership role which was nice to see.
 * Dance (Kathryn)**

Title says is all. Interestingly, they were paying more attention after, so I'm halfway considering having firedrills as energizers :)
 * My first fire drill on the Faculty Advisor visit day (Doina)**

My AT has to leave for the rest of this week due to personal reasons. Instead of relying on the supply teacher to deliver curriculum, we've decided that I will be taking over 100% until Monday morning. (I've been teaching about 50% since Thursday, so it's a natural extension). It's a bit stressful, but super exciting! *The supply will be observing and giving feedback.
 * Supply and Demand - Nathan **

This comment is more of a pet peeve - on Wednesday the school had a literacy workshop for ten teachers that took over the library. The library is where the Smart board is located and where there are 30 computers. Also it is where the primary group goes to read and investigate. No access to these resources for the entire day. Have the teachers work in the staff room, the board office, the hallway ... these resources are precious and should be used for educating. This Monday, Election Day – no access to the gymnasium and it calls for rain.
 * Library Access (Brian) **

I found myself in fatigue every morning and afternoon looking for a working photocopy machine, going out to purchase your own paper, and looking for other such school supplies. Every morning I would come in, pull out my folder and make my way into one of three photocopying rooms; if I was lucky, there would be no person in line. I was also surprised to how attached I got to my own students as opposed to other students coming in during rotary. To start off the day, we would have another grade eight class come in to do art, while my class was at history. I would sometimes ask my associate teacher if I could go to the history room to help them out because I felt attached to them - I wanted to give them the most of me as I could in terms of their academic learning.
 * I couldn't believe how much time it takes to prepare (Christe M.)**

A few times throughout the practicum I would give instructions that I felt were pretty clear, but somehow the students would be way off of what I wanted. For example, I told them to work on a given task until 11, one of the students stopped us at 5 to eleven, and when I said we still had 5 minutes he said: "But the big hand is at 11, that's when you said we were done" Wow, that's quite something. A stop watch like we have in class would have been a great alternative. I sometimes wished I had a laptop with me or something that would indicate to the students when to stop. //Did you have a Smartboard in your room by any chance?// **(Christe M.)**
 * I was surprised at what was intuitive to the students and what wasn't (Andy)**

There was one day near the beginning of my placement, when the students had a Science lab due, and when the time came to hand it in, a lot of them did not have it done. My ATs reaction to this surprised me greatly. She spent about 5 minutes yelling at them about responsibility, and that this won’t fly in high school. I couldn’t believe it. My AT was a bit more authoritarian then I would like to be as a teacher, but I thought this reaction went way too far. I guess she had been having a lot of issues with students completing work on time, but I was still incredibly surprised by the way she handled this. I think it was unfair to both students who didn’t and students who did, get it done, and it made the lesson I had to teach immediately after more difficult because the students were shaken.
 * I was surprised by my ATs reaction to late work (Greg Leverton)**

Something that surprised me was how mature and respectful my Grade 8’s were to me. I found that they were more co-operative and willing to learn that I had anticipated they would want to be. Perhaps I was surprised because I have spent a lot of time as a volunteer in the high school environment. I recall in high school, students were often bored and disengaged in class. I found it to be the total opposite in my placement.
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: small;">A Nice Surprise (Eddie) **

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: small;">**Surprising Story (Michelle B)** I was surprised at how quickly the class learned and understood the integer unit. They had never worked with negative numbers before and I thought it might take them some time to understand them, but the majority of the class found the unit very easy. I had to work to come up with more difficult questions for them.


 * PA Announcements (Brian) **

My biggest surprise of the practicum was the PA announcements. It appeared that every though or comment that the office had was announced. Very distracting when you are teaching. //Johnny forgot his lunch, somebody needs a book, et al.// If you are in a middle of a lesson – you lose the whole class and more critical lose your lesson point.

In my observation week, my AT had commented that he suspected that a certain student might be troublesome. This in itself was surprising because my first impression of this girl was completely the opposite - probably based on her diminutive size. In the first week of my placement, this same girl was suspended for threatening to beat up another teacher! You really can't judge a book by its cover.
 * Judging Personalities (Steve R) **

**Surprising Story - Amy LaRue**

=
I was surprised by how much life for grade 7 and 8 students had changed since I have been there. I believe that part of this had to do with the life experiences many of them had had to date, and I wonder if it would be different in other schools. However, the place where this became most evident was near the end of placement when I was informed that grade 6, 7, and 8 aren’t allowed to dress up in costumes because the amount of skin shown by various students was consistently inappropriate. This led to the withdrawal of the privilege of dressing up.=====


 * Students are exposed to a LOT more, and EARLIER! - Alex Willison**

For Halloween, the school allowed both students and staff to dress up in costume. Since Halloween is one of my favourite times of the year, I naturally already had a costume planned and prepared that I was to wear to a party at a friend's place that evening. The costume I had chosen this year was that of a character from a film that was Rated R; recommended not to be seen by those under 18 years of age. It was shocking to see that students as young as Grade 5 were coming up to me, and saying how I "looked exactly like him", and that the movie was "a favourite" of theirs. Considering the subject matter that the film contained, it is alarming to think that parents are exposing their children to stuff that is incredibly inappropriate for their maturity level! Growing up, I was not allowed to watch Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and The Simpsons until I was in HIGH SCHOOL! WHAT IS GOING ON?!?!