My experience in Mrs. Harvey’s 1^st Grade class at Christ King Parish School was probably the best field experience I’ve had so far at Marquette. I felt very comfortable in her classroom. The kids were all so smart and eager to learn, I was amazed by how much of the information from the text they already knew. Mrs. Harvey was so accommodating and flexible with us, she was great to work with. I learned a lot about classroom management and this age from watching her. Her classroom is SOOO cute. It’s filled with intellectually stimulating materials and bright colors everywhere. This woman is a whiz with construction paper! She is also extremely organized. I saw how crucial this organization was to managing the classroom. The students were able to see from all the adorable posters and schedules on the wall exactly what was expected of them at all times. She has control over the classroom because the students adore her and respect her. I could also see how she used rewards in her classroom to motivate the students. Every day, as we were leaving, the students left their folder out on their desk and went to music. Mrs. Harvey gave each student a stamp if they had been good for us that day. Also, there was a “monkey chain” on the front chalkboard. I found out that when the class as a whole was good they would receive a monkey (from the ‘barrell o’ monkeys’ game). Once the chain got to a certain length, the class received a reward.  

 

            I think I also learned a lot about patience from Mrs. Harvey. These first graders were very well behaved, however 1^st graders can be very needy, I never once saw Mrs. Harvey loose her cool. Everyday when we arrived they were coming in from recess. Immediately, there would be a group of students surrounding her, asking questions like ‘should I go do my job’, ‘should we go see the reading teacher’, ‘can I go to the bathroom’, ‘can I have a band-aid’, ‘can you help me get my jacket off’, the list goes on. I was amazed by how calmly she attended to the needs of each student. They were definitely sweet kids, but at times, their excitement was hard to contain and re-direct into constructive learning. Mrs. Harvey was patient enough, and knew the things to say, in order to create an environment conducive to learning. I really admired this skill. I could see how much she really cares about those kids. I could see that so much of her is invested into that classroom and those kids. I hope that I can offer the same to my students someday.

 

            I had so much fun teaching these kids. I knew that if we planned an interactive activity they would do really well with it. So, the first lesson we taught was called “what is an insect”. We had to teach the students the parts of an insect, and some examples of common insects and some parts that make each of them unique. Deanne and I came up with the idea of creating candy insects right away. We thought it would be fun to have them create one of the insects we learned about. Each students received a bag of candy and told that they could create any insect they wanted as long as it followed the rules we talked about (3 body parts, and 6 legs). Most of the students made butterflies out of circus peanuts or ladybugs out of York peppermint patties and red frosting. However there were definitely some creative choices, one of the students used the entire contents of their bag to create a dragonfly. I think this lesson went extremely well, the students LOVED it. If I had to change anything, I probably would have made the content a little more advanced. Deanne and I used the book as a guideline for creating our lessons. However, I felt like most of the students were bored with this material. The majority of them already knew the parts of an insect.

 

            The second lesson we did branched off from this lesson. We taught them the life cycle of a butterfly. We started by walking them through the stages of this life cycle on a poster board we created. Most of the students already knew the stages, so this was a review. So, we thought it would be fun to teach the students a song to help them remember these stages. The song was called "The Butterfly Song" and was sung to the tune of up on the housetop. We sang the song several times. They really enjoyed it. Finally for an activity, we created a wheel that would show the stages of the butterfly. This activity required the students to cut out a picture of each stage and paste it onto their wheel in the correct order and direction. This activity was a good idea, and the finished product was wonderful, but it may have been slightly too complex for the students. Deanne walked through the activity slowly step by step as Mrs. Harvey and I walked around and helped all students glue their stages in the right direction so that they could read them when they turned their wheel. When they were done we had them write the stages on the front to help them retain the vocabulary and reinforce the stage.

 Our final lesson was a review game. The last time we went, the students were just finishing up a unit on plants and animals. Mrs. Harvey suggested that we review this material with the students. We decided a game would be appropriate since it would be our last time there and the students had just finished learning a unit. We thought it would be a fun way to reward them for being so cooperative. Our game was very interactive. Students were divided into 6 groups. Each group was given a white board and a dry-erase marker. Then each group was given a turn to pick a question. All the groups could answer each trivia question for points. However, if the students picked a challenge question only their group could answer that question. The challenge questions were more interactive and a lot of fun. They would have to draw something, or act something out, one of them even asked the students to sing “the butterfly song”. The students worked really well together. I was surprised that all of them were so on task and that all of them were eager to participate. If I could change anything about this lesson, it wouldn’t be content related. I would change my ability to manage the classroom. The students got so excited and I didn’t have anything prepared to re-focus their attention. They weren’t being bad, they were just SO into the game that they couldn’t contain themselves. We should have established more rules at the beginning of the game or asked Mrs. Harvey if they had a classroom “quiet signal” that would help me re-group them.