Hi World! So this is the start of my blogging life in a public and professional setting. It is completely new to me and I am a bit apprehensive in reflecting and sharing thoughts about teaching and my life for anyone to see. That being said, I strongly believe it will be a strong tool in connecting myself as a teacher, with students and their parents!
I currently work at St. Michael’s University School in Victoria, BC. There I coach soccer, run weekend activities and spend time in the boarding houses as a houseparent, among many other things, in return for room and board. My time spent there working with kids is the reason I chose to go into the teaching profession. I grew up in Terrace, BC and have a love of sport in any shape or form. But enough about me for now…
This first post is an entry for a Literacy and Language in the Middle School course. I’ve been asked what an ELA (English Language Arts) class will look like/sound like/be like in the middle school classroom. Well… you might have students sitting, they might be standing or they might be hopping on one foot. You might hear students speaking one at a time or all at once in small groups, or you might hear a teacher reading or lecturing, or maybe even nothing at all. It will hopefully provide a wide range of experiences, pushing students limits in reading, writing and speaking. All of this will be with the goal in mind that they will learn skills useful in the next grade, and beyond any school setting.
Nice to know that this is a new event for others as well, blogging is a new thing for me.
ReplyDeleteSomething I thought about while reading yours and looking at your blog was travel and life paths. I think what hit it for me was when you mentioned teaching the students skills that can be useful in the next grade.
We (as teachers) always need to think that we are but one stop along the education path for our students. They are coming from somewhere last year and they are going somewhere else next year, and we are there to help them when we can.
I feel that it's easy to get caught up in an isolation bubble so to speak and get so caught up in what we are teaching. We never teach in isolation, and hopefully everything we teach has positive repercussions, as you mentioned above.
Food for thought: How many Grade 8 students are thinking about their paths in life??
I like your outlook on teaching ELA - it can look like anything, so long as it helps with the learning. Reading these posts and writing one myself, it really makes me wonder what my class will actually look like, not what it should look like. Will it be high energy or reflective? Will the students be engaged or distant? How can I help foster one attitude or another? It's pretty exciting! You must have a bit of an idea with your soccer coaching experience.
ReplyDeleteWelcome to the Blogosphere, David! It sounds like you are in a great place to observe, learn about, practice strategies, and get to know Middle Years students.
ReplyDeleteGoing to the point Greg made about teaching in isolation: some teachers teach with their doors wide open, and some with them shut with paper over the window. In my own experience it takes forward-thinking administrators to bring us all together.