*You must document your learning experience every time you visit your cooperating

classroom. Please write a narrative of what you did, what you learned, and what questions you
still have. Once you have completed all 20 hours of field experience, you will submit your
narrative of your experience from each visit in one document.

Visit #1 Friday, February 24th, 2017

I arrived at 9am at school, I signed in and gave my license to the woman at the front desk.

The teacher Im observing for my field experience hours met me at the front desk and then led

me to her Technology classroom. She introduced me to her lesson plan for the different class

periods. They are working on Photoshop, typing tests, creating menus, working on coding

projects, and many other little activities today. The third period 8th graders task is to watch a

video about how to Photoshop a photograph. After finishing the video, their assignment is to

Photoshop five other photographs using the guidelines from the video.

The fourth and fifth period 6th graders are taking one minute timed typing tests, finishing

their menu projects, and working on coding as a bonus activity when all the other assignments

are finished.

The seventh and eighth period 7th graders are also taking one minute typing tests but are

using excel sheets to transfer data to bar graphs instead of taking typing tests.

Her teaching style is very up front and based on individual independence. When the

students arrive in class, their schedule is posted up on the wall through the projector. It tells the

students what it is they need to do during the class period.

What stands out to me the most today is how much technology has impacted the

education system. Most grading is done online; attendance is taken online. When I was in school,

my teachers had physical gradebooks... not anymore! This district has become partners with

Google and they now use all kinds of online google applications to turn in projects and see

teachers posts updating information on assignments. These kids are learning so much more
about computers and technology than I ever did at this age. Theres this fascinating website

called Google Classroom where the students find all assignments that they need to complete.

They log in, find the assignment posted by the teacher, and then complete it and turn it in via file

folder that goes directly to the teacher. Its so easy and paperless! Such a change from when I

was in school.

Its easy to see the difference in maturity level with each grade of students. The 6th

graders were immediately thrown by the fact that I was in their class. Ms. ______ whos that?!

Whys she here? Whats her name? It was cute to see curious and nosy they were. The 7th

graders were a mix of calm and loud. Theyre clearly still a little nosy and much more

disrespectful than the other grades. Theyre clearly not aware of how their actions affect others

and are very self-involved in their own worlds instead of paying attention to their teacher. They

speak out when she is trying to teach and do not quiet down very easily. The 8th graders barely

even noticed I was in their classroom, my presence wasnt even on their radar. Theyre quick to

finish their work and independent, clearly already checked out and ready for high school.

I left the classroom at about 3:30pm, signed out at the front desk, and was given back my

license.

Visit #2 Friday, April 7th, 2017

I arrived again at 9am. I signed in and gave my license to the front desk. I asked the

teacher what was on the agenda for today and she gave me a brief play-by-play of everything

going on with the students. At 9:25 the 8th graders come stumbling in. Their task today consists

of finishing narrating a childrens book that theyve selected. They have to use a software on

their computers to record their own voice reading the book. Its really cool to watch them use the

software, I wish I had been given to opportunity to do this kind of stuff at my age, but we didnt
have this software yet! She told me the software program is called Audacity. They use their

headphones that have a microphone attached and speak into the microphone to record their

voice. She let me know that theyre recording these narrations for the Kindergarteners that go to

school across the street! The Kindergarteners have these books and are going to listen to the

recordings as a reading exercise. I thought that was awesome.

A handful of her 8th grade students couldnt finish during class time, so the teacher let the

kids stay during her, and their, lunch hour so that they had extra time and so that she could help

them finish by giving them each some one-on-one attention.

After lunch, the 6th graders come in and they have a calendar to finish. She instructed

them a few days ago to create a calendar. She gave them a rubric and it explains all the

requirements (month, year, landscape orientation, 5 special events, images). After they finish

their calendars, they are required to do a 1 minute typing test for practice and then can play

typing games. She only allows games to be played, after all assignments are finished, on Fridays.

The second half of class, the students are put into groups and introduced to their new assignment:

GROUP CONTEST! She walks around the room and talks about their new assignment. They

have to take a test about all the Word Processing assignments theyve done throughout the

semester. The only rule to the test? Theyre not allowed to use the internet to find their answers.

She used her teaching software and disabled the internet on all of the students computers so they

had to rely on their own memory and memory of the students in their group.

One of her gifted students, Cole, grinned and was clearly excited that they werent

allowed to google anything or use the internet to find their answers. It was so cute that he was

happy the assignment wouldnt be easy and was going to be a challenge. I like that she puts them

into groups instead of having them work individually. She purposely arranged the groups so that
there was a gifted and/or challenged student in each group so that they can help each other. It

teaches them to work together and learn from each other. It gives the gifted kids a great

opportunity to help those that arent gifted and the children who are not gifted or who are

challenged can learn from those that are gifted. She emphasized that no students are allowed to

take over the test and do it all themselves, they have to work together in order to get it done. Her

next class of 6th graders has the same agenda.

Her other 6th grade class has a brand new assignment: motivational posters. She asked me

to cut up a word document that had motivational words, then I placed them in a bowl and the

students will then pick a word at random. Whatever word they draw from the bowl will be the

world that they use to make their motivational poster. She has a template in Google Classroom,

the application the students use to access online assignments, and they use the template to create

their poster.

The 7th grade students have the same assignment (motivational posters) in their

technology classes. The teacher asked me to walk around with her and just make sure that the

students are doing what theyre supposed to be doing instead of messing around or chatting

amongst themselves. She also asked me to make sure theyre doing their assignments correctly.

After they finish their motivational posters and gain approval from us that its ready to print, they

are then told to print them in color and she will chose a bunch of the best posters to put up in the

lunchroom.

I left her class around 3pm, signed out at the front desk, and got my license back.

Visit #3 Friday, April 21st, 2017

 Im back at the school at 9am. I signed in and gave my license to the front desk. I walked

in to the teachers class and she was preparing for her third period 8th graders. She let me know

that half of the 8th grade class in on a field trip today, so the class would be pretty empty.

So far there are 11 kids in class. I asked how she handles so many kids being absent. She

said that she doesnt give any new assignments that are due the next day, she usually plans it so

that they kids who are in attendance can continue working on projects that are due a few weeks

from now. She also introduces them to their new assignment thats due in a few weeks. The

students on the field trip wont miss much because the assignments arent due for a while.

What the 8th graders are finishing up today is a Sounds of a Scene project. I thought it

was the coolest thing. The students have to tell a story completely with audio and without

dialogue. They must use only sound effects to tell their story. As an example, the teacher played

an excerpt of the sound scene/radio broadcast of War of the Worlds by Orson Welles. The

students were to learn from his broadcast to create their own sound scene. For example, the order

of sounds could be presented as; 1) snoring, 2) rolling over in bed, 3) yawning, 4) sitting up, 5)

walking to bathroom, 6) turning the sink on, 7) brushing teeth. We didnt hear any dialogue, but

the sounds told us that someone who was asleep, just woke up in the morning and walked to the

bathroom to brush their teeth. It was such a cool idea to have them create something like that. I

ended up asking her to send me the link to Welles War of the Worlds broadcast so that I can

listen to it later today.

During lunch hour, she let me help her with some grading of students who were already

finished with their sounds of a scene projects. One of the projects I listened to involved a girl

who woke up, got ready in her room, went downstairs to eat breakfast, left the house in her car,

and then attended a dance audition. I figured that out by just listening to the sounds.
 Her fourth and fifth period 6th graders are taking math tests. Theyve learned how to use

formulas and shortcuts in excel and today they will be tested on them. Theyve learned addition,

subtraction, multiplication, and division. Theyre only allowed to use the formulas or shortcuts

learned in class to find the answers. They are not allowed to use paper, calculators, or the internet

to find the answers. This is strictly to test their skills with the Microsoft Excel program.

Her sixth, seventh, and eighth period classes are all given the same assignment. 1 minute

typing tests and catching up on their 11 SCRATCH coding assignments that are due toward the

end of the school year. As the other students worked on SCRATCH today, she designated a group

of students called experts. They are the gifted students that already completed all required 11

SCRATCH assignments and did them exceptionally. The experts are then told to walk around

and help other students that are behind and need assistance.

During sixth and part of seventh period, she asked if I wanted to grade the math tests

from fourth and fifth period. It was fun learning their computer system. I made sure all the

students not only had the correct answers, but used formulas and shortcuts to find the answers,

NOT using their heads or calculators.

One of her autistic students, DJ, has her concerned. Today, the mouse to his computer

was broken and he started to get very upset. She was luckily able to give him a spare working

mouse for his computer very quickly so that his tantrum would not upset or disturb the other

students in the class. Soon, DJs TA will unfortunately be out of school for two weeks beginning

on Monday and she is worried. When DJ is faced with a significant change in his routine, he

tends to act out and cause disruptions during her class time. He will be with a substitute TA for

the next few weeks and she is nervous about giving him any new assignments because of how he

may react with his new TA. Because he will be with a substitute, she does not know if the
substitute will be able to successfully meet his needs. My question is, How can you make sure

that substitute TAs dont cause the student to become disruptive or unfocused?

At the end of the day, I helped her do some more grading and then helped her tally up the

number of SCRATCH assignments that the students have completed. I like how easy it is to

navigate around their computer system. Another day accomplished! I left around 2:30pm and

signed out at the front desk.

I left the school around 2:30pm.

Visit #4 - Friday, April 28th, 2017

I arrived around 9am at school. When I walked into class she already had some chores for

me to do, which I was super excited about! I love when she has things for me to do. Of course,

since Im there for observation, she knows that I cant do any teaching or be left alone with

students.

She asked me to help her prepare a few things for a class activity. She had this gallon size

bag of starbursts and little quart baggies with pieces of paper inside. She let me know she was

having some of her classes do a stacking activity today. She asked me to place 15 starbursts into

each quart bag, there were about 10 bags. There were 5 quart bags for each of the two class

periods she was doing the stacking activity with. By the time I finished, the next class was

coming in and she didnt get the chance to explain what the activity was for the later class

periods.

The third period 8th graders were working on their Still Movies. A few weeks ago, the

students had an assignment to create a story using only sound effects. That was their Sounds of

a Scene project. Today, theyre building onto that recording and adding pictures to it that also

assist with telling the story. She had me walk around and observe what the students were using
for pictures. She told me to feel free to ask them what they were doing and to explain their

projects to me but I didnt want to bother them while they were working. They were all working

very hard and seemed focused.

During the Lunch for Encore period, after third period, she and I sat and had lunch. She

asked me about how Ive liked observation, especially since its my last day. I told her that it was

great. I love seeing how she impacts the kids. She asked me about my plans for the future and I

asked her how she became a teacher. I had a great talk with her and I know that I can always ask

her for advice in the future. I still have a lot to learn about teaching and even deciding what age

of children I want to teach.

When her 6th grade students arrived for fourth period, they all sat down and began their

typing tests. After their typing tests, they were then told to continue working on their coding

projects that they have due at the end of the semester. The teacher took the time to let me sit next

to her at her computer and watch her grade some assignments while the students were busy. She

was grading some persuasive letters that her students wrote last week. The letters were addressed

to the administrators regarding problems they believe are important at school. For example, some

students complained about the amount of swearing on the bus, the lack of efficiency in lunch

lines, or bullying. She would then pick the best letters and give them to the administrators to

read. I think that its a fabulous assignment for the students. It gives them a chance to have their

voices heard. I learned that assignments such as these provide a lot of insight as to how the

students see the school and how much they are observing from what happens around them. This

assignment brought on the option for change and I believe its so important for adults to see how

the school environment affects the students. Id love to know how the administrators will address

the students letters.

 Unfortunately, I had a doctors appointment around 12:45pm so I left the school around

noon. Even though I left the school early, I was there long enough and was able to complete my

field experience hours.