S.H.++Journals+1-6

Scott Higgins KSP 330 Field Experience Journaling __Orientation to School__
 * Journal 1**

We had our orientation to the school (Mankato West) on Monday, October 31 at 9:45 and it lasted about 45 minutes. I had already met my cooperating teacher the Friday before and set up a time to come to her class so I did not take the time to talk to her during the orientation.

I met with Ms. Hinz at Mankato West at 3:05 on Friday October 28. The first meeting was a very brief meeting that last about 5-10 minutes at the end of the day after the send-off for the soccer team. We briefly discussed what times would be the best for me to come to her classes over the next few weeks and also what was expected from me from my KSP 330 teacher. I told her that I was required to do 30 hours with her and was also expected to teach a minimum of three times (taping one), but more than that would be preferred. I also told her that I would be working with Glenn Oslin (who she had already talked to the previous day) and that we wanted to co-teach together if possible. I informed her that we were scheduled for a building tour/orientation the following Monday at 9:45 and I would come to her class for the first time after that.

The information that she did give me consisted of what her plans are for the next few weeks with her PE classes and where she thought that it may be possible to get my co-teaching/teaching in. Her plan was to start her team hand ball unit and that would run for a week and a half and then she was planning on starting her CPR unit. She thought that it would be possible for us to help with teaching that unit because there was not many teaching opportunities with team hand ball.

I did not receive any materials to for for creating lesson plans or anything like that, however I did not ask for them either. I also confirmed that I had her correct email address because that would be the best way of contacting her.

__Interview with Cooperating Teacher__
 * Journal 2**

I was not able to make it to the entire class of the first day because of our building orientation so I did not really get a good read on the the class room management style on day 1. The second day was a lot more informative for me because I was there when the students entered the gym and was able to stay the entire time. One of the first things that she did was make sure that everything was set up before the students got there. Once everything was set up and the students were calmed down she went over that plan for the day and then took a couple of minutes to introduce me to the class. She gave the students the opportunity to ask me questions but made sure the questions were appropriate. One thing that I noticed about her classroom management style was she always remains calm and does not yell or scold the students in front of the other students. She just reminds them of the consequences of their actions and what could happen if the negative actions continues and moves on. The only potential problems that I could see are things that could happen in any PE class, such as injuries, but she always talks about safety so those issues are minimal. The classes are accustomed to group work because almost every activity that i have seen them do is working with a partner or with a team. Ms. Hinz did not mention any type of inquiry teaching but constantly assessing the students throughout the class to make sure that everyone is making progress. Ms. Hinz also discusses participation points with the students and uses a written unit quiz at the end of the unit that she uses for her summative assessments. I did not discuss what her opinions on the MCA II or NWEA with her.

__Lesson 1 Reflection__ Wednesday, November 16
 * Journal 3**

Wednesday was the first day that I co-taught with Ms. Hinz. We were teaching unconscious choking of an adult, unconscious choking of child, and unconscious choking of an infant. We decided it would be best if we flipped who was going to be the lead teacher vs. the teacher that assists. The first skill was unconscious choking adult. For this skill Ms. Hinz was the lead teacher and I assisted. The second skill was unconscious choking child. For this skill I was the lead teacher and Ms. Hinz assisted. For the third skill we flipped again for the unconscious choking infant, again Ms. Hinz was the lead teacher and I assisted. In the first period I felt pretty comfortable in two of the three skills. I was not as comfortable in the skill of unconscious choking infant so I do not think I did a very good job with co-teaching that part. I talked about it after class with Ms. Hinz and I told her that I agreed that I did not do as much as I needed to for quality co-teaching. I think because I was not as confident with this skill I did not add enough to the teaching, plus I did not want to give the students incorrect information. I struggled in the 2nd period with the teaching toward the end of the lesson because I somewhat lost where I was and got rattled. Ms. Hinz asked the students what I should do next and used it as a learning opportunity for them, which worked well, even though I was not totally comfortable with it. She also suggested to me that if I get lost I can ask the students what I should do next as a way of testing them and giving myself an opportunity to gather my composure.

__Lesson 2 Reflection__ Thursday, November 17 Period 2
 * Journal 4**

The lesson that I co-taught on this day was a review for Unconscious Choking of a Child. I co-taught the lesson with Ms. Kendra Hinz at Mankato West. The lesson was set up to be a role play with the two of us. I would play the role of the 9th grade student taking the skills test for the unconscious choking child. Ms. Hinz played the role of the teacher that was giving the test. I felt that I did a pretty good job with my co-teaching part in playing the role of the student, although I was nervous because I understand how important it is to play this role perfectly to set an example for the students. Ms. Hinz did let me know that I did make one error with the tongue lift by using my index finger instead of my thumb and let me know why doing everything exactly perfect is so important. I felt that I was prepared to take the “test” because I had went over the information numerous times prior to coming to class and because I also had the opportunity to watch the skit be played out in period 1 with two other teachers. She asked me if I was taking notes in period 1 because I was unprepared and I said that I taking a few notes because I wanted to make sure I did everything right the next period so I would not set a bad example for the students.

__Lesson 3 Reflection__ Monday, November 21 Period 2
 * Journal 5**

The lesson that I co-taught today was similar to the first lesson that I taught with a couple exceptions. The main thing that was different on this lesson was this time we were teaching Found Unconscious Choking Adult, Child, and Infant as compared to the first lesson where we were co-teaching a situation that a person is choking and becomes unconscious when we are already there. The other thing that was different in this lesson was I was the lead teacher in two of the three situations and Ms. Hinz was the lead teacher in only the situation where we find an unconscious infant choking. When we were not acting as lead teachers we were acting as assisting teachers. This type of teaching worked well for us because I not always comfortable teaching CPR and when I had questions I had her to help me out. I also think it worked will in the second lesson when we used role playing to show the students how the testing will be done. I felt pretty comfortable teaching on the adult and child but not feel as comfortable teaching on the infant so Ms. Hinz was the lead teacher on that part. Once the lesson was done the students had the opportunity to practice for the rest of the class period and to test on any of the skills they felt comfortable with. Because I am no currently certified in CPR I was not able to test them but I was able to help them with their studying and getting ready for their test. I also asked the students to fill out the questions that I gave them and they gave them back to me at the end of class. One thing that bothered me was Ms. Hinz on occasion would make a point in telling the class if I did a skill incorrectly and kind of put me on the spot, I thought she could have handled the situation differently. However, after I taught the lesson in period 1 she did give me some good feedback that I could use in periods 2 and 3 and I appreciated that. I think it was difficult for both Ms. Hinz and me to co-teaching CPR because it is so important and making a small error can be costly, but I do understand that it just happened to be what unit she had coming up when I started with her. I felt that I learned more about CPR/Rescue Breathing than I did anything else. I do think that I got good experience co-teaching in a school environment and learned that I will have to prepare better when teaching something that I might not be as familiar with.

__Overall Experience__
 * Journal 6**

I feel this field experience was a good experience for me. I really enjoyed the first week getting to know the students and learning how Ms. Hinz sets her class up. I thought she did a really nice job of communicating to the students what she expects out of them and I thought the students really responded well to that. I think this was very obvious because in the three weeks that I was there I did not see any behavior problems. This really helped me because coming in to a classroom and I did not have to worry about behavior issues and I could focus on what I was doing. The first week I was there we were playing handball and because I was not familiar with that game it gave me a chance to learn more about it and how to play it. Hopefully I can use the skills that I learned for that game in the future when I am teaching my own students. The second two weeks for me were more difficult than I thought coming into the field experience. This is when we started on the CPR/Rescue Breathing unit and I was not comfortable with that at first. Because I would be helping with co-teaching this unit on three different lessons I had to learn all of the information and steps before I could teach it. I have CPR certified for a long time but I have never had to teach the steps and I actually have not had any CPR training at in over a year so that unit was difficult for me. I felt like I had to spend more time learning the information so that I could teach it to the students than I did actually trying to figure out how to teach the lesson. At times in this lesson I felt that I was not much further ahead of the students in learning the skills. However, I did become more and more comfortable teaching the unit the more I taught. Teaching this unit with Ms. Hinz was very helpful because she was able to help me out when I got stuck and was not sure what to do. She gave me some ideas on how to ask the students questions as I tried to find my place on what I was teaching. I think that it was important for me to realize that this unit was probably more to teach correctly than any other unit because of the affect it can have on a person’s life and I really tried to convey that to the students. Most of the assessments that used were observation and question/answer sessions to individual or small groups. I think this was worked best for this unit because the students needed as much time as possible to practice their skills before they were able to take/pass their skills tests. All of the students seemed to like this assessment style because it gave them the opportunity to ask questions as they were practicing. Some of the things that I could have done better is teaching from the lesson plans that I had written up. I think I did a good job of sticking to the schedule of events on the lesson plans but there were time that I do not think I put enough emphasize on the goals and objectives that I was trying to teach toward. Ms. Hinz made a good point that just being able to write a good lesson plan does not matter if a teacher does not understand how to get the information across to the student, I thought that was very good advice and gave me something to think about in writing/teaching a lesson that I may not be real familiar with the information. Overall I really did learn a lot from this experience that I think will help me moving forward. One of the biggest things that I learned is that preparing and being ready for the class/lesson is just as important as teaching the class itself, especially if you are teaching content that you may not be familiar with (like CPR for me). Secondly, I learned how important communication is with peers. I think that I did not communicate as well as I should have in the beginning with Ms. Hinz but I think I did get better at that by the end of my time at West and we were on the same page before I left.