Week 15- November 29th-Decemeber 3rd, 2010 and Inquiry

This week is my last full week at my PDS and my mentor teacher has taken over all responsibility of teaching. I am now observing in the classroom and I also got the opportunity to observe in the special education classroom, which was a different experience. Next week, my last day is Thursday because I started the semester on August 16^th. I am having mixed feelings about leaving my placement. I have learned so much this semester from my mentor teacher and from my experiences. I have really learned a great deal about the development of Kindergartners and I think it will be very interesting to visit this classroom in the Spring and see how these children have grown. My favorite thing to see is the invented spelling that the students use in their journal writing. It’s so interesting to me that even though the words most of the students write are not spelled correctly; I can still read and understand what the students are trying to say. The students in my PDS classroom really do a nice job of sounding out words and are constantly exposed to this in the classroom. My mentor teacher has been teaching Kindergarten for many years so she really provided me with a positive experience and showed me one of the best ways to teach Kindergarten students.

My Inquiry project is completed in the classroom. I have collected all the final data that I need for my write-up. Every student but one increased on the number of missing number sequences that they knew however, I came to the conclusion that I cannot say if this is the result of my study/activities in the classroom. I am going to continue my Inquiry project for my contract next semester. I am going to implement a “Math RTI” in Kindergarten and pull 2 students from each Kindergarten classroom. I am very excited to start this and see the effect that this has on the students learning the different classrooms. I have completed a draft of my Inquiry write-up to turn into my small group facilitator for feedback. After I get this back from her, I will be able to complete my final write-up and polish what I have.