Practicum Reflection: 4 Weeks in Kindergarten
My four week practicum was spent in a Kindergarten class of 17 students. I have always been drawn to primary, and my experience this practicum only solidified that sentiment. I was very lucky to have a supportive coaching teacher who pushed me to be the best that I can be, and encouraged me to experiment in my teaching. The children in my class were a joy to learn with, and consistently expressed their enjoyment of being taught by me. What I am most proud of, is the growth that I experienced through this practicum. I can’t wait to get started on my 10 week practicum, and finally make my own way into the world of education.
The first week in my practicum, however, felt a little rocky for me. I was recovering from a cold, and did not yet have a grasp on what this practicum would consist of. I recall one of my very first lessons, a science lesson in which students would be doing an art craft to explore their learning. I went into this lesson feeling ready to teach it, but everything that could have gone wrong, went wrong! I had forgotten to prep a certain element of the craft, my pacing was off, the students were not comprehending what I was attempting to teach them, and one element of the activity that I had chosen, proved to be far too difficult for the Kindergartens. I was devastated at what I viewed as a colossal personal failure. My coaching teacher helped me to identify where she felt I had gone wrong, and what work I needed to do in order to come back from this poor lesson. I spent the entirety of the following weekend implementing a system to keep myself organized and to track all lesson preparation that must be done.
When week 2 came, I was ready. My coaching teacher immediately noticed a difference in my organization, preparedness, and overall confidence in what I was teaching. Week 2 was the most transformative period of practicum for me. I knew that I needed to prove myself, and prove myself I did! Each time my coaching teacher gave me feedback, I worked to incorporate her advice into my next lesson. Each time I taught, I felt my confidence and my skills grow. By week 3, both my coaching teacher and myself were impressed with the strides I had taken in my teaching. Halfway through week 3, I started teaching full days, and continued teaching full days until the end of practicum.
By the end of my final week, I felt so much pride. I had been teaching full days for almost 2 weeks, my classroom management was extremely efficient, and above all, I was confident. I didn’t feel the need to review my lesson plans over and over before teaching them. My post-school day conferences with my coaching teacher became less about scrutinizing my lessons, and more about professional growth and conversing with a colleague. I was comfortable with my own abilities, and in the way I could guide a lesson by my students’ inquiry.
Some of my proudest moments include interactions with students, lessons that were great successes, my creativity in my planning, my assessments, and observations by others into my classroom.
The first day that I stepped foot into my classroom for observations, I immediately began to create the foundations of the relationships I hoped to build with my future students. I got down to their level, and introduced myself to each and every one of the students in the class. I told the students about my journey in “teacher school,” and explained to them that I was hoping they would help me to become a teacher. The students loved the importance that I put upon them in my journey. They knew that they were helping me, not the other way around. I used my observation days to memorize names. I tested myself on names multiple times a day, and I asked my coaching teacher if I could be the one to hand out any work with names on it. By showing the students that I cared enough about them to learn their names and use them frequently, trust began to grow. I read them stories and taught mini lessons with the guidance of my coaching teacher during my observations, and by the time practicum began, my students were comfortable with me, and I was comfortable with them. Throughout practicum, I made a point of greeting every student, every day. I made conversation with all of my students, and paid attention to social dynamics in the classroom. For me, relationship building was my number one priority. I believe that if there are strong relationships, everything else comes afterwards. By the end of practicum, I knew all about each and every one my students: their interests and hobbies, dynamics at home, the names of their parents, and what they enjoyed most about school. I am very proud of the relationships that I built with these kids, and I will miss each and every one of them very much.
My favourite lessons that I taught were mostly my science lessons from my seasonal changes unit. We learned about seasonal changes in trees, hibernation, adaptation, migration, and the historical seasonal living of Inuit people in Canada. My lessons were led by visuals and discussion based, so that I could follow my students inquiry. We did crafts to solidify their learning, after which I would conduct individual interviews with each of my students, to assess where their learning had taken them, and where I needed to guide them to next. We finger painted, we stuffed paper bags with recycled paper to make geese, we built our own versions of igloos out in the snow, and above all we learned. Our learning was reflected throughout the classroom, as I took over every bulletin board to display my students work – including the class bulletin board in the hallway! I thoroughly enjoyed the energy and chaos of teaching gym, and the creativity and joy of teaching language arts. In my final language arts lesson, I had my students draw pictures of their favourite memories from my practicum. The students have been working on creating detailed work – using five colours and five unique details in their images. These pictures are so special to me! I plan to make a binder of the images so that I may keep them near and dear to me. I also thoroughly enjoyed teaching math. I took basic math lessons from my coaching teachers math resource, and added manipulatives and personalized visuals to make my students learning so much more interactive and fun. I had multiple students who expressed to me that our math lessons were their favourite part of practicum! The math assessments that I did also proved their effectiveness. My personal favourite math lesson was a lesson on patterns and Indigenous beading. My students – and myself – all made our own necklaces that we wore proudly throughout the school. We explored the meaning of each colour of bead, and every necklace in that classroom told a different story. It was beautiful!
I am very proud of my ability to take “bare bones” lessons and make them into something interactive and exciting. Any lesson that my coaching teacher gave to me, I was able to put my own spin on and turn into personalized fun learning. This is something my coaching teacher expressed admiration for, and something I hope to continue to work on. I incorporated myself into each of my lessons, making learning personal, and showing vulnerability to my learners, which made them so much more eager to share themselves with me.
Another area of practicum that I take great pride in is my assessments. For the units that I taught, I developed interview questions for each lesson. During center time, I would pull students aside for 1-2 minutes each, to ask a few questions about our learning from the day in science, language arts, or math. These assessments were created by me, for my lessons, and proved to be extremely valuable! Using these assessments I was able to determine where my students’ gaps were, and where I needed to focus my time. These interviews also provided valuable one-on-one time with each student, while still enabling me to monitor the rest of the class during their free play. What a valuable time centers is! However, my favourite assessment was not one that I did in my individual interviews, but one that my students did themselves, all together. I had chosen a few core competencies to focus on with my students over the four weeks. In the last week of school, we did a self-assessment using these core competencies, and the Seven Sacred Teachings, focusing on courage, the bear. The self-assessments were very well done, and I felt so proud of my students for their vulnerability and honesty. Each self-assessment will be attached to the students’ report cards when they go home later this month.
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Finally, I thoroughly enjoyed all of my observations this practicum. My practicum evaluator and I got along very well, and I was always excited for her to come into the classroom to see what I was up to. I loved having my triad observe me in the class, and I loved having any other guests, from the school principal, to first year UNBC Education students doing their observations. Any opportunity to demonstrate my craft was a welcome opportunity to me.
My biggest areas of growth came in the form of my pacing, my classroom management, and my confidence in myself. Pacing was very tricky for me. I felt that I was always pressed for time, and I never knew exactly how long a lesson would take. I have since realized that teaching is fluid – there is always going to be an interruption, and that isn’t a bad thing! Making room for inquiry is so much more important than sticking to a rigid timeline. I made sure to have extra activities planned in case my lesson was shorter than planned, and I grew comfortable with changing my schedule around if a lesson needed more time. I posted a visual bell schedule by the clock, used a timer, and wore a watch to keep myself accountable. I am now so much more comfortable with my pacing and my planning.
At the beginning of my practicum, I felt I should defer all classroom management to my coaching teacher, as I didn’t feel I had enough authority in the classroom quite yet. Once I felt strong in my relationships with the students, and once I had taught a little more, I finally came into my own. I struggled with finding my own strategies for classroom management, but with encouragement from my coaching teacher, I began to experiment. Experimentation proved to be extremely valuable for me. When I gave up the feeling of needing to have constant control and “perfection,” was when I truly started to thrive. At the beginning of practicum, when something didn’t go quite the way I had hoped it would, I took it personally. I would get very upset and resign myself that “teaching phonics isn’t for me” or “I’m just not very strong in managing the class during art.” When I truly embraced experimentation, I was able to see that teaching is full of experimentation and learning opportunities. If a lesson didn’t go the way I had planned, I knew what to change for next time. I kept trying, and was able to find my groove, and let go of the negative self-talk. It felt great!
This enabled me to blossom in my confidence. My coaching teachers final sentiment to me was that she was so proud of my development in both my confidence and my growth mindset! I felt so comfortable in my classroom, and I was ready to handle whatever came my way.
I am so very happy with how my practicum experience played out. As I said in my final email to my classroom parents, thank you to my coaching teacher that accepted me into her classroom, thank you to the school staff that welcomed me into their community, thank you to the parents that trusted me with their children, and most of all, thank you to the kids!