Blog #1: My Workplace: Tuesday Oct 11th
My Internship is at Cesar Chavez Middle School. Its located in Hayward California,on Whitman Street. There are about 30 teachers and about 600 students, of 7th and 8th graders. Most teachers there have 4-year college degree and a few with 2-year degrees. I work in room 29, I work with the hearing impaired. In the class I work with about 5-6 kids 7th graders. The students have a main-stream english class where they work with hearing students. There the class gets bigger and then I work with about 25- 30 students. The strength of my workplace is working with teachers that know how to sign so there are chances I will catch on and learn how to sign. A weakness so far is that students are still a little nervous so they often won't ask for my help with their work.
Blog #2: My Mentor: Tuesday Oct 18th
My mentor is named Patricia Adkins or Ms.Patty, and she is a Para-Educator for the hearing impaired. Her typical days working with students with there work and when the students go into there main-stream class help sign for the teacher so her students can understand what is happening.Some other things that happen during her day is grading papers and making copies day when I'm not interning. Ms.Patty got interested in her field by having the interest in sign language. Ms. Patty has been in school since 1997 to have the ability to sign. By 2015 she will have her full pledge teaching degree.
Blog #3: My Role: Tuesday Oct 25th
My position at Cesar Chavez is a teacher assistant. I have a few responsibilities in the classroom I work in, but the main one is to help out the students when they need help. There are times when the teacher is working with one student other students just sit there waiting so I usually help out one student when the teacher works with another. Another responsibility is making sure students are paying attention to the teacher, so then the teacher doesn’t have to stop the lesson to talk with a student. Tasks that I complete each week are grading papers, making copies of work, and after school tutoring. My day begins with coming to work at 8 o’ clock, meet up with my mentor and go into room 29 from there I will work a little in the office, and then around 9 o’ clock meet up back at room 29. The students have science and I will then grade papers from their 8 o’clock math class and then get the work together for the day. Around 10:20 or so the students have P.E. and I usually clean up the room and grade papers from Monday. Then lunch at 11:21 where I have a 30-minute break to hang with my mentor and get to know her more and just relax. After lunch at 11:55 the students have history where I help them out when I’m need but usually I make copies and get papers ready for Wednesday. Then around 1:05 the students go to their 4th period English writing class. When they have 4th I get to work with more students then the 5 I usually do. From there I help out the students more and only a few times do I help the English teacher because she already has a teacher assistant so I usually help out students and make sure they are working. At 2:10 the students have their final 6th period class, which is English reading. From there I make sure students have their books and are actually reading. After the students read they have an out loud reading groups and then worksheets to do I help them out with that when they are confuses. The at 3:10 school is over, I get a 20 minute break till 3:30 then I do tutoring till 4:30 where I sit and help out students that come in for help, which is usually for homework help. After tutoring I meet up for the final time with my mentor and she signs off on my timesheet and then we just talk about my day. Then I go home.
My position at Cesar Chavez is a teacher assistant. I have a few responsibilities in the classroom I work in, but the main one is to help out the students when they need help. There are times when the teacher is working with one student other students just sit there waiting so I usually help out one student when the teacher works with another. Another responsibility is making sure students are paying attention to the teacher, so then the teacher doesn’t have to stop the lesson to talk with a student. Tasks that I complete each week are grading papers, making copies of work, and after school tutoring. My day begins with coming to work at 8 o’ clock, meet up with my mentor and go into room 29 from there I will work a little in the office, and then around 9 o’ clock meet up back at room 29. The students have science and I will then grade papers from their 8 o’clock math class and then get the work together for the day. Around 10:20 or so the students have P.E. and I usually clean up the room and grade papers from Monday. Then lunch at 11:21 where I have a 30-minute break to hang with my mentor and get to know her more and just relax. After lunch at 11:55 the students have history where I help them out when I’m need but usually I make copies and get papers ready for Wednesday. Then around 1:05 the students go to their 4th period English writing class. When they have 4th I get to work with more students then the 5 I usually do. From there I help out the students more and only a few times do I help the English teacher because she already has a teacher assistant so I usually help out students and make sure they are working. At 2:10 the students have their final 6th period class, which is English reading. From there I make sure students have their books and are actually reading. After the students read they have an out loud reading groups and then worksheets to do I help them out with that when they are confuses. The at 3:10 school is over, I get a 20 minute break till 3:30 then I do tutoring till 4:30 where I sit and help out students that come in for help, which is usually for homework help. After tutoring I meet up for the final time with my mentor and she signs off on my timesheet and then we just talk about my day. Then I go home.
Blog #4: Project Brainstorm: Tuesday Nov 1st
For my WLE project I was thinking about trying to find new ways for the students to study but also where they don’t have to sit for like 20 minutes of reading. When the students are reading they look bored but also when the teacher asks them a question they cant answer it, which means they aren’t paying attention, and then they can’t pass quizzes. I came up with my idea but just watching what happens during the class and noticing how hard of a time they have when it comes to tests or quizzes. But also noticing that they aren’t learning by just sitting and reading the signs or reading the book. With the students being deaf they can’t read out loud much, so the teacher has to sign and read out loud but if the students are learning then something should change in my opinion. I’m excited to do this project for the next 3-4 weeks because I believe that if I can do the project then hopefully I can help the students and they will do good on test and quizzes. But also have a good time in class now instead of being bored. To be able to accomplish my project is to get a yes from the my mentor and the teachers I work with, but also I need to find like a plan or like how I’m going to create an easier way for the students to learn and to study for the tests or quizzes. Its hard to see the students having a hard time and even the teacher see’s them having a hard time and won’t change his teaching skills. By this project I hope it will befit the students and then they will start to do better in school, because I know they can they are just having a hard time learning.
Blog #5: Progress on my WLE Project, part 1: Tuesday Nov 8th
Today at my WLE I talked to my mentor on trying to get the students to work in groups, where hopefully that could change up the way class usually goes. My mentor liked my idea for my project to help find different methods to help the students do their work. She said that it would help both the students and myself. She thought that it would help me because it would give me good practice on how to work with the students better. She realized that the students do seem to get bored when all they do is read from the book and that group work might help more and give the students more opportunities to work together so the students learn from each other besides the teacher. I accomplished seeing how the students would work together in a group. It kind of was a successful but there were times it wasn’t because the students would work but there were times they would sit at the table for like 20 minutes not doing anything besides talking together. I think by working like this one more time might help but if they continue to talk and not work I might have to find a different way to help the students learn.
Blog #6: Leadership Skills: Tuesday Nov 15th
The leadership skill I’m using the most for my WLE is Collaborate Productively and Communicate Powerfully. I’m using these leadership skills almost everyday, because I have to collaborate with the students everyday to help them with their work. I use communicate powerfully to make sure the students are listen to myself and the teacher to make sure they are listening and talking to other students, but also to make sure they understand the lesson before they move on to the next lesson. I could improve on collaborate productively a little more due to often the students are not allowed to work with each other, so then I could try to work with one or two students at a time to help them when they are stuck. Both collaborate and communicate both help with my work due to having to work with students. I have to make sure I sound professional when I talk to them and make sure I help students equally. To make sure that each student can get the help they need. My mentor uses I believe Communicate Powerfully, because Communicate powerfully helps when having to sign for the students in their mainstream class. Ms. Patty has to make sure that the students look at her to be able to see what the teacher is reading.
Blog #7: What I learned, Reflection: Tuesday Nov 22nd
One thing I learned about myself though my WLE is that I can be a really good speaker. By that I mean that I would talk to the student 7th and 8th grade about Impact Academy and which telling them to get anywhere in life you have to go to college and that how impact changed my view of how I’m going to do with my life after high school. With that the students got inspired to try to go to Impact but also try to better themselves and do better in class. One challenged I faced during my WLE is talking to the students, with some being deaf I had a hard time understanding but after a while I started to understand because when people talk to the students you have to pay attention. It’s hard when you look away while they talk because you won’t know what the student said. I learned that learning sign language could always benefit me better in life. Sign language is one of those things where it could be really helpful, like meeting new people, being a signer for someone, or just to learn how because it seems interesting. My WLE placement affected me by just being a teacher assistant for the hearing impaired. It’s different than being with hearing students. The only difference is how they talk. The students are like everyone else they can do everything like hearing students and they’re not stupid either. Watching teachers treat them different cause their deaf gets annoying because they aren’t dumb or slow their just deaf which doesn’t change how they learn or function in the world. A specific skill I used during my WLE was learning how to work better with others. Working with students 4-3 years younger was difficult at first because they often just want to talk and mess around where I would have to be patient when it came for them to do their work. Also patient I used to believe I didn’t have patients for kids but after working with the group of student I did that changed because now I like working with kids and don’t have a problem with them now. If someone were to ask me why what I did at my WLE was important, I would say helping and benefiting students was important. For the first few weeks students were doing bad on the test and the students aren’t dumb but kind of lazy and after doing small group work with them and seeing improvement made me feel good because I actually saw a difference and knowing that I helped them do better made me feel proud of myself knowing I was doing good for someone else. After my WLE it will affect my choices for my future because it gave me more options of things I could do that I enjoy. Where I don’t have to end up doing something I hate or once had a passion for then I ended up not liking it. So I think I’m really going to make sure when I pick classes for college I’m going to do what makes me happy.
Blog #8: Professionalism: Tuesday Nov 29th
In order to find my WLE and get hired, I had to I had to create a resume and a cover letter. I also had to call and email places where I was interested to see if they took interns. After that I had to wait for replies from the jobs. It takes a while to get a reply or in generally to see if any of the jobs where I called even took interns. The most effective way of looking for a job and getting hired is by not giving up or getting low self-esteem if not getting hired by the place I wanted. Just trying my best to do something I want to do and not getting a job that I will hate and regret in the end. I tired to find places where I had an interest but the job places didn’t allow interns so I had to think of other places where I could possibly intern. I thought a school would be fun and help me get out of my shyness. As a result of my WLE, I think being a professional or a responsible adult in the work world means to do what I’m supposed to do to live and make it in the world. By this I mean by working going to school and making something out of my life, will help me be a professional.
Blog #9: Life at my WLE: Tuesday Dec 6th
Today at my WLE I presented my WLE keynote to my advisor and
my mentor. But before that I was helping a substitute with the students in
their math class because they were getting out of hand. Then I was grading
science quizzes while students worked on the class work and took notes. While
in science I also helped out the students when they had questions on the class
work. Then I presented my keynote. During history I worked with the students in
a reading group and helped to take notes. During the English I didn’t get to do
a lot since the students had to be quiet because the teacher was getting super
annoyed with the students. So I walked around and made sure the students were
doing what they were suppose. During the second half of English class the
students had to go to the library to type up book reports so I helped out the
students with their typing and making corrections to the papers. Then students
were asking me about high school and impact so then I told them about that and
how that school is important to get to a good college and a good job in the
future. I improved as an intern by
helping out more instead of the first few weeks being super shy to help out the
kids to where the students would rather have my help than the teachers. My
workplace is great because it helped me break out of my shell and actually be
able to talk to be and not be afraid of people. The only part I doesn’t make it
a great workplace is when they class get out of hand and I don’t know want to
and don’t want to get involved. But also watching the students not caring about
their education is hard, knowing they can do it but choosing to give up because
school is becoming hard for them.
Blog #10: The End: Tuesday Dec 13th
The final thoughts on my WLE are that I loved it and I was glad I was able to work with the group of students that I got. It’s going to be hard to say goodbye to the students because I feel l like I got really close to the students. I was really glad to see improvements in their work after the weeks I was working with them, and to see a total change on how they work and feel about school. This experience will affect WLE next year because I want to go somewhere where theirs more people, so then I could learn to work more with adults then children. But I really want to go somewhere were I have interest, because after working in a school I know I could never handle being a teacher. I’ve also decided that I might start to look sooner for a WLE and not wait last minute to pick something. I want to give myself more options on a WLE to try things before I finally make a decision but also do something where I know I won’t be bored or end up hating it in the end. But WLE has been a great experience for to see how it really is in the real world where I know I will have to work really hard to make it but also know to do something I enjoy.
