What: I completely forgot to blog last week. This was our last week in field. I am really going to miss it. The students were wonderful and this experience reinforced for me how much I really enjoy fifth grade.
While working at this school I noticed that the only specialty classes that the students had were P.E and computers. At my kids school their specialty classes are P.E., music, art, and computers. I asked one of the students when they have music and art, I thought maybe they had it later in the day when we were not there. The student told me that they don’t have art or music. This made me sad and a little angry.
So What: One of the days that I was there the students had some free time were the teacher told them they could do SSR (silent, sustained, reading), work on their tall tales, math, spelling or if they had all that done they could have some free time. There were many students that I know for a fact didn’t have their work done for those subjects and took the free time but I didn’t say anything. The reason I didn’t say anything was because almost all of the students that took the free time got out art supplies and started making pictures. The teacher, even though she doesn’t know a lot about art herself, keeps many kinds of art supplies available for her students to use. She has water colors, markers, colored pencils and lots of paper. Most of the students got out the water colors and were using several different types of techniques. When I asked one of the students were she learned to do what she was dong she said her teacher last year showed her how. I really feel like the class needed this time to be creative and unwind. I was happy to see that the teacher gave the students this time to explore and be creative.
There was one particular student that I noticed was really struggling in every subject. It wasn’t because she didn’t know how to do what was being taught but she had a hard time concentrating. One day she noticed my plastic wrist bands and asked me what they were for. I told her they were for Zumba. She told me she did Zumba also and really liked it. She also takes other dance lessons. I got thinking that all this student may need to succeed is to have some core lessons (math, science, lit.) done through creative movement. I wish I had notice this before we had taught all our lessons.
Now What: When we become teachers we don’t know what kind of conditions we will be teaching in. It may be a school like the one my kids go to that still has art and music or it may be like the one I did my field work in that has no arts at all. It will be my job as an education to expose my students to as many of the arts as humanly possible. I would like to take them on field trips to see plays, concerts, dance recitals, and art exhibits. I would like them to create their own works of art and share them with the class. I am very thankful for the PTA and their reflections program. I was in charge if it one year at my sons school and got to be a judge for several categories. Many of the students are so talented and have amazing abilities that need to be fostered. My husband shared this link with me today and I found it very interesting. I hope you do too. http://www.youtube.com/
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