Final Thoughts

I think this new class was a good addition to the courses required for the teacher education program. It's a good idea to get a lot of exposure to schools and the system, this class did a pretty good job of making sure we got some experience of what we're getting ourselves into. Of course there were some glitches with First Avenue and some organizational issues, but overall I think this was a good class. I'll admit I was intimidated by the workload, but after completing my service hours and going to all the meetings and finishing my blog, I feel like I accomplished a lot in a short time. My only thought about the course is maybe we might want to have a choice of what school we are assigned to. I want to teach high school, or at least that's what i'm aiming for. For some time I've been debating whether or not I want to stay on that path, or maybe work towards elementary ed. Although I enjoyed First Avenue school and its students, I worked a lot with younger children and it made my decision a little harder. I don't know if I want to change and teach the younger students because I have more experience with that age group, or if I want to teach high school history, or possibly get certified in both. My friend is in another section of this class, and she wants to teach younger students but was assigned to a high school. She said we should have been allowed to switch schools. I think First Avenue was a great school for us to visit and work at. I thought I went to a nice school, but this one was top of the line. The students were also very appreciative of us being there. Overall I think this course was a lot of work, but worth it, I learned a lot about schools and gained a lot of insight as to what kind of teacher I want to be.

Service Hours

Today I went to First Avenue to complete my service hours. I was assigned to a second grade classroom, where the teacher was absent so they needed extra help. There was a substitute teacher and an aid, and both were sick. Neither of them were able to speak so I helped a lot during the day. The sub pulled out worksheets and I pretty much taught with them the entire day. There was not much to go by, so I had to keep the kids occupied with about five worksheets for the day. I found a way to stretch out each assignment by adding to them and making them more exciting for the kids so they wouldn't realize that they were actually doing more "Busy" work. There was one sheet that involved finding how many words could be made out of 'hippopotamus,' so we made a game that the first five students to make real words would get a prize. It actually took longer than I thought because a lot of students were using words like Potamus, and some used their vocabulary words like Pioneers, which I thought was pretty funny but I had to explain the directions more than once. Another worksheet involved telling time, so I allowed one student at a time come up to the board to draw the time for everyone to see. There were nine questions and 23 students and a lot of time to spare, so I made up question so that every student was able to participate. The students were pretty well behaved, considering they were being taught by a complete stranger. Something I noticed was the the aid, who was in charge of one student, spent a lot of time on her cell phone and in the back of the room on the computer. She was doing work some of the time, and spoke up if the students were acting up, but otherwise I think she was taking the chance to rest her voice and relax while I was teaching. I don't want to say she was being lazy because she was doing some work. At the end of the day about half the class were dismissed to the after school program. I stayed in the cafeteria with a group of forth graders and helped them with their homework. One girl in the group didn't have any homework so I gave her a few of the worksheets that I took from the classroom I taught in. For about the last hour of the program the weather was getting worse and many students were gone, so the remaining students went from the cafeteria to the auditorium where some students were rehearsing for their winter concert. At the end of the day everyone was dismissed in an organized manner, making sure everyone was picked up by the right person and on time.

Bomb Threat on Campus and Rave

Today there was a bomb threat in University Hall, and I found out from my friend who texted me before I found out via e-mail from my rave phone. MY friend texted me around noon to tell me what was going on, and I did not recieve any e-mails until well after 1:30. I just now (4:30) got another e-mail saying that University Hall will be closed until 2:30, obviously two hours late. If this had been a real emergency, worse than just a threat, we would all be in a lot of trouble. We've talked so much about the new rave phones that everyone "just has to have" for safety, but when we're being notified of things way after they happened, it's not really doing anything for us.

12/03 Montclair Board Meeting

Tonight I went to the Montclair Board of Education meeting. Some observations I made about the board room was that it was in 2 sections; one being designated for the board members with their seats set up very similarly to our class, and the other side of the room set up with rows of chairs for the public with a podium and microphone in front facing the board members for public participation. We were present for the public session of the meeting; a private meeting had been held right before with some of the same agenda.

The first thing discussed at the meeting was Inclusive Schools Week, which is about compassion and social development in schools as well as welcoming all students into the school system, special ed or otherwise. Montclair has been setting the standards of closing the achievement gap by teaching towards interests and abilities.

The first topic brought to order was an issue that many students came to the meeting to talk about, and that was a new grading policy in the high school's AP calculus and statistics courses. It entailed having one test and quiz per marking period being used to determine their grades, which students as well as parents did not feel was an adequate way to go about grading or to prepare for the AP exam. The one test per marking period is meant to be a practice AP test, and graded as such. However, like one student stated, the actual AP test has a curve, while the tests they were taking in class were not, which effected their grades. Students are given the option to drop the AP class to take honors, but since this new grading policy went into effect after the beginning of the school year, dropping and switching classes is more difficult than it seems because it not only changes the levels of some of the classes they are taking, it can effect the way colleges evaluate their applications. I'll write here what the students and parents had to say-

Parent: It is hard for students who do want to switch out of their AP stats or calc classes because it may change the level of some of the other classes they would have to switch around
Student: Does not understand why new policy was createdl why does dropping a level increase their grades? 1 test determining an entire marking period's grade is unfair, their should be more grades to go by. This new policy should be used in all AP classes, not just Calc and Stats.
Student: Most students in these classes are seniors and it effects their transcripts for colleges
Parent of student in both classes: Son was in both classes effected by the new policy; unfair to change the curriculum after the school year has started; it should be tested before put into effect, and have more info to back it up
Parent: (read statement on son's behalf) Sees new policy as a bait and switch, he is a freshman and is afraid that the same thing can happen to him in the future if he decides to take AP classes.
Student: AP test has a curve, so the tests they take in class should also have a curve if it is to prepare them correctly
Give me the song and I'll sing it like I mean itGive me the words and I'll say them like i mean it
Student: Feels efforts have been wasted, wrong wat for students to prepare for the hard course and test

Dr. Alvarez, a board member, thanked the students for coming out and voicing their concerns. The High School principal then spoke about the new policy. He said it was set because the scores in those particular classes had dropped dramatically, and they were looking for a way to make the scores better to keep Montclair at its competitive standards. He said that the main ideas of the new policy were to hope that students would perform better, that they would recognize the importance of the test since many were not taking it for the right reasons, and he talked about being fair to everyone and promised to re-evaluate the case, and said a decision would be made soon.

This new grading policy was definitly the biggest topic at the meeting, and there was a lot of discussion afterwards during the 5 minute break.

Another topic discussed was Governor Corzine's preliminary funding proposal. I didn't understand it all but what I got out of it was that they were being given $450million, funding for special ed increased, early preschool and full day kindergarten was included, and there was a lot of talk about property and income taxes. They said it was unlikely that this would happen soon, but Montclair is watching closely and wants all the information early so they can get the budget done in time next year.

Something else that came up was sports teams and having level playing fields within their leagues. Soon NJSIAA will evaluate many (public and non-public) schools in North Jersey and possibly create a new league so that Montclair's teams can play at the state level.

The enrollment report was pretty interesting to listen to. The board member presenting it talked about student population changes in the Montclair schools. The African American student population dropped drastically, while the caucasion population did not change very much. Another member said that schools should recruit students. It was stated that the Watchung School had the least diversity when it came to economic background. School lunches were discussed, and I noticed that the number of students who got free or reduced lunch was pretty low. Montclair does not get a lot of government funding, mostly because of No Child Left Behind.

The last topic that was significant at the meeting was a change to the Language Arts curriculum. A main point of it was that teachers could look into previous grades and grades ahead to make sure their students are performing at the right pace. There will be performance assesments, for example oral presentations and dramatizations as opposed to nothing but written papers. Learning Centers will be utilized in all grades, and communication between the parents and teachers will be emphasized.

I felt that this meeting was very interesting. I like that they were democratic in the way they handled issues; in other districts students may not have been allowed to speak up the wat they did at this meeting. I respected the principal and board members for listening to what they had to say, and they took the students seriously. Every issue was looked over carefully. Montclair does a good job at overlooking every school and looks at them as a whole and as individual units, which I think works for this district because it is very diverse.