Field Observation Reflection - Journal Entries

Elena Wiener

Field Observation Journal Entries

EDPC 610

Summer 2019

Journal Entry 1:

I am beginning my field observation in a school in North Bellmore called the Saw Mill Road Elementary School in a 4^th grade class taught by Mrs. Gallagher. The school is not particularly diverse, most students are Caucasian and from middle-class income families. From my first day I did notice a few things that stuck out to me about some students in particular. In terms of students with learning disabilities, two of the children are at a 2^nd grade reading level. The school provides several tools and strategies to assist them with completing the coursework and attempting to help them overcome their issues and get on the same page as the rest of the class.

There is an application on both the web and on mobile that is made available to the students, parents and the teacher both inside of the classroom and out. This program helps students read certain words they might not understand from the text, provides the students and parents with specific helpful details about the lesson plan, curriculum, and content and can help them practice reading and writing words they may not understand. There are several pull-out sessions the students will be taken out of class for during two blocks of time throughout the day.  They are put into a different classroom with a teacher who specializes in working with students with reading and writing disabilities or difficulties. This can help them catch up on work they may fall behind on and gain a better understanding of reading and writing by one-on-one work with the teacher and private lessons. It seems these strategies and tools are very helpful for the students who are lacking in reading and writing skills and abilities.

Journal Entry 2:

In Mrs. Gallagher’s class, there is one student in particular who is extremely bright, motivated and scores high academically but has trouble paying attention, concentrating and following directions. He often disrupts the class and the teacher is always on high alert to watch out for any distractions he might bring to himself or to his classmates. He does not work very well in groups, so she tries to keep him working independently. It seems he gets bored easily with the content – perhaps he is especially gifted – when he does pay attention and complete his assignments, he usually gets perfect scores. When he loses his concentration or attention, he either does not complete the questions or seems to do his assignments “lazily” by not using full sentences, when he very clearly understands that he should be doing it otherwise.

One technological tool the teacher uses that seems to help this child is a website that offers a way to get the students’ extraneous energy out. If they are stuck inside and do not have the opportunity to run around during recess, this is a great way to get their energy out so they can concentrate better. The website offers some options that the teacher allows the class to pick from, ranging from dancing around the room, jumping up and down or singing and playing short, interactive games. For this one student in particular, it is extremely effective. He seems to really enjoy this app and afterwards, returns to his desk and is able to concentrate much better than before.

Journal Entry 3:

Due to the lack of diversity in this school and class, there are certain issues that arise. There are two children who are African American in the class. The teacher does her best to encourage inclusion and multicultural lessons in the class by giving assignments that help students to understand and gain acceptance – for example, they had some projects about Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. We had one situation when I came into class after lunch one day. The Vice Principal kept coming into the classroom and removing students one by one – first he took two of the Caucasian students, then one of the African American students several time and spoke to them out in the hallway. I spoke with the teacher after class, inquiring what he was speaking with them about. She said there was a situation in which one of the students was making fun of the African American girl, and during lunch it was reported by one of the aides that he called her “Blackie.” This was interesting to me, to see the way the school dealt with this situation. They made sure to speak to both parties – the bully and the bullied -- to their parents and to the teacher and administration.

I was happy to see how quickly they reacted. It was clear to me that the “bully” did not understand at first the full extent of the effect his words had on his peers. I do not know the extent of the punishment or way it was dealt with, but after this occurred, they brought in a teacher to show the students several presentations about bullying and why it is important to be inclusive, especially of students who are of different backgrounds. The videos included dramatized examples of situations in which students were being bullied and how to deal with it. After, they had a class discussion about how they felt about it and each student shared a situation in which they had felt bullied and talked about how they dealt with it and how they could deal with it better. I think this is extremely important to address and the school was definitely on top of making sure it was corrected quickly.

Journal Entry 4:

The two students who are of African American backgrounds were very interesting for me to observe. One of the students comes from a low-income family. His mother works full time and his father is incarcerated and he has spent a lot of time living in shelters. It is so impressive to me the amount of intrinsic motivation this child has regardless of his difficulties in life and his differences from his peers. He has a happy disposition; he is intelligent and always completes his homework. It is impressive he is able to be accommodated by the school regardless of where he is living, since he seems to move around a lot. When I asked the students what they were doing for their long weekend away from school, most of them said they would spend time playing video games or sports. When I asked this student, he responded that he was excited to take his brother to the park and to do his homework. He is clearly motivated to help his brother and to achieve his highest potential academically. He receives some support from the school as well and he seems to fit in with his peers socially. I hope that in the future he can continue to have this great sense of motivation to do well in school and serve as a role model for his little brother.

The other student who is African American also has a troubled family life. Her father and brother are also incarcerated, and she shows very little interest in school. She often lies to the teacher and does not complete her homework assignments and on several occasions has been caught stealing from other children, from the school, from bake sales and more. I have seen her mother having open communication with the teacher. They decided they need to have a dialogue about her homework and her lack of interest participation in school. The teacher and her mother came to an agreement that when there is homework assigned, the teacher will email her mother directly giving her all of the assignments required of her daughter, as she would tell her mother she has completed it or had nothing left to do and then come into class the following day having nothing done. There are many difficulties for her, and her school life and performance are clearly affected by her life at home. She is absent a lot and has the most “homework checks” left blank up on the board. I hope that her mother, the teacher, her peers, the district and her future teachers will be able to instill a sense of intrinsic motivation for this student as she is clearly smart and should show more of an interest in her own academic achievement.

Journal Entry 5:

I did the end of my field observation in Hempstead at The Academy Charter School. This school is a private school designed for children in the area who are under-performing, at-risk or coming from low-income families with few resources. The Hempstead school district has long been known to be under performing and lacking in student academic achievement. The school was created to give more opportunities to improve these children’s academic skills. They offer an interdisciplinary curriculum in a technology-rich environment, challenging students to explore connections and use experiential learning. They strive to improve student academic achievement. The students will learn structure, discipline and gain habits to give back to their community.

The school is extremely diverse and filled with students of different ethnicities and minority backgrounds – it is interesting to see the difference between this school and the Saw Mill Road Elementary School, as multiculturalism and diversity are lacking there but is prevalent at the Charter School. Some of these kids would have not been able to attend a good school or any school at all if not for the Charter School.  

Although I was there for the end of the year and did not get to see a ton of lessons being taught, I was still able to observe many situations in various classrooms of students in different elementary grades. They clearly stress the acceptance of diversity and have many lessons, activities, decorations and projects focused on the importance of knowing who their role models are. They use a lot of texts and readings from people who may serve as role models and are of the same ethnic background as these students. It is amazing to see how accepting they are all of each other and how supportive they are as a school and as a community. The students are respectful, motivated and have the knowledge base, values and peer support to make sound decisions. Civic engagement is part of their consciousness from the primary grades and they are involved in several community service projects, including on their field trips and in their day-to-day school life.