Collaborating with colleagues

Collaboration is an integral part of our whole practicum experience. Without collaboration the whole structure would fall apart. Within my practicum I collaborate with quite a few people; including my PPP, my site coordinator, the para in my room, and two additional teachers I work with in their classrooms. In my experience some of these collaborations have gone more smoothly than others. For instance I feel that the communication between my site coordinator and I has been very good. I feel as if she is always there to help me and listen if needed. Communication and collaboration with my PPP has not gone as smoothly. She is working very hard to help me succeed in my teaching practices, however I feel as if we need to work on better communicating with each other. I think it would also be beneficial to build a better relationship so that we can better know where each other is coming from which would lead to better collaboration. I feel as if I have this more naturally with the other teachers I would with.

Meeting my student's needs

The students in my classroom are a very diverse group of learners who have a wide range of differing needs. Thankfully my PPP is very adapted to making sure each and every student meets these needs. When I entered this classroom there was already many systems in place to address the needs of these students. One student requires extensive adaptive technology that my PPP has flawlessly worked into the classroom. During circle time routines we use Big Mac buttons and other communication talkers so she can participate along with the other students. Ms. Maloney also employs a visual schedule in order to help aid with transitions. One student who has ASD also deals with a lot of sensory needs. He started my first week in the classroom, so I have been able to assist my PP with acclimating him to the classroom. This student enjoys a lot of pressure stimulation and in order to help him with that I made a weighted blanket. We also use the communicators with this student since he is still developing his verbal skills. When it comes to small group instruction and work time differentiation is one of the most valuable things we provide for these students. During morning work time we often allow the children to work on simple worksheets that are used for concepts such as: sorting, pre-writing and letter identification. Since not all students are on the same level differentiation comes into play quite a bit. For instance when it comes to a sorting activity instead of just providing a word clue as to what needs to be sorted where, for some students we will also offer a concrete example of what should go in each group. In pre-k differentiation is such an incredible tool to be utilized. In any grade no two students will be the same, but in pre-k it's amazing just how different two students of the same age can be. These children learn at such an incredible rate, and it is only fair to them that they receive the instruction that is most on track for their personal level.