People I commented on

Here are the blogs I posted on (I didn't keep track so I'm sorry if I forgot any).  I know - what the ....?  Why was I commenting on all of these blogs when I should have been prepping?  It's called procrastination - not to mention, sometimes I was just moved to comment.  I have to say thank you for all of your blogs - they kept me company in the wee hours of the night as I sat prepping for my classes and everyone else in the house was asleep.  It made me feel less alone when I felt like I was going to have a nervous breakdown from lack of sleep.  Can't wait to see you all and catch up in person tomorrow at OISE.  I sure love midtown :)

Lance Dixon

Laura G.

Vivian (week 1)

Yilin (week 2)

Khushbu (week 1)

Gabrielle (week 3 & week 1)

Effie 

Andrei (week 2)

Justin (week 3)

Lauren (week 2 - I think)

Laura M (Last post)

Irina (week 1)

Lindsay (day 3)

Jen (week 2)

Jason (week 3 & 4)

One More Day!

So here I sit preparing for my last day at school.  All in all it has been pretty freakin awesome :)
We will do our French performance tomorrow for about 35 grade 3's & 2's.  The kids are pretty excited about it.  I was surprised that they all love their tee shirts so much that they would like to keep them.  I wasn't expecting that.  The principal came to watch me do my French class today.  She was very very complimentary afterwards and said I don't have to go back to OISE, I'm ready and I should just go get a job now.  Woo wee :)  You know who I'll be asking for a letter of reference from :)  And my AT said they are all going to miss me so much.  They really are a lovely class.

Tomorrow I'm also going to do another art project.  We are going to deorate white candles with coloured beeswax.  It's really fun and they make very nice presents.  And to update you on the finger knitting craze - it has caught on like wildfire.  Kids (boys and girls) just don't want to stop doing it.  If they could they would do it all day every day.  I started meeting a few kids at lunch recess to do finger knitting in the library - kids I knew from my class.  Well they told 2 friends, and they told 2 friends, and so on and so on (are any of you old enough to remember that commercial about a shampoo - I think it was called "Gee, your hair smells terrific!".  Any way - stay on task maryem! - there are now many many many kids who come and meet me every lunch pretty much to knit in the library.  I don't even know most of their names because they are from all grade (from grade 1 or 2 all the way to grade 6) and word of mouth really really spread.  So much, that another teacher (grade 2/3) asked me to come in to her class today to teach them officially how to finger knit (some of her students had started coming to meet me at lunch).  I brought in 4 of my finger knitting experts from my grade 4 class to help me teach them (2 boys, 2 girls).  It was so fun.  And the kids are getting really creative with what they are doing with it - changing colours, doing 2, 3, and 4 finger knitting patterns, combining strings to make other patterns.  One boy has the longest multi-coloured finger knitting chain going that I have ever seen - and he's not done!  Some kids say they are going to use their knitting as decorations on their Christmas trees, others are going to turn it into a hat for one of their parents, others use them as bracelets, necklaces or decorations for their backpacks, bookmarks - it's endless (and so lovely).

I'm having a blast!  But I am exhausted and look forward to being back at OISE.  Not to mention I miss all of you Midtowners!  See you all next week.

3 down, 1 to go

     Only one more week and then we're all back at OISE.  I felt pretty tired this week.  I stayed up one night until 4 a.m. putting different solids in freezer bags (enough for 12 small groups) for a science experiment on sound conductors and insulators.  I put various items such as sand, cotton balls, pennies, wooden popsicle sticks, etc. etc. (I kind of went overboard) - I also brought in some liquids (coke, oil, milk and we used water from the water fountain).  The kids put the freezer bag against their ear, then they put a ticking clock on the other side of the freezer bag - they had to observe how it affected the sound of the ticking clock - did it muffle it? did it make it sound louder.  I learned from one of our previous science classes that I had to carefully monitor and accompany any liquid they were using - or else it would end up on their desks, or their work or the floor (or on them).  So I asked the AT to help me, and we each accompanied a freezer bag full of one of the liquids to each student to try out (and in the meantime, I had put many other things on their desk to try out - including a bag of air).  So that worked out really well.  No major accidents, other than the fact that the freezer bags I got were really cheap, from a dollar store, so all of them did break - but I always managed to get to the staff room sink before they ended up on the floor (except for some of the coke which did make a little mess on the class room floor).  The kids were so intrigued by all the freezer bags full of stuff, that they couldn't wait to get to science to do the experiment.  (We did it after recess, but I made them come and do a community circle first because we've been doing them once a week - and I wanted to take the opportunity while I had their full attention to remind them of appropriate behaviour when doing science experiments).  It was certainly very experiential and the kids couldn't wait to get to it.  The results were kind of all over the place - but they mainly found out what I was hoping they would find out - that the best conductors of sound are solids, then comes the liquids, and gases last (the bag of air is what we used to test that out).  We did a survey of what everyone found, and that was how we determined (based statistically on how many people found solids to be the best conductors, versus liquids and gases).  We also talked about how our sample was pretty small and that a scientist would want to test it out on many more people than we did, to get a more accurate result.
     I feel bittersweet about next week being the last week.  The children are very sweet and I will miss them - but I will also feel relieved - I'm so tired.  I am feeling stressed about the fact that I have all these OISE assignments hanging over my head that I haven't submitted yet!
     For the last week of school, in French, we are going to do a performance of an autumn poem, a song (a round) and a story that we have been working on since I got there.  It is kind of ambitious - we are going to perform it for a primary class.  So far we've been working in a circle, and it is easier to maintain control of my 36 French students because I can pretty much see all of them in the circle.  But on Friday, I started to stage the story, and it was much harder to maintain the "attentive listening" of the children.  It was also hard for me to differentiate between the different characters.  So today, I went to chinatown and bough 10 yellow tee shirts (for my "sun" characters); 10 blue tee shirts (for my "wind" characters); 10 purple tee shirts (for my narraters); and 10 green tee shirts (for my "people" characters).  The story is Aesop's fable "The Wind and the Sun" (but in French).  I also bought 10 big scarves for the "people" characters to wear when they are "cold" and to take off when they are "hot".  (The story is basically a competition between the wind and the sun about who can get the people to take off their coats.)
     I'm hoping that will help me visually see my different groups (and it will help the audience too).  We'll see how it goes.  I asked my students to try to learn their lines (I have no idea if they will.  They aren't very used to having to do homework in grade 4 - and I wouldn't be surprised if many of the kids left their scripts at school).
     I'll keep you posted on if it works or not.  It'll be fun trying, anyway :)  I'm looking forward to going to the math workshop on Monday afternoon and seeing some of you OISE folks.  (It was also very nice to hang out with some of you at Daiva's lovely concert on Friday).
     Hope you all have a lovely last week!

Week 2 - Halfway There

So I am feeling pretty good after my first 2 weeks of practicum.  I've been teaching French since the first week to all of the grade 4 students in the school (38 of them, in the library).  I was worried at first about this class, but I would say, it is probably my best class and that I feel the most confident about it.  My AT has been really nice and letting me do things that are totally different than how he normally teaches French.  I told him that we could do some of the things he normally does, as well, but he said he preferred to let me continue what I was doing because he was learning a lot.  Talk about making a person feel good!  I've also been teaching science, some language arts, and most recently Art.  On Friday I taught the children how to finger knit.  I found a connection with social studies and "medieval times" when I did some research on the history of knitting, which apparently began in the Middle East, and got to Europe through the Islamic Empire, when they were in Andalusia for 600 years during the Middle Ages.  I also included a little music, teaching them a song so they would remember the technique.  As I expected, based on my experience teaching kids to finger knit, they became kind of obsessed with it, and I'm sure some of the students will want to do it day in day out (several students asked to take some different coloured pieces of yarn so that they could do it at recess and after school and over the weekend.    Finger knitting is something you can teach very young children, and it also improves hand-eye coordination.  If there is enough interest, I may have a knitting club 1 or 2 lunches per week, and open it up to any of the students at the school, not just the ones in my class.  


I did learn that I when I first teach it to the children, I should prepare the first knot (the disappearing knot) in advance, because it is actually harder to do than the actual knitting - and when I taught it to my class, the children who couldn't do it right a way (the majority of them) were feeling like they just couldn't do it.  I will also limit it to one colour of yarn at first, until they get the hang of it, because it took up a lot of time cutting the colours of yarn that the children wanted to work with, and then making the disappearing knot for them.  If I did it all over again, I'd pick one colour, make enough disappearing knots for the whole class - and then after demonstrating how to finger knit, give them each their piece of string, and work on the actual finger knitting together.  Once they successfully knit that first piece of string, then they could come up and ask for another one, in a different colour (it would minimize the mob of children all approaching at once, talking at once, wanting their string 5 minutes ago ;)


Overall, it was a pretty enjoyable art lesson and all the children seemed to be pretty happy/proud of what they were able to make.  


Next week, I'll be doing my first Media studies class (on Monday).  I'm going to start lesson planning now.  Until the next time,  Have a great week.

French Class - Week 1

I observed my AT teaching French to 38 students (all the grade 4's) in the library because no classroom was big enough.  I was not sure how it was going to work out for me.  My AT used a video called "Telefrancais" which the kids seemed to enjoy - but it seemed like a lot of time was spent on making sure some kids weren't get distracted by other kids and I was worried because although I knew the names of all the kids in my grade 4 class, I knew very few names of the other grade 4 class.  I started my first day of teaching French on Thursday and I'll be taking over the French class until the end of practicum.  The first thing I did was move all the tables & chairs in the library so we could form a big circle and I did "Tribes" kind of things at the beginning - rainstick for quiet - go around the circle introducing the child next to you (en francais, of course).  Then I started trying the oral (with songs and poems) and physically active way that I have been teaching French in the last couple of years at my daughter's school.  One realization I came to was that I'm pretty good at it - those 2 years really helped me build up a confidence that I actually know what I'm doing (even though I went from a class of 13 - to my present class of 38).  The children and my AT seemed to enjoy it quite a bit, too.  I came up with a plan on how I'm going to continue for the rest of the practicum.  I have some ritual songs and poems that we do at the beginning and end of each class - and then in the middle, we work on whatever I feel would be good to work on that day - whether it's moving and counting in French; singing some songs that we will eventually do in rounds; learning a poem about the Autumn leaves, etc. etc.  The, next week, I will introduce a story - one of Aesop's Fables - a story about the Wind and the Sun and a contest they have.  Once the children are familiar with the story, I intend to teach it to them, so that they can tell me in French, and eventually I will get them to act it out (where several of them will take the narrator role, several will be the sun, several will be the wind, and several will be the people.  I suggested to my AT, that towards the end of practicum, we have a soiree francaise, where we invite the parents, have French cheeses (that's for you Lauren), praise the Lord! and croissants, and the children can sing one or 2 beautiful French songs, say their poem about autumn (I thought we could do some artwork to go with that) and perform the Fable.  I also started teaching science - we are studying sound (grade 4) and doing experiments.  I think it is going well so far - again, the AT said we can work on the "Sound" unit the whole time I'm there, and of course I'll bring in my assortment of musical instruments as well as do many scientific investigations (we did our first one on Friday.  It was quite fun - we put saran wrap on little yogurt containers, and secured it with an elastic.  We then sprinkled salt on it, and then hit a tuning fork on our foot.  We observed to see what would happen when we put the tuning fork close to the salt & saran wrap, without touching it.  And then we observed to see what would happen when we touched it.  The children were delighted when the salt jumped right off (for some of them) from the vibrations of the sound from the tuning forks.  This coming week, we'll do a similar experiment where we fill the yogurt containers with water to see what happens.  And then move on to other things.

I'll also be presenting my all about me on Monday morning - I will tie it in with Medieval History (a grade 4 thing) but not from the perspective of the European Dark Ages (which is the general perspective that is taken) but from the perspective of the Golden Age of Islam in Andalusia where all kinds of wonderful art forms (literary & musical) were being created and scientific inventions and knowledge were being investigated.  I'll also tie it in with things they are familiar with such as the 1001 Nights - which the story of Aladdin comes from.  I will tie it in with science as well, because I will bring in some instruments which I'll play for them, and we can discuss how it relates to "Sound" and how what we have learned so far relates to how my instruments make sounds and how we hear/perceive them.

I'm enjoying my class a lot, I have to say - but I am also a little worried because I've been sick since practicum started (I started with no voice which is slowly but surely returning - PHEW! - but I know the workload is going to continue to increase - so I'm crossing my fingers I don't have a total burnout.  I'll keep you posted!

First day teaching - Wednesday, November 2

So I observed for the first 2 days of my practicum (which was great because I also got sick the night before Halloween and lost my voice - so it is slowly returning).  Today, I taught my first class - grade 4 science - focussing on "sound".  I started with a community circle which I think worked out really well and the children seemed to really like it.  I told them we'd be having one each week while I was with them.  I taught them the 4 tribes agreements and we definitely have to work on "Attentive Listening" :)  I love the class and I'm getting to know the kids better and better with each day.  When I started the science lesson, I played a game with them - I recorded many sounds (some at their school and in their classroom; some at my home) and they had to guess what they were.  Many of the sounds were unusual instruments that we have in our home - and lots of them are from the Middle East, India.  One girl in the class (from Yemen) seemed very excited about this because she was one of the few students (maybe the only one) who had actually heard and recognized many of these instruments and was proudly telling everyone about them.  I'll be doing my "All about me" on Monday, where I'll bring a lot of the instruments in so they can see what they look like and sound like - and I'll tie it in the medieval times (which they study in grade for) and the Golden Age of Islam in Andalusia (between the 8 and 14th century) - and the connection between that and Medieval Europe.

I also figured out a plan of how I'm going to teach my 38 grade 4 French students for the next month.  I am going to teach them an autumn poem, a lovely song (a round), and I'm going to work on one of Aesop's Fables with them in French (The Wind and the Sun) which I will get them to eventually act out. I'm hoping that towards the end of my practicum we can have a soiree francaise and invite the parents and eat croissants and cheese (maybe we can do a performance for some of the classes in the school, as well).

I'm enjoying the practicum so far, but I do look forward to the weekend so that I can hopefully get my voice back in full working order :)