Amy’s HS Block Blog

Once upon a time, in a resource math classroom not at all far away, there was a student who could not bring himself to speak to me. My cooperating teacher warned me, on my very first day in his classroom, that I would need to give this student time, that I would need to “grow on” him. So I haven’t taken it personally; I’ve just tried to be patient and give him his space. During our second (maybe third?) class period together, I was walking around talking to each student briefly just to make sure I had each of their names correct. I spoke to this student on that occasion and he curled up into a ball in his desk. The cooperating teacher got him to answer my question, but generally speaking, he ignores my presence completely.

That changed last week, if only for a brief moment. He read something aloud, to no one in particular, but was reading a word incorrectly, a word that was critical to getting the assignment right. (This was a worksheet that had math problems that would lead to solving a word problem.) I happened to be standing pretty close to his desk, so I glanced at his paper and asked him if the word he’d said was the right one. He examined his paper more closely and then read aloud the correct word. (And then he went back to ignoring me completely, if I recall.)

Nonetheless, it does feel like progress, even if it’s tiny. I’m not familiar with this student’s situation, so it’s particularly difficult to work around a problem I am legally not allowed to have identified for me, but I feel like my patience and willingness to respect his space may have paid off a little.

In the future, I hope to remember and apply this lesson. Sometimes, the best thing I can do may be to back off.

This semester I’m working in a resource algebra class. Most days, there are six students. Their math abilities are varied; obviously they are all “behind” in some sense but some students have more difficulty with the assignment than others. What I’ve noted recently is the teacher’s ability to quickly adapt his lessons to meet the individual needs of his students. Monday, he handed out a packet of seatwork to his students. They needed to do all the problems on the fronts and backs of four pages, and show their work. But! If the student could show him that he or she is capable of doing this work, then that student was exempted from having to complete that page and could spend more time on skills that were still developing.

I thought this was brilliant! By individualizing the work the students do while they are in class, he is able to tailor lessons to their needs and not waste their time on things they know when there’s more critical work they need to do. Not only that, he’s able to do it on the fly, which probably works a lot better overall than planning in advance for six different lessons and trying to orchestrate them during a single class period.

I will definitely keep this experience in mind when I’m teaching. Especially in special education, it’s critical not to waste time when the students have so many other things they could be learning and necessary skills they could be practicing. I think this shows foresight — the teacher is looking at the “big picture.”

I walked around to three or four different classrooms before I even found a teacher who was in the room and staying there for the period! I realize special ed teachers have a lot of obligations outside the classroom, but I have to wonder about the difficulties of teaching a class that is likely already having problems in the subject area when added to having a teacher who isn’t there. I finally settled down in the classroom of my cooperating teacher, who we at least knew to be present today. He was teaching/reviewing the distributive property with that class. He made many “aside” comments to me as he went through the lesson, noting his usually sparing use of sarcasm and his hall pass allowance for his students, among other things. I’m having trouble thinking of a lot to say about that experience this morning but I’m back in that class after lunch and many more times this semester so I’m sure I’ll make up for it by the time this is all over…