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Alyssa Daffron
Educ-M403 Technology In The Classroom
Dr. Conner-Zachocki
26 April 2015
CSA Lincoln Reflection 1
Field experience this week was very different than it was last week. I got to the
school around 7:30 this week. I got to see as well as help Ms. Cook get ready for her
day. I also got to talk to her about the lesson I was planning on teaching this week. I
spent the first twenty or twenty-five minutes helping Ms. Cook prepare the classroom for
the students. I then went to the teachers lounge and printed copies of the worksheet
that students would be doing during my lesson. After I printed the copies I went back to
Ms. Cooks room to help the students with their morning work. Students also checked
in with Ms. Cook so she could check their homework and do attendance. The
announcements started around 8:10. After the pledge and announcements the rest of
the day got started.
I started the day off by checking some of the struggling students morning work.
Each day students have a language arts and a math worksheet to do for morning work.
It was my job to check with the students and make sure they were understanding the
math worksheet and doing the problem correctly. I spent about fifteen minutes in the
hall helping these children with their math morning work and making sure they did the
problems correctly. After that, Ms. Cooks class went to Mr. Shipleys classroom for
literature, while Mr. Shipleys class came to Ms. Cooks class for math group. For math
group, Mrs. Gerth and I taught our lesson to the students. This was an awesome

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experience because we were actually in control of planning, teaching, and helping the
students for the topic we were working on. Mrs. Gerth and I co-taught the students
about PEMDAS using the smart board to do example problems and to write information
that the students needed to know. This allowed the students to respond actively to
visual images that conveyed academic content (Maloy, 2014). We compared the order
of operations to baking a cake and talked to the students about why the order is
important in both instances. We then talked to them about the order of operations in
mathematics and why they do the parentheses and exponents first because they are
already grouped together. Teaching to includethe learning styles of different students
is key to successful differentiated instruction; therefore we showed them a video to help
them remember the order of operations and talked to them about how PEMDAS relates
to the acrostic poems they were doing a few weeks ago (Maloy, 2014). This allowed
students to hear, see, and sing about the order of operations. A couple students came
up with really good acrostic poems that they could use to remember PEMDAS. One
student came up with Please Eat My Dinner At Seven. Most of the students liked this
one so we wrote it up on the board for them to copy down. For the stations, I worked
with the journal group while Mrs. Gerth worked with the choice group. The choice group
got to pick one of the two games we provided to practice their order of operations. We
provided them with a FunBrain game and a Math Play game. The journal group worked
on a worksheet that doubled as a game. Students rolled dice to get their numbers and
then used the order of operations to solve the problem after they got all their numbers.
Each group lasted about twenty minutes and then they rotated to the next group.

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After math group, the students had a read aloud in the classroom. Ms. Cook
read a book to them that they had been reading for a couple days. Many students were
very excited to have a chance to hear what was going to happen next in the story. They
sat on the floor in front of Ms. Cook quietly and waited patiently for her to start reading.
They were all really disappointed that she could not read to them longer than she did.
The students got to have recess outside this week, which made them very happy.
They were eager to get outside and enjoy the fresh air. Ms. Cook and I spent the first
ten or fifteen minutes in outside with the students until the principal took over for us.
After lunch, the students spent some time doing quiet reading. At this time,
I pulled three or four students into the hall to work on their morning work some more.
Many of the students had some of the morning work done, but they were having trouble
with certain parts of it. I got to help them get through these difficulties so that they could
finish their morning work. I spent about fifteen or twenty minutes helping these students
with their morning work.
After quiet reading time, the students went to groups again. Ms. Cooks class
was in math group, while Mr. Shipleys class was in literature group. The ability to
engage in self-reflection about ones work is key to success as a teacher (Maloy, 2014).
Mrs. Gerth and I again taught our lesson to the class; however, between our first lesson
and our second lesson we reflected together on how the teaching process went and we
made a few corrections so that students would have more clarity on the subject. For
this group, I felt like the material flowed more smoothly because we had already taught
it once and we made corrections to the previous lesson. When we switched from the
lesson to the stations, I again stayed with the journal group. Because we more

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thoroughly covered exponents during this group, we had fewer questions about how to
handle exponents. However, a few students still had some trouble with them.
The class showed community this week by being polite and excepting of each
other. They were eager to share their ideas during group and no one criticized anyone
for their opinion or view. This allowed for a comfortable, safe, and encouraging
atmosphere.
I really enjoyed getting a chance to teach this week. I felt like the students and I
had a better connection because I was helping them learn something. Being able to
see what kind of impact that has just makes me feel so much better about my future
profession. It was really neat to see how we changed the lesson after the first teaching
to make it better suited for the students. It really showed me that we will constantly
change and alter our plans to make the most out of a situation for our students. I look
forward to my last week of field experience next week. I cannot wait to learn more and
be able to apply it in my future classroom.

Work Cited

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Maloy, R. (2014). Ch. 9 Expressing Creativity with Multimedia Technologies.
InTransforming learning with new technologies (2nd ed., p. 223). Boston:
Pearson.
Maloy, R. (2014). Ch. 10 Promoting Success for All Students through Technology.
InTransforming learning with new technologies (2nd ed., p. 249).
Boston: Pearson.
Maloy, R. (2014). Ch. 11 Engaging Students in Performance Assessment and
Reflective Learning. InTransforming learning with new technologies (2nd ed., p.
249). Boston: Pearson.