Dylan McGee 1

Journal 3: Teacher Interview

1. Do you have suggestions for classroom configuration/layout for summative and/or

formative assessment activities?

I have the same class layout regardless of activity, and it’s pretty typical. I have rows that

are spaced out, and it works relatively well. This year, I tried putting the desks in arched

rows, but I’ve found it’s not as effective as a more typical structure. I’ve found that

maintaining spaced-out rows works the best.

2. What are the key components of your grading system?

One main component is my differences in grading between my honors and academic

class. In my honors classes, tests and quizzes are a higher percentage of the grade, while

in my academic classes, classwork and projects are worth more. This gives the academic

students a better chance of getting a good grade in the class. Some of these students are

not very good test-takers, and they may also be absent for a few days of lecture, which

puts them at a disadvantage.

3. How would you describe your teaching style?

I try to be both fair and flexible. I also try to make what I teach somewhat relevant to

students because many of them are short-sighted. This fairness and flexibility also carries

over to how I handle discipline and misbehavior.

4. What are your policies for make-up work and academic dishonesty?

For my honors students, there is basically no make-up work allowed. They can bring an

assignment one day late, but after that the highest they can get is a 40 percent. As for my

academic kids, they get 3 or 4 extra days past the due date, but they can’t submit anything
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after the unit is over. With academic dishonesty, any form of plagiarism is an automatic

referral. Along with this, if I catch a student cheating, I write them up immediately.

5. What have you gained by cooperating with other teachers in a PLT?

One thing I’ve gained is being shown different perspectives and insights. For example,

one of the teachers in the PLT is a bit more lax and laid-back than me. PLTs are also

good for sharing resources, such as the SAT videos I’ve been using to teach students

common SAT words.

6. What tips would you like to share for keeping students engaged in your classroom?

One important thing is to make things relevant to students and apply to their own life.

Also, giving them some kind of autonomy is important, but you must make share that

they still stay on task. Routines also help keep students engage, just so they will know

what will happen next. For example, with The Great Gatsby, students know they will first

have a quiz, then read as a class, and then read by themselves.

7. How do you handle students who are incredibly hesitant or refuse to participate?

You really just have to work with them. If doing this doesn’t work, personally addressing

them might help. Trying to build a strong connection with them is a big help, such as

saying “hello” when they walk in the classroom. If none of these work, I’ll try getting the

counselor or parents involved to see if there is something else affecting them.

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Reflection

Overall, I liked the teacher’s answers in the interview. My teacher has been teaching for

over 15 years, so he certainly has some wisdom he could impart on me. I liked his comments on

the need to find relevance with the students. This was always a problem for me in high school; I

couldn’t focus in classes I didn’t relate to at all. I also like his “fair and flexible” approach to

teaching, as it strikes a balance between being too strict, which can lead to deep resentment, and

being so laid-back that students think it’s okay to just not learn. Given that I am currently in my

PS1, I have seen quite a few of his classes, and he also handles discipline in this way. Although

the academic students sometimes get a bit rowdy, he has never called the office and tries to

handle all disciplinary issues himself. I may be a little less strict with make-up work, however.

Students often have things come up, and high schoolers are quite emotional, which can cause

them to either eschew their work entirely or do very poorly on it. I would rather receive an

excellent assignment three days late than an awful assignment on time. I like my teacher’s

position on student autonomy as well. Letting students “do their own thing” to an extent helps

with making them more eager to participate, and students produce better quality work if they can

work the way they want to. This is especially true given that this an eleventh grade class, a

formative time in many teenager’s lives, where they must make the decision to either continue

schooling after they graduate or not. This interview did not change any of my assumptions from

the previous two parts of the assignment, except perhaps my teacher’s make-up policy, which I

thought he would be less strict about. The main reason my assumptions didn’t change much is

because since I’m already in my PS1, I know my teacher and his style relatively well.

One thing that I think I’ll definitely incorporate into my teaching is my cooperating

teacher’s method of having classwork be worth more in academic classes. Most of the students in
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his academic class right now participate in class, even if their work is not exemplary, and so their

classwork grades are probably quite good. Doing this gives academic students a better chance,

since, as he said, many are not good test-takers or don’t know how to study effectively. On the

flipside, honors students are already relatively effective studiers, and so there is less of a reason

that they do not do well on a test. If an honors student doesn’t do well on a test or quiz, it is

probably because they just didn’t study, not because of another underlying problem that can

often affect academic students. Another thing my cooperating teacher did that I’ll try my hardest

to do as well (even though I’m relatively shy) is to engage in banter with my students. This is

especially effective in his academic class. Whenever he engages in conversation with these

students, rather than simply telling them to be quiet, he shows them respect. In return, they

participate more in class. My teacher’s lessons are rather structured, which I both like and

dislike. It is good because students know what they need to write down and what they need to

know, as well as making it easier to keep students on task. On the flipside, it can harm creativity

and lead to a rather monotonous routine that students grow tired of. In my classroom, I will

certainly keep some sort of structure, such as having a daily routine, but I will also experiment

more with assignments, such as having students write creatively more instead of just taking notes

or having them do more visual-based learning.

One thing I think I will need to change about myself before teaching full-time is my

idealism. Although I would love to see every student excel in class, go to college, and land their

dream career, this is simply not the reality for many students. Observing classes has made me

realize this quite a bit. Although telling students to constantly strive for excellence and do the

best that they can is incredibly important, expecting all of these students to actually do so will

lead to nothing but frustration. Many students have extenuating factors that may prevent them
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from doing this and realizing this is important. However, I will treat every student as equal and

constantly praise their potential, regardless of the circumstances. I will turn mistakes into

learning experiences, rather than condemn students for getting things wrong. One bias I

previously had that has already been changed was my notion that academic students constantly

misbehave and act up. I was never in academic classes as a kid, so my only idea of what they

were like came from media. Given, I am teaching in a suburban school, but none of the academic

students ever misbehave too much. They are certainly more talkative than other classes, but I like

this, because it makes the class time fun rather than just being a silent room for 90 minutes. They

also have more trouble staying on task, but the teacher does a great job moderating this, and the

students remain respectful at all times. Academic students do present more of a challenge, but

more so in the way of instruction, not discipline.

My teacher assesses students daily, if they are reading a book. He will start class off with

a 10-question quiz, which students then self-grade. Maintaining this routine of formative

assessment is essential in making sure students actually read the material and will also prepare

them more so for unit tests. In my classroom, I plan to have a similar routine, and having a quiz

at the beginning of class can serve as a defining point between the warm-up and the actual

lesson. My teacher also exclusively uses short-answer questions for his quizzes, which prevents

students from getting lucky by guessing and getting a grade they don’t deserve. It also requires

students to read the text more carefully, as they cannot just look for a word they remember being

related to the question and choose that answer. I plan to do the same with quizzes in my

classroom. However, I will include multiple-choice questions on my tests, mostly for the sake of

time, but also because they cover a much larger area than small, per-chapter quizzes do. I will

probably include more informal assessments that encourage writing, such as warm-ups or “free-
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writes,” where students write whatever they feel about a topic for a specified amount of time.

Overall, my teacher’s cycle of assessment works well and I will probably inherit much of what

he does as a teacher, with a few minor tweaks to make it my own.