Field Experience Day 2

On May 9, 2009 I completed my second and final day of field experience at Southview Middle School. Upon entering the lobby to the main office, I noticed all of the colorful posters with educational sayings. There were also multiplication facts written on the lighting fixtures on the ceilings. I thought that was a great idea. After receiving my visitor's pass, I was escorted to Mrs. Harmon's 7th grade Science class. The first thing that she had the students do was stand up and form a circle around the classroom. Mrs. Harmon squeezed the hand of the child to her left side and that child did the same and so on. She kept track of the time that it took the children to get back to the starting point. She then began her lesson about nerve cells and reaction time. Initially, I was wondering why they were doing that but once her lesson started I completely understood why she did this exercise. She used an overhead projector as a tool for teaching her lesson. Once the lesson was over, she asked the children to write down one fact that they remembered from the lesson and crumble up the paper. They were then asked to throw the balled up papers into the center of the classroom and repeat a few times and then pick up someone else's paper. Next she asked for some volunteers to read out loud the facts on the piece of paper that they picked up. She told me that this was called a "snow ball fight." I thought this was a really cool way of making sure that the children were learning something while having a little bit of fun.
The second period that I observed, Mrs. Harmon showed me a few more of her successful strategies that she would often use in the classroom. She taught this class the same lesson about nerves and reaction times. Once she was done teaching she showed me a different type of strategy called ball toss. It was like the 'wonder ball' game, once the music started, the children would pass the ball around the circle and when the music stopped the child holding the ball would have to answer a question about the lesson. I enjoyed this type of teaching strategy as well. Mrs. Harmon told me that an important way to keep the children involved was to let them stand-up as much as possible. She said that when children just sit and listen to a lecture, most often, the children do not pay attention as well as they would if they were involved.
I really enjoyed observing Mrs. Harmon's classes. I think I learned the most from her. I found her to be extremely helpful. She also gave me her email address so I could keep in touch with her in the future in case I had any questions. Overall, I had a really good experience and I am glad that I had to observe Mrs. Harmon's classes.