First Day at Placement!

    Today was my first official day as a Student Teacher!  I am very excited to announce that I have been placed in Mr.Terrance Mitchell's fifth grade classroom at Gideons Elementary School in South Atlanta.  My Collaborating Teacher has been teaching for five years and was recently named the Teacher of the Year.  All of the students, staff, and administration were very welcoming and friendly.  The students were absolutely wonderful because they were very respectful and kind! I am looking forward to my placement at this Atlanta Public School!
     Overall, the day was very positive and engaging.  When the students arrived, they went straight to their desks to complete their morning journal assignment and to eat breakfast.  The students then transitioned to ELA/Reading by grouping up for reading centers.  Students rotated between two different ELA board games, IXL on the computer, and a summary activity center.  Then students were directed to take their weekly story/vocab quiz & create a brainstorm map for writing  a persuasive letter. Some of the students were confused on how to correctly formulate a topic and an introductory sentence.  By giving specific examples, I was able to help those students create a proper introductory sentence that guided them to create branching main ideas/facts.  Next, students transitioned to Social Studies.  The topic for the past two weeks has been about Character.  As an end to this theme, students reviewed the associated vocabulary and reviewed issues and individuals associated with Character.   Most of the review was associated with Civil Rights and the students were happy to share their opinions about each topic and famous individual.
    For Math, students reviewed homework (on Numbers and Operations in Base Ten) from their Common Core Workbook.  After the review, students were broken into teams (boys vs girls).  They competed against one another in an online Mathematical version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire?.  The problems required students to use the correct Order of Operations to find the answer.  Before students shouted out the answer, they were instructed to explain how they found the answer they chose.  This game was a fun and interactive way for students to learn more about and practice their Mathematical skills.  As a hands on activity before lunch, the students went outside and played an egg toss game.  The object of the game was to toss the egg back and forth without breaking it.  However, when the students did accidentally break the egg, they were instructed to examine the yolk and compare it to a cell.    This was an easy way for students to share their knowledge about cells with one another.  At the end of the day, the students were excited to find out that they were going to make their own cell out of candy!  The students were very attentive in the review before the activity because they wanted to understand the information so they could eat their scientific project!  Not only did they have fun but they were also able to correctly fill out their experiment worksheet.  Everyone knew how to correctly identify the materials, independent variable, dependent variable, control, and the parts of the cell that their candies represented.
    This is my first year working in an environment with upper grades and I am very excited to see how the rest of the year will develop!  I do not think that I could have received a better placement for this experience!

Go Gideons Wolves!