SPE 6110_101
Class Reflections
Class Engagement Reflections will reflect on what I've learned from participating in synchronous class meetings.
Learning Task Reflections will reflect on what I've learned from completing weekly assignments and readings, both individual and collaborative.
Class Engagement
Reflection
Within the school system, it is true that there are many individuals with different professional backgrounds that work together to provide services for both students with varied abilities and typically developing students. However, until this course, I did not have the opportunity to listen, observe, and learn alongside colleagues with different backgrounds. There are individuals in my course that are SLPs (Speech and Language Pathologists), Special Educators, Reading Educators, administrators, doctoral students, and more. The thing that impresses me the most, is that their background knowledge contributes in sync with my background knowledge. We are able to create a microcosm that represents the true nature of collaboration in a school system for the benefit of a student.
For example, during synchronous class meetings, I am able to hear the perspective of a colleague that has experience working with the blind/deaf community. While I have limited experience socializing with individuals in the deaf/Deaf community, I do not have professional experience working/ socializing with the blind and/or deaf community. During the synchronous class on February 25th, I was utterly amazed at the background knowledge that this colleague mentioned while discussing a case study. The case study revolved around Whitley, a young man in the deaf/blind community. My class was discussing the various ways in which to engage individuals with High-Intensity needs in literary experiences using “alternative pencils” -- a strategy to promote students, who may not be able to use pencils/pens, to begin writing. It is an assistive technology method.
My colleague and professor described the following instructional strategies to help benefit the Whitley: “ Attribute meaning”; hand underhand; Monitor eye gaze - Tobii gaze viewer, Establish means of measurement of focus - to finetune physical capabilities, Connect letters with multiple levels of meaningful feedback (including haptic), Talking word processor and/or software that links letters to meaningful feedback, Object/picture”. Learning new ways in which to improve the educational experiences of children with High-Intensity Needs is exactly what I need to grow professionally, so I am glad I am able to hear and learn from the experiences my colleagues have to offer during collaborative synchronous zoom sessions.
Throughout this semester, my class engagement and learning tasks have taught me how important it is to have high expectations for all students, regardless of ability level. As an elementary education teacher, I was taught to have these high expectations, but I wasn’t taught ways in which to assist individual students with high- intensity needs or students with multiple needs. This is a flaw in the education system and within the ranks of education as a whole. Every teacher should be taught ways in which to educate every student, not just students that fall under one category. That is why I made it my mission to join iSHINE, learn more about individual students with HIN, and obtain new knowledge to help grow the mindset of myself and others. As a reading specialist, I now know the importance of working collaboratively as a group to ensure the best possible outcomes for all students. However, I found that working collaboratively with peer educators gives children, both typically developing and atypical, the opportunity to work collaboratively, as well. In my opinion, this is one of the most important things I have learned this semester. Learning how to create an inclusive environment is what I work towards everyday, so finding learning strategies that are supported by research that help support the literacy engagement of both emergent and conventional readers/writers has helped me to achieve my professional goal.
Learning
Tasks
Reflection
Finding ways in which to engage emergent readers/Writers and conventional readers/writers has been the goal of the learning tasks in this semester. One of the learning tasks that I completed individually was reading about the 4- essential questions to determine if a reader was in the “emergent” or “conventional” stage of reading/writing. These questions include: Does a student...
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identify most of the letters of the alphabet, most of the time
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Is interested and engaged during shared reading
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Has a means of communication and interactions
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Understands that print has meaning ( Erickson, Koppenhaver, & Cunningham
These four questions drive the literacy route a teacher takes with a student. Therefore, the answers to these questions are essential. These questions dictate if a child learns/participates in :
(Erickson & Koppenhaver, 2017)
Therefore, these are the questions that drive the lesson plans that are collaboratively created between myself and my colleagues. One of my colleagues is a Special Education masters student and the other is a SLP. We work together to create lesson plans that will navigate around the understanding that the students in our practicum experience are mostly ‘conventional’ readers and writers. We all collected different data that helped answer the four questions for each of our children in our practicum.
Individually, my colleague that focuses in special education brings her insights and background from the special education field that includes her previous clinical experiences with working one-on-one with students with varied needs; my colleague that is an SLP uses her background knowledge of speech and language to help us incorporate all students into the practicum experience, and I use my knowledge that comes from my reading education master’s program and working with typically developing children-- all of our individual skill sets come into play when creating a lesson plans for our students that are both typically-developing and kids with high-intensity needs. By working collaboratively, combining our individual background knowledge that we learn from research articles and weekly assignments, we are able to create an experience for our students that is inclusive and fun.
One of my favorite learning tasks of this semester has to be participating in the online ISHINE practicum. I have previously detailed how group collaboration was used amongst my colleagues and myself. Therefore, I want to focus on one of the learning tasks that I enjoyed during iSHINE online: Anchor, Read, Apply. Anchor, Read, Apply is a strategy used amongst conventional readers to promote engagement during their literacy experiences. I would like to say that my group members tried to implement this strategy during every lesson, but as the weeks of iSHINE practicum progressed, my group members and I were able to confidently implement this strategy.
During iSHINE online, we ‘anchored’ our students' prior knowledge by using an interest inventory that my colleagues and I collected on Day 1 of practicum. This interest inventory was completed by the kids and was filled with places that they may want to visit and what they are interested in. My group members and I used this information to take our kids on a virtual field trip weekly. After ‘anchoring our students interests based on their prior knowledge, we were able to read different books based on our field trips. For example, we watched two videos about Norway: one informational and one was filled with fun facts. Then we read a book about a Norweigen folktale. It is important to note that before we began reading the books that related to the videos, we instructed the kids to pay attention to certain aspects in each book. At first, my group members and I neglected to do this, but after receiving helpful criticism, we changed our approach. After reading books, we were able to ‘apply’ the students' knowledge to writing. Writing proved to be a challenge due to our iSHINE practicum being online, but the kids were able to write electronically.
Research promotes the usage of ‘alternative pencils’ for students with disabilities. Therefore, my group and I were able to take text that was written using the zoom char feature and transfer it into book creator. This allowed every child, with and without a disability, the ability to participate in the lesson.
From my own experience, I have seen that every child, regardless of ability level, can participate in literacy experiences. Therefore, I can support, with my own personal evidence, that “every child can learn to read and write” (Erickson & Koppenhaver, 2020).
