Observations and Reflections

Serving this semester at Ivey Lane has taught so much about the concept of time. What we do with it, how we spend it, and who we give it to. Ultimately, the answers to these questions produce a kinship with people around us. In serving my fourth grade students, I learned to cater to their needs, to develop a listening ear for the things they said and didn't have the courage to say, and to learn discipline when it came to their education. 

Serving, essentially, produces the immaterial quality of being selfless. Our characters are comprised and defined by the choices we make, and being selfless is the choice you make for someone instead of the choice you make for yourself. Giving up time, a commodity people are generally selfish with, enables a person to develop brand new perspective; It isn't always about you. 

Service Learning proved to me, to be a valuable tool in a classroom. In terms of preparing students to work, it was excellent. I really had to put effort and planning behind all those lessons. As for the impact of service learning, I believe it to be monumental. What is the biggest lesson you could give to a student? That is up to you to decide of course, but for me, it was to pour out how much I believed in them and their imaginations. If they walked away with that, then I would say I'd done my best. 

Election Day!

Election Day at Engville!

After doing some major editing and spelling of their work, I thought it might be fun to somehow incorporate the election day in their writing. 

The in class assignments for the day were the following:
1. What makes a good candidate?
Some of their thoughts were the following: gives out ice cream on sundays, stops wars, lowers gas prices, makes people stop taking drugs, educated, nice, african american, a woman. 
2. What makes a bad candidate?
Their thoughts: a liar, a thief, a bully, someone who has been to jail multiple times, someone who isn't nice or can't read. 
3. Construct a poster of an Ad for your "good" candidate. I had the students draw pictures and then below write a Headline. Some headlines were:
Vote for me! No school for a year!
Mrs. Peanut for president!
4. Lastly, their lengthy in class writing assignment was to write a couple paragraphs starting with the sentence, "If I were president I would..."

This assignment turned out to be very fun. Ms. Smith was actually doing a mini election with them after we left so the writing assignments turned out to be very helpful. The students participated, indeed they were nearly standing on their chairs to shout out what made a good candidate for president. Every student I heard, and I believe I heard all of them, wanted Obama to win. This class gave me the idea to start tying in more writing assignments with world issues. Instead of arbitrarily thinking of something the kids could write about, why not pick a global issue. I was astounded that for one of the "If I were the president" paragraphs I read how a student would stop global warming. H-mmm, food for thought.

The Perks of Serving

Service learning can be done anywhere, at anytime, at anyplace. The whole wide world is yours to serve upon, all you will need is a willingness to incorporate serving into a classroom setting. Teaching a subject in a classroom may produce the despairing result of that particular subject remaining stagnant in the confines of the four walls it was taught. The community at large, existing outside those walls, could be one of the best places to impact, using your students who have learned the subject well. 

My experiences at Ivey Lane were illuminating! In terms of progress and the impact it was having on the kids, service learning proved to me that it is a valuable tool in reaching out to the community. 

As each week went by, and my time at Ivey Lane Elementary became easier, I started to notice a quality the students began to possess: pride. Pride for their creations, for their writing pieces, for their characters. As their writing strengthened, their inhibitions decreased and I had more students wanting to read aloud their work each week. A simple line of encouragement, a few markers and crayons, and one can almost see the wheels in their head turning as they eagerly scribbled down onto paper their ideas. 

Proofreading

Today we worked on Editing and Vocabulary. I brought in a sheet with twenty words on it. The students had to copy each of the words twice on that sheet of paper. After they were done, I randomly called on a few students and asked them how to spell one of the words on their sheet. 
Though I thought this would be a good exercise, some of the words I had picked out were too simple which surprised me. While reading their previous work I noticed that most of their assignments had simple spelling mistakes. I resolved to add more difficult words next time. 
Once they were done, I handed two different worksheets, each telling a short story. The paragraphs had many grammar, spelling, punctuation mistakes. I instructed the students to correct each of these paragraphs. When they were done we went over them and I called on each student, asking them to tell me what was wrong with the paragraphs. 
After this, I had them write two paragraphs of their own, using Engeville as a backdrop. The catch was that they had to use 5 of the spelling words from their worksheet. The sheet contained words like "chocolate" and "alligator" and "entertainment". These stories turned out to be very cute and creative.

Ivey lane Elementary

My next visit at Ivey lane proved to me that the little town "Engville" was there to stay. This monday I brought in worksheets explaining simple and compound sentences. The teacher walked around and helped me manage the class as I handed out the worksheets and explained to the students what the in-class assignment was going to be. 
I realized it helped when I broke down everything into a list format. For example, I told the kids the first thing they should do, then the second, etc. Most of the kids tend to jump around and then get really confused. 
Once the kids had finished the worksheet, I asked for volunteers to read aloud each sentence and decide whether it was a compound sentence or a simple sentence. Every single kid wanted to volunteer! They love participating.
After the in class writing assignment I handed out writing prompts about the little town Engeville. There were five different writing prompts and the kids each got one random prompt they had to finish, using compound and simple sentences. 
After they were done some of the kids volunteered to share their stories.

Day One

I had never thought or dreamed I could teach creative writing to fourth grade students (or for that matter, any student). Since it was my first time ever, upon arriving at Ivey Lane Elementary on that first day, my nerves were almost beyond control. 
Looking back, I tried to reassess why I was feeling nervous, I mean I had prepared with a lesson, I had gone over all in-class assignments, and had a definitive back up plan in case my original plan backfired. Luckily, Laurie, a volunteer teacher, was there to assist me with coming up with the lesson plans. If all else failed, I really hoped Laurie could save the day. (Reader, she did many times). 

I finally just chalked it all up to nerves and stepped into the classroom with Laurie.

I don't know how many pairs of eyes immediately turned to me, but it was enough for my face to turn a deep shade of red. I forced the corners of my lips upwards and introduced myself (and I was reasonably proud of my tone- my voice didn't shake!)

The first thing I had the class do was talk to me about their favorite movie, The Incredibles. I had them define the main and secondary characters, the setting, list a few plot points on a map, the climax, and then the resolution. 
After we had gone over those definitions, I had the class get out a sheet of paper. After a few minutes papers rustling, all eyes were on my again. 

They were to create a Town, from scratch. 

I asked them to think of a name for their town, come up with a few key characters, and to draw out the actual town. Where was the school? Next to the fire station, park, or shopping plaza?

Characters were being made up, establishments and institutions were being devised as part of the town setting, and suddenly Engville came to life.

I then had the students pick a location on the town map to write about as well as creating one made up character. Everyone made up a teacher and a student of their own design. The assignment was to write about an interaction with their student and the teacher. 

At the end of the class period I collected their stories, delighted with Mr. Peanut, their imaginary teacher. 

I was relieved to find that I enjoyed my first day and the beginnings of Engville Elementary.