"What do you do?" "I'm a 4th grade teacher!" "Aw, how lovely!"
"What do you do?" "I teach middle school math" "Oh, no. I'm so sorry."
Middle school has this heavy connotation that I was ready to face. Why were teachers and parents always so hesitant to talk about the difficult stages of middle school? I remember loving my middle school teachers, curriculum, and experience. It's the gossipping girls and bullying boys who make this stage difficult. However, I was shocked by the culture here at the Intermediate School in NZ.
Quick Facts about my school:
My class has 28 students, although there are just under 300 students total.
Backgrounds range from a variety of demographics including Maori, Asian, and European cultures.
The school has 3 different "Blocks" / buildings, each containing 3-4 classrooms
Every Friday there is a School Assembly and Block Assembly.
School Assembly: beginning with the national anthem and led by the school leaders, the school as a whole learns about current events, orchestrates school-wide events (Literature Book competition), delivers awards, the opportunities are endless!
Block Assembly: students can share announcements, awards (class, school, or national), accomplishments (sports wins, concert performances, etc), and talents! We had a few girls volunteer to play the ukulele and the piano.
Students are extremely independent and extraordinary learners.
The school is on a term system:
Term 1: January/February - April (Summer)
Term 2: April - July (Fall)
Term 3: July - September (Winter)
Term 4: October - December (Spring)
I have two students with ASD, two students with behavior issues, and 28 reasons to wake up in the morning
Also, we have a few class pets. 1 rat, 1 bird, and 2 turtles.
My purpose of this experience is to obtain extensive, international experience implementing and teaching technology. I've had plenty of experience in primary grades, but Years 7/8, in a foreign country were going to be my new challenge. The class has a class set of Chromebooks, but only about a 1/2 class set of iPads. However, this class also uses the school's IT room on a weekly basis for differentiated programs students can access during Independent Learning (IL).
A few things I'm looking forward to teaching/implementing in 1 / 3 :
Vlogging: every Friday, students write to the teacher and reflect on their week; however, this video opportunity allows students to verbally reflect on their week through natural discussion
Google Form: To assess what students liked or didn't know how to use, I had them complete a Google Form while my host teacher and I were away on a course
QR Scavenger Hunt: in order to broaden the student's knowledge of America to more than "Trump", I decided to create a QR Scavenger hunt for them to guess and identify different facts about different states in the USA
Kahoot: After attending Body Worlds, I will create a Kahoot testing their comprehension and growth of knowledge of the human body
Algorithms: I thought it would be engaging to teach an unplugged activity where the students must create an algorithm of an everyday activity (their paper route, directions to school, after school routine, etc) in algorithms form after a brief lesson
Hour of Code: Many of the students are interested in gaming, but no idea how the behind the scenes coding works. This is a one hour program that teaches students step-by-step how to code.
Scratch/Snap: While I'm familiar with Scratch, the coding games for beginners, the IT guy here introduced me to Snap! which is the older, intermediate version.
Ted Talk, Kid President: I love Ted Talks and Kid President. Always good to hear some motivating advice and answers to bigger questions. My goal is to challenge these students to research a topic they want to learn about and then present on why it's important and others should be aware.
iMovie/Screencastify: Utilizing these video programs, through vlogging or other video performances, are common here at school. However, many of the Year 7 students are unaware how to use these programs. I've offered a few beginner crash courses before each tech time helping prepare those who need the extra tutorials.
Canva: This program is extremely applicable as we have the Adidas Fun Run coming up at the end of the term! In order to continue the fundraising efforts and awareness, the students will be creating Canva ads for the school's Fun Run.
eBooks v Books: These digital natives are not as familiar with researching in books versus using the internet and ebooks. I want to include a mini lesson on how important it is to include research from various resources and materials.
Explain Everything/Prezi: The students will then be putting together a presentation on either their choice of state or the issue they completed their Ted Talk/Kid President research on. Since not everyone has an iPad, students will be able to use this or Prezi to present their findings.
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