Field Journal 2.4

Rachel Lorenzo

10/11/11

LAE 4530.001

Tara Payor & Nina Graham

Field Journal 2.4

Last Friday when I visited Sickles I walked into my host teacher's conference period as she was conversing with a student about how to improve her thesis and rough draft for a paper she was writing. The topic was on the negative impact the media has on women's body image. 

 

The student seemed lost for a beginning and the host teacher worked through it, giving her suggestions for what to write. Ms. Rich even told her she could copy what she was suggesting verbatim. I was surprised at this, I would expect teachers wouldn't want students to simply copy what they say (even though it's just the start and she'll be on her own for the rest of course). She may have felt that this student needed a push in the right direction for this paper though. Her doing this made me rethink how I view myself as a teacher - being secretive with the "answers" and trying to catch students doing something right or wrong to see if they really "know" what they're doing. While I don't want to be this kind of teacher, I know many teachers can feel this way. I want to be more comfortable with giving my students as much guidance as possible but I don't want to cross the line of spoon-feeding them everything. It seems that once I know what objectives I want to focus on with students and what will get them there, I will know what I can give and what I need to challenge them more on.

Some of the suggestions she gave were to research different doctors' opinions on eating disorders, talk about the different kinds, include binge eating as it is not often thought of as an eating disorder, etc. I felt her suggestions helped to open the student's mind about what she could write on the paper whereas before it seemed she felt she could not come up with anything because she did not even begun a rough thesis statement.

 

Later on Ms. Rich and I planned out what would be happening the next few weeks. She suddenly remembered she had to grade some tests and shyly asked if I wouldn't mind grading them. I happily set out on the task and I feel it was a great experience for me. While the test was multiple choice, I got a feel for how tiresome it can be to grade so many tests at once. They were only for three periods as well because it was for the sophomores, but there were 46 questions. By the end of the first batch I was no longer having the fun with it as I had initially. After the second batch I was tired, and by the third I had memorized most of the answers in order. Even with my help, Ms. Rich said she was swamped with papers and tests to grade over the weekend. She was extremely grateful that I had helped her and I was glad to have been able to. I now have a true appreciation about what it will be like to have to work outside of work hours although I will be sure to employ as many helping hands whenever possible!

To finalize the day I ate with the teachers in the "restuarant" that Chef runs with his students. We were served by the students as if we were in a real restuarant with bills, waiters, the works. I got salad, bread, the lasagna I ordered, and a desert all for five dollars! The food was homemade and delicious! It was such a nice experience. Aside from the food I got to sit with the teachers Ms. Rich normally eat with and interact with them. They were very nice and talked casually about vacations, their husbands, their informal religious practices, and other non-school related things. It was nice to see a friendly atmosphere where they were relaxed, probably something they need and look forward to in the day.