So today was my second day of service learning and I am somewhat disappointed.
When I first arrived I was discovered the Special Education classroom empty.
After finding the students in their English class I set about helping them with their poetry assignment.
They were working on finding poetic devices in popular songs. This was easy and I moved from group to group explaining some of the terms and helping them locate examples. After about ten minutes of rotating through groups, it was time for the students to head to math class.
Once they got to class, they worked on a new chapter of math while I sat observing for the next 50 minutes. By then of the period I was annoyed that I had sat there for that long, doing nothing.
The students themselves were unruly and a few had to changes seats. One student had his mother called for being inappropriate. The class period seemed to be full of interruptions and students wandering from desk to desk.
There was some level of authority but it seemed to me that the students had no respect for it. When asked to settle down they talked back and ignored their instructor. Both teachers in the room had difficultly keeping 14 students under control.
I guess this was a learning experience because I learned how differently I would handle classroom disruptions. Also, ff I had a college student coming to work in my class, I would have them go around and help students instead of having them sit there. Hopefully next week will be better.
That sounds like a disappointing day. Like you said if you had college students coming into your school, you would think they would take advantage of the help offered. I'm curious what grade this was because I noticed that their disruptiveness and disrespect varies through different grade levels that I have worked with so far there.
ReplyDeleteThat was my whole entire experience with that group of students but in the English classroom. I sit there for about an hour next to the special ed teacher. She doesn't really do anything either. I sit with her and listen to the teacher talk about poetry, verbs, and sentence structure. I feel like an 8th grader wanting to fall asleep in class..
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