Field Placement at Thurmont Middle School - November Observation #5

* For confidentiality purposes, a pseudonym will be provided for the observed student and mentor teacher *

     As the month of November was coming to a close, so was my field experience at Thurmont Middle School. My last visit of November took place on Thursday, November 17th from 1:30-2:30PM in a 7th-grade social studies class, and it was undoubtedly one of my most memorable visits of the entire semester. 

    On this day, Ms. G planned one of the more creative and advanced activities I had seen up until this point. As mentioned in the previous post, students were studying African kingdoms, and in the days leading up to this lesson, students were learning about the gold and salt trade that took place between African kingdoms during the 7th-14th centuries. For this lesson, students would have the opportunity to be the tax collectors/merchants and pretend as if they were trading gold and salt. To set this activity up, Ms. G split the class into 5 groups with 4-5 students in each group. One group, the tax collectors, sat in the middle of the classroom, while the other 4 groups, the taxpayers, sat around the outside of the classroom. The taxpayers would cut up pieces of paper (representing gold and salt) and begin to make trades with the tax collectors. The challenge was that as the taxpayers received more "payments," the amount required to trade would increase. In the weeks leading up to this lesson, Ms. G was so excited for me to see this lesson, however, inappropriate student behavior, unfortunately, spoiled the lesson. 

    The student I observed in class this day was named Brodie. In my last observation post, I mentioned a student named Justin, who wore the class clown mask largely due to bad influence from some of his classmates. Brodie is one of the students who encourage such bad behavior, and that behavior was on full display during this activity. Brodie, while not alone, ruined the integrity of the activity. Not only was he yelling and making inappropriate noises, but he was cheating by stealing other groups' gold and salt. Brodie's poor behavior ended up having a ripple effect across the class, as when Brodie started to steal from other groups, other students started to do the same which ended up causing Ms. G to stop the activity altogether. After the class was over, Ms. G was very disappointed and expressed her apologies to me because usually, the activity goes over very well. While obviously Brodie's behavior could not have been predicted, it got me thinking about what could have been done to potentially prevent it and what I could possibly do to support literacy development in a student like Brodie. 

    Depending on what your students are like, whole-class activities may not always be ideal, and end up being more counterproductive than productive. This was made evident here, especially for a student like Brodie who was clearly overwhelmed by the chaotic atmosphere of the class that day. For this reason, to support literacy development, I would break the groups down further. Instead of having 5 groups, I would split students into 2 groups on one side and 3 on the other (depending on how many students are in the class, this could be smaller). This way, there are fewer people for students to worry about or possibly feel inclined to interact with, which will hopefully better focus students' attention on the activity and learning objective, which will therefore better support students' literacy development. 

    To conclude, I want to say how thankful I am to Ms. G and her students. She welcomed me into her class with open arms, and introduced me to several instructional, behavioral, and literacy strategies, which I am confident will help me grow into the effective educator I strive to become. This experience was one that I will certainly not forget and will cherish as I continue my professional journey.