Thursday, April 2, 2009

Psych Reflection #3

For my final reflection I chose to observe my mentor teacher, Mrs. Bernfeld. During the practicum I was able to learn a lot from her and watching how she taught. Some of the things that she incorporated into her classroom and her teaching style were distributed practice of many concepts, she used a lot of levels of the Bloom taxonomy, and I believe that she helped the students achieve expectancy x values.
When Mrs. Bernfeld would teach a new topic or concept, she would always teach it as a unit so that the students could have plenty of time to learn it and practice their understanding of it. This helped any student who would get behind to have practice more and students that were advanced were able to help others or get better at what they had just learned. I found this to be a really important and helpful way for her students to really understand and feel comfortable, as well as allow her to assess their how much they were able to fully grasp.
As I mentioned above my mentor teacher was also very good at incorporating the aspects of Bloom’s taxonomy. They were many instances when the students were able to analyze and evaluate new scenarios and situations, then after they had really looked at the concept they were able to apply it to their knowledge that they already had. All of these things allowed the student to remember the new information better. L
Finally, I think that my teacher did an excellent job of helping her students to understand that if they really believe that they can do something, then they can. The students were always encouraged, no matter how far behind they were, to continue trying and to continue to do their best, because that was all she wanted from them. I think that this class was so successful because of this encouragement.
I’m sure that I am looking at my teacher through rose-colored glasses because I feel that she knows so much more than me, but I still truly believe that she was an excellent teacher. I’m sure there are things that she could improve on as any teacher could improve on something, but I think that for this particular class she has done an excellent job of teaching to their needs. I hope that I can incorporate these practices into my own teaching so that I can really help my students succeed.

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