Blog Entry #6

There was a lot of diversity in my service-learning placement. I was in a school where it was a lower income area, and there was a lot of different ethnic diversity in the school. There was a student who was from Iraq and he doesn't speak very well English. He is still learning and trying to get to know the language. His first language was Arabic. He would act out a lot in class and would be loud, or not follow directions or instructions. The teacher wasn't really quite sure why we was doing this. She finally traced it back to English not being his first language. He wasn't quite understanding everything and he wasn't following directions or anything because he didn't know he was doing something that he wasn't supposed to be doing. He didn't understand so he was doing these things. So she started working one on one with him a lot more. She would help him and explain different things to him so that he could better understand.
The teacher does a lot of things to differentiate learning styles for the students. She will do visuals,  kinesthetic, and auditory. She also does a lot of different motions sort of like sign language. When she is teaching them science she does a lot of different motions for the different types of animals, or for different big words to remember. For cold-blooded animals the motion is the kids rub their arms like they are really cold. She has a lot of different ways to help the students with different learning styles.

Blog Entry #5

For an example of educating children with disabilities, there is a student in the class of my service learning placement who has disabilities. He will participate with the class and learn with the class for about half of the day. Part way through the day he will go to resource. He has learning disabilities but has the individual plan to help him best learn. Resource helps him to learn on his own and he gets one on one help from those teachers. But also being with his peers helps him to learn social skills, and make friends. IDEA has made it possible for him to get individual help but also to learn and interact with his peers.
I also saw the rehabilitation act of 1973 in my service learning placement. There is a student who has diabetes. The school and teacher accommodate to him with his disability. The teacher keeps treats and different things for him in the class room. He is allowed to go and get it whenever he needs it. He also has special permission and accommodations he is allowed to get up out of his seat whenever he needs to, to go to the hall and check everything he needs to. All of the other students have to ask for permission to get up and go and do different things, or even to go out in the hall. He has the accommodations he can just go as he pleases. Because of the rehabilitation act of 1973 he can go and do what he needs to do.

Blog Entry #4

The teacher in my service learning engages the learners a lot. When Ms. McPartland is describing an assignment or is giving the students directions she will have the students read along with her. When she was doing the reading section for the day she will have the students fill in the blanks. She will read a sentence and leave certain words out that the students have to fill in by saying.  This really helps to engage them and help them to really understand what they are doing. Ms. McPartland also has clothes pins that have names of each of the students. When they were doing math she would pull names out and have the students answer her questions. When she wants to hear from everyone she will just pull the names from the jar with their names on them, and then have them answer the questions. She will have the students work with their table partners at certain times. When she wants to have the students engaging or trying to understand the concept she will have them work together.
I feel like the teacher in my service learning always tries to engage the students. She is good about making sure they are all paying attention, no one has their heads down, and that everyone is understanding what they are doing. A time I think wasn't really engaging for the students is some of the math lessons I have been there for. Sometimes she just gets up there and isn't really engaging them. She just gets up there and starts talking, which I don't think will help them a ton because they are wanting to talk and engage with other students and the teacher too. I think to engage them more she could have them work together more, help each other, and come up with activities that will help them remember the math.