1. May 19-23
1. English In what way does my classroom work come into play at work?
--It’s become apparent to me that repetition is absolutely essential in getting the children to
remember what they’ve learned. In my classroom experience--let’s take English for example--I
always dreaded writing down vocabulary words, their definitions, and example sentences
employing them. However, now watching the 2nd-graders as they learn about silent letters (like
the k in “know” or the g in “sign”), I now realize how vital reiteration is in committing something
to long-term memory. When teaching kids something new, such as these silent letters, we make
the children say them out loud; they hear the teacher saying them; they write them down; we
expose them to as many different forms of the word as possible and make them repeat them
numerous in order to aid them in remembering these tedious spelling rules.
2. Social Studies To what degree have you utilized your debate skills at your internship site?
Describe.
--Children can be extremely stubborn to say the least. They ask innumerable questions and no
matter my answer, they always seem to have even more questions up their sleeves. Although I
don’t necessarily debate with the children themselves, I find myself debating with myself so as
to answer the kids’ questions satisfactorily, while also getting to the point so that we can move
on with the lesson. I’ve observed that it’s hard sometimes when one certain child will be
struggling with the subject matter and the teacher has to decide whether or not it’s worth it to
stop the entire class to better explain the material one sole kid. I think that teachers are
constantly in debate with themselves over issues just like, or similar to, this.
May 26-30
1. Physical Education/Health Describe how an employee’s health and safety are ensured at
your site. Look at the physical and environmental nature of the space(s) in which you
work.
--The employees’ health is certainly a concern for the school, both for moral and liability
reasons. However, apart from the general regulations of the school, not many rules are in place
to ensure their safety because there aren’t many dangerous obstacles that could pose a threat
to them. The children at the school, on the other hand, are held to different standards because
they are constantly traveling all over the school, engaging in different activities, all with differing
levels of safety/danger. Thus, they have to follow different rules than the teachers to ensure
they are kept safe. For example, during physical education, the students are required to wear
sneakers; otherwise, they can’t participate in the class for that day. There is no running allowed
in the hallways because the floors are slippery and the kids could fall and get hurt. Additionally,
during recess, there are many lunch aids and other teachers to make sure the kids are as safe
as possible.
2. Science Provide one example of how you used problem-solving and/or critical thinking at
your internship this week.
--As the weather gets nicer and nicer, the children get antsy to go outside. So my teacher and
mentor, Mrs. Friedman, decided to take our 2nd grade class out on a “weathering” walk, where
the children were free to share any observations they notice regarding signs of weathering, and,
together, we hypothesize about what could have caused such changes to occur. Naturally, the
children did a lot more asking than answering, but it was my job to get them to attempt to
answer their own questions. I had to use my problem-solving skills to get the kids to come up
with ideas of their own, by prodding them with questions and giving them other statements to
think about. Together, as a class, we came up with many different observations and possible
reasons as to why they are the way they are, not only using my own critical thinking skills in the

2. process, but also instilling the same type of skills in the kids so that they could come up with
answers for themselves.
June 2-6
1. Science Reflecting on one of the projects you have observed or worked on, can you make
predictions or provide alternate methods to complete this project.
I’ve been spending a lot of time reading individually with the children in my class and then
testing them on the material they had just read. Although I find that this is effective in forcing
them to recall details and reflect upon/process what they have just read, it is also not as
effective as it could be because the children only recall the information they thought to be
interesting or significant rather than the entire story as a whole. I think it’d be a good idea to
have kids keep a chart on them so that every time they read, they can record a summary, their
thoughts on the book, predictions they might have, and have other guiding questions to prompt
them to make the most use of their texts. This would hopefully make them better readers in the
future.
2. Foreign Language To what degree did you use/hear/interpret the foreign language you
studied at THS during your internship? Explain.
Knowing a foreign language is crucial in the education field. Whether or not you can speak
fluently, comprehension is necessary in more endeavors than one might think. At recess, the
younger children who are foreign often have a hard time communicating, which may not seem
too bad, but if they were to get hurt or were feeling sick and were not able to tell an adult about
it because of the language barrier, a lot of problems might ensue. Personally, I have yet to
experience a language issue first-hand, but I have seen it happen during free time amongst kids
from other classrooms. The more languages you know, the better!