Practicum Week 12/13 (Recap)

What a busy and amazing week!

First of all, I cannot believe next week is the last week of practicum.  

I already told everyone this week that I don't want to talk about leaving until next week because I get really sentimental.  

So let's get this out and open.  I am a cryer and will probably be in semi-tears next week so I need to remind myself to not put on too much make up otherwise I'll end up with racoon eyes! =p

Anyways, I had an awesome week and here are the notable events of the week!

On Monday, we went to visit TD bank and got to see who worked at the bank and what the bank does to help our community.  The kids were super excited to see where all the money goes and had so many questions!  From small buttons to how the locks in the bank actually worked! We learned some top secret stuff!

Then we started our mini-unit on community helpers because a lot of things came up and I could not extend the unit but they sure knew a lot of different community helpers.  We also reinforced how they can be peacemakers for our community and how they help the people and creatures in our community.  I love all the pictures they drew and I took a picture of some to show you.  

We learned about firefighters, doctors, and teachers!  They were surprised to learn that teachers actually go to school early (sometimes having meetings at 8am - before some of them are even awake!) and that we also stay after school sometimes until late to plan lessons and organize for the next day!  We teachers sure are hardworking! ;) 

I also got a chance to finish the report cards with my SA.  I had the opportunity to write all their introductions and complete all their performance based assessments which are based on all my unit's PLO's and objectives. Of course my SA overlooked everything as they are official documents.  The only thing remaining is to input them into the system which we will have to wait until next week.  We need to be ok'd by our principal before we proceed! :) 

As mentioned before, my SA and I attended a Canucks for Kid's workshop earlier in the year focused on Fin's Friend Character Education Program.  Well, we won a free visit from Fin! Yay! 

Fin came to our school on Friday and the kids were super excited about meeting Fin!  It was so much fun and Fin told us that it is okay to be weird!  I love that!  This workshop inspired me to create my peacemaker and peacebreaker unit.  I told the students that not everyone gets a chance to meet Fin so we are very lucky to have Fin in our classroom.  We will be studying more about character education throughout the year! 

Lastly, I was invited by Jenny Chin Petersen, the principal at Florence Nightingale Elementary to go to Gina Wong's award celebration in recognition of her excellence in teaching! 

Gina Wong was my mentor teacher before I got into the UBC Education program and I had the opportunity to volunteer in her kindergarten classroom for about a year!  I am so happy and excited for her!  I don't know how she manages to balance everything out in her life because she is constantly working on projects, mentoring students, teaching students, completing degrees, giving workshops, and travelling! She's incredibly inspirational and aspiring!  I remember her telling me two years ago that teaching kindergarten is the fun and easy part and that's why she loves it!  And I believe all her other projects and studies are the parts that keep her challenged and on top of her game! Congratulations once again Gina! :) 

That's all for now!  Enjoy the pictures. :) 

I have something exciting in the works to show you that is in collaboration with the kids in my class and in relation to our peacemaker unit! I'll let you know more soon!

Take care everyone! Time to apply for my teacher card and jobs soon!

Fin's Friend came to visit our classroom!
Here's Fin and I!  He tried to eat me! :)
The kids were beyond excited and had so much fun!
Yay!!! 

My SA read the book 'It's okay to be different!' by Todd Parr while Fin enthusiastically re-enacted the pictures from the book!  The kids were laughing and engaged!

Fin is signing photographs for all the kids!  He signed extras! :) 

Here is our peaceful corner of the classroom!
We have been talking a lot about being peacemakers and not peace breakers.
We have a special project coming up!  More details on this later. 

Fin and Me! :) 

We are walking to a bank!  On Monday, we visited bank and got to see who works there and what they do there. 

Inside the big secret vault! 

Inside the secret vault!  The kids had a lot of fun flipping the empty locks and learning about the organization of the locks!  They had so many questions!

Mr. Graeme read us a lovely book about a boy who is trying to identify his pet! 

We started a mini unit on community helpers!
We read a book about community helpers,
identified different community helpers through identification of hats and drew about our favourite community helpers.
I made sure to emphasize that all genders (female/male) could be that community helper. 

I took some pictures of what the children drew!  They are so cute!

My build-a-bear fire fighter!
We read through parts of this book and looked at the pictures.
Then we brainstormed what we know and learned about fire fighters!

I love them so much! So cute!

Doctors!  My build-a-bear doctor with it's own medical kit! 

The kids made their own version of a medical kit!

Cute!  Here's the doctor bear helping the little bear who is not feeling well.

Congratulations to Gina Wong, my mentor for winning the 2012 Prime Minister's Award for Teaching Excellence! 

I'm so happy for you Gina because you are seriously an inspirational teacher!
She always tells me that if I keep working hard I'll get to where she is now too!
Well, I don't know if I can ever compare to you Gina!

Wow! :) 

Indeed these are true but she is even more than these words!