My Weekly Report and Reflection 6 (Week 13)

For Week 13, the main purpose of the lesson was to reflect on our placements. Since physical education is my major, I sometimes have anxiety when thinking about teaching mathematics. Although I am extremely confident in my mathematical ability and have tutored many students in math in the past, I sometimes feel as though I will not have enough experience as a math educator once my career begins. In relative terms, I feel like I will be less prepared than my classmates because they have placements in Mathematics, whereas my current placement is in Health and Physical Education subjects. I will not have experience actually teaching math – as a professional – until I am in my final teaching block. This makes me apprehensive about whether or not I will have the experience necessary to be a professional Mathematics teacher in a secondary school setting. Physical education is a far different domain than mathematics, so I am nervous about having to teach both, when I have only focused mainly on the former domain.

One advantage to teaching both Mathematics and Health and Physical Education is that I think it will help be integrate both curriculums. Teaching an integrated curriculum is a major task in 21^st century education and is extremely beneficial for learners today. Math and physical activity may seem to be very distinct from each other, but I see many similarities between the two subject matters. For instance, pathways and directions (special awareness) in the gymnasium relates to coordinates and shapes in math. Furthermore, sport and physical activity rely heavily upon statistics, which is a mathematical course. Keeping records and quantifying physical achievements is how athletes progress in sport, which is dependent on math and statistics. Therefore, I can see statistics – among other math courses – being incorporated in physical education courses, and vice-versa.

It was really satisfying to be able to interview Alyssa and have her do the same for me. Talking about my placement was much needed, and I really enjoyed discussing it with Alyssa and the rest of the class. My placement did not go as well as I had anticipated, and my associate teacher had much more negative feedback than I expected. Instead of criticizing me during the teaching block and allowing me to work on my areas that need improvement each day, she gave me all the feedback at the end on the final day. She presented me with the feedback sheet, which had one line of what I did well – my lessons and activities. The rest of the page was entirely things that I need to improve on, and my associate teacher even wrote sideways to fit it all on the page. This was very surprising, and even somewhat overwhelming, to me since she had not discussed any of it with me beforehand. This not only made me feel overwhelmed with advice, but also was a bit of a shot to my confidence in my teaching abilities. Mainly, the teacher said that I need to work on my classroom management skills. I found her critique to be a bit redundant and unnecessary, as I think classroom management is something that I need to work on and believe it will come with experience. Therefore, I think my associate teacher could have just reminded me to work on my classroom management skills, rather than drowning me in negative comments about how poorly I am doing at the moment. I think it would have been much more beneficial if she had been a little more positive in her review, given the fact that it is only my first placement.

Nonetheless, the rest of my classmates and Joyce were extremely helpful and supporting. They reassured me that some teachers can be enormously nit-picky and expect perfection. Joyce also mentioned that if the problem escalated to the point that I could not withstand it, I could request a transfer. I am not considering this at the moment, but it is good to know for the future, in the case that I change my mind. Mainly, it is really great to know that I have an amazing group of colleagues and a terrific, caring professor in my mathematics class that I know I can count on to make me feel better! I hope to encounter teaching partners like this in the future as a mathematical educator!