Observations 12-8

I finally observed today!! It was P.S 4 school in Queens and I loved it! The school was beautiful and the staff was super friendly! I observed a 6th grade class of students that all are emotionally disturbed. There were 3 teachers in the classroom but the main teacher gave me a lot of information about her career goals and how she manages her class and how her social studies curriculum is run. There was no lesson given today but the teacher showed me the teacher book that she uses and explained that there is a new system this year. The students are given a text book but no workbook. Instead the teacher is given a cd that she can use to print out worksheets for the students if necessary. Also in each chapter, the text book shows connections from social studies to other subjects and aspects of life such as the economy and literacy which better helps the students understand the concepts and build on prior knowledge. Some worksheets that the teacher had used were entitled "A Geographer's World" and had matching and fill in the blanks with geography terms. The teacher explained that Social Studies was her favorite subject to teach and with the new curriculum it is more enjoyable.