Blog 4 Observing and Interacting With Families of the Children in Your Setting

·         Whom you observed and interacted with in your setting during this module

      I had the opportunity to observe and interact with the teacher at Pablo Casals and her classroom. This is her first year to teach and she is working in AUSL School also known for turning around schools and making them more functional. This schools objective is to provide teacher training of classroom/school management. All the classrooms look similar in environment structure and expectations. For me was amazing to see that the behavior expectations in the entire school were the same all the students were standing in lines and being silent to move to one place to another. In addition, AUSL School requires students to go outside for recess and promote healthy food in the lunchroom. The classroom have posted classroom rules, chart of students’ behavior and promotes students to do better to receive a praise, chart of attendance to promote students to come every day and they would get praise, and teacher objectives of the days in all the subject areas.

      I used to observe this school before this AUSL took charge of Casals school and the changes are wonderful. The staff has a lot of respect towards students and students towards staff. I love the idea of having a uniform makes everything consistent plus the uniform is affordable. I am gratified of the respect that is fostered in the school towards everyone including parents. According to the host teacher they attend training before the school begins about students’ behavioral expectations, classroom environment expectations, teacher job expectations, and classroom management. Even the school organization is wonderful because they have staff outside the classroom to supervise the students in the playground, hallways, and around the school outside the premises to make sure students are safe and well behave at times.

      Chicago public schools give teachers the liberty to choose rules, classroom expectations, and the overall classroom authority. But I think that AUSL school train teachers to achieve the maximum in their classroom. I strongly believe that too much power or liberty for teachers to conduct in the classroom lack teacher responsibility to promote a learning environment. I considered that is essential to hold teachers accountable to provide students with a wonderful learning experience therefore teachers should be trained on how to provide those experiences to their students. Plus having the same behavior standards and curriculum make a smooth transitions between grades teacher the next school semester doesn't need to take time about their expectations because students already know what is expected from them making room for more learning opportunities. At last, respect, discipline, and being consistent is the key for students succeed at school and in our society.

·         Any special learning experiences you may have had or an experience that provided you with insight about children and families including advocacy efforts

      The insight that I gained during this observation is that being consistent, discipline, respect, and classroom structure is essential to foster a positive learning environment. I considered that would apply all these posters in the classroom, teacher approach, classroom expectations, and classroom consistent into my classroom. I am looking forward to learn more about this turn around school program. 

·         At least two insights gained from your observations of, and interactions and experiences with, children’s families regarding advocacy efforts and needs related to your area of interest within the field of early childhood

      One insight that I gain from this observations is that AUSL program is trying to make some changes in the students’ life by providing them with physical activities such as recess, and provide students with healthy food choices to promote a healthy life style. AUSL program really understand children as a whole and not just part (math, literacy, science, etc.,) I considered that is essential to understand that children are complex that they need much more than academic skills to be successful they need discipline, self-control, be active, eat healthy, and parents involvement in their education. The second, insight that I gained is that even the school is trying to promote healthy food choice at school parents are sending children to school with juice, candy, chips, or other poor food quality. Therefore, is essential to inform parents how vital is to provide students with healthy food to help them to growth healthy, to prevent diseases, and to foster life skills into their adulthood.