Journal #1

As I get close to my very first field work assignment, there are many things I am anticipating greatly and I am really looking forward to. I am currently working as an assistant preschool teacher at Manhattan Day School on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, and it is there that I plan to carry out my field work this semester. I plan to spend the first ten hours observing the twelve students in my own classroom who are all two years old. I then plan on spending another ten hours observing my fellow co-worker's four year old kindergarten classroom. This year will be my second year teaching in a toddler class, however I am excited to have the opportunity to observe them with a more critical eye than I typically would during my daily teaching experience. The toddlers come into the classroom in the beginning of the year with such naivete and yet it is pretty amazing to watch how they grow and are able to assert their independence as the year progresses. I am also very eager to observe their social interactions and watch how they learn to pick up on social cues from their teachers and fellow classmates. Furthermore, I am eager to interact with and observe the four year old children particularly because I lack the experience of working directly with this age. Last school year I was given the chance to substitute as the head teacher in a four and five year old class for one day. I was amazed at how drastically mature these children were in comparison to my toddler students. Being two or three years older brought forth so many new capabilities and challenges for these students and I greatly enjoyed getting to know them and teaching them according to their advanced level. I am really looking forward to beginning my field work and being able to observe the individual and group differences within each of the two classrooms.