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Below are my responses to case studies we read in class. From reading these case studies, I learned how difficult it is to make decisions in schools regarding holidays that will be inclusive for every student as well as how social media can enhance and disrupt relationships both inside and outside the classroom.

Are Middleboro’s attempts to be inclusive to cultural minorities fair to everyone? Why or why not?

I understand that the teachers of Middleboro Elementary School are trying to do the right thing by limiting the celebration of Halloween to be inclusive of other cultures in their classroom; however, by doing so, they are unintentionally being unfair to the Canadian children who look forward to their traditions of Halloween. Halloween is an exciting day for some children where they get to dress up in costumes, carve pumpkins, go trick-or-treating, and tell scary stories. Instead of taking away the celebration of Halloween in the classroom, I think a possible way for teachers to be inclusive of everyone in their classroom could be to teach their students the origins of Halloween and the different ways it is celebrated in other cultures. For example, Mexico celebrates the Day of the Dead where they celebrate life and death and honour those who have passed on with colorful skulls and skeletons. As another example, this case study discusses the Filipino celebration of All Saints Day where families honour their loved ones who have passed away which falls the day after Halloween. I understand the teachers of Middleboro Elementary School were trying to be sensitive to this tradition by limiting the celebration of Halloween, but I think it’s the perfect opportunity to teach students how other cultures celebrate Halloween.

How might social media both enhance and disrupt relationships inside and outside the classroom?

In regards to social media, there are both positives and negatives that can arise when used inside the classroom and outside the classroom. On the positive side, we can see in the case study how social media can enhance relationships inside the classroom by allowing the students and the teacher a platform to discuss common interests. In the case study, the teacher had a blog on schooner building and the students who were interested in boats were able to follow his blog which gave them the opportunity to discuss this common interest and build their relationship. In addition, social media can enhance relationships outside the classroom by providing a platform where the students can connect and communicate with one another. As an example, students can use social media to communicate outside of class to arrange a time to get together or if they missed class they can easily reach out to a classmate and find out what the homework is. Although there are ways that social media enhances relationships, the use of social media can also disrupt relationships. For example, kids these days are so dependent on their phones to communicate with each other that it could lead to a loss of vital social skills since most would rather text their friends than engage in face-to-face conversations with them. As a result, they miss out on learning non-verbal communication skills such as eye contact, tone, posture, space between one another, etc., which are crucial skills that help create positive relationships (Fuller, 2021). Although social media comes with negatives, it is something that is predominant in our world today and will not be going away anytime soon; therefore, we need to teach kids how to use it responsibly as opposed to banning them from using social media.

References

Fuller, J, R. (2021, December 15). The impact of social media use on social skills. New York Behavioral Health. Retrieved January 19, 2022, from https://www.newyorkbehavioralhealth.com/the-impact-of-social-media-use-on-social-skills/

I have chosen to showcase 2 lesson plans and 1 unit plan on my e-portfolio. I have chosen these specific plans because I believe they demonstrate how much I have improved on creating lesson plans. The “Elements of Story” lesson plan is the first lesson plan I ever created, the “Sight Word Bingo” lesson plan is one that I created and used while on practicum, and the “All About Me” unit plan is the first unit plan I ever created.

The PDF below is the scholarly article for teacher education for social justice. The reading for this topic was one of the the most difficult reading I have ever encountered but it taught me an important lesson which is we as teachers cannot truly be an advocate for social justice until we are aware of our own privilege. The activity I had my classmates engage with was a simple but powerful way to show what privilege is. I have attached the write-up for this activity below.

“For the activity, I’m going to hand out a piece of paper to everyone and I’ll explain what to do once everyone has a piece of paper.” 

“Okay now that everyone has a piece of paper, I want you to crumple it up” (move the bin to the front of the room). “The game is simple, you all represent the country’s population and everyone in the country has a chance to become wealthy and move into the upper class.” “To move into the upper class, all you have to do is throw your wadded-up paper into the bin while sitting in your seat.” 

“As you saw, the closer you were to the bin, the better your odds.” “This is what privilege looks like.” “Did you notice how the only people who complained about fairness were in the back of the room?” “By contrast, people in the front of the room were less likely to be aware of the privilege they were born into.” “All they can see is 10 feet between them and their goal.” 

“Now, your job as students who are receiving an education, is to be aware of your privilege and use this particular privilege called “education” to do your best to achieve great things, all the while advocating for those in the rows behind you.”

Click the link below to view a presentation that myself and 3 classmates created to expand our knowledge on teacher education for social justice.

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1a7Mzz-ka8xXr8Rfd1E5wRolM7HWjWDauSbIg_HEbdG8/edit#slide=id.p

The professional standards for BC educators are in place to ensure we as teachers do our best to advocate for student needs and create a safe and inclusive learning environment. The professional standards for BC educators are:

1. Educators value the success of all students. Educators care for students and act in their best interests.
2. Educators act ethically and maintain the integrity, credibility and reputation of the profession.
3. Educators understand and apply knowledge of student growth and development.
4. Educators value the involvement and support of parents, guardians, families and communities in schools.
5. Educators implement effective planning, instruction, assessment and reporting practices to create respectful, inclusive environments for student learning and development.
6. Educators demonstrate a broad knowledge base and an understanding of areas they teach.
7. Educators engage in professional learning.
8. Educators contribute to the profession.
9. Educators respect and value the history of First Nations, Inuit and Metis in Canada and the impact of the past on the present and the future. Educators contribute towards truth, reconciliation and healing. Educators foster a deeper understanding of ways of knowing and being, histories, and cultures of First Nations, Inuit and Metis.

Click the link below to be redirected to the professional standards for BC educators document.

https://www2.gov.bc.ca/assets/gov/education/kindergarten-to-grade-12/teach/teacher-regulation/standards-for-educators/edu_standards.pdf

The BC Curriculum has been a huge resource for me in my journey to becoming an Elementary School teacher. The layout of the BC curriculum is clear and easy to follow which made the process of creating lesson plans and unit plans very straightforward for myself. The BC Curriculum displays the core competencies which are communicating, thinking, and personal and social as well as big ideas, curricular competency standards, and content learning standards for grade K-12 and for each subject. The content section was extremely helpful in identifying what students are expected to learn as well as the “Elaborations” which shows you further details and examples of what a lesson plan should entail. Click the link below to be redirected to the BC Curriculum.

https://curriculum.gov.bc.ca

Noon hour supervisor at Pacific Way Elementary School:

During the school year of 2020-2021, I was fortunate to have the opportunity to work as a noon hour supervisor at Pacific Way Elementary School. Prior to working as a noon hour supervisor, I had a narrow mindset regarding what grade I wanted to teach in the future but this experience allowed me to work with every grade from Kindergarten to Grade 7 which caused me to become more open-minded and made me realize I would be thrilled to teach any grade in the future. Similar to my experiences in the classroom, my experiences as a noon hour supervisor also solidified that I was going down the right career path and additionally opened my mind to teaching other grades.

Classroom volunteering at Pacific Way Elementary School:

During the school year of 2019-2020, I was fortunate to have the opportunity to volunteer in a grade 2/3 classroom. By this point in my life, I knew I wanted to become a teacher one day but my experiences in the classroom inspired me to want to learn more styles of teaching. When I was working with a student who found it difficult moving forward from auditory instructions, I brought in a white board as a visual. This experience caused me to learn new tools for teaching diverse students and gave me great fulfillment as I saw the students suddenly grasp a concept that had been difficult. This was an important time in my educational journey as it made me want to learn more ways to adapt to student’s diverse learning needs as well as solidified that I was going down the right career path.

Click the link below to be redirected to my LinkedIn profile.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/carly-sutherland-97547b107/

My name is Carly Sutherland and I was born and raised in Tsawwassen, British Columbia. I always knew that one day I would have a career that was focused on helping people but becoming a teacher was surprisingly not on my mind until I was in my second year of University. As I went through Elementary School and High School, I was certain that I would go to Nursing school after graduating from High School; however, this quickly changed when I found out the summer before my first year of University that the sight of someone else bleeding causes me to faint. Upon this realization about myself, I enrolled myself in business courses at Thompson Rivers University in 2016. After my first year of taking business courses, and failing 2 of them, I knew that business was not the right career path for me and I switched into the Bachelor of Arts. I enrolled myself into a wide variety of courses to figure out what interested me and I began to gravitate towards Sociology courses. After I found out that Sociology interested me, I decided to take the Myers-Briggs Personality test and my results were ENFJ (extraverted, intuitive, feeling, judging) and the career that best matched this personality was teaching. This was the light-bulb moment for me where I felt that I had finally figured out the career I wanted. A career in teaching meant I get to help people and be around kids and I began my journey towards this wonderful job. After attaining 90 credits of post-secondary studies, I applied to the education program at Thompson Rivers University and I am currently finishing up my first year of the Bachelor of Education program.

January 2019, I began volunteering in School District No.73. I was a Teaching Assistant in a grade 2/3 class and a noon hour supervisor at Pacific Way Elementary School. During my time in the grade 2/3 classroom, I helped students with their work one on one and in small groups, I read books with students, I assisted during Library block and Gym block, and I marked the students work during recess and assisted the teacher’s prep work. During my time as a noon hour supervisor, I made sure the students were playing safe and helped the students with any issues they encountered. The students I supervised during this time ranged from kindergarten to grade 7.

When I am not working or doing homework, I am enjoying time with my family, friends, on a walk or hike, baking, reading a book, or doing a puzzle; the simple things in life that make me happy.