Reflection: My Special Education Field Experience

Introduction

My field experience for EDUC 2130 was done at Rabun County Elementary STEM camp. The camp and its instructors had the goal of increasing the student’s awareness, knowledge, and interest in STEM. The student age groups I worked with went from kindergarten to 5th grade which gave me a wide range of behavioral, moral, and developmental stages to observe. The teachers running the program used many of the techniques we have discussed such as whole class discussions, small groups, and observational learning.

Field Experience Site: Rabun County Elementary School STEM camp

Rabun County Elementary is located in north Georgia along the border of South Carolina and North Carolina. According to the U.S. Department of Education (2015) the

school is 81% Caucasian 16% Hispanic 2% mixed race and 1% African American, Asian or American Indian and I found this to be representative of my time there. The class was close to a 50/50 split between male and female. Each week I worked with 4 teachers and approximately 40-50 students. The first week was Pre-K and Kindergarten Second week was first and second grade then finally third and fourth grade. There were several children who had learning disabilities or physical disabilities that required assistance of varying degrees. I personally worked with a young girl with CP that needed assistance physically completing some of the projects. I was encouraged to let her do as much as she could and would only intervene if absolutely necessary. There were also students in each age group were more advanced than most of the class, teachers encouraged them to help others in all age groups.
The focus of the camp was Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) and it was the first year the school had attempted it. The students, teachers and parents were all excited and motivated to have the program be a success. It was set up to provide in class instruction and projects throughout the week then culminate with field trip related to what they had learned. The teachers also added in an art component to round out the student’s activities and provide a mental break or refocus. In my opinion it was a very successful program and according the teachers I worked with they will be offering it again next year.

My field Experience: Connections to Educational Psychology
Each age group I worked with had a focus for their science learning for the week they were in camp.

The Pre-K and Kindergarten class studied habitats of various animals and insects. They were given examples and tough how the animals made their homes. The students built a bird house as their project and as something to take home to remind them of what they learned. Finally they went on a field trip to Legoland where they explored and built “habitats” for their families and the Lego people. The first and second grade class learned about marine life and the ocean. They built shoe box dioramas of coral reefs and created art projects depicting sea life as well as learning new facts about the ocean. The students got to go to the Aquarium for their field trip. Finally the third and fourth graders studied the rain forests and their ecosystems. The students built rainforest models and terrariums along with small group discussions on different ideas human intervention and conservation. They finished their week at the zoo where they studied different rainforest inhabitants in

person.
Most of my time was spent working with students while they built, painted and designed their various projects related to the lesson of the day. It gave me the opportunity to work closely with the students and understand some of their individual challenges. By providing encouragement and support I was able to positively affect a few of the children that really needed it. As an outsider to the community I was able to view the children more as they were my expectations when working with them weren’t limited or tinted rose. Unfortunately the “small town” nature of the community did affect what the teachers expected because of familial history or town gossip, which did affect students.
The younger students all had whole class discussions lead by the teachers. This allowed and encouraged the students to share what they knew already and to ask questions about what they now learned. This was used as either recap or way to transition to the next topic. To start the day the teacher would ask a question about what they learned the previous day, after the students were engaged the teacher would ask a question concerning that day’s topic to see what ideas they had as to how it relates. From there the teacher would begin the lesson correcting errors and showing how things were related. For example discussing the habitats of reptiles then using a group discussion to examine the mammals that live in the same ecosystem and how they differed and how they were similar in how they build their habitats.
For the third, fourth, and fifth grade students the teachers regularly broke them into small groups to discuss how humans are affecting the rain forests and what can or should be done to conserve them. I noticed that the teachers didn’t always assign a leader to the groups letting the students decide who should be in charge instead. This didn’t work as well as when the teacher assigned a leader, because the students would pick the popular student or who they were friends with over the smarter or more capable student. However no matter how they picked a leader for the group the results did lead to positive discussion, facilitated learning (Kitchen, 2012) and they were able to transfer the knowledge to the rest of the class when they shared.
Most of my time was spent with the students working on their projects and providing an art portion to tie into their STEM learning. The teachers and I used modeling and observational learning to provide the students a greater opportunity to succeed (Groenendijk , Janssen , Rijlaarsdam , van den Bergh, 2013 ). The teacher and I would show the student what we expected them to create and depending on the project how much freedom they would have. We then would let the students begin to work on them and offer guidance when they needed it. We also offered encouragement to motivate the students when they were doing well. The student with CP had difficulty physically doing some of the projects however I was instructed to refrain from helping too much and instead we offered praise. She responded well and didn’t grow frustrated, and found a way to complete projects. As a side effect it seemed to encourage her fellow students from growing frustrated, the students in the other classes doing the same project did get frustrated when they made mistakes. This was a similar result of on vicarious learning that was found in the work done by Hall, Fox, Willard, Goldsmith, Emerson, Owen, Davis, and Porcia(1971).
The students were motivated by the teachers in multiple ways. The knowledge was presented in multiple ways to keep the students engaged. The teachers also did a great job of maintaining the students’ curiosity by giving examples and feedback. The projects that I work on with the students were another way to motivate them as the students regarded them as part art class and part “fun time”. The teachers used the field trip planned each week as a reinforcer using the Premack principle (Wiseman, Hunt, 2013, pg. 57).
There were also a few students that were much more advanced than their peers. They tended to finish projects quickly and easily grasp the subject matter. One of these advanced students in the kindergarten class would immediately begin to help the others once she was done with her own work. Another of the students was labeled to me as disruptive however I believe he was just bored. He would finish first and when not given other instruction he would end up disrupting the rest of the class. He might have done better if he was with the age group ahead of him as he in a different zone of proximal development than the others his age or if the teachers ignored their preconceptions of him and gave him more challenging work than the other students.
Reflections, Implications and Conclusions
The Rabun Elementary STEM camp was a great setting to observe how different educational psychology theories and educational tools are used on a daily basis.

As we went through each chapter of our book it would remind me of situations I already observed or would see that week. The more I learned about the educational theories I was able to see certain situations in a new light and it highlighted the differences I saw in the ages groups and different classes. The use of different motivation methods that were utilized by the teachers was great; most of them I didn’t realize were motivators until later and the one motivator I thought I understood was a reinforcer. I did see how the teacher’s preconceived ideas about students because of the type of community they are affected the students most of the time not positively. Some students were quickly disciplined and others were allowed to get away with similar offences with no comment all because of the relationship the teachers had with the families involved or the town gossip about them. I could see that this was negatively reinforcing the bad behaviors in both students. This made me aware of checking my own preconceived ideas and trying to judge the children based on what I have learned about how students learn. Overall I do believe the goals of the STEM camp were met and this has taught me to use multiple approaches to keep students engaged and

motivated.