Guest Student ECE Blogger: Kiersten

"For the past couple months, I have been co-teaching in a third grade classroom. In the classroom, we have two students with multiple learning disabilities. I have gotten to know one better than the other so I will talk about my interactions with one student for the most part.

The boy in third grade is one of the sweetest students in the classroom. He loves to talk to you about his newfound love for birds. One thing I have noticed about him is he loves to move and learns best that way. My mentor teacher and I often let him move while he’s in the classroom. He loves talking about his friends who are in the multisensory room with him for most of the day.

DEC (2015)

One of my favorite interactions with this student was when he came in after his mom dropped him off. I was asking him if he was excited to become a big brother and he replied, “I like birds.” He didn’t want to talk about babies; he wanted to talk about his newest favorite thing, which are birds. He told me about his favorite types of birds, which were robins and blue jays. He then told me the colors of the birds and where he sees them.

We don’t have him in class very long because he goes to the multi-sensory room for most of the day. When we do have him though he is very funny and full of stories. The time he is in the classroom is in the morning for about 15 minutes, before lunch for 5 minutes, after lunch for 5 minutes, and before they go home for another 15 minutes. During these times it’s a lot of classroom directions such as when the class should line up and how, and at the end of the day how to get their bags packed. This boy follows directions very well and never needs to be told more than twice, which is way better than the rest of the class. The only thing we have to tell him to be careful of how loud is he sometimes but if you just tell him to quiet done, he does it right away. Like I said before we never have to tell him again.

When he is in the classroom he gets along with everyone and he always plays with lots of kids at recess. At recess, he love to the swings, to run around, and to sit and watch people. One recess I sat with him and people watched. He had some interesting stories about his class earlier that day. Seeing this boy at recess or at the end of the day and hearing his stories is one of my favorite parts of my day. He is so sweet, funny, and loves to laugh with people."