Week 5

For my internship at Sunset Heights, there was no school Monday and Tuesday of this week, so the younger students were well-rested and ready to learn on Wednesday when they returned.

Unfortunately, this didn't last through Thursday and Friday.

In the first grade writing class, the students began to discuss topics--how to come up with a topic and recognize one in context. The kids seemed to enjoy talking about dogs. In fact, dogs were the only topic they were able to focus on. Dogs and puppies. After multiple behavioral issues, the teachers Mrs. B and Ms. R had to reassign seats three separate times.

Finally, on Friday, the students were given an open-ended prompt: write about your favorite toy. The teachers did not help them with their writing at all, and the kids were given half an hour to draw a picture and write a few sentences about their toy. They struggled with this quite a bit. One girl claimed she didn't know how to spell and wrote random letters with no spacing in between. Another student ignored the prompt and simply wrote: "I like to go in my backyard." One boy turned his paper in after the full thirty minutes with only the words teddy bear written down (and misspelled). The students made their dissatisfaction with the assignment clear; the room sounded like Mrs. B was pulling teeth.

However, I also began my research with high school students this week, and they were much more eager to cooperate. I interviewed students from BASIS Peoria about their personal high school experience, the value of their education, and how they perceived BASIS culture. Surprisingly, very few had negative reviews on the school itself, but almost everyone I interviewed expressed a desire to better manage their time and be more social. The overall vibe from the BASIS students: nerdy, but confident in their nerdiness.