Prompt 1: Shor

Last Thursday was my first day being a volunteer at an elementary school. As I found a small tight parking spot after fifteen minutes I was extremely relieved that I had left much earlier than I anticipated. As I was walking around the building to the large blue doors I noticed how crammed the school was. On a tiny area with no parking whatsoever I saw many teachers and parents walking from blocks away. The school was much different than I thought, it was quite larger than any elementary school I had been to, especially in comparison to mine as a kid; one story small school.

As I entered the building I immediately saw many children, without hesitation they began to question who I was. I didn't expect any of the kids to come up to me but to my surprise they were very comfortable and because of that I immediately felt the same. The classroom in which I volunteered was covered in posters, rules, and subjects. At the beginning of each class the poster that read "Rules" was repeated. There was not one space of the wall left over with half of the classroom filled with books and every table cluttered. Both the students and the teacher seemed very welcoming and extremely nice. It was definitely a new feeling hearing the children call me Ms. Alysa and ask for help if their teacher was too busy. I was surprised that there were only ten children in the class, although some of the kids were absent I was expecting at least twenty to twenty five.

One important aspect in the school I visited was NECAPP scores and it seemed to me that they would teach anyway possible to raise them. The teacher was upset about the teaching method but was in a bind, she taught straight from the book without using any of her own words. She was reading a script over and over again to these children who seemed bored out of their minds. Ira Shor would agree that the students should create or incorporate their own ideas into the syllabus and not be taught through a system to raise test scores. These students had no way of questioning anything, they were taught to listen along rather than to be curious. It's obvious to me these kids are curious, for example when I first walked in they immediately asked who I was. Children hold qualities of questioning and when the school is failing to allow it, it causes for memorization and not learning. The teacher told me the only way to keep their attention is what she called "cookie time". This was used so that depending on how much they completed for that day, if enough, they could receive a cookie before they left. I realized how although the teacher had no control on how she could teach she at least created a reward for the students to work for. Hopefully this particular teacher could change the way she taught like Shor stated, by taking the students opinions into account.

After I had left the school I was ready to go back. I want to hopefully help these children and the teacher as much as possible. I was so excited when a received an email the next day from the teacher telling me that the children asked when I was coming back. That gave me more encouragement to get back there! Can't wait for next Thursday!
~Alysa