I love that this class gives me the opportunity to write about what I’m most passionate about: differentiating socially, emotionally, and behaviorally. I try to be a very innovative and understanding teacher, although I know I often fall short. To properly address this topic, I think I will just share a story. It’s a long story full of ups and downs, but it is an important story. It is my story. It’s the story of my first three years of teaching. It feels like I’ve spent much of the master’s program thus far writing about how to differentiate academically. I will start from the beginning of my career. During my first year of teaching I was thrown into a Title I school with a class full of very high needs. I walked into my classroom on the first day to twenty-nine incredible students. These students were from five different countries, two of them had autism and six were reading significantly below grade level. I student taught in a school that was very different from this school. Throughout my student teaching experience, I had no english language learners, I had no special education students and we only had two students reading slightly below grade level. Jewell’s classes prepared me for …show more content…
The community meeting was a meeting that we had first thing each morning. We sat in a circle on the ground and students answered three questions: How are you feeling, what is your goal for today, and who can help you reach your goal? This meeting provided time for students to reflect on how they were feeling and it also gave them hope for the future of their day. It also built community in our classroom because students were able identify someone who could help them reach their goal. After Implementing the calm corner and the community meeting, my classroom environment changed completely. My first year of teaching ended, and I learned so