Use Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle to discuss your in-situ at Marysville Elementary School this week:

1.What happened? While at Marysville elementary school we helped the students make stop motion videos. The students were put into groups and there were two education program students with each group. The group I was with had lots of ideas that we were trying to put all into one video, which was an interesting challenge especially with the time constraints.

2. What was I thinking and feeling? I was very interested in the creation of the stop motion and was very happy to see the students were enjoying the process as much as I was and it was amazing to see how much the students already knew about the program we were using by changing settings I was unaware were available to us such as how fast the frames would play.

3. What was good and bad about the experience? Seeing how the students worked together was amazing along with watching how they included the student who had forgotten his desk pet at home was great. I also loved watching what ideas the students had and how they decided to execute those plans within the stop motion we made and in the stop motions of the other groups as well.

I had a hard time by having my allergies act up during the experience which made fully present and ready difficult, I have learned to be sure I always have my allergy relief with me even because I did not expect for a school to be where I would have that happen and it would have been so much better and easier to continue to be fully involved if I was able to take something for my allergies so that I could actually focus. I also had a hard time with having a partner in this assignment because I do struggle with allowing myself to fall to the side when someone more so or equally capable is also working a group.

4. What sense can you make of the situation? Having listened to the teacher and heard that these students are in the position that the grade 6 students are in in Cranbrook by being the oldest students in the school make a lot of sense on how mature the students were and how amazing their collaborative skills were and how well they planned and worked together on the stop motion.

5. What else could I have done? I do wish that I knew more about where the students wanted more help or that we had more time because I feel that the group would have enjoyed adding in more details or having had time to finish adding in sound effects throughout the video.

6. if it arose again, what could I do? If I was going back into the classroom to make stop motion videos, I would be sure to take my allergy relief with me in case I do start to have my allergies act up so that I can be fully present and engaged with the group. I would also want to push for us to complete the early planning stages quicker so that the group would have more time to do the filming and editing parts, which were the spots where we had run out of time on. I also would probably definitely try to push harder on myself to be sure that I am also equally trying to lead the group instead of falling back into a support roll to the other student teacher.

Image Alt Text: