Student Description

At my practicum site, I will be teaching in the afternoon class. The class has a block schedule of writing, reading, and social studies. For the past few weeks I’ve been getting to know these students in particular and have found them to be really fun and at times extremely entertaining. As a class, they are fairly laid back, but, of course, have their moments of being too noisy and allow themselves to get off task.
Out of 27 students, there are 18 girls and only 9 boys. The class as a whole is marginally diverse. There are 21 students labeled as White, 3 students labeled as Hispanic and 2 students are labeled as Asian/Pacific Island. Much like the demographics of the middle school as a whole, the majority of the classes are primarily of a Caucasian background. Although I have my own assumptions as to why the school is primarily White, I would prefer to not make those generalizations here without the proper information.
This class is unique in that 11 of the students are considered TAG. This middle school has what are known as classes with “TAG clusters.” These students were put into the same class for a reason. This way the teacher can tailor his class to more advanced students and still keep the “lower level“ students engaged in what they are learning. Personally, I think this class works great together as a whole and if I didn’t have the information in front of me I wouldn’t be able to tell you who the TAG students were and which students are not.
There is only one student with an IEP in this class. She was placed in this classroom only four weeks ago. Previously she was in the ’special needs’ classroom because she is labeled as student with aspergers syndrome. It’s unfortunate that this student came into the classroom half way through the first quarter because it appears to have made it more difficult for her to fit in with the other students. The other students have not been informed of her condition which can be helpful and difficult at times.
This class has taught me a lot and it has nothing to do with their ethnic diversity. I think the biggest learning experience any teacher can have is to work with a classroom that is heavily dominated by TAG students. These students keep you on your toes and force you to be prepared for any question because they are more likely to ask you questions that broaden the subject you are teaching. It has also been helpful having an IEP student in this class because it has taught me to be prepared for anything.
I think as teachers we need to be prepared for anything to happen because in the long run something unexpected is going to happen. We are going to have to learn to work with a diverse group of students, dealing with ethnicity and learning styles. Having the opportunity to work with these students has been very helpful to me.