Field Placement Symposium Paper

Jillian Ferguson
St. Thomas B. Ed. Program
January 19th, 2018
 My first field placement was an incredible learning experience, during which I

feel I grew as not only a teacher candidate, but as a person as well. I learned how to

manage a classroom, how to engage learners in lessons and how to cooperate with other

teachers in both a classroom and in a school community. I got to know my students;

what their strengths were, what they enjoyed doing, and areas where they needed a little

extra attention. I am so thankful that they truly made each and every day both exciting

and enjoyable.

While my placement was an exceptionally positive experience, one of the most

significant moments that transpired during my field placement was a very personal and

tragic accident that occurred in the life of one of my students. A boy in my grade two

class lost his father early this year, just before my first week of observation. This

incident was obviously traumatic for this student in particular, but greatly impacted the

lives of the other students in my class, as well as other students within the school. He had

been living with only his dad for most of his life, and his mother was not in the picture at

all. Therefore, this meant he had to move into his aunt’s home with his 3 older cousins.

Losing a parent is a traumatic incident for anyone to endure, but I cannot imagine having

to do it at the age of 7.

As mentioned above, this did not only affect this student in particular, but many

of the students in my class as well. We had a counselor come in and talk to our class

about what had happened to this student’s father, along with the fact that he had

previously lived with only his dad, and that he would now be going to live with some

other family members. It was such a complex concept to explain to group of grade 2

students and watching someone do that was a definite learning experience. Some
students were very shocked at the fact that he had only had one parent, and could not

imagine having to live without their mom and their dad, just like most people. My

mentor teacher used that moment however to have the class talk about the different types

of families there are in today’s society. We also talked a lot about being considerate of

what might be going on in other people’s live that we do not know about, which actually

related a lot to the guidance theme of kindness which they had been working on.

Throughout this I learned how to turn concerns of my students into topics of class

discussion that seemed to make everyone feel a little better.

Such a devastating loss can result in triggering some behavioral problems in

children, so I prepared myself for what might be to come from my student. I learned that

I needed to be especially mindful of him and to watch for certain body language or

behaviors that could indicate how he was feeling. There were definitely some days were

I could tell he seemed down or upset, or times when he would get overly worked up

about an issue that normally would not bother him. Whenever I noticed this, I tried to

have a conversation with him, whether it was about how his day was going or how his

night went, in an attempt to get to the root of the problem. Some days it took longer than

others, but for the most part he always turned his day around. He was a highly motivated

and strong academic student and this attitude for success stuck with him throughout his

hard time, which is really inspiring to think of a 7 year old being able to do that.

While I realize this incident is not an ordinary classroom event, or related to any

professional development activities that took place during the course of my placement, I

feel that it helped me develop skills and witness the skills in other teaching professionals

that are essential to being an effective teacher. Knowing what may be going on in
students’ lives and affecting them in the classroom is an important part of classroom

management. This incident truly revealed the human-side of the profession, and proved

that sometimes there are much more important things than outcomes and test scores.

Unfortunately, there will always be students in our classrooms going through hard times

and dealing with instances in their personal lives that impact their school life as well. As

teachers, we need to be able to help students work through these times and try to be a

positive influence on their lives.