Fun First day of Fieldwork..Theories and developmental differences

    My first opportunity to do field work, was with a first grade class and a special needs class of first, second and third graders. It was exciting to see how the classrooms operated and be part of a "real" teaching environment. In the first grade classroom I was able to work one on one with the students as they read their assigned books to me.  It was neat to see how great of readers they were. There weren't major developmental differences on their reading levels, some read a little faster than others but all of them were amazing readers. They paused at periods, read with excitement when they saw exclamation points and didn't have to use their fingers to keep their place on the page.
   When I was in the special needs class there were a lot of developmental differences between the kids.  It might have had a little to do with the mixed ages but I think also with the different disabilities they have.  The teacher had two aides and myself and was able to split the kids up according to their abilities to give them a little more personalized learning.
  In both classroom settings I could see a lot of the Behaviorism Theory in place.  The kids were very well behaved and seemed to know what was expected out of them.  In the special needs class, the teacher colored in smiley faces on each child's desk when they finished a task or received a frowny face if they weren't behaving appropriately. The teacher explained to me that if they had frowny faces they missed five minutes of their fun activity and the end of the day. The kids seemed to  react to this form of reward system in a positive way.
   I was able to spend about twenty minutes at lunch time, with the Special needs teacher.  She told me that her teaching is pretty organized in what the kids are studying each day.  She said that they do well when things are structured and expected.  She follows the schedule of each day and that helps to have things run more smoothly.  It was such a fun day! All of the kids seemed so excited to be at school and ready to learn. I was so impressed with the teachers and how organized and effective their classrooms were set up.  Their classrooms seemed to be a great environment for learning.