Demographics
I am entering my ninth year as a fourth-grade teacher in a Title I school. For several years, like many elementary school teachers across the nation, I taught all core subjects (reading, writing, math, science, and social science/history) to one class of students all year. Three years ago, my school transitioned to a departmentalized model for the fourth-grade students (fifth grade was already following this model). We have three fourth grade teachers and each teacher provides instruction in one tested core subject to the entire grade level, plus science (which is not a state tested subject in this grade level) to each respective homeroom. I recently completed my second year of teaching mathematics to the entire grade level. This past school year, I taught approximately 80 students who were broken up into three classes ranging from 23-30 students, with each class lasting about 80 minutes each day. Although my school is not as affected by transience (students who move from school to school) as some of the other schools in the district we do have notable spurts of transiency at certain times of the school year, which affect the students’ ability to learn concepts thoroughly.
Comments: