Hello, my name is Katy Dellinger and I am a 7th grade Exceptional Children's Teacher at Lincolnton Middle School. I have almost completed my second year of teaching. I graduated from Appalachian State University with a Bachelor's Degree in Special Education: General Curriculum K-12 in the spring of 2008. The school that I teach at is a Title One school and there are many pros and cons to teaching at this school. First of all, since we are funded by the federal government we have access to a lot of materials. I am hoping that one day we will all have smart boards or promethean boards in our rooms to teach with. We also have the privilege of having a literacy coach who comes in and helps us teach our kids. She is great at showing teachers how to differentiate instruction and she is also willing to come into our classes and co-teach with us. Title One schools such as ours also have Title One teachers. We have a Title One reading and math teacher. These teachers are very helpful in providing more intense instruction to a smaller group of students who struggle with something specific. The downside to teaching at a Title One school is that TEST SCORES MATTER, which I'm sure has become the case almost everywhere. Currently, we are the AYP situation where we have to make it this year or we will be in corrective action. So, this can be frustrating at times and it also puts a lot of pressure on both kids, parents, administration, and of course teachers!
So far in my two years of teaching, I have taught math inclusion, language arts inclusion, math resource, and language arts resource. I have had the privilege of using promethean boards in both my math inclusion and language arts inclusion classes. I have been trained in Corrective Reading, Language!, and Reading Foundations. For the past two years I have taught Language! in my Language Arts resource classes.
The school that I work at would be considered an "inner city" school. We would be considered a melting pot because of all of the different ethnic groups that we serve. Because of this there are many different cultures that I have learned about and what is important to one group of people may not be important to another group. Also, some parents are very much involved in their child's education while others do not think education is that important. Pretty much, I am excited about this class because I think that I could definitely apply what I learn to my everyday teaching.
Katy Dellinger
Comments (1)
Katy,
I understand what you mean about the pros and cons of being at a Title One school. For my first ten years of teaching, I was at two schools consisting of mainly solid middle-class families. Since I've been in pre-K, however, I have been at a Title One school. You are correct in saying that the resources that Title One can bring into your school are indeed beneficial. Until my current principal started letting us have a say in what we wanted to keep or get rid of that was paid for with Title One money, I had no idea that so much money was being funneled our way or what it was used for.
Also, my school has to "make the grade" this year in order to get off the watch list. It has been amazing to see the amount of progress that has been made by people working together to do what is best for the students. While I realize that all that work will not have gone to waste if the school does not make AYP, it will be disheartening to see what will happen if all that effort and increased achievement that HAS taken place is not given validation.
Clyde Rice
Posted by Clyde Rice | June 6, 2010 11:09 AM
Posted on June 6, 2010 11:09