My introduction to Scoil Mhuire was unique in
that I began just as the school was making its final preparations for a musical
to celebrate its 60th anniversary.
With all the commotion surrounding the show, the teachers were very
enthusiastic about me helping as much as possible. I eagerly accepted and, in
addition to taking on some backstage responsibilities during the musical, I
have been teaching lessons each week and supervising lunch/recess. I have even
started a pen pal system with my practicum class from last semester!
I will discuss the musical and lessons later
on, but first, a proper introduction to my school is in order! Scoil Mhuire
(pronounced Skol Vera) is a small all-girls school in Cork city. The students
come from all over the county as Scoil Mhuire is the only private all-girls
school in the city. I am working with 5th class (the Irish equivalent to 5th grade), which is made up of 13
motivated, creative and incredibly chatty students.
Scoil Mhuire’s small size combined with the
fact that it is Catholic and all-girls means that my experience teaching at
Scoil Mhuire has been very different than my experiences in Boston Public
Schools. One of the most pronounced differences I have observed is the style of
teaching. Students have textbooks for each subject and I have found that most
lessons here are taught directly from these books. The lessons tend to involve
a short introduction to a new topic, which my CT reads aloud from the book,
followed by some short exercises. I have found this approach to differ greatly
from my experiences in Boston.
The learning in my classroom is also very
focused on homework. A typical maths lesson, for example, begins with a review
of the previous night’s homework, followed by a brief introduction of the next
topic in relation to the next homework assignment, and ends with my CT going
over the first problem of the homework to ensure that everyone understands.
This reliance on homework is something I have not experienced in an elementary
classroom before. Students in my classroom at Scoil Mhuire always complete
their homework and almost every one of them brings the books back to school the
next day, making this style of teaching possible. However, I believe placing so
much emphasis on homework could have negative results, particularly as it
prevents teachers from addressing student misunderstandings. Additionally,
Scoil Mhuire’s students are privileged in that they have the time and resources
to complete their homework each night. This is certainly not true of all schools
and makes me think about my experience in Edison K-8 in Brighton last semester,
in which only a handful of students completed their homework each day. I look
forward to talking to my teacher about homework to find out her reasoning
behind it as well as what happens when students do not complete it.
In addition to being centered on books and
homework, most of the work students do in my CT’s class is silent and
independent. This can be quite a challenge as the girls in my class LOVE to
talk and are constantly sharing anecdotes, asking questions, and naming
celebrities I somehow resemble. I am interested to see what happens when, in
some of my upcoming lessons, I ask the students to work in groups to complete
their assignment. I have not seen them work in this way before so I expect I
will have to give a thorough introduction to the dynamics of group work.
Another quality that differentiates Scoil
Mhuire from the schools I have worked at in Boston is its strong sense of
community, which became clear to me during the school musical. As I mentioned
previously, Scoil Mhuire was in the midst of a production of Practically
Perfect Mary (a remake of Mary Poppins) when I arrived. On February 6th the entire school came together to
perform in front of a full audience of family and graduates. It was quite the
production; students had been rehearsing for months and staff had been planning
and developing the play since the summer. I felt very lucky to be involved in
the show because it allowed me to see how Scoil Mhuire worked. There was a real
sense of camaraderie throughout the show and students were all supportive of
each other. I saw older students playing with and helping younger students,
revealing the family-like environment the school creates. Additionally, it
became clear that all of the staff and students not only know each other’s
names, but also know personal information about one another and talk as
friends. There is a real sense of unity at Scoil Mhuire that I have not always
felt as strongly in my BPS placements.
Although Scoil Mhuire is very different to my
other practicum placements, it is not unlike other schools I have experienced.
For the past year I have occasionally substituted in St. Paul School, a small
Catholic school in Wellesley, MA. St Paul School and Scoil Mhuire are very
similar in terms of their sense of community and the emphasis they place on
books. For this reason, I think some of Scoil Mhuire’s traits come from its
religious nature and its size. Interestingly, Scoil Mhuire is most similar to
the school I attended when I lived in England. The sense of community fostered
by assemblies and whole school activities was a defining quality of my school
in England and is also true of Scoil Mhuire. Additionally, both schools
encourage personal relationships between students and teachers and have a laid
back approach to management. These similarities are likely due to the influence
of the several English teachers working at Scoil Mhuire, particularly the
Headmistress. In light of this, my experience teaching at Scoil Mhuire might
not be a quintessentially Irish experience. That said, it is certainly a
wonderful experience and I look forward to going each day to learn, teach, and
hear which American movie star I look like that day!
Katie, I loved reading your post and I'm glad that you're having such a great experience at your school! I have had very similar reactions to my school while comparing it to BPS schools as you did in comparing yours. One of the things that I connected to while reading your post was a lack of group work in class. I have seen some partner work; however, I have yet to see group work unless a teacher is working with a select group of students on improving their skills. I found this to be odd as well because my students are so well-behaved and I think that they would benefit greatly from group collaboration. I am curious as to why this is the case and I want to try implementing group work into the lessons that I will teach at the end of the semester to see how the students react to this type of structure.
ReplyDeleteAnother point that you made that I fully agree with is the sense of community that you get at your school. My school in Bath, England has an amazingly strong sense of community. All of the students support each other in good times and in bad and all of the teachers know the personal details of every student and teacher, which helps to increase this sense of mutual support. I am glad to hear that you experience this sense of community in your school as well because since my school is so small (only 20 kids per grade) I thought that it might just be like this due to having such a small amount of students. However, in talking to other student teachers in my program, they feel this sense of community in their schools as well and I am curious as to why this seems to be lacking in American schools. Overall, I loved hearing about your time in Ireland and I can't wait to read more about it!