February 23, 2026 – March 13, 2026
From the ending of February to the start of Spring Break in March, I completed my first three-week practicum at Prince Rupert Middle School. My practicum placement was in a grade seven class full of students I know from previous years and taught by my old grade eight French teacher. I found myself very lucky to be placed in the class because the practicum teacher is a very good teacher and a good person. That helped ease a lot of my anxieties. In my practicum I got to teach math and social studies. For math I covered Order of Operations (BEDMAS), this was my most taught class. Socials were different as I only had time to teach it twice. For this class all the grade seven classes are coming up on something they call the “ancient civilization walk.” This is when the grade seven classes all pick and ancient civilization unique to their class like, ancient Japan, Mayan civilization, ancient Greece, and ancient Tsimshian civilization. The students then research and construct models in their classrooms so that the entire school can walk through each room as part of the ancient civilization walk. The class I was in chose ancient Rome, so I taught two classes about Rome and how to properly research online. I had a lot of fun teaching this class with both subjects, but sure enough I found some challenges that I did not expect.
The first challenge I ran into was space for me to sit and work. My practicum teacher tried to make a spot for me, but in his defence, he has the smallest classroom in the school outside of LST and over twenty years’ worth of supplies filling the room. I ended up having a chair to sit on close to his desk, and if I needed to write anything I would grab a spare textbook to use a hard surface to write on paper. When it came to teaching, I feel I had an easier time than others may have. This is because I have been lucky enough to have worked in schools as an EA for three years and as an uncertified TTOC for four years in this district. This allowed me to know most of the students from years prior, so we are not complete strangers. On top of that my practicum teacher has over twenty years’ experience with teaching so he has incredible control of the room.
One of my biggest challenges I ran into almost every time I taught was time management. I would find time slipping away faster than expected and often get caught by the bell for lunch. If I did catch the time before the bell, it was usually only a couple minutes before the bell, not leaving a lot of time for a wrap-up and clean up time. Another thing I found challenging was ensuring I spent enough time with each student who needed my help. My practicum teacher let me know in after school meetings that sometimes a student would have their hand up for 5-10 minutes waiting for my help. They would eventually put their hand down before I would notice due to helping other students. Finally, the last major thing I noticed near the end of the practicum was ensuring students knew how to show their work in math. While I feel that I did a good job getting the information across for how to work with order of operations (BEDMAS) I did not realize that the students needed to be taught how to show their work. I would write operations on the front board and have the students follow along. Then I would show them how to solve and show work. What I did not do is make sure they understood how to show their work or why it is important.
For my Ah-ha moments I feel I could write a 10-page essay on so I will instead limit it to a few that really stuck out. To start off I found myself lucky to be in this classroom as I found the practicum teacher aligns with my view of teaching and with what I am learning in the Bachelor of Education Course. First off, no phones allowed in the classroom, some teachers do allow phones in the room as they see the benefit to them as a tool. Both my practicum teacher and I see them as more of a distraction and he tries to model that by not using his phone at all during class time. If he needs to, he sometimes has a chat with the students on why as a working adult and father, he will need his phone on occasion but will never allow it to get in the way of education. Another thing that surprised me was how he starts every math class. He asks the students to grab these thin whiteboards that have paper inside them. The paper is a times table chart from 0-12 with blank spaces. The students have roughly five minutes to fill in the times tables using recall to ensure that they know their times tables. From what I saw is that some of the students who had a harder time with math would be proud of themselves when they would make more progress on the chart than previous days. I too used these whiteboards at the start of my math lessons and would get the students to flip them over to the blank side to work on BEDMAS. When I would teach order of operations, I would demonstrate a question on the board and have them watch. Then I would ask them to follow along with their white boards and solve the operations as a group. Finally, I would write a question on the board and have them solve it themselves and show me their whiteboards when completed.
Overall, I had an incredible experience with this practicum. My coaching teacher is incredibly kind while being firm with his class. I learned many new tips and tricks on assessment and classroom management. From whiteboards to recall practices in multiple subjects to how to explicit instruction and time management. This practicum has helped to make me feel that this is indeed the right career for me and I cannot wait for my future practicums.