America Vs. Belize

Looking back on the past 4 months I can see just how much I have grown professionally and personally. Spending 10 weeks at Bradley Creek Elementary seems like ages ago now and I feel more like a Belizean then an American. My student teaching experience at Bradly Creek was absolutely wonderful. I was placed with an amazing partnership teach who taught me basically everything I know and the kids were wonderful. Teaching in the States, to me, was extremely stressful and busy. There were times that I would be at school until 7PM. I'm told that this gets easier and I could already see that the planning wasn't taking me as long as it did in the beginning if the semester. I always felt so overwhelmed teaching in America, the rules are so strict and so much pressure is put on the EOG's. There is not a lot of room to step outside the box it seems. Now I only had 10 weeks in the schools so I could be seeing this the totally wrong way. In Belize everything is so open which is a good thing and a bad thing. On one hand you have all of this room to be creative and plan basically what you want to teach but on the other hand many of the teachers don't have the training and are not aware of the instructional methods and tools that are available to them. Most of the teachers in Belize just have their high school diploma, and no special training to be a teacher. Also the lack of materials makes teaching a challenge especially when I have been used to having any type of material right there at my finger tips. I did manage to substitute certain things for materials and I was able to adjust my plans quite quickly so they would be appropriate with the lack of materials. All in all I think that no matter where you teach there are going to be challenges and you are doing to have your share of obstacles where ever you are. Kids are kids and they all learn differently. I think that it is great that American schools after so many different programs and help for kids with disabilities and gifted children. I like that in America kids participate in extra curricular activities and specials are offered. I think that elementary children are too young to sit in a room and take notes all day. I think they need to get out there and make personal connections with the material in order to make concrete connections to remember the content. I noticed such a difference in my Belizean kids when I had them do hands on activities. They seemed to even catch on faster then my American kids.