Everyone has been so supportive. There are so many fun events in the school to be a part of!
Where were you before you decided to join this community? I’ ve only worked in schools for six months before. I was at the Vancouver School Board on-call, so I was able to go to so many different public schools around the city, which was a really great experience, and before that, I worked in healthcare, which was very different.
Where were you born, and what is something you would like to share about your childhood? I was born in Ontario. I had a pet bird, and she lived until she was 13 years old. Her name was Poco, and she wasn’ t named after Port Coquitlam, but was actually named after Pocahontas.
What is your favourite place on campus? It would be the courtyard because it is so sunny, and I know that there will be flowers and leaves on the trees soon that’ ll make it really pretty. It’ s where I do most of my supervision, and so there are a lot of students and a lot of activity going on that makes it really cheerful. It’ s just gorgeous and nice to be in the centre of campus.
What do you do in your free time? In my free time, I like to ski in the winter and play hockey. I’ ve also been curling for a little over a year, and I’ ve even seen Ms. Kempel at the rink! In the summer, I like to hike and camp. I like to do multi-day hikes if I can and camp in the backcountry.
We hope these questions provided helpful insight into Ms. Ferguson. Now you can understand that even if someone is new, adjusting to a community, although challenging, can be less difficult if others are helping. It is important to keep spirits up along the way, and make sure we can to learn and grow together in this wonderful school community.
INTERVIEW WITH MS. LIANG
By Aavya Kaliray, Andrea Tan and Isla Sims. Grade 5.
This is our interview with Ms. Liang. Thank you for giving your precious time and energy to our classrooms with us. We really appreciate that. We hope you enjoyed it and like teaching and spending your time with us to make this an amazing interview. Thank You!
What do you like about teaching? I like the students ' curiosity and the excitement to learn and play each day. How long have you taught at Crofton? I have been teaching for a very long time.( 14 years)
Have you always taught JK? The first year I was in the grade 1 and 2 classrooms, and then after that, I’ ve taught JK.
What is your favourite subject to teach and why? Math, because in JK it is really playful with lots of materials related to the themes that we’ re learning about, so students find it really fun.
Have you been on any field trips this year? No, we have not done any. Unfortunately, in JK, we can not go on field trips, but we do bring speakers and visitors in. In the fall, we had a visitor from OWL rehabilitation society bring an owl and a hawk for us to see, learn about and ask questions.
What do you find most rewarding when you are with your students? When they learn new skills. I see them persisting for a while, like learning to write their name or draw something, or start to spell.
What does a typical day look like in your classroom? We’ re very busy. We start with something called soft start centres, where the teachers set up activities on the tables, then students choose and switch where they would like to play. This allows the students to warm up for the day. Then we usually start with a morning meeting and our first lesson. It might be a literacy activity or a math activity, and then students go to the tables and do something related to the lesson. It might be more centres like math, or maybe it’ s a writing activity. Then we have morning break, just like the Junior School. The JK‘ s play on the JK Terrace. We do more lessons, that’ s usually when we have our music block, and we always have PE before lunch, so the girls can get hungry. After, we have lunch in our classroom at the table, so each class eats together. Next, they go back out and play, but at lunch, the students can choose to play on the terrace or the mini woods. Then we usually come in, and students get a choice. They can have a nap, rest or go to quiet centres at the tables where there are quiet activities. We end our day with something called big centres or mashup, where the C and H class can mix and do centres and bigger activities like art projects and dramatic play. The day ends with an afternoon meeting on the carpet before the students go home.
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