Britan Wallace

1st & 2nd grade Classrooms - 22 children; ages 6-8

• Assisted lead teachers with classroom management and lesson plan implementation.
• Provided behavioral and academic intervention for children overcoming personal challenges.
• Supported individual students by answering questions, allowing teachers to focus on classroom instruction.
• Encouraged responsibility by guiding children to care for their personal belongings and school materials.
• Scaffolded emergent skills to help students acquire personal knowledge from classroom activities and experiences.
• Cultivated critical thinking by encouraging students to consider the consequences of their words and actions before making choices that could affect others.
• Offered emotional reassurance and regulation techniques to children experiencing frustration with learning.
• Assisted in conflict resolution by supporting self-advocacy during discussions between peers.

Nutrition Program - up to 66 children; Grades K-8

• Received and stored stock from the school district's Nutrition Services Center.
• Provided healthy food options, allowing children to select meals for breakfast and lunch.
• Encouraged self-awareness by guiding students to assess their needs for food, water, and bathroom breaks.
• Supported students in developing responsibility, teamwork, and practical life skills through cleaning tasks.
• Reinforced the school's philosophy of stewardship: caring for oneself, others, and shared spaces.

Alaska Reads Act - 17 children above grade-level, 8 children below grade-level, 4 children at-risk; Grades K-3

• Focused on phonemic awareness and language arts by practicing isolated components in small-group settings.
• Designed play-based activities to enhance literacy skill acquisition.
• Strengthened students' confidence in reading accuracy, fluency, and comprehension.

Outdoor, Physical Education - up to 66 children; Grades K-8

• Promoted physical health and mental well-being through outdoor exercise and socialization.
• Balanced organized games and free play to practice cooperation and prosocial behaviors.
• Nurtured students' self-esteem by fostering an “I Can” mindset through appropriate risk-taking on playground equipment and in natural landscapes.

• Deepened familiarity with seasonal changes by revisiting locations in the boreal forest throughout the year.
• Facilitated unstructured play within clear safety guidelines, nurturing curiosity and calculated risk-taking.
• Supported students' growth and resilience by minimizing interference in their play while offering verbal guidance to overcome physical discomfort, emotional challenges, and social conflicts.
• Empowered children to navigate fears by listening to their bodies, making safe choices, and recognizing dangers they could encounter in nature.
• Celebrated unexpected discoveries in the woods to strengthen relationships and connections with the environment.

• Established a team-focused environment by creating Community Agreements centered on safety, commitment, respect, accountability, and fun.
• Participated in rotating weekly jobs to prepare the garden for work shifts.
• Applied cartography skills to maintain a thriving garden spanning nearly 1,200 bed feet.
• Identified plant families (19 vegetables) to optimize crop rotation and harvesting.
• Designed organized systems and documented weekly crop data for planting, grooming, harvesting, and sales.
• Harvested, washed, packed, and sold fresh produce weekly at the South Side Farmers' Market.
• Selected recipes and prepared meals onsite using our fresh garden produce.
• Investigated the root causes of food insecurity and identified local resources to address it.
• Nurtured relationships with Elders from Golden Towers to care for their garden boxes.
• Crafted adaptive lesson plans that encouraged exploration, conservation, interdependence, and calculated risk-taking for ThrivAlaska Preschool field trips and Garden Camp for school-age children.
• Organized and hosted a community-wide Garden Party to advocate for more educational opportunities in school gardens and green spaces across Fairbanks.
• Program graduates gained knowledge in urban agriculture, food justice, intergenerational education, marketing, and culinary skills, equipping them with confidence, work ethic, and leadership skills for future employment.

• Stabilized the preschool classroom by maintaining consistent child-to-teacher ratios upon reopening after COVID-19 closures, providing reliable educational childcare programs for the UAF campus, while supporting the emotional adjustment of 16 children, many of whom were experiencing a classroom setting for the first time.
• Nurtured a collaborative classroom community where students celebrated individuality, embraced diversity, and contributed to the Symbiotic Learning Cycle among students, teachers, and families.
• Adapted the classroom and curriculum around thematic units of study tied to seasonal changes, months, and holidays.
• Created strong relationships with each child through consistent, personalized engagement to assist with their development of social-emotional awareness, including respecting boundaries, making responsible decisions, practicing positive self-talk, and expressing empathy.
• Encouraged prosocial behaviors by modeling and providing opportunities for sharing, taking turns, following instructions, taking responsibility and initiative, offering motivation, and cultivating patience.

ECE 214: Infant and Toddler Curriculum and Learning Environments

• Studied principles rooted in a Philosophy of Respect, creating a Reggio-Emilia/Montessori-inspired curriculum.
• Organized weekly home visits with a pre-toddler, documenting her interactions with activities to deepen understanding of this developmental stage.

ECE 240: Inclusion of Children with Special Needs

• Arranged family interviews to support a child with special needs in their home and school environments.
• Conducted observations and developmental screenings using the Ages & Stages Questionnaire (ASQ-3) to identify strengths and areas for growth.
• Coordinated personalized learning opportunities to reinforce goals established during parent-teacher conferences.

ECE 235: Screening, Assessing, and Recording Data

• Practiced implementing research-based early childhood assessment tools (ASQ, HELP, DECA).
• Analyzed a child's artwork and conversations to capture key developmental phases.
• Supported the relationship between the student's family and her education through weekly home-based activities.

ECE 270: Practicum II, Student-Teaching Experience

• Completed 200 hours of student teaching, applying 6 NAEYC standards for developmental teaching and professional relationship-building with children, families, and colleagues.
• Focused on building a deep connection with a self-selected student and her family, monitoring and documenting her progression throughout the school year.

• Encouraged the student's self-determination by arranging his daily schedule to balance school assignments, meals, personal hygiene, breaks, and recreational activities according to his needs
• Supported online accountability by guiding the child in retrieving and submitting assignments and attending biweekly reading-group sessions.
• Delivered lessons that build on the child's existing knowledge, scaffolding new skills and insights.
• Encouraged the child's critical thinking by reflecting on daily experiences, identifying solutions to challenges, and developing resilience for successful learning

• Strengthened children's self-awareness, autonomy, emotional regulation, and confidence, while prioritizing students' internalization of a consistent routine, age-appropriate playgroup entry techniques, and sense of belonging, as the classroom is designed to offer freedom of choice and opportunities to explore materials, challenge new skills, navigate conflicts, and repeat experiences alongside peers
• Created culturally responsive lesson plans and individualized portfolios featuring: artistic, musical, and culinary experiences, gross/fine-motor skills, sensory and construction play, and imagination activities, with integrated math and literacy concepts
• Chaperoned field trips to explore our Military Community: Library, Commissary, and Post Office, coordinating with guest speakers such as Pilots, Ambulance Drivers, and Firefighters
• Developed an indoor gross-motor area and implemented program-wide schedule adjustments, providing 48 children with daily opportunities for exercise and socialization beyond their classrooms when outdoor playground visits were suspended due to poor air quality (Osan).