Questions: Or the Things One Thinks While Teaching

Questions:

What will the plan be for tomorrow?

Who is going to cause a fuss today?

Do the students consider me a “cool” teacher?

Am I one of the “lame” ones?

Why does he always fall asleep?

How well would this lesson plan work?

Why are we reading this book?

Why are those two even sitting next to each other?

Am I ever a burden on my CT?

Seriously, why can’t he stay awake?

Have the students realized I only wear one of five outfits?

Are there any students I don’t focus enough on?

What am I going to eat after class?

What is the point of this lesson?

Come on, dude, this is getting old.

Will the students miss me the last two weeks?

Why doesn’t he trust his writing when he always gets A’s?

Should I start wearing a tie?

Why does she always forget her book?

Thats enough, wake the hell up!

The First Final Haul

The past few weeks of this semester have been rather hectic, but I feel at last as though I am beginning to see the end of the craziness and can at last take a moment to enjoy everything. Within a rather short time frame, at the end of October, I had to complete both my video reflection, as well as my formal observation. Both assignments added a bit more pressure to those days, as would be expected when you have somebody watching over your shoulder and jotting down notes over every move you make for an hour and a half. 

On top of this, I also had the class all to myself multiple times over the course of my unit lesson. While these solitary (well, mostly solitary as the subs in the classroom were instructed to let me have the class to myself) moments did not seem like much to fret about for my teacher, for me I had the added stress of making sure I didn't set our class back to summer. Sometimes students just don't behave as well and don't get things accomplished quite as smoothly without the head honcho in the room. On one hand I'm lucky that I have a teacher with such solid management skills that I can learn from, on the other hand, because of this my less than perfect management skills are only exacerbated. 

But the light is there. Having received several items of feed back from both my supervisor as well as my CT, I am finally feeling more comfortable in the classroom. Nothing has gotten too out of hand with my students, and they are still, as far as I can tell, moving forward. As long as I continue to build relationships with the students and continue to work on my management skills, I think that the future in this classroom looks quite bright. Fortunately for me, both of these items go hand in hand. 

As this semester begins to settle down, next semester rolls ever closer. Oddly enough, though, I am less concerned with how things will go next semester than I was at the start of this semester. Sometimes I surprise myself with a tool I have picked up within the last three months. I will also begin spending some time wherever possible these final few weeks with some of the other classes that I will be student teaching next semester. The more familiar all of the students are with my face, the more quickly I feels we will be able to adjust to one another.

While I am admittedly excited for this semester to come to and end and to enjoy a little bit of a break away from everything, I am also excited to get things going for the final haul next January. While the next year certainly holds a lot of questions for my future, I have no doubt that the experiences I gain over the course of the next seven months will be vital for the rest of my career, wherever it leads me.

KATE

I really had no idea what to expect going into it as I really have not ever been to something quite like this. Was I just going to be listening to talks and lectures? Would we be interacting with the speakers and other teachers during the breakout sessions? Will this even be worth my time, or will I just be hearing the same things that I have heard from my classes? Fortunately, I did find myself picking up a few tips and gaining a bit of knowledge as the conference went along. Due to my work schedule, I was unfortunately not able to attend as much of the KATE conference as I would have liked to. However, for the majority of the sessions that I was able to listen in on, I did gain a fair amount of knowledge and did feel like I got a lot out of it.

While I was a little less than riveted when the initial chair members spoke, I did get a lot out of Brent Crawford’s talk. You could tell that he was very sincere in how grateful he was towards the teachers he had while growing up. It was clear that he had come a long way from where he was back in school to where he is now, and that even he is somewhat surprised that it was writing that put him there. His humor kept the talk lively and through that he made it very easy to see which student he was while growing up. I unfortunately was not able to catch Rachel Hawkins, so if anybody wants to let me know how her talk was comparatively I would be very appreciative.

As for the breakout sessions, I think that the one I got the most out of was “How to Survive Your First Year.” The lady giving the presentation was a fairly young teacher herself, having only taught for three years, so it was clear that her experiences were still fresh in her mind and relevant to what we may experience ourselves. It was really the little things from her talk that struck me the most, the ones that would seem so obvious that we often forget them: Make sure you allow yourself to have a life; end confrontation thoroughly and immediately; take a step back. Essentially, they were the things that would allow you to remain sane during the school year.

While I felt like I was all over the place during the conference, I did have the fortune of doing at least some amount of networking. I received some email addresses from some of the other participants. I was very thankful to see that many of the presenters offered their addresses as well in case we have any questions down the road. Over all, I was very impressed at how open of an environment it was and how willing people were to jump into discussions and ask the presenters questions if there was something that they did not understand.

Again, due to work I was only able to make four of the breakout sessions and listen to one of the keynote speakers so I do feel as though there was a fair amount that I missed out on. However, what I did attend was as much, if not more informative than I expected it to be. Having gone to the conference once certainly gives me a better idea of what to expect if I ever attend this one, or anything similar in the future. 

A Letter To Myself

Dear Scott,

This letter is being written with the hopes that you will read it fifteen years from now (sometime in the year 2027). It is difficult to say what you will be doing by the time you reread this, as I know you are currently pursuing many potential paths that you could take come the end of your five undergraduate years. I am writing this letter not to persuade you to do anything radical with the rest of your career, but rather to remind you where you came from as an undergrad.

As this letter is being written, you are currently spending your semester participating in your pre-student teaching. You have been fortunate enough to work with a classroom full of some great students, as well as cooperating teacher who has been more than willing to help you along the way. It is my understanding that you were a little bit nervous coming into this school as it hasn’t always had the best reputation. It is amazing how much an impression can change once you actually start working somewhere, isn’t it? (Pssst, remember the positive feelings you had about the first school you observed in? Yeah, it works both ways.) No matter where you are now, or where you wind up in another fifteen years, please do not forget that.

I would also like to remind you about the first week in which you had a classroom full of freshman students mostly to yourself. It is amazing what can happen when you are thrust into the fire, isn’t it? Yeah, there were a few hiccups- like when half the class left the room to listen to the band in the hallway- but hiccups happen. What is important is that rather than succumbing to a nervous fit, you actually became much more confident when you were handed the reins. Your interaction with the students increased substantially, and you had little trouble building relationships and, therefore, building respect. I hope this quality has remained with you these past few years.  If it hasn’t, get it back.

In short, these are the two most important pieces of information that I can impart to you:  1. Don’t draw conclusions about anything until you have had the chance to experience it; 2. Be confident, it goes a long way.

Sincerely,

Scott

P.S.

Come to think of it, there is one last piece I want to pass your way. If you have developed the habit of asking people, “Does that make sense to you,” after explaining something, please smack yourself upside the head.  

Monday vs. Friday

For the first time in my undergraduate career I had an entire class of high school students all to myself...twice. Granted by "all to myself" I mean there was a substitute there in the classroom with me due to legal reasons, but the class was mine to be in charge of. For the most part, I was actually fairly pleased with how everything turned out. However, I learned that there was a big difference between working with a class on Monday and working with a class on Friday.

Last Monday was an interesting experience. As usual, I showed up within a reasonable time span before class began to meet with my teacher and figure out what the day's plan was to be. However, as time crept closer to the start of class, I began to wonder whether my teacher was going to show up. Right before the bell rang, in walked a lady whom I had never seen come in or out of the classroom. She was the substitute. Now, I had talked to my teacher about taking over the class with a substitute for a couple of days in October, but I received heads up for that particular day. The sub and I both looked at the day's plan and found out that I was to be in charge of the class and lead them through their assignments that day.

As it turned out, I was very pleased with how responsive the class was that day. Everybody stayed relatively well behaved and got through their work with no issue. The students broke up into their normal groups as they had done several times prior to this class to do their reading and take their notes. My CT did pop into the classroom to check up on some things (she had an administrative meeting that day), and apologized for not letting me know that she would not be there for that class. At the same time, however, she let me know that I would have the class to myself again that Friday. Because of this, we met after class on Wednesday to discuss what the plan would be that Friday.

Friday's class was significantly different than Monday's. While the class was fairly subdued all throughout the class on Monday, they were quite rambunctious on Friday. Not only was this the start to the weekend for them, but they also had a tradition in which the band marched through the hallway and all the students were supposed to go out and clap and cheer them on. This led to a very high energy class that I was not anticipating. In fact, at one point shortly after the band marched by our classroom, we heard them upstairs. Thinking that they were coming back down our hallway, the students rushed the door and many went straight back into the hallway. This of course resulted in me having to corral them back into the classroom so we could get started with our daily assignments. While they eventually settled down to some degree, they still did not work nearly as hard as they had that Monday and took a lot more reminders to get back on task.

Over all, I can't say I blame them. Mondays and Fridays really do not change no matter how old you are.

A Good Start

Two weeks in and things seem to be going pretty well. My teacher is allowing me to ease into the culture of the class in such a way that while I don't feel rushed, I certainly feel that I am allowed to operate and communicate with the students from an authoritative position. More than anything I feel like I have simply been given an opportunity to just get to know the students, help them out and answer questions when their teacher is busy and, more than anything, learn their names. For this reason I feel like I have already begun building some connections with the students and they are beginning to see me as more than just a fly on the wall in the classroom.

That being said, we have begun looking forward to lessons that I will be teaching. It was recently determined that i will be doing an introduction to Lord of the Flies. I am actually kind of excited about this as it is a book that I have never really taken the time to read but have always been curious about. Fortunately I have over a month to read the book and prepare my lesson. I am really pleased with the fact that my teacher seems to be very open about working with me on preparing my lesson. Starting this week we will begin to look into various lesson possibilities and variations on what she had planned for the students before she was informed of my entry into her class.

Even more exciting than her willingness to work with me on this lesson is the fact that she just informed me that the class will be left entirely to me for a couple of days this semester. For two days in October she will be out of town and while she will have to have a substitute teacher in the classroom during those days, she told me that I will be in charge. What a great opportunity! While I have had the opportunity to teach lessons and spend minutes at a time with the teacher out of the classroom, I have never had a chance to work with a class all to myself. Even if it is just for a couple of days I feel that this has the chance to be a great learning experience and bit of preparation for next semester's student teaching and beyond.

While there is still a long ways to go, I am already feeling a lot more confident and comfortable about this upcoming year. While I feel I have had teachers in the past who have been willing to get me as incorporated in the class as possible, it seems as though this is the first time I have taken a bit more initiative to involve myself. I think that a lot of it has to do with the fact that I know I will be in the classroom for more than a semester. It really makes a big difference when you know you are going to be with a group of people for a significant amount of time. I know it does for me at least. Regardless of reason, I'm just happy that I am in the position I have found myself. I think this is going to be a good year.

Fine

 Day one has come and gone. Coming into this school year I was a little bit apprehensive of what the semester had in store for me. Truth be told, I am still somewhat uncertain of what the near future holds. Over the past couple of years, I have been placed at several schools in the district, each one with its own flavor, its own positives and negatives. All of my placements up to this point have been just fine. Sure, some have been better than others, but the resounding theme of my observations up to this point has simply been that "everything is going fine." And honestly that is my biggest concern for this semester. I don't want to go into this school and walk away with the same perception at the end of the year. I want to come out of this semester, and even more-so this year, feeling more accomplished than just fine.

But how do I change the trend? Obviously the answer has to start and end with myself. In the past I have been somewhat unwilling to step out of the role of the unobtrusive observer. My mentality has always been that, "This is somebody else's classroom, not mine. I don't want to get in their way, nor would I want them to get in my way if the roles were reversed." This mentality, I have determined, is completely fair. I have also come to the realization that this mentality is ultimately irrelevant so long as I act within certain boundaries. While I would not like for a classroom observer or a pre-student teacher to get in my way and undermine my authority were I the one in charge, I would be more than willing to accept the help that they can offer. I would love to somebody around that could offer perhaps a different perspective during a lesson or help guide my students when I am not able to answer every little question during a group project.

This is my biggest goal for the semester: that I assert myself up to a point within the classroom's social structure, while at the same time avoiding the potential issue of surpassing my cooperating teacher's wants and needs. I want to build stronger relationships with the students than I have in the past. Fortunately, with the extended time in the classroom, I feel that this is a very reachable goal. Achievement of this personal objective will only bring about more easily flowing and creative lessons in the future. When a teacher has developed an authoritative but amiable rapport with his students, learning becomes far more natural and far less forced.

Ultimately, I just want to have some fun this semester. I want to leave the school feeling more than just fine.

This is a test and only a test. It is a test of all testing testable tests testers for whom the test must be tested.