Last Student Teaching Blog Post

Summarizing this past week into one work, that word would be emotional. I’m so excited to finally be done but I don’t want to leave these students. I like my students and they like me. They don’t understand why I cannot continue to teach them psychology. I also found out that I passed the last two test I needed to pass to become a teacher and teach psychology. I finished my eportfolio and several other assignments that seemed so daunting. It still hasn’t sunk in that I am going to be done in less than a week.  The prospects of the real world are also quite frightening. I’ve found myself reflecting on this past semester. Trying to remember what I thought student teaching would be like, compared to what it actually was.

Our school policies and procedures are clear and strictly enforced at my student teaching placement. I learned that in a school like the one I’m at; writing passes can be a danger to myself, the student and other students in the school With gang activity, constant fights breaking out and the culture of the school, by following the no pass policy I’m keeping my students and others safe. The other strictly enforced policy is one they just started enforcing. It is the policy, if you’re not in your classroom by the time the bell rings you’re late. I believe the school is implementing this policy because students don’t really understand why being late is not okay. We’ve had several discussions in our department meetings about preparing students for the real world and this is one of those preparations. The saying at the school I’m at. If you’re early you’re on time, if you’re on time, you’re late.

This semester I did an action research project on the best ways to teach vocabulary. I learned a ton in my placement, in department meetings and in my education class about teaching and learning. Mostly it was in my own classroom that I learned the most about teaching and learning. Some things have to be tried and have to fail in order for you to learn that even though something sounds good on paper, it doesn’t mean that will work in the classroom.

I started three referrals of a student for special education this semester. Before initiating a referral of a student for special education I met with them, I tried to figure out if there was something going on this semester that was hindering them from doing well in my class. I also sent emails out to their other teachers, asking if they were having the same issue I was. I also checked to see if they already had an RTI in the system. After all of that I started some interventions to see if there was a simple fix to my students’ problems. Only after trying all of those things did I start a referral of a student for special education.

One of the most important things I learned this semester about choosing education as my profession is that how we educate students is always changing. This means that we need to be able to change with the system. We are always going to be looking for better ways to teach something and better ways to educate our students. If this isn’t being done then we are doing our students a disservice. I think the most important thing I learned this semester about being an educator is that I was meant to do this. I may not be perfect at it like I thought I would be but I was still born to teach.

The Schmidt chapter that challenged me the most was the chapter on communication and collaboration with parents. Up until we read that chapter I hadn’t done much collaboration with parents. I had communicated with some parents but I hadn’t really got them involved in their child’s education in my classroom. After reading Schmidt’s chapter I realized I could really use the help of my students’ parents. I was pleasantly surprised after contacting several parents about their students’ behavior or grades that the students’ attitudes and work ethic did change for the positive.

Instead of reflecting on the last goals I created I would like to reflecting on the first 7 goals I created.

1. Being the best teacher I can be. This idea of best teacher change throughout the semester. I think the most surprising thing to me was that often this included taking care of myself, more then it included what I was doing in the classroom. Not that I put me as a priority over my students. Just that I tended to get caught up in everything that had to be done and forgot to take care of myself.
2. Not going crazy. Does it count that I am still here relatively sane. J
3. Maintaining a healthy social life. Well I wasn’t a hermit this semester but God sure does have a sense of humor. He likes to give me a good challenge and he did challenge me this semester. I had gone the last three years without a boyfriend and he chooses my busiest semester to make that happen.
4. Better my relationship with God. Well I think that was bound to happen, with me depending on him for so much.
5. Do not procrastinate. Does it count that I didn’t with my students?
6. Find a job. I found a job that I went to once a week while student teaching for a couple hours. But I think this was more referring to a teaching job, which I haven’t found.
7. Eating healthier happened for the most part.

As for my goals from last week

8. Co-planning and teaching did not go well. My cooperating teacher was barely in the room. Planning went better then co-teaching. I was disappointed my cooperating teacher wasn’t able to be in the room more, for my last week.
9. The lessons that my cooperating teacher was in the room for went very well so the lessons were planned out well.
10. We will have to see how my students transition back into having my co-operating teacher back in the classroom full time.

 This is my last student teaching blog post but hopefully it will not be the last blog post I make about the life of a teacher. My student teaching class is giving the reins back to me. From now on only posts about the struggles of finding a teaching job and hopefully the struggles of being a first and second year teacher. 

Keep praying please, 

~Abby

Wow, Almost there

Wow I can’t believe I only have a week in a half left of student teaching. It seems like yesterday that I was just starting to student teach and I was scared silly. One thing that I would say I am pretty good at now is reflecting. Reflecting helped me grow as a teacher and become better at teaching. Reflecting is always going to be part of helping me grow professionally because its forcing me to take a look at a lesson did or did not work. How I did overall for the week and what I can be improving on.

With every observation I had I improved dramatically. My supervisor was amazing. He had amazing ideas and suggestions but he also did amazing reminding me what we learned in our education classes to help improve my teaching. When my supervisor observed me and the observation when really bad he had me reflect first on what I thought was the problem and what I thought should be changed. I really struggled with classroom management and my supervisor gave me some great ideas to fix that. With this last observation he said he could see real improvement with my classroom management.

I have found that my knowledge of learning disabilities was invaluable, but I still have so much more to learn. I did find myself seeking out knowledge and opinions from other teachers and especially the special education teachers. They would give me pointers and also give me words of encouragement. I was sent links to activities that would help me teach a subject better and teachers also gave me the lesson plans they’ve used in the past that have worked. I plan to continue this practice when I get a job teaching. I found student teaching that the advise and collaboration of experienced teachers is invaluable.

As for my goals this week;

1. Treating every class like it’s a new and wonderful class is still working, stopping and praying before each class is a must and I will continue this practice.  
2. Co-teaching all this week will be interesting and that is going to take some praying as well.
3. I’m praying that my students will be ready for their final exams.
4. Healthy eating is on and off with the stress but still going well over all.  
5. God time is still a work in progress.
6. Focusing on the positive students has really helped keep my classroom environment positive. The students who were acting negative saw me thanking the students who were acting positive and now they are acting more positive.
7. My lesson in government to solely use technology is this week and hopefully it goes well.

8.      I’m in my last week of full time teaching and co-teaching with my co-operating teacher so I’m praying that goes well. Co-planning did not go as I thought it would.

9.      Lessons to use co-teaching have been put into place and I’m hoping that the students also take full advantage of having both teachers in the classroom.

10.  I’m hoping that my students transition well back to my cooperating teacher and I plan to help with that as much as possible. This is my new goal for the rest of my time student teaching.

Pray that this week goes well and that the transition goes smoothly,

Almost done, 

~Abby

Thanksgiving Blues

This past week was a short week for us because of thanksgiving break. Instead of the energy from last week which I was expecting to be more intense this week. I had pure exhaustion from my students instead. I think they were just burnt out and sick of all their teachers testing them this week. Which I have to guiltily say I was one of those teachers. One thing I was working on this week, which isn’t really new but It was a focus this week was communicating with the parents of my students. Last week at the end of the week I sent home a not to the parents of the students who were getting a D or an F in my class. Now this was no new information to the parents of these students. I’ve found that the more I keep that communication with those parents open, the better my students do. The barriers to family relationships is that sometimes it doesn’t matter how hard you work to communicate, you just get some parents who wont communicate back.

I email my parents/ guardians, I call home and I send progress reports and letters home to help open lines of communications with my students’ families. As for my students who have learning disabilities I have another very important line of communication and that is with their PDS teachers. Their PDS teachers help my students with learning disabilities stay organized and get their work in. All I have to do is email these teachers about missing work or an upcoming test and they will help me keep that student performing well in my class. I hope that when I have my own classroom we have a similar system put into place for our students with learning disabilities. I plan to do all of the things I’m doing now with the students in my future classroom.

As for using the community in my classroom I can think of so many ways to do this in my future classroom. I’ve already used some of the ideas but I can have my students do a case study on their own community. I can have community members come in and talk with my students about their jobs and how they use psychology to improve the community. Or for history, the history behind their own community. I could do field trips not only to gain more knowledge of the communities history but also to see how psychology has an effect on the people of their community. I could also have my students use their own knowledge to give back to their community. The possibilities are endless, especially with the classes I teach.

As for my goals this week;

1. Treating every class like it’s a new and wonderful class is working better because I stop and pray before each class.  
2. I have another lesson planned that will involve some more co-teaching this week. I planned with my cooperating teacher this time so hopefully it goes better.
3. As for my assessment this past week, my students seemed to do okay on it, not as well as I hoped they would do. I found five questions that over 50 percent of them got wrong so I had to throw those out. They were not reliable. I believe its because these questions were poorly written and they confused my students.
4. Healthy eating went well especially over thanksgiving. I was quite proud of myself.
5. I still need to find more time to just spend with God.  
6. Focusing on the students doing well in my class or the students with positive attitudes have helped me stay positive and this week I’ve been thanking the students who are positive.
7. I have a lesson that is solely using technology planned but I haven’t been able to do that lesson yet. It is coming up next week
8. I learned that there is tons of different available technology to the teachers at the school I’m student teaching at but most of it requires hours of training in order to use it. When I have my own classroom that training would be well worth it.  
9. My plans for the rest of my time student teaching is to successfully co-teach for the last week of full time teaching with my cooperating teacher.
10.  Also I plan to Come up with lessons that take the fullest advantage of co teaching. 

I'm also getting observed this week so pray that goes well. 

~Abby

Thanksgiving anticipation.

for the delay in posting. The last few weeks have been hectic.

One word that describes my teaching experience for this week is anticipation. Everyone is anticipating Thanksgiving break. They kids are hyper and ready for the break and the teachers seem to be hitting a wall. I’ve heard more than one teacher say we just have to get to Thanksgiving break. Once we get there everyone will be rejuvenated.

I learned a lot about integrating technology into teaching this week. My department started this program called key train this week. Its only incorporated into the U.S. History courses but it uses technology to get the kids ready for the ACT’s. We also use technology a lot to make teaching history to different types of learners. We use different things from webquests to videos and interactive games to teach our kids history. We use technology in our classrooms everyday for teaching history through PowerPoint’s, videos and projecting images that we would have otherwise had to make 30+ copies of before things like ELMO’s.

I have planned the use of WebQuests in my lessons, and research online for my students. I’ve used interactive games that are solely based out of technology with my students to help them review for tests. I’ve taught them and showed my students helpful resources that allow them do things like cite papers correctly. I use technology almost every day in my classes. I will continue to do these things but also learn as much as I can about the other technology that is out there that I could potentially use in my classroom.

As for my goals:

1. Treating every class like it’s a new and wonderful class, works unless the class before gave me a really hard time. I’ve found that stopping and praying and taking sometime in the five minutes I have between classes helps me reprepare myself for the next class.
2. I did plan two lessons this week where I needed my co-operating teacher to help me co-teach. I think he feels a bit uncomfortable helping me co-teach because I planned these lessons. He acted more like my aide then a co-teacher. I think next time I will try to include him in the planning. If he has time to be included in that process.
3. I did talk to my cooperating teacher about improving my assessments and we also had a team meeting about improving our assessments. I found that making sure each objective we are given to teach should be tested equally. I also found out that the test review has to be written carefully so as not to contaminated the validity of the test.
4. Healthy eating is going well. I found that with a student teaching schedule I have more of a schedule for eating which makes it easier to eat healthy.
5. I need to find more time to just spend with God. I think that will help keep me grounded in him.
6. Its been nice focusing on the positive students but I still find the students who are struggling take up more of my time. I’ve been making a point to talk to my positive students and asking them how their day has been going. I do this with my students who need more help too but I just want to make sure I’m connecting with my students who are doing well.
7. My new goal this week is to plan a lesson that has the students using technology to learn.
8. My second goal this week is to learn more about the technology available to us at the school I’m student teaching at. 

Please pray that I continue to get better student teaching and that the upcoming Thanksgiving break rejuvenates me.
~Abby