15 posts from 2008

I'm alive!  No really, it's been a challenge.  I am truly grateful  for the support and advice from MTC.  I cannot image teaching without having the support of this great program.  I have encountered several struggles and i haven't figured them all out yet but I have confidence that by the end of my first year I will have it all down or know what to do to fix it.  My major problem is assigning appropriate consequences to certain behavior.  Am I too tolerant?  Or too strict?  Are my kids truly learning? Am I a good teacher?  How do I measure those things?  I think now its just a matter of finding a balance.  Finding my teacher voice.  Is it coming?  Or have I found it?  I am forever changing.  I haven't quite gotten into a groove.  There's a routine but it's not one I like.  It's my classroom shouldn't I make it fit me or should I try to fit it?  It doesn't feel naturally to follow my schools classroom structure of constant worksheets and simple recall.  I expect more from my kids.  Should I just close my door and do what I want in my classroom?  Is it time to ask for forgiveness instead of permission?  Maybe.  Major reconstruction will happen after this christmas break.

Okay so I had a adventurous, movie-like day.  Let's start at the beginning.  At some point this morning my lights went out, and I lost track of time. Because of this, I was running, not late but hurried.  I had twenty minutes do get to work.  Plenty of time for my fifteen minute drive.  I locked up my apartment and loaded thing in my car.  Then a closed the car door with my keys in it.  I was locked out.  At this exact time, Michele, a second year, came rolling down the street with her lunch on the roof of her car.  Got Lunch?  At this point, I am not so panicking as in utter disbelief that this could be happening to me TODAY of all days.  Anyway, although Michele presented some much needed comical relief she wasn't much help, and left to go to work after I handed her her lunch. 
Not to worry, I am a college graduate and a critical thinker.  I can figure this out.  I had twenty minutes, and the clock was ticking.  What to do?  How was I going to get into my car?  I do have another set of car keys, but they were in my apartment which I had already locked. Luckily, I had left my window cracked from the previous day.  Thank you, Rosei.  Now all I needed was a wire hanger or something else that I could use to open the door.  Across the street there was a pile of branches; maybe that would work.  So I ran across the street and got a few branches and brought them back to try.  On try three I managed to unlock my car; I was finally in. VICTORIOUS! I now had thirteen minutes to get to school.  I quickly jumped into my car and sped safely (oxymoron, I know) to work.  I got work with two minutes spare.  Yea for me!
Now, to the actual school day. I had a great first day of teaching. Objective:  The students will practice rules and procedures, and we did.  Homeroom/1st period lasted almost 3 hours.  Lunch/5th period was so long, maybe 2 hours.  Side Note: I really like my 5th period class.  I only have 6 students.  It's so nice.  My other classes ran smoothly.  I know the first day/week is the time when the students are on their best behavior, but I have to say my student were great. At least until the end of the day they got a little restless. 7th period winded up be an hour and a half; it is supposed to be 52 minutes. I actually had to give out a couple of writing assignments.  All day the students in my class sat in their seats quietly, did what I asked them to do, and listened to me.  It went well.  I expect and hope for the same tomorrow, but I am prepared for the worst.  Until then...

Training?  What training?  I unfortunately was not able to participate in the professional days.  However, I was able to go to the district meeting, welcoming new teachers, last Thursday.  But besides that we were not allowed to go to the much important meetings. We weren't even allowed to go into our rooms and hang poster.  We weren't allowed to do anything. My school district had a recent switch of superintendents so they were unable to hold a board meeting until the day before classes started (today).  I would have liked to go to training, but I guess I will get that information later.  Luckily they were able to meet otherwise they would have had several teachers in the district not reporting to school.  Anyway so today was my first day. And again, luckily I had set up my desks and cleaned my room prior to being BANNED from the premises. Luck, luck luck, read my next blog for my first day adventure. Until then... 

Closing time...  I had a great, awesome, wonderful summer. I really like the people I am in the program with.  I am so excited about teaching.  I am moving today.  I am actually taking a break from packing to write this blog.  This summer was one of the most stressful tiring things, but I loved every moment of it. And I wouldn't change it for anything.  I am ready to move to Greenville, even though I don't have an apartment yet. Hopefully with in the next two weeks that can be remedied. But life does what it wants not what you want.  I need to return to packing I am trying to leave in the next three hours and I have a lot to do.  Until then...

Most of my comments about summer training I wrote on the evaluations earlier today.  But I will repeat them.  The good things about summer training:  A lot of information was provided. Summer School ran smoothly.  I loved teaching.  I have learned a lot.  The team teachers are full of advice which is awesome.  Some things that I didn't like was there was a lot of things left unclear.  We weren't told things in an appropriate time.  The second years didn't have enough guidence and a lot of times the first years were left to fend for themselves.  I wish I could have been able to see other subjects/teachers teach.  It would be great if we could do that.  I know this blog is kind of short because I don't have much to really say.   Overall, I have a positive summer training experience.  

Round Two... (ding ding)

So this week the second self assessments were due.  As always watching myself was akward but very useful.  I think this lesson was one of my best lessons so far.  It was the best lesson because I started out with a small concept:  triangles then eased my way into the Pythagorean Theorem.  It was also one of the best lessons because I tried different things.  I had them do an activity where they used string to construct their own right triangles.  It was great and the students really enjoyed it. 
I started out really strong with my discipline in the beginning of the video.  The do now was silent; the students were working diligently. Anyone who talked during the first 20 minutes received "T's"  It was about 20 minutes in when I began to falter and became inconsistent.  This is a big issue for me.  I want to be able to ask questions where the class has free response and questions where I want them to raise their hand, but my questions are all the same so I have a lot of blurt outs, which invites the class talkers to add their side comments, chaos begins. To avoid this during the school year I am going to have a strict raising your hand policy.  I cannot afford to have students talking while I am talking or blurting out things during class.  Consistency, consistency, consistency.  This is what I need to work on.  It's Game time!  And I HAVE to bring my A game.  Until then...

Blog 2: What is the number one thing you need to improve on as a teacher?  Why?

It is no secret that the number one thing I need to improve on is classroom management.  More specifically, consistency, I am not consistent enough. Some days I am really on and other days I just let my classroom management crumble at my feet.  I know that classroom management is the most important thing to have before you can even begin your lesson.  I have been talking to many teachers asking them how the managed their classrooms and I have come to the following conclusion:  although, their management techniques have been useful to them and are great and efficient ways to run the classroom it cannot always be applied in your classroom.  I think I know where my management went wrong.  First, I gave my students too much freedom.  I treated them more like adults when they are just children and should be treated as such.  Secondly, because I am inconsistent the students do not know what and when they can get away with something; it is unfair to them to give a consequence to one student for talking and not another.  I know that I can do this.  I just need to, as Hunter says, put my game face on. I should treat everyday as a new day and never let up.  Classroom management is an on going thing not something you just do the first week of school. Until then...

Throughout this summer I have been getting lots of advice.  Some of the most valuable and inciting advice has come from my team leader Hunter.  He has been great he is full of so many ideas and ways to improve instruction and the students enjoyment. There are a lot of things that I have learned form Hunter.  The first thing that I have learned is that fair is fair and consistency is key.  Here's an example:  during Hunter's lesson he asked that the students raise their hand before replying.  One student, let's call her M, blurted out the correct answer.  Hunter acknowledge her answer but also gave her a consequence for talking.  I have learned that consistency is important and students understand that talking out of turn is just that talking.  Another thing that I have learned from Hunter is that you need to differentiate the way that you deliver you instruction.  Lecturing is not the only way to teach math. Changing your instruction keeps the students engaged.  The third thing that I've learned from Hunter is to have activities for the kids; not all students learn from lecturing.  You need to vary your assessments.  Trying to engage every student is a challenge but doing activities is a way to gain maximum retention.  There has been a lot of advice and suggestion, and I plan on trying to incorporate it whenever I can.  As a teacher you are forever trying to find new things and new strategies to make your class not only efficient but engaging.  Until then....

I have never liked watching or even hearing myself on tape or film. It's weird. I think I sound so annoying and completely unlike myself.  My voice is higher and almost foreign.  "Do I really sound like that?"  Watching the video of myself teaching was interesting.  There were a lot of things that I liked and a lot of things I can improve on.  The things I liked:  I liked that I was utilizing the whole class.  I did a good job moving around the room.  My voice was clear and projected.  I was posed and look really comfortable in front of the classroom and the students.  Things I didn't like:  The students talked a lot. The group work was a little disorganized.  I did not give enough detailed instructions.  There also was a lot of note passing.  I need to find a way to intersect it. We have assigned seats and that has helped with the talking and note passing but classroom management is still something I need to work on. Consistency is the key.  I need to be consistent.   It is not far to me. It's not fair to the other students. And it's not fair to the student disrupting the class.  If they don't know what they can or can't do it is not really fair to "punish" them for it. The students really like me and the are receptive to what i have to say and they listen to me when I give them an order.  I have learned that you cannot ask if they would like to do something, you need to tell them to do it and they will. Until then..