Preparing to Strut Your Stuff
As I prepare to spend time with you, what would you like me to see and give you feedback on? What are you most proud of thus far? What do you think you still need to focus on? Share with each other.
posted by Chris @ 9:53 PM
5 comments
5 Comments:
The week that you're here, being Tera Nova week, will be an interesting one for us and for the kids. As I'm sure you've heard, our schedules are completely flipped around and for the younger grades this is an enormous change for them to deal with. Instead of having specials at the end of the day they will be having them in the morning which means a completely uninterrupted afternoon of learning. Something I liked to do to help them make it through long spells of learning is to get them up and playing Simon Says or Mum Ball (my name for quiet ball). This allows them to get some of their pent up energy out and refocus on learning.
As for what I would like you to see. I have been trying to work harder on getting up and moving around the classroom when I am using the document camera. Sometimes when I am helping them through their math journal or working on the daily fix-it in the morning I myself get a little comfortable in the computer chair and forget to move around the classroom and observe their work. I have written myself a sticky note to help me remember to get up and move around but I am still working on it. I am also trying to work on my pacing during lessons. I have done better recently, however, throughout the semester I find myself taking too long to teach my lessons as I am trying to keep the "lower" students with me but in doing that manage to lose the "higher" students and also not get to everything that we're trying to get to in that day.
Something I feel is going much more smoothly is simply my interaction with the students. It has finally come to the point, I think, where they really trust me as their teacher and enjoy having me teach the lessons. While many of the students showed signs of this earlier on, there will still some that were hesitant to hand me the reigns without more of a fight. I feel that I have now become a teacher in their minds and throughout the last week or two have established myself as someone that they trust and like. It's a good feeling!
See you in one week Chris! WOW!
I cannot believe you are already going to be here! The time has just flown by! I am excited, as is Delome, for you arrival. I am excited to get your feedback on the TPA and on my overall classroom management. I feel very comfortable in front of my class and I am excited for you to see me in action. I mainly want to just get feedback on my lessons and your thoughts on my teaching styles. I have combined my teachers classroom management with ideas of my own and I would like to see your thoughts on this.
I am very proud of the strides and progress I have made in my teaching skills. I am mostly proud of the fact that I am able to plan out beneficial and fun lessons and have them go smoothly. I was worried coming into this experience about planning every single lesson for every single day but I feel very on top of it and not overwhelmed. This is such a relief and something that I am very proud of.
I still need to focus on differentiating instruction. I know the levels of my kids and I automatically check in on the kids that I know will need more help. However, I think it would be more beneficial for my class to be broken into small groups, for instance for reading, more often. I try to as much as possible but it is overwhelming. I know that this is something I need to work on.
I am so thrilled to have you here and be DONE with the TPA. I have a few questions for you about the TPA and certain areas I am struggling with. Good luck to everyone with finishing up these last few weeks working on the TPA. Miss you all! See you soon Chris!
It is crazy to think that you will be here in less then two weeks! The time has just flown by. I am excited for you to see me in action and to meet all my wonderful students ☺
I am proud of how much I have grown and progressed since I first started student teaching. Going into my classroom I was very overwhelmed but now I feel so much more confident in myself. I also feel comfortable talking to parents and interacting with parents and this is so important as we want parents to be involved as much as possible in their children’s education.
I also feel that since the way our classroom is set up where we do a lot of work in the developmental learning centers, I can differentiate my instruction to meet my student’s needs. It is such a great teaching style that I have adopted from my mentor teacher and I have learned so much on how to modify instruction for the student’s instructional levels.
I would like you to give me feedback on my classroom management as I feel that it is something that is very important and takes a lot of practice and I still need to focus on it. I also am really working on remembering to give more positive feedback as I feel it is often easy to forget about the positive behavior when you always catch the negative behavior. I also would like to get feedback in general on anything you feel I need to focus on and improve on.
We also have Terra Nova testing the week you will be here so it should be interesting having the routine interrupted, but an important part of teaching is learning to be flexible so it’ll be a good learning experience for all of us.
It is hard to believe that in one short week, our fearless leader will be in our midst enjoying Patrick Henry Elementary and the beauty of the Deutschland.
As Michael mentioned, it is a little bit of a backwards week when you are here. We have a strict policy that we are not allowed to teach new material during this week, so all the material will be review. The students will also be stressed and tired of testing during the day, so each activity we prepare is aimed at letting them let their hair down and relax a little bit. It should be a good week, but a little different from the usual.
I'm most proud of building relationships with the students, as well as working hard each day to think of creative ways I can instruct the students. While it would be easy to stand in front and throw together a couple of examples on whatever we are studying-- understanding what my students get excited and relating the material to their lives so they can understand it is what I strive for. For a couple weeks the students would give me ovations when my teacher would turn the classroom over to me to teach. It was a nice little pat on the back. Now that I teach all day, the ovations have subsided.
I would most like you to give me feedback on my tempo in the classroom. There are times when I focus so much on not losing students, I feel like I slow down a little too much. It has only happened to me when I am teaching math, but it is a bad feeling. Trying not to leave kids by the wayside, but also not slowing 3/4 the class down so I can keep the other ones on pace. It is a hard balance.
I still want to focus on my organization when it comes to grades and lesson planning. I am always up to date when it comes to lesson planning, however I'd like to consistently stay a few weeks ahead of myself. Being new to grading side of things, it has taken awhile to get used to figuring out the ins and outs of assigning work, getting work back, and dealing with the parents of students who didn't turn in their work and received poor marks. It has been pretty interesting.
Safe travels Chris. Looking forward to seeing a friendly face from WSU.
As everyone else has said, we are so glad you're coming! Back in January this time felt so far away and now its already here. Sad to think that we are about half way done!
I am most looking forward to both your feedback on the TPA and on my classroom management. I think I manage most things pretty well but would like just a little more feedback.
One thing that I am proud of is my ability to think on my toes. In first grade things often change very quickly based on children or things not going as planned. Carol taught me quickly that it is best to just roll with the punches. She often says that academics will come as the days and year progresses. If we can just teach them how to behave in school, how to be friends and how to be respectful to teachers we've helped them. This is something that I believe will help me no matter where I am placed in the job world.
Two things I would like to focus on in the coming weeks would be my differentiation in our daily activities and my patience. I often run low on patience at about 2:00. These days wear on your quickly! But I just need to remember that they are only 6 or 7 years old and once 2:30 hits you can be cranky...Just hold it together! I also think its important to change up our centers a little for the extreme levels in our classroom. This will help keep kids engaged and working all day long.
Carol and I are planning and discussing the TPA today so hopefully that will help a little as well.
See you soon Chris!
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