I Love These Rules

AMAZING

If you havn't heard of Ron Clark, go and buy this book, The Essential 55. I ran across it over the summer. His rules speak of love, respect, and discipline in the classroom. These are rules that can take place as parents, caregivers, and even student-teachers. There is also a movie about his incredible, warm-hearted teaching experience called the Ron Clark Story. I bought the movie as well. It's a tear jerker, but very good....it really makes a person re-evaluate their life.

My Journey Thus Far...

I have been in the 2nd grade classroom for 2 months now. The time seems to have flown by. In the beginning I was with my students everyday, now, I am only there two days a week. I miss the students and while my time in the beginning was beneficial for so many reasons, I am so sad because I feel that I just got pulled out of the classroom right at the moment when I was really starting to fit in and feel comfortable. I try and cherish the little time I have with the students, learning who they are, who they are becomming, and how they are growing and molding into classroom routines and procedures. I feel like I am missing it all. Now, when I go into the classroom, they still recognize me as the teacher, and will at most times, come to me for questions... but, I feel that my connection with the students isnt the same. When I am in the classroom, I feel comfortable and in charge. My teacher constantly praises my efforts and gives me compliments and words of wisdome throughout the morning. I have truly been blessed with a warm, kind-hearted CT, who understands where I come from and shares a lot of the same values and beliefs as I do. I hope that my full-time internship teacher is just as pleasant to be around. I will be sad to leave Mrs. Sweeny and the students, this I did not prepare myself for.

Blog #1- Changing classroom convictions

I had always thought that in order to teach, you had to have specific lesson plans written out with a step-by-step process that must be followed. I had always assumed that every teacher has lesson plans that he or she goes over every time they present a lesson. I had these strong convictions for myself, that I too must always have these type of lesson plans written out for each and every lesson, never teaching in the moment. Since I have begun my student teaching this past month or so, my certainty in this action has subsided a bit. My teacher has unit topics and worksheets that she uses to teach from. She partakes in many read alouds that connect to the writers workshop activity, and in many cases, she uses no lesson plans, but rather ideas of how she plans for it to go.. and in most cases, it goes as planned. When I am quickly presented with mini-lessons that I have to teach to the second graders, I too have begun teaching in the moment. Partly due to the lack of planning time available for me, but also due to my teachers convidence in me to think on feet and act in the moment. Frankly, I love it. I find it cumbersome to know that I can look outside of the box with teaching my lessons and not teach to every phrase that I had written down in my lesson plans, which, until now, is all I have been doing, it is all that I have been taught to do. I believe this is a sign of personal growth because it has taught me that teaching can be more fun, I can relax and still get the material to the students in an acceptable learning environment, that I can teach on a whim... I can add and delete as I teach. I know there are times for full written lesson plans and times for partially written lesson plans. Other times call for flexibility and am confident that I can be more flexible with my future students and let go of some of my old convictions.