Midpoint, Yay!

Long time, no blog!  If you don't already know, I've wrapped up my experience in my 2nd grade class and moved onto my special education placement.  I've posted a video for your viewing pleasure to check out how I feel about my new placement!

 

Fun Lunch

Very Important Lesson #1 (for all of you future interns out there):

You want the students to like you, right?  It doesn't matter.  Do not promise anything to your students (good or bad) that you cannot follow through on.  I'm talking about consequences and rewards.

Yesterday the school gave us (my lead teacher and me) six free passes to a school fundraiser at a local rollerskating rink.  Keep in mind that we have thirty students and I have a bleeding heart for each one of them and 80% of our school population comes from low socio-economic backgrounds.  How is that fair?  Anyway, I had to choose six kids but, I love all thirty and couldn't decide.  I decided to play a fair game of "Eny Meny Miny Moe" to choose the six because it just wouldn't be right to simply hand them to six kids who had a good day (that sounds wrong, but they all have bad/good days sometimes!).  Well, the game didn't go so well and we had kids flipping desks, bawling their eyes out, and pouting at their desks.... Not what I expected!

What did I do then?  I offered them a fun lunch, of course.  A fun lunch (I was making it up as I went) is where you get to have your lunch with the teacher (me, duh, because I'm cool) and watch something cool/not exactly what the school would deem "educational."  To qualify for this fun lunch, you had to be a good sport about not getting a pass.  Some kids were like, "I'll be fine, I have my own allowance!" and others were freaking out like the world would end earlier than December 21st.  

Did I look at the school lunch menu before making that promise?  Did I ask my lead teacher if it was okay?  Did I find out if they could even take lunch out of the cafeteria (maybe a strange thing to wonder, but I guess with Title I schools there are some rules about free/reduced lunch)?  Did I plan ahead and pick out something to watch during Fun Lunch before this morning?  Did I think about whether I'd actually want to spend an additional 45 minutes with them in the event that we had a bad day?  The answer to all of those questions: No.  

Luckily, after talking this morning to my lead teacher, she was all for it and helped me get permission from the cafeteria and track down a "special" garbage bag from the friendly janitor.  Then, while my lead teacher was talking to the students this morning, I polled them and asked what they like to watch at home and found some "Funniest Animals" Animal Planet video on Netflix (thank goodness that worked on the district computer, nothing else does!) based on their requests.  Luckily, pulling Fun Lunch together last minute was easy.

Then I saw what they were bringing into the classroom for lunch.

Remember how in elementary school you'd get at least one or two nasty lunches every once in a while?  They smelled like baby poop and looked like grey/off-white slop?  Unfortunately for me, they had my least favorite school lunch EVER; turkey/gravy/mashed potatoes.  It stank up the room and it is almost unbearable, even as I type!  What was ironic was that they were saying that my food smelled bad and was "so stinky" (it was a delicious vermicelli noodle-shrimp-red pepper-garlic-curry-stirfry thing from Tastier Than Takeout).  Basically, what I'm trying to say is that it was my nightmare lunch...  Once the first student walked in, I had visions of "gravy" all over every desk, rubbed into the brand new rug (circle time), smeared on the walls... Although I'm exaggerating, reality wasn't too different from my vision of gravy terror.

The "special" garbage bag had a hole somewhere and of course, being the genius that I am, I let it sit on the doormat while students tossed their half-full milks and trays of mush (apparently, they aren't fans of turkey+gravy+wannabe-potatoes, either!).  There were not enough paper towels in the world to clean up the spilt milk because the rug was being stubborn and absorbing the milk instead of letting the crappy paper towels sop it up!  

Aside from all of that, though, I really liked having the students eat lunch with me.  We all laughed at the silly animals and ate together and I was sad when it was time for them to go to gym (which they call "PE" here and if you refer to it as "gym" they look at you incredulously and say, "HUH?!").  I think we all felt appreciated by one another and I wish I had more time in the classroom so we could do it again!

All Signs Point to...

----->  Depressing

1. I keep making simple mistakes while completing a job application process and I feel that it makes me look like a sloppy and hasty candidate.  All mistakes are unintentional, but I still feel embarrassed.
2. I had to look up my loan information while filling out a funding application for the job mentioned above (which has to do with #1)... It's not pretty, folks.  I'm looking at about $60,000 worth of debt!  
3. A death in my education cohort has really made me think about how much time I've spent in class and not getting a chance to really do something or make an impact in the classroom.  We're so close and I'm disappointed that someone will not get that opportunity.

----->  Hopeful

1. I am really getting along with my lead teacher; we had a serious chat one morning last week and we have both changed for the better.  I'm sure she is feeling great, too!
2. It's my last week of "full control" in my first placement, which is sad, but exciting!  I cannot wait to completely finish and start my career!  I love teaching and I know it is what I'm meant to do.
3. The weather has been beautiful since Friday and it's supposed to stay that way all week!
4. I'm looking forward to events I've planned for the weekend (I wish there were little smiley faces for me to post here, but blogger doesn't have that option, I guess!).
5. I recently did something for myself (outside of the classroom) that I'm hoping will have a positive impact on my future!

I ended on a positive note because I truly am feeling positive.  Yeah, it's scary to think that when I get hired, it will take two years of an average teacher's salary to pay back my loans, but I'm okay with saving and living simple for a little while!  My education was worth it.  

I've really started to think about how much I'll miss my current students and I'm happy that I've had this experience; ups and downs.

An Update!

I've been a bad, bad blogger.  According to my page views, it doesn't matter much, so I don't feel that bad!  

I hope that everyone in my cohort is enjoying their placements; I'm currently in my 2nd week of "full control" and I'm ready to move on to my next placement.  Time has passed so quickly and I cannot believe that I only have 17 days left in second grade!  After having this experience, I cannot wait to have my own classroom and I am disappointed I will have to wait until at least mid-January to make that a possibility!

My first placement has been kinda rocky at times and I've been trying to stay calm, cool, and collected.  Ironically, I have received a lot of compliments about how calm I am (seriously!) and a lot of staff say that they're surprised about how easy going I seem to be.  I personally have a lot of confidence in how I'm performing/teaching and my supervisor is providing so much positive encouragement and advice when I need improvement- I'll have to send her a huge thank you card when this is all over! 

Unfortunately, my lead teacher and I do not see eye-to-eye on a lot of things, so our relationship is strained.  She tells me each day what to teach and how to teach it, no creativity allowed.  Each time I have an idea that is shot down, I write it in a journal to save it for when I have my own classroom because even if my ideas really are bad, I'd hate to lose them before getting a chance to try them!  I'm not truly gaining "full-control" experience, so I'm just trying to stay positive and hope that things will be better in my next classroom.  If you're wondering, yes, I have had discussions with her (and my supervisor) about how I'm feeling, but I feel obligated to keep my mouth shut because this is a learning experience and it is ultimately her classroom. 

I'm staying positive and enjoying my students!  Believe it or not, I like lesson planning- I've been trying so hard to write all of my lessons on the weekend so I can have more time during the week to adjust them after teaching each lesson.  Plus, if I get it done on the weekend, I can relax a little at home after school.

Time to grade the math tests from earlier today!

On Explaining Tragedy

In other words, a second grade teacher's guide to explaining 9/11.   

This morning when I walked into class, my teacher said, "the math lesson is ready, right?  And you're ready to explain 9/11 to the children?"  Uh, what?


I'm student teaching on the west coast, but I grew up in Southwestern Ohio (should "southwestern" be capitalized?).  On the morning of the attack on the twin towers and pentagon, I was in my seventh grade history class when the principal asked teachers to turn on the televisions over the intercom.  I didn't really understand what was happening, but I was pretty nervous when people started spreading the possibility of random attacks on towns throughout the U.S.  You know, the corn fields of Morrow are an obvious target...  Anyway, I started to really understand when I went to Papaw's house and tried watching TRL, but instead found only 9/11 coverage/tributes.  

I have heard from my friend that grew up in California that 9/11 wasn't as scary for him because of location and awareness.  A lot of his classmates weren't in the loop immediately about 9/11 because they hadn't watched the news before leaving for school.  In his experience, Northern Californians were a little nervous that San Francisco was a potential target.

Given my different experience with 9/11 (considering my teacher was an adult at the time of the attack), I really didn't think I would be an appropriate candidate for explaining 9/11.  Did I mention she didn't want me to really talk about the terrorist attack/death aspect of the events?  Don't get me wrong, as a teacher, no matter my background I should be able to represent an unbiased view of historical events, but having no time to research appropriate presentation methods along with NO IDEA HOW TO SPEAK ABOUT TRAGEDY to students who are seven or eight year olds...  I just think that this would have been a great "modeling" opportunity for my lead teacher.

So what did I do?  I illegally hopped on the computer and researched "9/11 for kids."  The best link that I found was a link to watch the Nickelodeon video "What Happened? The Story of September 11, 2001" which I watched a little bit of.  I have to say it's pretty good, so you should check it out.  Unfortunately, a twenty minute video is unacceptable for a brief discussion (there was no extra time allotted for this discussion, thank you) so I wrote down a few tidbits by watching the beginning and end.  I started out by asking students if they knew what day it was ("Tuesday!").  I then explained that it was 9/11 (a.k.a. Patriot Day, if you haven't heard) and asked if they knew what 9/11 was ("it's when the war started and the soldiers went away to fight!").  Eventually, I explained the Twin Towers, terrorists, and the memorial.  Then I explained that it is important to remember events like this because we want to come together as a community to protect each other.  We "remembered" 9/11 by singing Grand Old Flag, Star Spangled Banner, Yankee Doodle Boy, This Land is Your Land, and God Bless America.  We didn't really have much of a discussion, now that I think back on this morning, it was more like an "info session."  Even though some students do not eat breakfast before school, at least they had a large helping of American patriotism to start their day!

Next time, I'll definitely take care to come up with more of a discussion and structure some in-depth understanding- I'm sure there is at least ONE picture book out there explaining 9/11... (September 11, 2001: Then and Now, A Place of Remembrance: Official Book of the National September 11 Memorial... Sorry they're all informational, I can't find any "cheap" picture books)

I havae a ErasRe in my malpfe. Srooy"!

Today marks the beginning of my fourth week in my general education placement!  This is the week before "mid-point" since there 10 weeks in each placement (special education and general) and there are a lot of assignments that I'm working on.  I have to put up 2 bulletin boards, create a substitute binder, write about three classroom procedures/routines.  There is probably more that I'm forgetting, but oh well!  Maybe next time!  In the last week I recently picked up Math along with Shared Reading and Read-Alouds.

Math is not so bad, but I haven't quite mastered think-alouds to my lead teacher's liking.  She usually interrupts my lesson (before I've even moved on!) and will provide more examples.   Sometimes this is annoying, but honestly I've thought about it and I'm just being grumpy- obviously she knows what the kids need and I'm learning!  We teach math out of a Houghton Mifflan book- chapter by chapter (we also teach reading/phonics with Houghton Mifflan...).  The kids seem to get it, mostly.  There are of course, some obvious strugglers, but they receive extra help from aides and the teacher.

Shared Reading is this daily activity where the kids sit on the carpet and learn a song, poem, or read a big book.  They come with pre-made lessons that create goals like learning how to question the author, making inferences, and using pictures or headings to interpret the text.  It's not bad and the kids like the songs.  We usually do read-alouds first thing in the morning, so they're either really interested, or, really NOT!  

For Read-alouds, we have to select books from a list of "mentor texts" which are boring and terrible books pre-selected by some "expert" in the district because they model certain styles or genres of writing (example: personal narrative, descriptive writing, etc.).  So far the worst book that I've read was My Mother Has a Dancing Heart by Libba Moore Gray....LAME!!!!  Sorry, it could be the best children's book ever, but in my opinion it was the most terrible book I had ever read ("it has rhythm," my lead teacher said).  They really like authors like Donald Crews, Cynthia Rylant, and others are frequent flyers of this "mentor text" thing.  If I can't be interested, how could the kids possibly love this stuff- FYI they hated that book, too. 

*In case you were wondering, the title of this entry was determined by a letter a student wrote to their mother after my lead teacher caught him chewing a pencil eraser.  Gross!  

**Another gross thing:  another kid can almost move his front tooth a full 360 degrees!  It creeped me out!!!

Word Vomit!

If you're a student teacher, you understand!  Nothing personal towards anyone I work with, just a whole lot of junk I need to get out of my system because of how hectic and fast-paced everything is.

Teacher's Lounge Revelations

Usually I eat lunch in my teacher's classroom because she does, too.  Today, I took my lunch to the teacher's lounge to see if I was missing anything (and because my teacher usually makes me do work during my lunch break).  There were three other teachers there and while I ate with them, I realized that being a student teacher can be lonely.

Some teachers smile and say hi, but there are some that ignore my existence even when I greet them.  I'm no stranger to the staff, either- I was introduced to them several times and I have been present at all school meetings/training.  I can't really blame the others for not starting up conversations, what would they have to say to me?  I can admit that although I'm lonely, it's nice to not answer the same questions each time I meet a new person (where are you from, which school do you go to, wow they let you student teach out of state?, etc.).

I'm the only student teacher at my school so when I received the staff list during training, I was excited to see that another teacher had a student intern.  Unfortunately, that other intern is non-existent at this point because I have never seen anyone with the teacher the student was listed with.  I thought we'd be able to bond over the complications our programs presented, or, laugh about our experiences fumbling through lessons... If only, if only. 

When I go home I complain or celebrate about my daily experience in the classroom, but since there is no one to trade stories with it's not as satisfying because I want reassurance that someone else is going what I'm going through!  Especially because I've started disliking my placement because I know I'm not a good fit with my current teacher... Oh well, I'll go cry a river later, I guess!

Educating Esme

Yesterday I read Educating Esme and I wasn't impressed, which is really too bad because I've been pining over the book for so long!  I mean, yes I enjoyed reading her "diary" and reading about her students, but nothing was deep- there wasn't a lot of content and I didn't really walk away from it thinking about anything.  I bought a version with 25 tips for new teachers, but nothing was surprising, especially since I paid attention in class for the last four years.


If you're wondering what Educating Esme is about, it's a journal-style narrative that guides you through the author's first year as a teacher.  She talks about her students, the staff, and her frustrations.  It is a really quick read and I don't know what else to say about it...  If you want to read it, you can have my copy (assuming that I know you!).

I wouldn't say it really gave me any true advice or even showed me the ropes of becoming a teacher, with is really too bad.  I guess I chose to read it because I was expecting a "survival guide" type of book.  Her diary entries were about a page at best, which was why there was little depth.  Yes, she struggled with her principal and vice principal, but it was a superficial problem.  I admired her strength (or stubbornness, ha) and creativity, but I wish I could have learned more from her experience.  

I've never been very good at reviews, so I realize that I have no examples to support my claims of "lack of depth".  Sorry, but the book is upstairs and I'm downstairs enjoying a Sunday afternoon!  Find a cheap copy on Amazon if you don't want to take my word for it or borrow/take my copy.

Link to Amazon Review of "Educating Esme"

One Week Down...

I just registered for Praxis II: Special Education Core Knowledge and Application on September 12th.  My heart is racing, my blood is pumping, and my stomach is in knots!  I have no idea why I'm so nervous.  It might not have been such a great idea to register for a test that takes place at 5pm, but I really had no choice because I have plans for the two Saturday dates that were available for computer testing.

Today was our second day with a substitute and I taught even more today than yesterday (and I am exhausted!), which was awesome.  I am sad to see the sub go, but SUPER RELIEVED to have my lead teacher back tomorrow.  She is just so much better with student management than me at this point!


To celebrate my first completed week of student teaching, I sent an email to my supervisor with concerns about being percieved as an aide, rather than an intern.  At the staff meeting, an item was discussed that brought on suggestions for me to give people bathroom breaks during yard duty (or if that was inconvienient, class time).  I'm not against helping a sister out, but when I begin my full control take-over, bathroom breaking will cut into my personal prep time/lessons (they were not asking the other teachers to use their prep time to bathroom break, so why would they ask me?) annnnnd I will only be in my current classroom for ten weeks.  

The larger issue, though, is that they are placing me on yard duty in order to cover them, which is illegal according to my interning agreement.  What if they head to the bathroom and get locked in and while they're locked in the bathroom, something terrible like millions of injuries occur????  Also, I shouldn't be pulled from observations in the first week (or ever!) in order to run errands such as photo-copying, laminating, etc. or to give people a classroom break.  I know their trip to the restroom would be short, but if I cannot substitute for other teachers, why would I be permitted to supervise their class alone for even a few minutes?

I tried explaining this to the staff at the meeting yesterday, so we'll see.  I also asked for help from my advisor- hopefully she can write a good email that I can forward to the principal.... OR people could just read the manual I forwarded to them...  

FYI (if you have no idea what I'm talking about):  basically I'm saying that I can't really be anywhere my teacher isn't because of liability issues.  

Miss Alley + a Substitute

Today we had a sub- to find out more, watch my video!

FYI: It took multiple 'takes' to complete one video, so enjoy this blooper below!

Morning People Still Need Coffee

I always vowed to stay away from coffee.  When my parents would brew it each morning, I would plug my nose in disgust and ask, "how do you drink that stuff?"  When my friends bought their fancy Starbucks drinks, I would order a frappacino because if they had any form of coffee in them, I couldn't tell.  Then, one day someone ordered me an innocent carmel macchiato.  It wasn't bad and I actually started craving them every so often.  Then, finals started getting serious (at some point in my college career) so I would have a super-cremed coffee every now and then...and another... My roommates last year would always offer me a morning cup of Joe and managed to get me to try McDonald's iced coffee, but I was still living in coffee denial.  I, Jessica Alley, just purchased a GIANT bottle of creamer (Almond Joy- I have an extremely refined palette- HA!) to help me bear a daily dose of coffee in order to get through the next 10 weeks of early mornings.  I'll be texting my parents tomorrow when I wake them up to let them know that (ehem) they were right and I was wrong about "someday you will grow to love it, too!"

(To make a decision about how much/what type of creamer to buy, I called my friend Liz in the middle of a Walmart this afternoon- thanks again!)

Anyway, my point is that although I'm starting to get the hang of seizing the day at 5 a.m., waking up to student teach every day is kinda rough.  It sounds lazy, but honestly observing and worrying every day about what you should do or say (or if you're doing enough) is tiring.  Plus, without stimulation, it's hard to stay focused and refrain from yawning!  It's not terrible, and really I shouldn't be whining, but maybe whoever is reading this right now can identify with what I'm saying.

To save myself precious moments of sleep in the morning, I have started following the following routine the night before each day begins: pack my lunch, lay out my clothes, take a shower, set out all necessary tools for morning prep (hair tools, makeup, tooth brush/paste, ect.), and get my bag together.  After working on my routine, I actually got to enjoy 20 minutes of sitting and watching the news this morning while eating breakfast (YAY! I love watching the news in the morning).

Laughable Moments

My teacher was trying to get everyone lined up (there are 30 kids in our class and it's the second day, so it's rough) and was becoming frustrated with the kids because they were chatting and not following the line-up "rules."  She was saying something along the lines of, "I will take the quiet students to [wherever we were going]" and had tried making several similar statements.  One student walked up to her and said, "Mrs. ____, tomorrow I'm going to play soccer."

During a task titled "self-portraits," my teacher was modeling how to draw and what features are important for a self-portrait.  She had drawn an oval to represent her face (connected to a neck/shoulders) and asked, "what else do you think is important for a self-portrait?"  I'm sure she was looking for answers like, "eyes!" "lips!" "nose!" or whatever, but instead, the students were shouting things like, "pupils!" "a collar for your shirt!" and "a hair clip!"

Moments like these make it hard for me to keep my giggling to a minimum.

First Impressions

I survived!  

Today was the first day and I decided to make a video about it. 

A couple of disclaimers:
1)  I may have made my lead teacher seem unappreciative or rude, but I really REALLY like her and she is a very nice woman who has already helped me a lot!
2) I mention the name "Jeffery" as an imaginary student- it is a fabricated name, there are no actual Jefferys in our class (not even middle names!).  It would be a serious FERPA violation to post something that discloses student info!
3) When talking about my 2nd placement, I wasn't using People First Language.  What I should have said was, "a classroom with students that have emotional behavioral disorders" instead of "emotionally disturbed" classroom.  Apologies!

One of my dogs was enthusiastically barking in the background AND there is a lot of traffic on the street behind me!  Overall, I feel that it was a great first day- it is not as overwhelming as you would think!  After the students left, we had a short staff meeting, and afterwards my lead teacher and I skyped with my supervisor (a part of the orientation process).

Before the First Day:

Over the summer, both my lead teacher and I were out of town.  We had previously discussed having me visit and help prepare the classroom once we came back, so imagine my surprise when my teacher told me I had to come in on a Monday morning at 7:30 a.m. for training!  The certified staff came in on Monday and Tuesday from 7:30 a.m. to 2:15 p.m. to plan lesson/unit outlines for the rest of the year.  It was cool to see what the students would be doing, but ultimately I sat idly because I had nothing to add/no say in planning.

On Tuesday (and especially Wednesday), we did actual classroom prep.  In order to butter up my lead teacher, I actually came in for two hours on Sunday (yeah…) to help out a little bit and ended up organizing a cabinet full of construction paper and another cabinet full of dining utensils/plates/cups, etc.  Most of my tasks in prepping the classroom included sharpening #2 pencils, sharpening colored pencils, creating labels, constructing book boxes (like the cardboard ones that are about ninety-nine cents at IKEA), writing names on nametags, and other odd jobs.  I feel like my teacher is nervous to ask me to do anything, simply because she knows how she wants things done and you know what they always say- if you want something done right, do it yourself.

I can’t blame her.  In fact, today while writing student names on their take-home folders/student handbooks, I was writing in all-caps.  [Fun-fact:  the handwriting that teachers use has a name (ex: times new roman, papyrus, arial, etc.) and my lead teacher told me that they (the teachers) try to use that style of writing to model and make the students’ future transition to cursive easier.]  Basically, I failed at writing- I was pretty embarrassed.  I actually wrote all of the name tags, too.  When I offered to complete that task, I could sense her reluctance as she handed them over to me in order to complete other important prep-stuff.  My teacher is really nice to me, but I’m really starting to wonder if she’s slowly dying inside because I haven’t adjusted to how she operates yet….

Hello, Miss Alley!

From August 16th until January 16th, I will be completing my final semester in college as a student teacher.  Student teaching is a non-paid internship, a.k.a. free labor for any teacher that is willing to take you on for a few weeks (or more!).  I am entering a true test of if I can run with the big dogs in the classroom and prior to enrolling in the internship, I had no idea what to expect (I still don't!).  This blog is basically a taste of what I'm going through as an undergraduate student teacher so others can gain some insight instead of suffering from blind anticipation.

In my internship, I will have a lead teacher (the actual teacher who is mentoring me) and a supervisor (an assigned person that makes sure I'm keeping up with assignments/evaluates my progress).  I am directed to act as a communication bridge between the two and work with them to complete the requirements to my internship (there is a ninety-something page document chock-full of requirements....) and become a bonified teacher.  Because I'm trying to become certified to teach Special Education (K-12) and General Education (K-6), I'm required to complete 10 weeks in a general education setting and another 10 weeks in a special education setting.  Here's to hoping I survive!