This week was a a big transition week in my student teaching experience. It started off with me doing more observing and helping with general classroom management like on the first day of school the week before. As the week went along, I became much more involved in the classroom including teaching my first couple lessons. Because of how much of a transition it was, the week started off iffy in terms of my mindset, but as the week progressed the more comfortable and fulfilled I began to feel.
Monday and Tuesday were continuations of the previous week where when the students were in the classroom, I mainly observed. The week was still full of setting and practicing school-wide procedures, but Monday and Tuesday were the most procedure heavy, but there was still curriculum taking place throughout. I found myself getting a bit antsy, not helped by the heat and the fact my district was the only one in Cedar Rapids that did not get out early either day. I pulled through on those days and Wednesday was the start of me actually working on lessons with the students.
Starting on Wednesday I took charge of the morning meetings. What this entails is going over a lesson the students learned the day prior to check their knowledge, reminding them of whole group expectations, and doing community builders through a share question and an interactive activity to get their minds ready for the day. I also would take charge of a small-group lesson during math when the class is split into two groups. During this, I ran a math game which helped them work on their pairs of 10 addition. This stayed the same the rest of the week, but what changed drastically was how I felt about how things went.
After teaching the first day of lessons, I felt extremely overwhelmed and felt like I did a poor job at managing the students. Because of this I felt very discouraged and disappointed in myself. My CT made sure to give me great feedback and reminding me of the attention signals we have that would help me keep the students on task. The next day, I used the feedback she gave me to drastically improve the participation and attention from the students. The increased engagement felt great and my mood got substantially better during the rest of the week.
I think its fantastic that even though the week started off rough, you pulled through and kept an open mindset throughout. You improved upon your teaching with just one day worth of feedback which is always something great. I'm super glad that your mindset and the week in general got better as the days passed.
ReplyDeleteIts good that you were able to end the week on the positive side. It is also good that you were able to take over the morning meetings. It is a small step to you getting more used to the students and them getting more used to you. Once the kids get used to you in the classroom I'm sure you'll be able to make a lot of connections with them.
ReplyDeleteStarting off is hard and its super exciting that you were able to have a good end to the week despite having an iffy beginning. As the semester goes on, things will get easier!
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