UGH!!!!!

 

     I am so FRUSTRATED right now it's not funny.  I was on my last sentence for my blog, and my laptop crashes.  Even though I saved it now it's GONE!!!  So I have to start over, and after getting through writers block I now have to figure out again what I want to write.  I have noticed that lately I am having issues remembering things verbatim.  It is driving me insane.  It makes taking notes for journals and what not extremely difficult.  If anyone has any suggestions please let me know.

     I am happy to see the kids again, I did miss them.  Within the first 10 minutes I realized that they missed me too.  As soon as they came into the classroom Monday they all had to come and see me.  They let me know very quickly that they missed me and that they were happy to see me again.  This made me feel very good.  At least with the kids I am getting positive feedback.  These kids are so amazing and I am honored to get to work with them.

     I wished I could say that I was sad to miss my classes, but unfortunately that is not the case.  I missed seeing my classmates.  It was also nice to not have that gnawing feeling of despair on Tuesday and Thursday nights.  I feel like nothing I do is ever good enough.  I am trying so hard, and it feels like the more I try the worse it is.  I have heard that when you break something down, it will be stronger when you build it back.  Well I for 1 am ready to be built back up.  This experience has made me aware of my students feelings.  The student should never feel less than.  I see myself consciously trying to think before I do or say anything.  I don't want my students to stop trying because they think why should I. 

     I have decided that on Thursday nights and possibly Tuesday nights after class I am not going to look at my book or read anything after class.  I feel like I need a break somewhere in my over busy week.  I discovered that otherwise I really have no down time.  I wish I could be a total student, and not have to work.  Unfortunately, I have to have gas to get to school and I do have to eat.  I know next semester won't be any easier but I need to try to get as much saved up as I can. 

     I feel so scatter brained tonight and I'm sure this blog is disorganized.  I am doing basically what my students did today.  I'm doing a brain dump, but instead of doing it in my journal it's on a blog.    

1st Lesson Down

     I will admit up until the actual time I was schedule to teach my first lesson, I was very nervous.  I think it was just the idea of teaching in front of my professor. My teacher that I am working with gave me some great advice.  While our students were in their guiding reading groups she had me go to our back table and practise.  That really helped center me, and I had everything set up and ready to go.
     My students were very excited that I chose them to work with.  They did very well, and I was impressed by their reading.  When choosing them I didn't want to pick those in the highest or the lowest levels.  I noticed that the boy that I was working with knew what he was reading, but he was afraid he wasn't right.  He had no confidence in his reading ability.  I hope that by using him as one of my case studies I can change this and give him some confidence in his ability.  The girl that I worked with was very confident, and tried to be the center of the lesson.  Their strengths and weaknesses are opposite of each other, and I think they both could learn from each other. I'm excited to test this theory and see if I can make a difference.
     I see where I need to make changes in my lesson, and if I ever teach it again I think it will be even better.  When I was planning the closing and assessment, I thought using the letter to the I can statement was a great idea.  In hind sight I didn't really like it as much as I thought.  Since we were learning visualization I should have had them draw a picture of what they saw in their mind. 
     I am already thinking about my second lesson.  I love math and I am ready to see how I can incorporate reading and math into one lesson.  Even though one of my majors at Guilford was English, math is one of my favorite subjects. The only thing about math that I hate is geometry.  I don't want my students to see that I am not that knowledgeable about geometry.  It was one of the hardest classes that I have ever taken in my life. 
     I am so glad that we have a week away from school.  It will be nice to regroup and get ready for the last 1/2 of the semester. 

I have been feeling lost and undecided about planning my first lesson. My biggest hope is that I don't turn the cartoon above into a reality. Today I sat down with my teacher and worked on my lesson plan. At first I wasn't sure I knew what in the heck I was doing. Through her guidance I think I am finally starting to understand.

I have decided to do my first lesson on text features with an emphasis on visualization. I have a book that talks about ranches and ranchers, and my first thought was omg how can I do this. I have decided to look at this as a documentary. I will first ask the students if they know what that is, and then explain that they are the director putting the documentary together. Then I will ask them to close their eyes while I read to them, and then I will tell them what the passage brings to my mind and compare it with what they saw. Then I will have them pair up and do the same. This is still a work in progress, but I do love the idea for closing that my teacher gave me. I will have them write a letter to the I can statement and explain that they learned it today because of something, and that they know they learned it because of doing this. This will be a great assessment of how much they actually got out of my lesson.

I think that what I am most nervous about is doing my lesson in front of Julie. I think I can handle it in front of the kids, but if I can do this in front of her I can teach in front of anyone. I just need to spend my weekend working on the lesson and making sure that I have every t crossed and i dotted. I know that there are no perfect lessons, but I hope that with this one I can get some justification for wanting to be a teacher.