A new fresh start...
Student teaching has been a learning experience. It has had its ups and downs. But hey, you have to have a challenge and push through in order to learn and to better yourself. My teacher taught me a lot. I have had my struggles through this placement as well. My kids were great. Again I struggled a lot with classroom management, but my kids overall were wonderful and I am going to miss them so much. It still has not quite set in that I am not going back to the same school on Monday. But even though I am going to miss my students a lot. It gave me time to reflect on myself as a teacher and to really take everything I learned from this placement and take it with me to this next placement. It is time for a new fresh start. And to take everything I learned and to press on and practice everything I learned and become a better teacher. Again it is time to practice and work extremely hard. As always. Like we should be doing with everything. I had a great last day on Friday. The teacher worked with the students to make me a cute book. Each student made me a page with their picture on it and telling me something that they learned from me. They gave it to me at snack time and brought in munckins. It was so cute. I also had a really great talk with my teacher.
Also this week in school I was feeling really down and really upset about myself and my teaching. I was just really discouraged. And then as I was going about the morning this verse came to me... 2 Corinthians 4:8-9 "We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed."
I am sad to be leaving this school, but I am also very excited for my next placement. I am looking forward to what is to come. I know it is going to be a challenge but I am definitely looking forward to it. God is good. And I know that he is definitely going to bring me through this.
Sunday, October 30, 2011
Friday, October 21, 2011
It's all for the children
One more week to go. To be honest this placement has had its ups and downs. I absolutely love my students. And I really like my teacher as well but honestly I put so much pressure on myself to impress her and make sure I look great to her and PERFECT. And I know we all want to look our best for our teachers. But to try and be perfect is not realistic. We are STUDENT teachers. Now is our time to learn. Our time to make those mistakes and for our teachers to catch them and correct us and to make us better. Those mistakes are what is going to make us the best teachers we can be. Well I have gotten so caught up in trying to impress my teacher that I feel like sometimes I lose sight of why I am truly there. And today God reminded me why I am student teaching, why I went through 4 and half years of school and why I am pushing through all the tears and late nights. Today during computers my teacher was doing something on the computer so I was running around to all of the students helping them with different questions they had. I was between two students and I look over and was watching one little boy as he was working so hard and really focusing on what he was doing. It was only about 10 seconds that I was observing this little boy but in those 10 seconds God reminded me of my passion for children. I absolutely love children, and I want to teach them, and mold them and impact them. I want to help them. I have always had a passion for children and watching this little boy working on his computer today God just reminded me of that passion. And I talked to one of my best friends tonight and one of my old cheerleading coaches and it really helped me to think and reflect. God is really good. In the midst of all the busyness God has little ways of reminding us of our passion and that all the struggles and bumps in the road and the hard times are all worth it.
Thursday, October 20, 2011
Strengths
I know I am really last on posting about my strengths... but here goes. I did the test a while ago. And read about it. And took notes about it and everything. Just didn't get around to blogging about it. I would definitely say the test was pretty accurate. When I read my 5 strengths I was like "Wow yes those definitely describe me." My five strengths are developer, discipline, empathy, positivity and relator.
Developer: It said you see the potential in others and like to watch them grow. You challenge and stretch people to help them reach their goals. I felt like this is like me because I feel like I am a very encouraging person. I might be very hard on myself but when it comes to other people I am very encouraging. I love watching people grow and achieve their goals. I feel like I am a developer in the classroom because I love to help and encourage the students. I love to watch them grow and when I see growth I love to acknowledge it and give them praise. And let them know how great of a job they are doing and to continue working hard.
Discipline: You need to be ordered and planned. You set routines and need to feel control and need structure. This definitely is me in the classroom and in general. Every morning with getting ready to go to school I have a plan and a routine. And with school work I need to know that I have everything totally planned out and ready to go for my lessons. If I need notes or samples or pictures. I need to know where it is and that it is perfect and ready. Also when I am in the classroom my teacher has a routine and the students know the routine. I think that is important too because they students then know what to expect throughout the day and it is comfortable for them. They know what is going on as well and it is not like they come to school and never know what to expect or what is going to happen.
Empathy: You can sense the emotions of those around you. You can feel what they are feeling as though their feeling are your own. You are able to see the world through their eyes and share their perspective. This is definitely me. When someone is hurting I hurt with them. My dad lost his best friend a little over a month ago and I did not really know his best friend too well because he lived far away but that fact that my dad was hurting and I could feel his pain and put myself in my dad's position I cried so much for him. And because I care about my dad and when he hurts I hurt. I also am like this in the classroom. When they students are struggling or are upset because they are not understanding something they learned or are getting bullied I need to still be an authority and have their respect but at the same time I show them that I care and have compassion for them. That they have feelings and that how they are feelings matters to me.
Positivity: You are generous with praise and quick to smile. Enthusiasm. Lighthearted. I feel like this one described me very well. I can be very hard on myself but I feel like most people can be. But when it comes to other people again I love to encourage them. I love to smile and give them praise. I also feel like a lot of enthusiasm. :)
Relator: You love being around close friends. You want to have that closeness and know each others fears and goals etc. I feel this is definitely me. I do not look for a lot of friends I look for a few close best friends. Who I know a lot about. I do have a friends I do not want that to sound rude. But it is important for me to have best friends who you know everything about and can truly be there for each other. Who are willing to do anything or everything for you know matter what time of the night it is. No matter how big or small. I had something recently just go on and again one of my best friends just told me she would have come at 1 am to come be there with me because I needed it. That is a true best friend. She knows me. She knows me strengths, my weakness and what I struggle with, what brings me joy and what I need. She knows how to encourage me. Again I think it is important to have friends who truly care about you and know you and will do anything for you. I also bring this into the classroom because I think it is important to be able to relate to your student, again you still need to be the authority figure but they need to know that if they need something that they can come to you.
I did enjoy taking this strengths tests and finding my 5 strengths and reading about them and really thinking about how they relate to me and my classroom.
Developer: It said you see the potential in others and like to watch them grow. You challenge and stretch people to help them reach their goals. I felt like this is like me because I feel like I am a very encouraging person. I might be very hard on myself but when it comes to other people I am very encouraging. I love watching people grow and achieve their goals. I feel like I am a developer in the classroom because I love to help and encourage the students. I love to watch them grow and when I see growth I love to acknowledge it and give them praise. And let them know how great of a job they are doing and to continue working hard.
Discipline: You need to be ordered and planned. You set routines and need to feel control and need structure. This definitely is me in the classroom and in general. Every morning with getting ready to go to school I have a plan and a routine. And with school work I need to know that I have everything totally planned out and ready to go for my lessons. If I need notes or samples or pictures. I need to know where it is and that it is perfect and ready. Also when I am in the classroom my teacher has a routine and the students know the routine. I think that is important too because they students then know what to expect throughout the day and it is comfortable for them. They know what is going on as well and it is not like they come to school and never know what to expect or what is going to happen.
Empathy: You can sense the emotions of those around you. You can feel what they are feeling as though their feeling are your own. You are able to see the world through their eyes and share their perspective. This is definitely me. When someone is hurting I hurt with them. My dad lost his best friend a little over a month ago and I did not really know his best friend too well because he lived far away but that fact that my dad was hurting and I could feel his pain and put myself in my dad's position I cried so much for him. And because I care about my dad and when he hurts I hurt. I also am like this in the classroom. When they students are struggling or are upset because they are not understanding something they learned or are getting bullied I need to still be an authority and have their respect but at the same time I show them that I care and have compassion for them. That they have feelings and that how they are feelings matters to me.
Positivity: You are generous with praise and quick to smile. Enthusiasm. Lighthearted. I feel like this one described me very well. I can be very hard on myself but I feel like most people can be. But when it comes to other people again I love to encourage them. I love to smile and give them praise. I also feel like a lot of enthusiasm. :)
Relator: You love being around close friends. You want to have that closeness and know each others fears and goals etc. I feel this is definitely me. I do not look for a lot of friends I look for a few close best friends. Who I know a lot about. I do have a friends I do not want that to sound rude. But it is important for me to have best friends who you know everything about and can truly be there for each other. Who are willing to do anything or everything for you know matter what time of the night it is. No matter how big or small. I had something recently just go on and again one of my best friends just told me she would have come at 1 am to come be there with me because I needed it. That is a true best friend. She knows me. She knows me strengths, my weakness and what I struggle with, what brings me joy and what I need. She knows how to encourage me. Again I think it is important to have friends who truly care about you and know you and will do anything for you. I also bring this into the classroom because I think it is important to be able to relate to your student, again you still need to be the authority figure but they need to know that if they need something that they can come to you.
I did enjoy taking this strengths tests and finding my 5 strengths and reading about them and really thinking about how they relate to me and my classroom.
Saturday, October 8, 2011
Being real
To be real and honest... this whole blogging thing is new to me and definitely going to be a challenge. I am not a huge fan of writing out my entire day or feelings for everyone to see. But I had a really good talk yesterday with my former cheerleading coach and it is something that I feel like I can share. I have been struggling with student teaching because I do not want to fail. I love children and love teaching. I have wanted to be a teacher since I was a little girl. But now that it is actually here I am afraid of failing and not being good enough and I do not have a back up plan. So to be honest I have been so stressed out and worried. Well I was talking to my coach last night and I was telling her about my lesson and how it went pretty well and that there were some things that needs to be fixed but my teacher said overall it was very good. She said the things I need to change are just little things that will make me lesson that much better the next time. My coach reminded me that it is like cheerleading. When I was flying and we stuck a stunt. After we came down from the stunt we would talk about it and she would tell us what we could fix to make that stunt better and to go up or come down more smoothly. She reminded me that it didn't mean the stunt was terrible they were just little tips to make it better and to go more smoothly, and to help me. To make me a better cheerleader. So we related it to teacher. The advice and tips my teacher is giving me is not being I did a bad job, it's because I am there to learn from her so that she can make me the best teacher that I can be.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)