a canvas for the ambiguous

Yay week 3 is over! But the work is piling on!!

On Tuesday, I taught the first lesson of my “All About Me” unit. Basically, I showed the children a picture of my family, and we talked about who lives in my house. Then they were to draw who lives in their house. Most of it was a success, besides the kids who started drawing Gingerbread houses and spiders.

On Wednesday, we had our parent involvement day. It was so interesting/curious to see the parents interact with their children. And you could totally tell that some of them were being “star” parents in front of the teachers. The principal came to see me play on the piano and help the children sing the songs. Overall it was a success. The end of the day got a little crazier. We had an ambulance come and then in the midst of all the craziness, my supervisor showed up to grade me. This was very peculiar since she knew not to come that day (because there weren’t going to be children present in the afternoon), so she gave me a grade of N/A. What am I supposed to do with a N/A. I think she did this on purpose in order to not be held accountable. Bunch of blarney.

On Thursday, we got back to our post-Gingerbread normal days in the morning, and then in the afternoon, the cooperating teacher and I attended an IEP meeting. It wasn’t for a case study, but more of an in-service. Very interesting why some ppl in administration get hired.

On Friday, I taught a lesson! It was actually the cooperating teacher’s lesson. So she taught it in the morning, and I basically did the same thing with the afternoon kids. We practiced writing the letters a, b, c and their own names on a Doodle magnetic board. The kids had fun, but didn’t always want to do the lesson and more so wanted to color on the doodle board.

Overall, the week was a success, but I have so much to do these next two upcoming weeks. I’ll be finishing my Unit of Study — “All About Me” and simulatenously working on my teacher’s unit “Alphabet.” It’s going to be crazy, and I’m going to be super tired. Pray for me.

Yay for Mondays off! Thank you, Dr. King!

Today was a fun day. I did calendar/weather time, and I taught a math lesson about the ppl in our families. I even brought a pic of my family to show the kids. It was fun. I think they liked it, but the started drawing their dogs and friends. But as long as they counted them, it was okay. The drawings were cute though. :-) Mostly scribbles only a teacher would love ;)

Then the children had OT/PT. We played hopscotch with huge puzzle-like number pieces. They really enjoyed it. But it’s fun to see which kids are developed more in motor and which aren’t.

Lastly, we practiced (for the last time) our Gingerbread Play. I can’t believe all the parents are coming tomorrow. It’s great, yet I can’t believe how fast the time flies.

Btw, my supervisor teacher… NEVER SHOWED. And I was super nervous all day. O well :(

I’m excited about tomorrow!!

Day 8: Still practicing

We still continued to practice for our Gingerbread Man play. It’s gonna be great when it’s over. The only thing I’m worred about, is that the day parents come the children will have a total 180 and not sing, just stare at me blankly. They’re kinda doing that as it is at this point. I did however bring in my keyboard today, and they really enjoyed playing it (banging on it) after. The teacher and I made a huge gingerbread house out of a tri-fold poster. :-)

Afterschool, the teacher has yearbook so I came in to observe that. I didn’t stay too long because I had to jet to my seminar appointment. Which btw, was a hoot. FU seminar, fuuuu.

Day 9: Cooking baking, cookie baking, it is fun….

Yes, today I was a chef. FML Does anyone realize how hard it is to make/bake cookies with 4 and 5 year olds. And it’s not like it’s one kid. There’s 5 of them. And they all want to mix with the electric mixer. It takes a lot of careful planning and holding down hands to do it. But we were successful, although they kinda tasted like poo. Maybe once they have the frosting on, they’ll be better. I HOPE. The parents will love them anyway, of course.

Day 10: Teacher Institute Day…

…kinda blows. It was so boring. I did learn a few things about IEPs and goal writing, and the guest speaker was amazing (I think I heard him speak before either in jr. high or HS, but it was just unecessary. And of course I didn’t speak up much cuz what am I gonna say? Make myself look like an idiot, no thanks. They did feed us (but it wasn’t great), but at least we got out early. :-)

Great job to me for successfully completing week 2 and getting a great eval!

Day 6: Not againnnnn….

It was REALLY hard waking up today!! :-(

During the weekend I worked putting together the song for the Gingerbread Day and tried to fit in some lessons for my actual unit. I don’t meet with my supervising teacher til Wed., so I didn’t want to plan a lot just to have her tell me it all sucks and needs to be revised!

The kids and I also practiced the songs and the whole skit today. It’s hard practicing for AM & PM because obviously all the parts aren’t there. We also decorated foam frames. We’ll be taking pix of the kids with their special parent that day and putting it in the frame they made that day so that they can take it home. Overall it was a good day, and it went by SUPER FAST.

Day 7: I overslept!

Well I set my alarm for the right time, and yet instead of pressing snooze, I must’ve pressed off :( Anyway, Agnes’s alarm clock woke me up at 7:10 (40 min later than usual). Thankfully I now get ready the night before. I was in my car by 7:30! So not too bad, and I made it there really fast, almost my normal time.

Today the teacher and I made a huge gingerbread house out of a tri-fold poster and some extra cardboard. We made snow, a door, window, gumdrops, peppermints, and candy canes out of construction paper. It was sooo cute and such a great idea. The afternoon kids are a lil higher functioning so they helped put the gumdrops and other candy on the house. It’s so crazy how much work teachers do. We worked almost thru our whole lunch break to build that house. Not to mention the time Ive spent afterschool building the other tinier foam houses and making copies of the songs we are singing, etc.

One interesting event that stuck out to me today was an incident with a little girl and the speech pathologist. This girl likes to act out a lot. Maybe not in a way that’s negative per se, but it’s just very disruptive. She doesn’t know a time and place for it. So when her and the speech pathologist were reading a book, she kept getting up from her chair to act out what was going on in the book. Totally unecessary and she couldve just sat down and listened. It so happened that one time when she got up, another child with the book came to sit right in her seat. She got SO MAD. But it was such a great lesson. She realized she needs to stop acting out so much.

One thing that made me mad today was when the OT was visiting. She had a one-on-one with one of the girls. She left weights on her ankles for an exercise they were doing. This poor girl couldn’t run during the skit and we wondered why. Until finally she lifted her legs. I hate stupid ppl.

I found out that sometimes it’s not dealing with the children that’s difficult, but with idiot parents. I can’t wait to see their parents when they come in next week.

Afterschool today my teacher holds Multicultural club for the 5th & 6th graders. It was fun watching them present on different countries, but some of it if not all was totally pulled from wikipedia and not edited or revised at all.

Day 4: Not as tired anymore!

So I did wake up earlier hoping to go back to bed in case of a snow day. Apparently the school district has amazing snow plowers. No snow day! On my ride there I realized how spoiled I’ve been the past 10 years. SXU was so close, and even though this isn’t much farther, my regular 15min drive turned into 35 almost. Dumb snow and 87th Street .. boo!!

AM session wasn’t awesome either. Because of the snow, only one child showed up. So I spent the morning observing 1st grade classrooms. I picked up on so many teaching strategies. For example, the kids have a word wall that changes up every week. The teacher called one student to the board to spell the word “felt,” but instead of the other kids sitting in their seats waiting for this child to write up a word, they all “silently” practiced tracing the letters on the palm of their hand. The other first grade class wasn’t as beneficial. I came in when they were doing worksheets as the teacher tested a child. Also I got mad because she made them color their snowmen one particular way. Effin disgusting.

The PM session had a few more kids. They have began to interact more which is great! But sometimes they need so much help to share with one another and to speak with one another. Definitely much different from the preschoolers I’ve seen in the past.

Day 5: Please let there be a snow day?

No dice. It was a fun day though. The kids enjoyed listening to a story about The Gingerbread Baby - Jane Brett. In a couple of weeks their parents will be coming for a parent-child day. The kids (from both sessions) will be putting on a play about the story. I wrote a song to the tune of Frere Jacques and they’ll be singing as I play my piano. They are also dressing up as different characters from the book and later their parents will help them make gingerbread houses. I actually made them all yesterday (in case the parents have too much of a hard time). The only thing they’ll have to worry about is the windows, doors and decorating with candy canes.

I also got my weekly review from my cooperative teacher. It was really good. :-)

‘Til Monday!

So I decided I should probably blog about student teaching. One day I’ll be able to look back and think.. awesome or omg that sucked looked where I have come.

Day #1: First day!

…was reallllyyyy cool. I wasn’t too nervous just kinda anxious and I definitely could not sleep the night before. I had met the teacher and kids a month ago, but going in there full on is a different story. The kids are great, mostly behavioral, emotional and speech disabilities (they’re all special ed.).

On my first day I got spat on, kicked, licked and hit in the face with a toy truck. Very eventful :-)

Day #2: I’m tired

Getting up at 6:30am reallly sucks even if you press the snooze button. I keep having dreams that I’m late or that I never make it and I get kicked out. Today we did our general type of schedule: calendar time, weather, read books & played with small toys, had snack time and then played with “big toys.” The AM and PM kids are both special ed., but the pm kids are higher functioning. However, the AM kids are pretty high. They have made such strides, it’s crazy.

Other than that, I’m happy to be there!

Day #3: I’m somewhat awake

Getting up this morning was a little easier. I did get caught by the Metra and by crazy traffic, and I really thought I was going to be late! It was so scary. Today the kids had occupational therapy and speech. They got these huge rubber balls & peanuts and they rolled over them on their tummies. It was cute! I did it too. :) For speech, the speech pathologist read them a book “Where’s Spot?” and then they talked about where Sally looked to find Spot. They also colored the places where Sally looked.

My ID still doesn’t work so I can’t get in the building officially!

Tomorrow might be a snow day (hopeful)!