I am Blessed: A Post of Thank You's

I have been truly blessed in my life and during this experience to have such an amazing support system. There are many, many people that gave me advice, let me cry to them, and simply encouraged me throughout this time. Hopefully, I will not forget anyone in this very important entry. This is bound to be pretty long, so feel free to scroll down to your name if you don't want to read about everyone else. Also, I am sure not everyone mentioned in this post will read this, but you can believe that I told them in person how much I appreciate them.

Jodi Chesbro- I could not have wished for a better mentor. You are exactly the kid of teacher I hope to be some day and I feel so lucky to have worked with you. Thank you for all of your support and encouragement, not to mention your friendship. I could not have done this without you and I am forever thankful to you for that.

Fred Lugo- Thank you for making me part of the Bales family pretty much as soon as I arrived. You are such an amazing principal and I hope to work with you again some day. I appreciate your support and your willingness to be flexible in order to make my student teaching successful.

Michelle Bjorklund- Thank you for giving up your classroom to me and for being so flexible. I honestly would have quit if I was in your position. I do not know how you are able to keep going with a smile on your face, but I truly enjoyed working with you.

Shauna Hall- Thank you for being my friend and walking with me every day during our prep to the office. I would not have survived this if I did not have you to complain to and laugh with every day. I hope you can survive without me. Haha.

Katie Preston- Thank your for sharing your house with me for the past four months. I loved living with you and appreciate all that you have done for me. I am so thankful I was able to share this experience with you and get advice from you along the way. Oh, and thanks for providing motivation for me to complete my field notes and lesson plans on a weekly basis.

Cornell English and Education departments- I really want to list professors individually, but that would take too long. I am thankful that I have such amazing professor that have taught, inspired, supported, and encouraged me throughout my education here. Whenever people ask me what my favorite thing about Cornell is (besides the block plan), my answer is always my professors. I would not be who I am today without you.

Cornell Fellows Program/Haffke- I am thankful I attend a school that believes in their students and wants to provide them with opportunities that they would not have without the financial support. I would not trade this experience for anything and I am forever thankful to the Fellows program and Haffke (the alum who donated money for me to do this).

Casey Daugherty- I know I haven't been your student in four years and I haven't even seen you in about a year, but you are one of the main reasons I ever pursued teaching. You continue to inspire me and I am continually thankful for everything you have done for me. I honestly would not be here if it wasn't for you. Thank you for that.

My friends- I could list people individually, this post is already long enough and all of you know who you are. Thank you for always putting up with when I get stressed out and ridiculous. For allowing me to call you and cry or listening to all of my boring teaching stories. Thank you for encouraging me to apply to this in the first place and understanding when I was too busy to talk. Even though you were all far away from me, I never would have gotten here or made it through without you guys.

My family- It would not be a thank you post without thanking my family. Thank you for supporting me and never holding me back from what I have wanted to do. Thank you for your love and encouragement. I know it has been difficult letting me go to school out of state and even further away for student teaching, but I never would have done it if I knew you couldn't handle it. Thank you for listening to me cry and telling me that I was being too hard on myself. Thank you for seeing the things in myself that I have never been able to see.

If I forgot anyone, I am truly sorry. It is not because I love you any less, but simply because this was long list.

Now, the final question remains as to what will happen to this blog now that I am done student teaching. Well, the answer is that I do not know. I could say that I will promise to keep posting about various things, but if I say that, I am far less likely to actually do it. When I am feeling inspired and have the time to do it, I will post again. Until then, I love you and thanks for everything.

Everyone Get on Your Desks So She Can't Leave!

Wednesday was my last day of student teaching; I think my students were trying to make me cry. Eighth graders are normally thought of as moody, hormonal teenagers, but I saw evidence of really sweet, cute children on my last day. Many of my students made me cards, brought me a soda, or some Chapstick (they know me well). The day started with my homeroom coming in and making me close my eyes and not look into the classroom; they had a surprise for me. When I entered my classroom this is what I saw.

They made this sign for me in art the previous day; it will now receive a prominent location in my dorm room this January.

As the day continued, I kept receiving more and more random little things. Nearly every student signed this giant card for me. (Those are some littler cards in the middle and a Dr. Pepper chapstick).

 

Furthermore, if given the opportunity, every student loves to write on the white board. They took advantage of my leniency on my last day and wrote goodbye messages all over the white board (I normally do not allow students to write on it). This is what it looked like by the end of the day.

One of my favorite stories of the day, happened in afternoon class with my homeroom. I took them outside to play and we went back in for them to get their stuff in the last few minutes. My rule is that every student has to be sitting in a chair before I dismiss them ("the bell does not dismiss you, I do). One student, J, that I have had a lot of trouble with, was sitting on his desk.

Me: Whenever J sits in his chair, I will dismiss you.
J: Quick! Everyone get on top of your desks so she can't leave.
(A few students get on top of their desks)
Me: I have to go guys! I cannot stay in Arizona. (Laughing and very flattered). Just leave; you guys can go.
Students: No! Don't go. (All rush to front of classroom and give me a giant group hug).

I came very close to tears at this point, but managed to hold it together. At the end of the day, I had a long line of students outside of my door to give me hugs and say their final goodbyes. I was anticipating some sort of sorrow over my departure, I was not expecting it at this level. This is the sort of the day that really shows me why I want to be a teacher in the first place and that I have what it takes to be a good one.

After all of the students left, I had to go up to the office to return my key. I went into my principal's office to say goodbye to him and Jodi was in there as well. Saying goodbye to them was truly the hardest part of leaving. I held it together all day, but I lost it at this point; tears poured out of my eyes and I could not stop it. I was truly blessed with such wonderful support from my mentor and my principal, not to mention the rest of the Bales staff. I feel incredibly lucky to have received such a unique and comprehensive (albeit bizarre) experience. I would not trade this for anything.

(Look for a post of thank you's very soon)

"Are you sure you can't stay?"

I honestly cannot believe I only have three days of school left. This past week was pretty wonderful. Everyday (except Monday, which was not awful, just not as good), was really wonderful; the kids were good, worked hard, and we had quite a few laughs. I know people rarely associate the classroom with laughing, but that is one of my favorite parts about teaching. My students are so hilarious! Whether they intend to or not, they make me laugh pretty much everyday. I love that I have been able to build a relationship with them where we able to joke and laugh together, but still learn. That is truly wonderful.

This week, we worked really hard on our final writing assignment. I asked them to write a story about where they saw themselves in five years: graduating high school, starting college, going in the military, their 18th birthday, or anything else. I liked giving them this assignment for a few different reasons. First, I really like hearing about what they want to do with their lives. True, at this point, their goals will probably change, but I like thinking about them growing up and being successful. I also assigned it to help motivate them. At this point in the year, attitudes are growing and motivation is waning (vocab word!). If they think about what they want to do in the future, it gives me a chance to think about some of the choices they are making now and realizing that they may not lead to the life they want. It also gives me the opportunity to talk about how their choices now, truly can affect their future. Plus, it is really funny/interesting to hear their perception of high school and college; it is very skewed, but I do not have to heart to tell them that.

On Thursday night, I went to go see the midnight release of Harry Potter with Katie. I knew there were two battles I had to face in making this decision. First, being able to stay awake that late to watch the movie in the first place. With my "grown up"/"teacher" sleeping schedule, it is pretty impossible for me to stay up until 3 am. However, thanks to pure excitement and schoolgirl fandom, it was pretty easy. Plus, it helped when (spoiler) Nagini came out of the giant hole in the floor, jumped at the screen with her mouth open, and made me (nearly) pee my pants. The second, and much more difficult battle, was teaching the next day on only three hours of sleep. Teaching really wipes me out most days (hence the early bed time) and I was not sure I was going to be coherent enough to teach. Thanks to my good friends coffee, Diet Dr. Pepper, and Coca-Cola, I managed to survive. I simply had really cute bags under my eyes and said a few silly/unintelligible things. It was completely worth it. If you haven't seen it already, go right now. Do not even finish reading this post. Or at least make plans to go see it.

But enough about Harry Potter (is it ever really enough?), I only have Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday left. Really, only Monday and Tuesday count because Wednesday we are having another Diggory day. Well, one of my classes might not earn it before then. They did not have as much fun this week because I had to be mean to them, but this not really the point. The point is, this is the end. I think it is finally hitting the kids, and me, that I am actually leaving. I tried not to mention it, but it kept coming up that I was leaving very soon. Every time, at least one student would say "Do you have to leave?" "Are you sure you can't stay?" "Can you come back for Disneyland or graduation?" or something along those lines. It simultaneously breaks and warms my heart to hear them say these things. Honestly, if I had the choice between going back to school and staying here, I do not know which I would pick. As much as I love and miss Cornell (not to mention my friends), I love teaching. Even when there are days when I hate my students and I would prefer to not wake up at 6 am and grading is not the most fun activity, I would not trade this for anything. Honestly, I complain just as much about Cornell and I think everyone knows how much I love my school. The same is true of teaching.

The Importance of Being Flexible

To be perfectly honest, this past week was pretty much a waste of time. On Monday, most of the eighth grade went on a field trip to see Math Eureka!, a math play (yes, you read that correctly, a play about math) in Phoenix. I stayed behind with the approximately twenty students who did not attend. We just watched videos, played games, and played outside all day.

Tuesday was one of the few days I could actually teach a legitimate lesson. However, Jodi thought it would be better to show a movie that day for a variety of reasons which are mildly complicated and not really something that should be blogged about.

On Wednesday, about half of my students went on a field trip to see a production of Alice In Wonderland at the high school as a reward for good behavior. We rearranged the students a bit and most of the day they took a math test. The rest of the time we played outside.

Thursday we did not have school because of Veteran's day. It was nice having a day off, but it was pretty weird to have it off in the middle of the week. We didn't really do anything special; Katie and I did some shopping and saw Morning Glory.

Finally, on Friday we took the district writing benchmark. This took nearly the entire morning, so it messed with our schedule again. However, in the afternoon I actually got to have all of my students for the normal amount of time! We had to finish the movie from Tuesday and then we worked on some grammar that we are trying desperately to finish up.

So basically, I taught one lesson the entire week. While I have learned so many different things during my time here, one of the most important things I have learned is flexibility. While this week was very abnormal, teachers constantly have to be flexible with what they are doing. There is always a plan and always a schedule, but those things can and do change. There have been so many times this year where I will hear we are doing one thing one day and the next day we are doing the exact opposite of the original plan. And in my own teaching, I often find myself change lesson plans in the middle of class. For example, if my students are not understanding adverbs, it is important to take the time to re-teach and get to whatever else I had planned for the day at a different time.

I am going into my last full week of teaching. I feel about as nervous to end this experience as I did beginning it. This is truly the most bittersweet ending I have ever experienced. Look for a more exciting blog post next week.

The Magic of Poe

This week seemed to last forever again, but it was actually a pretty good week overall. This was my third week of teaching all of the classes and it feels pretty normal now. Still exhausting and stressful, but normal. As the end of my student teaching gets closer and closer, the more I am realizing how difficult it is going to be to leave my students. I worry about them and do not want to "give them back" to the actual teacher. I know I have to and I know going back to Cornell will be great, but a large part of me really wishes I could stay just a little longer. I feel like I am just now really starting to to get the hang of things and really understanding the world of teaching. But now, just as things are starting to make more sense, I have to leave.

Anyway, we continued our unit on reading suspense stories. I think (the days kind of run together sometimes) on Tuesday we read "The Sniper." It is a short story about, surprise, a sniper in Ireland during the Troubles. I showed two videos as part of my anticipatory set (teacher language!). The first gave a brief history of the civil war/the Troubles in Ireland, explaining who was involved and major events. The second video showed actual photos and video footage from the late 60's to late 90's which gave the students a clearer image of how heartbreaking and terrifying the Troubles were (and still are, even though they signed a peace agreement, there is still violence from time to time). I don't want to give away the ending of the story, but when I read the last sentence, it was great seeing their reactions. Seeing them have an emotional reaction to a story and to the lives of people in other countries was really refreshing. Junior high students are, typically, very self-centered and seeing them think about the problems of others for a little while was amazing.

On Thursday we started our Edgar Allan Poe unit. I read "The Tell-Tale Heart" aloud to all three classes. There were very few students who said the did not like the story; honestly, I think the students who said they didn't like it, just wanted to go against the majority. It was so fun seeing the level of engagement as I read (quite dramatically)- I could feel my students hanging on every word. On Friday, I showed to one of my classes a pretty cool animation of the story that I found on Youtube. However, I was quite flattered to hear them say that they found it more engaging when I read it to them. Even though Poe tends to write well above an eighth grade reading level, my students really love him already. Anything that can get my kids this engaged is pretty magical.

On a slightly less happy/successful note, I was also reminded this week of how mean junior high girls can be. One of my students turned in something and had drawn pictures of her classmates on the back. Overall, they were cute and nice pictures. However, one picture was of another girl and was labeled with a rather unfortunate/rude nickname. The student who drew this picture is an excellent student and is, normally, a very nice girl. I was pretty shocked to see that she had turned something in with something like this on it.

This was also upsetting to me because the girl who was in the picture is another one of my top students. I love having her in class and always look forward to reading her work. I know she can be a bit of a mean girl to other students, but I honestly believe this comes from her home life. She is in a truly tough situation that I cannot even imagine being able to handle. I do not know how she is able to be so successful at school when her home life is so tough. I am continually amazed by her. Because of this, it is really upsetting to me that the other girls are being so mean to her. I really wish I could make them realize how their actions affect and hurt others, but, at this age, they generally do not seem to care.

On a lighter note, I only have 2.5 weeks left in Arizona. This next week is going to be pretty easy too. We have field trips both Monday and Wednesday in addition to no school on Thursday. This week will definitely go by quickly and should be pretty stress free.

Campfire in the Classroom

This past week seemed to last forever; by Friday, I was completely exhausted and felt like the week was twice as long as it actually was. I'm still working on building my "teacher stamina." Teaching all of the classes all day really wears you out and my body is not adjusted to it yet. Plus, my voice tends to hurt at the end of the day because I do not normally talk this much, especially not using my "teacher voice." On Tuesday, I read a story aloud to my students during the afternoon class and my throat was killing me by the end of it.

Overall, it was another pretty solid week. It was a little more difficult than last week, but I would still call it successful. We have been working on writing scary stories and my students got really into them. Friday afternoon, I found a Youtube video of a campfire and figured out a way to make it loop. I projected this and then we read our scary stories by the campfire. Plus, my best class during the week got to eat marshmallows. It was really fun and it was great to hear their stories read aloud. I was pretty impressed with a few of them. One of my students, who tends to be a little shy, read his aloud and it was definitely the scariest of all the ones read aloud. It was great seeing him be so successful when I normally do not hear much from him.

If I were at Cornell student teaching, then this would be the end of my lead teaching all of the classes; pretty much everyone else just does two weeks of the full teacher load. However, since I cannot ever seem to do things the easy way,  I still have three and a half weeks (aka one Cornell block) left of lead teaching. It actually only amounts to about 15 days because we get out of school for Veteran's day, have a field trip one day, and my last day we are doing Diggory day.  Here are my thoughts and feelings in a stream of consciousness fashion about having only 15 days left to teach:

It will be really nice not feeling responsible for a group of 70 thirteen year olds, but I will still think about them all the time and wonder if they are being successful without me. I am looking forward to being a student myself and spending time on campus and in the library and with my friends, but I will miss the lolz my students bring to me on a daily basis. Thank God I won't have to make lesson plans anymore or write field notes or be required to blog weekly or wake up at 6 am or dress professionally. But it has been kind of fun feeling like a "real grownup" and what if I think of a really fun lesson that I know my students will love and won't get to put into the classroom right away. It is going to be truly miserable being in Iowa in the middle winter when the weather will be absolutely beautiful in Arizona. I am going to miss the trip to Disneyland and their graduation; I will miss them walking across the stage and seeing them with great, big, proud smiles across their faces on the day they have been looking forward to all year. The moral of the story is that I am looking forward to the end, but I also am going to miss my students and will think of them often. I intend to get the most out of these last fifteen days.

Passing on my Love of the 90's

My apologies for not posting yesterday; Katie and I were gone nearly all day because we went to Phoenix. There was really incredible book sale put on by the Phoenix public library and I got 11 books for $8! We spent three hours there and did not even get through all the books. It was pretty amazing.

Last week, was my first full week of teaching all of the 8th grade language arts classes. I was really nervous about taking on this challenge, but after the first week, I feel pretty hopeful for the next few weeks. The students have developed some pretty bad habits and they are difficult to change. However, we have really started using a system they used last year and it is proving to be fairly effective. They use integrity cards; if, the student is misbehaving or is irresponsible, then they receive a hole punch in their card. If, they do something outstanding, then they receive a sticker on their card. They also need it in order to get into dance, sport events, and other activities. If they have too many punches, then they will not be allowed to attend the events. At the beginning of the year, we really did not use the cards much and we are now using them a lot. This seems to have improved their behavior.

This week, we also began a unit on suspense/scary stories. We are currently writing our own scary stories and my students are really excited about them. On Friday, a few of my students asked if we were writing and when I told them no, they were visibly disappointed. It makes me incredibly happy and excited that they are actually looking forward to writing and not rolling their eyes every time I tell them to get out their draft books. This also makes me hopeful for the readings we will be doing in connection with the writing piece.

Also on Friday, I showed my students an episode of "Are You Afraid of the Dark?". I was excited to realize these episodes are on Youtube and they are completely relevant to what we are learning. I love everything about the 90's and loved this show as a child. My students were completely enthralled with it. At this point in my life, I do not really find the show very scary or creepy anymore, but they were still pretty creeped out by it. I suppose they are still young enough that they do not notice the cheesiness of the show.

Even with the stress and extra amount of work involved with teaching all of the classes, I am hopeful and excited for the remaining weeks. And after such a successful week, it really makes me feel much more confident about my abilities as a teacher and what my future will hold. Let's hope this week does not change all of that.

Here's to the Next Five and Half Weeks

Well, the end of fall break is here. I am back in Arizona and putting off writing lesson plans for tomorrow. Being at Cornell was beyond wonderful; it felt so right being back on campus. Being away has been so much harder than I thought it would be and I look forward to January when I will be back full time. It was great seeing all of my friends and my professors as well. My professors really gave me a lot of encouragement and compliments that helped me to remember why I am here in the first place, which is something I desperately needed.

There are only five and a half weeks left of my student teaching. Right now, going back to school tomorrow sounds like the worst thing I could possibly do, but I know once I get back into the swing of things, it will feel normal again. I also know that these five and a half weeks will go by so quickly and then I will start missing my kids once I am back at Cornell.

Tomorrow, I am going to take over all of the English classes. This is where student teaching becomes even more stressful and I am in full on teacher mode all day everyday. I am hoping that starting after fall break will give us a "clean slate" with the kids and I won't have to struggle too much with them. I am planning on treating tomorrow pretty much like the first day of school in order to set ourselves up successfully for the rest of my time here. So, here's the next five and a half weeks! Bring it.

Just Call Me Miss Swaggoner

As of right now, I am officially on fall break and I am sitting in the Denver airport waiting for my flight to Iowa. I thought fall break would never get here and this past week seemed to last forever. However, the past week was pretty good, I had some really good days with my students.

On Wednesday, there must have been some sort of miracle or something because my students were wonderful in the morning. Perhaps it was because they were pretty drained and still half asleep or maybe it was because we were having parent teacher conferences that night and the next night. Whatever happened, it was great. We worked on our descriptive paragraphs and I showed them the one I wrote about Cornell. They were really interested in my college and what I had to say about it. I even showed them a few pictures, which was pretty funny. Many of them thought my college seemed HUGE, even though Cornell is so tiny. Their concept of college and Iowa is really skewed, but I find it rather charming. At any rate, after I modeled some writing for them, they started work on their own paragraphs. This the remarkable part: they were actually quiet and I saw nearly every student at least begin writing.

On Wednesday and Thursday the students had half days and then we had parent/teacher conferences after that. I was a little nervous for this because I had never done anything like this before, but they went really well. Of course, it was mostly parents that I had zero complaints about. However, there were a few parents I really wanted to talk to that did come; I am hoping it will make a difference after fall break. Overall, the conferences were really successful, but they made for a really long day.

On Thursday morning, we pretty much finished up everything we need to do before break. Thursday afternoon, I did the fun writing activity they loved where I give them a beginning sentence and they continue the story. Then, they trade papers and continue on another person's story. Again, there were a lot of stories including Justin Beiber, either positively or negatively. I believe every single story included him somehow. In one story, I beat up Oprah, glued her to the road, and then went to the moon on the cow. Where they come up with these things, I do not know, but I love reading these stories. They are so funny and really allows them to show their creativity.

Friday, we already planned on pretty much having a free day. Jodi brought her dog, Diggory, to school and we played with him all morning. In the afternoon, we started watching the Princess Bride and had an assembly. At the end of the day, I was in the Social Studies room where they were playing Oregon Trail as a class. Unfortunately, I got shot, had my leg amputated, and died. Also during this time, my students decided my new name is Miss Swaggoner. Overall, it was a really fun day and it allowed me to really enjoy my students. It are times like this and stories like I talk about above that make me love my students.

I am now making my way to Iowa and cannot wait to get there! I really need a break and cannot wait to feel like a normal college student again. After fall break, I only five and a half weeks left. It has gone by so quickly already. Even with all the difficulties, this is something I would not trade for the world. I am learning so much and I know this experience is setting me up to be a great teacher in the future. Hopefully, this break will give me the motivation and energy I need to get through the remaining weeks.

One More Week

This week was a pretty average week at school: a few ups a few downs. Overall, pretty solid. The new trend seems to be the beginning of the week starts off pretty rough (maybe including tears) and by the end of the week it feels okay again. Hopefully, this next week will start smoothly and end smoothly. Granted, it is the week before fall break and the kids are definitely going to be wound up. And let's be honest, I am looking forward to fall break as much, if not more than the students are.

Anyway, on Wednesday, I attended another training. This time, it was for Step Up to Writing, which is a supplemental program that focuses on, as you probably guessed, writing. Thankfully, this presenter was much better than the last one and the curriculum is actually really good stuff. I have been struggling a bit with teaching writing, so I am definitely going to start using this in my classroom. I don't remember if I was really a good writer or a bad writer in eighth grade, but my students really need some extra help in writing. It is difficult to teach because there is not an exact formula to follow; you give a writing assignment and everyone will do something different. You know good writing when you see it and you know bad writing when you see it, but how do you teach good writing? I am still figuring this out...

On a not related to school note, I went to see Anberlin last night in Tempe. It was truly awesome; the best concert I have been to.  They had the perfect combination of new songs (which are fantastic) and old favorites. They sadly did not play one of my favorites (Inevitable), but it was amazing regardless. Also, the lighting was really amazing. They had, what I am guessing, were a bunch LED light bars. Considering their newest album is titled "Dark is the Way. Light is a Place" it makes sense for them to have incredible lighting. I will post pictures on Facebook as soon as I find my camera cord.

This is a really short post, but that is probably okay considering most of my posts are pretty long. One more week and then a much desired week long break. Here's to hoping for a successful week!

When the Classroom Feels Crazy and the Teacher Feels Crazy...

Just when I thought student teaching at Bales couldn't get any crazier, it did. Monday was, by far, the hardest day of student teaching yet. Going to school on Monday, I was not in a very good mood and teaching when you do not feel very happy is tough. As I mentioned in my last post, I am now sharing a classroom with Mrs. Bjorklund. We did not really get to organize much since she left early on that Friday which means that the classroom was total chaos on Monday. Plus, I finally took over the homeroom on Monday and the kids normally just socialize during that time. However, I really want to do other things with them during homeroom, but is going to be a bit of a process to get them to adjust to how I think homeroom should run. Needless to say, homeroom on Monday did not go according to plan.

Since homeroom was a bit of a disaster, this then carried over into first hour. It is difficult to expect the students not act crazy when the classroom feels crazy and the teacher feels crazy. However,  I still had things I needed to teach and stuff we needed to accomplish, but it was next to impossible to get anything done. Basically, by the end of the first hour I was beyond frustrated and in a completely awful mood. Thankfully, I was able to go have a nice cry in Jodi's office and she helped a lot. During the afternoon class, it started out really rough and I yelled at them; I really am not much of a yeller, but I had absolutely zero patience and did not know what else to do. Thankfully, Jodi came a little bit into class and helped me straighten things out. We had a talk with them (including me apologizing for being a in a bad mood and yelling at them/being part of the problem) and I genuinely believe they felt bad.

I was telling Katie about my day after school and she said something that made me feel a bit better. I was telling her how I knew part of the students' bad behavior was my fault and part of it was their fault. She told me that it takes some teachers years to realize that their attitude and behavior can be part of the problem with the students. It seemed really natural to me to realize that since I was in a bad mood, I was affecting the students. It always makes me feel better when I seem to be doing and realizing things that teachers who are far more experienced cannot seem to grasp.

The next day things were much better. However, it is a little bit frustrating that they seemed to lose a lot of their personality after getting in trouble. Another teacher told me that she often finds you can let them behave inappropriately and keep the personality or you can get them to behave but lose personality. Jodi seems to think that their personality will come back with a little bit of time and I think I agree with her. By the end of the week, they were still behaving well (with the exception of Thursday when they had a sub, but more on that in a minute) and we were able to have a bit of fun too.

On Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday I spent nearly all of my time that I was not teaching in the main office helping to prepare for the state audit of ELD (English Language Development). There are a lot of different requirements for students who have not tested proficient in English and there is a ton of paperwork that goes along with it. So, I went through a lot of student files checking to make sure they had their paperwork completed and in the correct folder. It was a pretty tedious and boring project, but, again I was glad I could help. The state visited on Thursday when I was gone and we will not know if we passed or failed until later.

On Thursday, I went to training for Language! (or LangBang as we have nicknamed it), which is a core replacement program. We are soon going to be implementing this in our school for our ELD, special ed, and fall far below (failing the state test) students who need really need extra help with reading, writing, and language. The program actually seems pretty good and could be really effective for these students. It not really something I think I would like teaching because it is sooooo scripted, but if it helps my students, then I am for it.

As I mentioned above, my students had a sub on Thursday since I was gone (Mrs. Bjorkland too). I was worried about leaving them because I knew they probably were not going to behave well for the sub and there were some things I really wanted to teach on Thursday that the sub would not be able to do. Honestly, it is much easier to just teach than prepare for a sub; I feel like I lost a whole day of important instruction. The sub did leave a bad report and on Friday I had to have another discussion with my students. I am worried they are going to start hating me, but they know that their behavior for the sub was truly unacceptable.

There are only two more weeks until the end of the quarter, beginning of fall break, and my much anticipated (week long) return to Cornell. Also, this is my last week living with Katie; I am going to move on Saturday to stay with Julia (a 1st and 2nd ELD teacher at my school) for the rest of my time. She lives in Phoenix so it will be nice to live a bit closer to things like Target and Starbucks.

Egg Propaganda and The Twilight Zone

This was probably the most exhausting week of student teaching thus far. First, the week felt slightly off since we did not really have school last week and getting back into the swing of things was difficult. On Monday, I started taking over the afternoon class, which I am pretty happy about. I believe I have mentioned a few times how much of a struggle time is and having more time with the students is definitely a good thing. However, behavior is a real problem in the afternoon. When I get them, they have just come from recess, lunch, and specials, meaning they are pretty wound up. Plus, they are not really accustomed to having me in the afternoon and are struggling a bit to remember our expectations are the same for both the morning and afternoon classes.

On Thursday, we took all of the junior high girls to an assembly at the high school called "Tomorrow's Winners." They started this program last year and basically it is all about empowering young girls to become future leaders. I was pretty excited about this because Jodi told me that they were really good last year and the girls really liked them. Plus, this sort of thing is something I am really passionate about would like to be a part of something similar in the future. However, with all of this build up, I was severely disappointed. The first 3/4ths of it was fine; it could have been better, but it was tolerable. However, the last presenter made me want to dig my eyes out with spoons (to borrow a phrase from Jodi). She was the owner of Hickman's Eggs and it, quite literally, was 45 minutes of egg propaganda mixed with support of the Republican party/ideals. The only thing remotely empowering was the fact that company was started by women; I am guessing that this lady has donated money to the organization that hosts Tomorrow's Winners because I do not know why else she would be allowed to present. Plus, Jodi told me that she presented last year as well, meaning my 8th grade girls have heard this lady, not once, but twice.

Friday was, by accident, my first day of teaching all of the classes. The day started with Mrs. Bjorklund moving all of her stuff into our (Jodi and me) classroom. Why would three teachers be sharing a classroom? Well, to make a long story short, Options (the behavior kids that are not in a normal classroom) needed an extra classroom. Since Jodi and I only teach part of the day, it made sense for Mrs. Bjorklund to move in with us and the 8th grade math teacher to move into Mrs. Bjorklund's old classroom. Then, the Options kids get the old math teacher's room. Needless to say, this whole process is pretty frustrating and stressful for everyone involved; I am just glad that Jodi and I did not have to move. She has been teaching 25 years meaning she has a lot of stuff in her classroom.

So, Jodi and I taught our morning class as usual and Mrs. Bjorklund's second class comes in after that. She was feeling pretty stressed with the move and just intended to show them a movie for the day. Jodi offered that I could help her since I was available and I will be teaching this kids eventually anyway. Therefore, we just decided I would teach all the morning classes the same thing I did for my own class. About ten minutes into class number two, Jodi comes back and says she needs to talk to both of us for a minute. As it turns out, Mrs. Bjorklund's son has been puking at pre-school and she needs to go pick him up. Now, I am not just helping with the morning classes, but I am teaching all the classes all day. Wow. I thought I would have a little more notice and more of a plan before I was teaching all day by myself, but you know, it honestly could have gone much worse than it did.

All of the morning classes watched an episode of The Twilight Zone called “Talking Tina.” We stopped the video every few minutes and let the students write predictions about what they thought would happen next in the show. The students were very engaged and really seemed to enjoy it, despite how incredibly creepy the doll is in the show. In the afternoon, all of the classes took their vocabulary test.  In the class I normally teach, my students then worked in groups of four writing a paragraph describing a cheeseburger. They were told to describe it as if it was the best burger they ever had; someone else is going to read them and decide which one is best. The winners will receive ding dongs on Monday. In the other two classes, we stared working on adjectives and went over the "helpful hints" handout that we have for each part of speech. Then, they wrote five adjectives describing themselves and the rest of the class guessed who it was.  Thankfully, I had already taught my class about adjectives earlier in the week and did the same activity with them, so I did not have to do anything new.

There were definitely behavior problems, but nothing that got too out of control. I also struggled because I only knew a few names in each class, which makes it hard to teach at this point in the year. Overall, I would say it was pretty successful for my first day and without much notice. However, at the end of the day, I was completely exhausted. I was already wiped from the rest of the week and this just took everything I had left. I completely crashed at home after school and basically laid around the house all of Friday night.

Oh, I know I mentioned in my last post that I was going to be going to the high school for a day for observation, but the plans fell through. Hopefully, I will get to go there soon and meet some of the high school students and teachers.

On Saturday, Fred (our principal) had a gathering at his house for all of the teachers and anyone they wanted to bring. I went with Katie and we had a really good time. There was a lot of great food and it was fun socializing outside of school with my co-workers. It is still weird to be on the "teacher" side of things, but I am adjusting. Today, Katie and I went to see Easy A. I definitely recommend it- it was so good. I had really high expectations for it and it exceeded them.

On another note, only three weeks until fall break and I will be back at Cornell for one week. I am really missing my friends and life at Cornell right now. I am learning a lot while being out here, but I am really not ready to give up my college kid life just yet. Looking forward to getting back to "normal" for a little while and not thinking about teaching. I think it will be just what I need to give me the energy for the rest (and most difficult part) of my student teaching.

Are you sure you don't want a jacket?

Last Monday we did not have school; I honestly forgot that most places get national holidays off! It was beautiful having a three day weekend, especially knowing that all the Cornellians were in class. However, I would rather have a block break than national holidays. Anyway, Katie and I went on a little shopping excursion for the day, most importantly to Ikea. I have a small obsession with Ikea/furniture stores in general, so even though we did not need to buy anything, we spent a long amount of time just wandering. It was really nice to have the day to do whatever we wanted and not worry about school.

As I mentioned in my last post, the junior high students went on a trip to Sky-Y Camp in Prescott, AZ from Tuesday to Thursday. Overall, it was a really successful event and I am glad I went! However, there were definitely some issues, mostly dealing with organization. There was not really a clear lead teacher for the trip which meant that communication failed at certain points. For example, the drive to Prescott was supposed to take us about 2 hours. Unfortunately, we went to the wrong camp at first and doubled our drive time. Surprisingly, the girls on our bus were really well behaved (even without a bathroom break!) and did not complain too much. The teachers seemed to be a bit more annoyed than the students did.

When we finally arrived at camp, we ate lunch, unpacked, and then started our activities. Mr. Forni, a fourth grade teacher that went to help chaperone, and I were in charge of a group of 15 students. Our first activity involved a few different team building things that were designed to help the kids to communicate properly. A few were effective and a few were not. The teachers were instructed to not help the students at all sot hey could really "self-discover." This was really frustrating for me because I have done a lot of these kinds of activities before and I could see where they were not being effective. However, I kept my mouth shut as I was instructed. It was really great in the end when they were successful on the see-saw. Essentially, there was a large square see-saw that the entire team had to stand on and make it balance. The trick was that when one person got on the edges could not touch the ground or else they had to start over. They did a really great job at this event and I was very proud of them!

On Wednesday, we had two really physical events and two team building events. The physical events were the high ropes course and the rock wall. I am quite proud because I completed both high ropes courses and climbed the 50 foot rock wall (I do not have pictures from the rock wall)! Plus, it was really great seeing the kids over come their fears and complete the courses. These two things were definitely a highlight of the whole trip.

Climbing the pole

Mr. Forni and me about to embark on our high ropes journey.

Going across the lily pads; this was definitely the hardest part!

High ropes course 1 (a little lower than the above pictures)

Jodi overcoming her fear of heights and totally killing the ropes course!

Beautiful view in Prescott.

That night we had a campfire, some skits, and s'mores. All of the day time activities were really fun, but staying over night with a bunch of junior high students is not necessarily my favorite thing. Thankfully, my girls actually wanted to go to sleep at night, however, it was really strange being responsible for them at night. I was the one who was actually supposed to know what was going on and where they were supposed to be at what times. I still have not totally adjusted to being an "authority figure" and this was a new level of that. Plus, there were a lot of woods around the camp and a few girls in my cabin that were definitely attempting to meet up with their boyfriends in the woods. I think we avoided any late night meetings, but, as Jodi says, we will find out in June if this true or not. I felt a bit like a mother a few times because girls would ask me if they could go shower and I also had a few girls leave without jackets. I felt just like my mother as I said, "Are are you sure you don't want a jacket? It is going to get cold." Speaking of weather, that was also a really great part of camp. It is still really hot in Buckeye (getting better but not fall weather), but since Prescott is farther north and in the mountains, it was much cooler there. It was really great being able to wear jeans and a hoody without dying and sweating profusely.

We drove back to school Thursday (without getting lost) and, thankfully, we let the kids go early and we got to leave early too. We were all completely exhausted and it was pointless to stay at school anyway. Friday was a bit of superfluous day to a certain extent; everyone was pretty checked out and there was no point in teaching any content on that day. However, did have to take a district benchmark writing test. The test was supposed to be taken on Wednesday, but we were obviously gone and took it on Friday instead. Basically, the students are given a writing prompt and must write (including a pre-write, draft, and final copy) in one sitting. This test is given a few times throughout the year to help measure their growth. However, the truly silly thing about this test is that the first one (the one we just completed) is a narrative. They do not write a narrative at any other point making it impossible to measure to their growth. When each prompt is a different genre how are we supposed to compare them? Not to mention the fact that this test is required by the district, but the district does absolutely nothing with the data. In fact, they never even see the completed tests.

This week I am picking up the afternoon class (started today, but I will save that for next weeks post) and will be visiting the high school all day on Friday. Hopefully it will be a good week!

DIBELS and a Fifth Grade Guido

I spent a lot of time this week doing extra work that others teachers did not have time to complete. A I spent a large amount of time working DIBELS tests. DIBELS (Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills) is a reading test that is taken three times a year to measure students' growth in grades K-6. Even though I am working with 8th grade, I found myself grading numerous DIBELS tests simply because I am an extra pair of hands and other teachers did not have time to grade them. After grading, I also alphabetized and made sure that we had all the tests for all of the students. Even though this was a pretty tedious job, I am glad I could help because it would have taken a lot more time if I had not been there.

I often find myself wondering how teachers can ever get all of their work done; there is always so much to do! I feel like they need to hire someone to do just the extra stuff that teachers do not really have time for, but need to get done anyway. Of course, with budget cuts and everything, this will never ever happen.

On Friday afternoon, I was volunteered to watch a fifth grade classroom because the teacher needed to work on ILLPs (Individual Language Learning Plan). An ILLP is basically like an IEP for students who are learning English. I was told to take each class to the library, they would read, and that would be it. However, it was not nearly that easy.  The students were awful: they would not listen and just kept talking throughout most of the class. Again, it reaffirmed my choice in being a secondary major. A fun bit of side information: there is a fifth grader who is a total guido. He has hair kind of like Pauly D's and was wearing an Ed Hardy style shirt. Seeing him almost made the whole afternoon worth it.

As far teaching this week, there is nothing too eventful to report. Jodi was actually here all week; I think a curriculum developer had an apoplexy (vocab word!) somewhere when they realized they did not send her to any training all week. Since she was here, she did about half of the teaching, which was fine. That will probably be her last week to get any significant amount of teaching because in two weeks I will be taking over full time.

Next Tuesday (no school Monday!), the 7th and 8th graders are going on a trip to Sky-Y, which is a leadership camp in northern AZ. This is not just a day trip though; we leave Tuesday afternoon and do not return until Thursday at 3pm. This means that I will be sleeping in cabins with junior high girls for two nights. I am kind of excited for the leadership activities, but the sleeping situation does not sound nearly as thrilling. At the very least I will have some good stories to blog about.

Justin Bieber and Tupac

I have been in Arizona for one month now, which is weird. It feels like I just started, but also that I have been here forever. Student teaching seems to be full of opposing feelings like that. For example, I also feel really young, but really old a the same time. I feel young because I am working with people that are older than me and, for the first time in my life, I am not around anyone my own age. However, I also feel really old because I have been working so long to actually be a teacher and now I am finally doing it. It is a very strange feeling.

Anyway, this week was really good. Jodi was only here Monday and Tuesday. She had meetings Wednesday and Thursday; she was going to be at school on Friday, but she got food poisoning! I texted her on Thursday night to make sure she was going to on Friday and I did not need to prepare lesson plans. Thankfully I did that otherwise I would not have been prepared on Friday at all!

I was worried that the students would misbehave on Wednesday since Jodi had been there the days prior and Wednesday is also early release. (We have professional development every Wednesday after the students leave). However, they were surprisingly good and we managed to get through the entire lesson. I think they are really starting to view me more as their teacher and taking me seriously. Plus, I am starting to take myself more seriously and view myself as an actual teacher, which feels good.

Thursday, was another successful day. I struggled a bit in deciding what to teach for the day because Jodi wanted me to start their next writing assignment. I did not really have much more direction other than that so I felt like I had too much to choose from. Ultimately, I found a picture of a crowded airport and had them brainstorm ideas of how they think it would feel if they were in that picture, where the people were going, etc. They did not actually start writing, but we will get to that next week.

Finally, Friday was a kind of crazy day. Woke up on Friday morning and it was storming outside! Not just a little bit of rain, but full on thunderstorm. When it rains in Arizona, everyone goes crazy! Plus, it was a Friday so the kids were extra crazy. However, we had a pretty successful day. They had two tests to take (gross) and we were supposed to do a pronoun worksheet after that. However, I changed my mind since I knew they were really restless and I felt bad after their two tests. So instead, we did a fun writing thing. I gave them a starting sentence: "It was a dismal [vocabulary word!] day in the little town of Buckeye when..." Then they wrote for a few minutes and switch papers, continuing the other person's story. We did this for the rest of the period. Overall, it went really well. This was always something I loved to do in school and it is super entertaining. Plus, it got them writing and it was way more fun than a pronoun worksheet.

Here is a list of common themes in their writing:
1. Justin Bieber
1.1 Justin Bieber's sexuality
1.2 Killing Justin Bieber
2. Hannah Montana
3. Tupac (not sure where he came from...)
4. One student showed up in nearly everyone's story
4.1 That same student wrote about himself getting three girlfriends in each of his stories
5. Teletubbies
6. Giant things falling from the sky (babies, burritos, etc.)
7. Michael Jackson

At any rate, their stories were pretty entertaining and I will definitely do this activity with them again before I leave.

Thankfully, Jodi will be back on Monday and we will start language rehab with the kids! I am not even entirely sure what all that entails, but I will write about it next week after I figure it out. Also, I think this week I am supposed to take over the class full time, which is terrifying, but also exciting. This also means I am going to start picking up the afternoon class, which I am definitely looking forward to. I really need more time with my students in order to accomplish everything I want to do, so another fifty minutes will be great. Looking forward to what I will learn this week!

A Successful Friday

I cannot believe I have already been out here three weeks; the time is going by really quickly! It is also really strange knowing that everyone else is just starting their student teaching and summer is just now ending for other Cornellians.

At any rate, week three of student teaching was very interesting. The week started off a little rough, but turned out great by the end. Monday and Tuesday felt a little overwhelming and terrifying. Since last Friday was not a highly successful lesson, I started feeling really nervous about teaching again. Jodi had more meetings Tuesday and Wednesday so I was again left to lead teach by myself. Tuesday was not a complete failure, but it could have been more successful. We went over their vocabulary words and I was trying to get them to give me example sentences using their words. However, they pretty much just stared at me instead of participating. I realized later that I should have used puppy biscuits to help with participating. No, not actual dog treats. Jodi uses candy as a reward regularly and calls them puppy biscuits, as inspired from the behavior she gets from her dog when she gives him a puppy biscuit. I don't necessarily believe in using extrinsic rewards because the ideal is that students will be intrinsically motivated. Using extrinsic rewards goes against much of what Jill Heinrich taught me. However, you cannot deny the effectiveness of candy on 8th graders.

Wednesday, Jodi managed to get out of her meeting so she could be in the classroom with me. We did a little bit of team teaching and it was good. Also, Kerry Bostwick, my education advisor at Cornell, arrived in Arizona. That night, we had a dinner with all of the Cornell alums (seven) and Kerry. It was a really great dinner! Katie cooked really great fajitas and it was really fun having a group of Cornellians together. It also made me feel really great about the education I have received and what my future could be like. They are all highly successful teachers and it is fun to think that I might join them out here next year. At several points, they were all talking about certain classes they had to take in order to be certified in Arizona. A large part of their class they took was about writing objectives and effective teaching strategies. They all complained that it was a waste of time because they had been learning these sorts of things since their 200 level education classes at Cornell. Apparently, not all schools prepare their students to be teacher as well as Cornell does.

Cornellians (sitting on Katie's really great couch)

 

On Friday, Kerry came to visit me at my school and observe me teach. I, of course, was very nervous to teach in front of her. However, the day was fantastic! It was actually the best day I have had out here yet. The lesson (pronouns) went really well. The kids were engaged and participated. Kerry and Jodi had only positive things about my teaching. Kerry was really impressed with me and with my entire school. She told me multiple times how lucky I am to be out here and to be getting such a great experience. I felt pretty lucky before, but Kerry just reinforced that feeling a hundred times over. I am so glad she got to come out here, see me, and meet Jodi. The beginning of the week may have felt a little rough, but it definitely ended on a high note.

Next week, I will probably start picking up a few of the afternoon classes. Jodi has more meetings to attend so I will be lead teaching a lot. I am feeling good about lead teaching right now since Friday went so well, but I also know that there will be days in the future when things do not go well. I have to be able to accept the good and the bad, learn from both, and change accordingly. Each day is new and different and I am looking forward to what next week holds.

They could duct tape you to the chair if they wanted...

So, maybe I lied about that whole "posting tomorrow thing." But, whatev. I'm posting now right? I am currently in week three of student teaching, but this post is about week two (aka last week). This weekend (I might be lying again), I will post about the week I am in the middle of right now. Then, we will be all caught up and life will be happy!

Last week was the first full week of school for the students. Jodi had meetings both Thursday and Friday so I was left to lead teach. I was terribly nervous to be in front of the students and attempt to teach them something. Standing in front of a room of 25 eighth graders that could (as Jodi kindly reminded me) duct tape you to a chair if they wanted to, is terrifying. It is much easier to talk about teaching from a theoretical perspective (i.e. in education classes at Cornell), but it is an entirely different ball game to actually do it.

Thursday went really well. The students were well behaved and my lesson seemed to be effective. First, we played a game with nouns. Students worked in pairs to see who could list the most nouns in five minutes and the winning pair received candy. Unfortunately, two students lied about how many words they came up with. The things students will do for a piece of candy... After that, we went over their vocabulary sentences. Each week, they get ten new vocabulary words and have a test over them every Friday. In order to learn them, they write sentences using the words each week. We were also supposed to work on their writing assignment, but we ran out of time. It is funny how 50 minutes can feel like forever as a student, but it goes by so quickly as a teacher.

Friday was a bit of a different story. The students were not horrible, but they were not as good as the day before. First, we had their vocabulary test (which many of them did very well on, thankfully). After that, we worked on their persuasive paragraphs. I gave them about half an hour in class to work on their assignment so they would not have as much to do over the weekend. Instead of working though, many of them just socialized. I trained to reign them back in, but I could not manage to do it. What I should have done is switched the noun game to Friday and worked on their writing on Thursday. Unstructured time on Friday does not seem to be very effective, particularly when it is at the end of their first full week.

I will be lead teaching even more lessons during the third week- even a few of my own creation (ah!). Plus, Kerry Bostwick, my education adviser at Cornell, will be visiting Wednesday-Saturday. She is planning on observing me on Friday. I am excited for her to be here and meet Jodi! I am also nervous for her to observe me teaching, but I think the feedback will be very helpful. Student teaching is all about learning and more people I have to learn from, the better.

Over the weekend, I spent a large amount of time by myself because Katie works a second job on Friday and Saturday night. This is not nearly as depressing as it sounds, however. I successfully ordered a large pizza for myself and have been eating it for lunch all week. Plus, I skyped with a bunch of Cornellians, which is nice. Sunday, Katie and I went to lunch with my principal, Fred Lugo, which was also fun. Then, we went to see Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. This is not really Katie's type of movie, but I liked it a lot. All in all, life is good in Arizona!

Hey, look! A blog.

So, as I am sure you know if you are reading this, I am student teaching in AZ and I am required to keep a blog as part of my little journey out here. All of my blogs will be on the Cornell Fellows website, but apparently they kind of suck at updating it since my post was supposed to be put up on Wednesday and it is now Saturday with no sign of it. Because of that, I have decided I will do a personal blog as well. This also gives me room to write about some things that might be not be applicable to the Fellowship blog. At any rate, here is my first post about my first week of school. I will post tomorrow about week two.

I arrived in Phoenix on Saturday night (July 31st) and was picked up by Katie Preston, a Cornell alumna that I will be living with for the first two months of my fellowship. We drove back to her house in Buckeye and had all day Sunday to hang out and become adjusted to life out West. Monday was my first day at Bales Elementary School. I met my mentor teacher, Jodi Chesbro, and a myriad of other teachers and administrators. Monday and Tuesday were spent setting up classrooms and in meetings. Monday was an exceptionally long day: I arrived at school at 7:30 am and did not leave until 8:30 pm. Monday night was meet the teacher night where students and parents come to the school in order to, as the name suggests, meet the teacher! 

Meet the teacher night was a little complicated because there are basically three different 8th grade language arts teachers. My mentor teacher, Mrs. Bjorklund, and myself. Even though Jodi is my mentor teacher, she technically is no longer the 8th grade language arts teacher. This year, Jodi is an academic coach, meaning she observes other teachers and helps them with their teaching. However, since she had a student teacher, she convinced our principal, Fred Lugo, to let her teach one class of 8th grade language arts. Mrs. Bjorklund is teaching the rest of the classes. Bales runs on a modified block system; they used to have nearly 2 hour long blocks, but some teachers were having classroom management problems with such long class periods. This year, they start the mornings with half an hour of home room and then 50 minute blocks. With language arts, you see the same group of kids twice a day: once in the morning and then once in the afternoon. So, you have the kids for a total of 100 minutes, but it is split up throughout the day. Eventually, I will take over both the morning and afternoon classes of Mrs. Bjorklund's homeroom. Anyway, this is the reason meet the teacher night is complicated because the students will really have all three of us as a teacher at various points throughout the year.

Wednesday was the first day of school. I was really nervous! By this time, I was really comfortable with my mentor teacher and was learning my way around the school pretty well, but the school changes once the students arrive. However, I really did not have a reason to be nervous because, at this point, I am only observing the students. Wednesday-Friday I pretty much followed the students around most of the day: homeroom, Mrs. Chesbro's class, Mrs. Bjorklund's class, math, and social studies. I have also been into a couple of other classrooms in the lower grades. Jodi really wants me to get a well rounded experience, so I will be observing all over the place. 

Overall, things are going really well and I am so happy to be here. Jodi is absolutely wonderful and I am pleased that I am getting to work with her. She definitely has really great advice and makes teaching look so easy, not to mention fun! It has definitely been a huge adjustment coming here in a couple different ways. First, I am adjusting from the easy life of summer to the busy life of a teacher, which I have affectionately dubbed "teacher mode." Normally, I would have a few more weeks of summer and then go into "student mode," but this a completely new experience for me. Secondly, I also am adjusting to life outside of the Midwest. The culture out here is very different and I am excited to learn more about life in Arizona. Along with that, I am meeting a lot of new people and making a lot of new friends. Plus, the people I am meeting will be great contacts after I graduate in May; networking is definitely an important part of being out here. 

For the second week of school, I am actually going to start picking up a few lessons and then I will be lead teaching on Thursday and Friday. Typically, student teachers will not start lead teaching for at least a month or a month and a half. However, Jodi has meetings on Thursday and Friday, so it makes more sense for me to start teaching earlier. I am definitely nervous about this, but I know that I am as prepared as I am going to get and I may as well just jump into teaching as soon as possible.  

To end this post, I have a few obligatory first day of school photos.

My legit (blurry) teacher ID. (I also have a teacher email!)

First day of school nerd.

In front of my school.

Classroom

Classroom again