Day 18: Planbook

Friday, half day.
Today we only had a half day for the students, which was probably for the best. It could have turned into a rough day.
A few things to talk about today.

Spiral Teaching. The 5th grade at my school does spiral teaching with their mathematics. This means that they his everything in their core very quickly, but they do it three times throughout the year. This means that the students all get every topic three times which cements it into their memory more than just teaching it once.

I had decided to not get a plan book from Erin Condren because it was so expensive and that I didn't need one right now. However, I am beginning to reconsider...

So I have decided that I need to get a planbook, but I don't want to spend that much money (though I could because I could use it for when I get a job in January.) But to Wal-Mart it is.

I have also been thinking about learning a language. I want to know how to speak a different language, not only will that help me but it will also help my students and their parents.

Another week done, another week on it's way. Next week I am teaching everything except for science, so I have a lot of reading material for this weekend.

Day 1: Preparing for School

I went to school today, not really knowing what I was getting into. I knew that I was going to meet my teacher but I didn't know if I would be staying or what. She said we would go over my student teaching requirements for her classroom. Or maybe we would just meet and she would send me home.

Neither assumption was correct. I went to find a classroom and a teacher who was not what I expected, but a happy surprise. As soon as she got there she put me to work. I started copying pages and cutting them out, picking out paper to put them on and so forth. At first I was frustrated  that I was just copying stuff, but the more I thought about it... That is what a teacher does on the first work day of the school year. Copying, cutting, pasting, hole punching, laminating that is all part of what a teacher does. So I stopped my pessimistic thoughts and happily finished my job, greeting all of the teachers that came in.

I should mention, I am starting my student teaching this week instead of in two weeks when the rest of the student teachers are because the second half of my student teaching is in Norway. I have to leave two weeks early for that and so here I am! Thankfully I get to see all of the before the start of school procedures and how my teacher sets up for her class. This is something I have been wanting to discover how to do, and now I have an opportunity to see how it works!

My teacher, Mrs. Burton, was working with another teacher in the 5th grade on what they were going to do this week. They had matching plan books ( that were gorgeous! Take a look!) and they were planning what to do on Thursday and Friday. They obviously knew what they were doing since they were using phrases and words I didn't understand. But they were also looking at the lesson plan book they had made the previous year, which was just as detailed and well designed as the one they were making for this year. I was very impressed with it. Especially since the last teacher I was with said she did not use lesson planers anymore. When I am in my own classroom, I will be sure to have a good lesson plan book, and keep careful notes of what I am doing so that I can do it again or not, next year.