Winter Sensory Table Activity

   I don't just want the sensory to be something to play in, but also a learning tool for my students. I actually use it as one of my centers that the students go to through out the week. During this month of January in my sensory table I have placed snowballs. My students absolutely loved them. 

   I was searching on Pinterest different and fun activities that I can do with word families when I stumbled across this great idea. Though I don't have the students toss them. Instead they have to just search for one, read the word, and then place it into the correct bucket. I did 11 words for each word family. I did some four letters words for my more advanced students.     It was so simple and cheap and something I could use until the end of the month and just add the different word family when I taught it with the others. I bought the same ping pong balls that the website suggested and there was a lot, so I didn't use them all. I am sure down the road I will think of different activities that I can use them for. 

   I got the buckets really cheap at Walmart from the after Christmas sales, but even so they were only 97 cents to begin with. Also on the buckets I wrote on duct tape and placed on the bucket so I can reuse the buckets for other things and activities. 

Parent Volunteer

   Well I had the parent that doesn't like make volunteer for the first time this week. I was so nervous and I think I was worried that she was going to say something to be about my teaching or worse to one of my bosses. Hopefully she won't be around very long. She is just trying to get her son to open up more because whatever. I on the other hand am trying to get the student to learn all his letters and sounds, but apparently that doesn't worry her. 

   It went completely fine. Which was really surprising to me. I thought for sure she have something to say about my teaching or something. I figures out that she was there for 3 hours! That seems like a lot of time to me and I wasn't expecting her to be there that long. 

   But yeah, She was only in my room for maybe 10 minutes and then the rest of the time she was in the work room. I honestly didn't think I had that much stuff to do, but she did everything I gave her up until the every end of the day. 

   One thing that I thought she said was interesting was that she child didn't want her to come today. I of course didn't notice anything off from the students since the parent wasn't in the room. 

College Organization: Tip 12

Small Whiteboard

I recommend hanging a small whiteboard in your room where you can write down notes about your assignments, appointments with your adviser, and other things. I love having it in my room because I can look over to see the important things that I need to do for that week. 

It is a helpful reminder to see everyday what is due or when you are suppose to meet with your adviser. I like to have a visual reminder that I see every time I enter or leave my room. 

I would usually write down what I need to do that weekend for the upcoming week. I write down what day the assignment is due too. You can use different colors to be even more organized, though that is not necessary. 

You don't need a big whiteboard. Something small about 1.5' to 2' will be a good size. Also check prices for them everywhere like Walmart, Target, and Amazon to get the best price. 

I put my whiteboard right by the entry to my doorway, so I always see it and know what needs to be done. 

Then I like to check or cross them out, so then I feel more productive and know what I got done and what I still need to do. 

Student Teaching: Primary: Week 1

So I am back in my primary internship place. It feels weird to be back and I really miss my old kids in my pre-primary classroom, but I know that I will still get to see them around the school. 

On Monday and Wednesday my pre-primary class walked past my classroom outside and they all start calling my name. I turn around and they have big smiles on their faces and are waving at me like crazy. It was really great to see them and to know that they miss me. 

I can't remember which day this week, but I started doing opening. The first day I did it the Smart Board was still not working, but then on the following day it got fixed. I am so happy that it is fixed now, so that I can use it for my lessons. 

Student Teaching: Pre-Primary: Week 8

I finished my last week in my pre-primary classroom. I was so sad to say goodbye to the students. I really enjoyed working in Kindergarten and I feel like it is a potential grade that I would like to teach. 

During this week i got to go around to the other kindergarten classrooms to see what they are like. I also went and saw a second grade classroom. I was in there during their math time and it was the highest level math kids. It was very different and I thought I used to want to teach that grade and now I am thinking not so much. 

On my last day i gave the students their gifts and my mentor her gift. The students also made me a little something. I also got to leave early on this day. My mentor wished me luck on my interviews since they were the next day. 

Student Teaching: Pre-Primary: Week 7

This was my teach week, so I taught and did everything. It was a good week because it was a normal everyday week. We did not have delays or closing or drama performances. So I really got a authentic full week of teaching kindergarten. 

There was one incident where one of the students said no to me and would not listen which is something the student has done in the past. My mentor took him out of the class room and later he came back and apologized. 

I got to the school early everyday and stayed late every night. I always took paper how to grade and put into the gradebook also. 

I only have one week left before I go back to first grade. I don't know if I have ever said this, but a year ago I did not want to teach kindergarten and now after spending so much time, I feel that is a grade that I would really enjoy teaching. 

Student Teaching: Pre-Primary: Week 6

On Monday we were closed and I spent this time preparing for my COL because I was beginning on Wednesday and my supervisor was going to come on that day. I wanted to start typing up my lessons plans since this COL has to go in my portfolio. 

Tuesday we celebrated Dr. Seuss Day and we had a blast. I made green eggs for the kids to try and most of them enjoyed eating the eggs. While making the eggs the burner stopped working for a few minutes, but my mentor got it working again and all was well. We read lots of Dr. Seuss books and activities that went along with each book. 

Wednesday was a normal somewhat normal school day. We had missed our counselor day last week, so we had this day. It was during out reading group time, so we did not have reading groups on this day. Also my Supervisor came in and observed me during my math lesson. 

Thursday and Friday were both snow days. I spent Thursday mostly relaxing and wondering if schools were going to be open or closed tomorrow. On Friday I did some shopping later in the day when it was safe to drive on the roads. I also did a lot of planning for the upcoming week since this upcoming week is going to be my teach week. 

Lastly, this weekend I decided on what I wanted to give the students and my mentor because believe or not this next week is going to be my second to last week with the students before I go back to my primary class. 

Observations and Assignments

I have only had two observations from my supervisor thus from in my pre-primary internship. I was thinking that she was just going to show up one time unexpected during the last two weeks, but that didn't happen. 

My first observation was back during the second week I believe. She is suppose to get in four observations for pre-primary and another four for primary. One has to be during our COL and one needs be during out Teach Week. 

Make second one was during this week. She observed my first lesson for my COL. She made that comment that I need to smile and relax more. It's hard for me to be out of my comfort zone and do silly things in front of other adults. My Supervisor said that she wants to see that from me the next time she comes which is sometime next week. 

My Supervisor is in a rush to try and fit everybody's observations in with all of the snow days and delays. She is also going to be gone for about a week, so that is less chances for her to come and see us. 

There are still assignments that I need to complete during this rotation before I move on to the next one. I need to videotape one of my lessons which I plan to do sometime next week during one of my math lessons because we need to turn in a lesson with it and I already have to type up all of my COL lessons. So I thought I would kill two birds with one stone. 

I also need to type up all of my COL lessons and everything else that goes with that. I need to type up whatever I need to for my Teach Week. Both my COL and Videotaped lesson is due on April 1 and I am not sure when the Teach Week stuff is due. 

There is also my action research project that I need to complete in my second rotation because I got too busy during this rotation and with all the snow days it would have been a mess anyways. And that is not due until sometime in May. 

Student Teaching: Pre-Primary: Week 5

This semester is going by so fast and this week was just as crazy as last week. We had a two hour delay on Monday and on Friday. We also had no school on Thursday. 

Monday was crazy and my first day doing whole group. On Tuesday whole group was better since school was on time and I was able to fit everything in on time. I continued that on Wednesday. 

On Friday, I did nothing but give the math test because we had a drama performance that took up the rest of the time at school.

Nothing really interesting happened besides that. I have to be honest that I can't wait for these last 3 weeks to be over because I am late everyday there. The thing is that the other team teachers come in and always have to talk to her or she has the special ED teachers that need to talk to her about one of her students, so what we need to discuss is after all of that. 

I know in my primary weeks that won't happen and so we will have more time to plan during the day and not so much after school. Also my mentor has kids and has to leave at a certain to get things done. 

Student Teaching: Pre-Primary: Week 4

On Monday we were closed for President's day and then on Tuesday we were closed because of the weather. Then on Wednesday and Thursday we had two hour delays. ON both of those days we celebrated the 100th day of school. It was suppose to be on Tuesday, but it got pushed to Wednesday and Thursday since we did not get to do everything we wanted on Wednesday. 

On Friday we had another 2 hour delay, so I got to teach math and it went really well. I had the students go "fishing" for addition and they really loved it. I even had one of the students ask me if we could go fishing again. 

I stayed after school for a good while, to plan some things out for the next week. 

Student Teaching: Pre-Primary: Week 3

This week was better. I had planned ahead on what I wanted to do during math. The students have been doing very well with addition and that makes me very proud. Oh. I forgot to take a picture of something I created for math that the students loved. 

We had a Valentine's party on Thursday since the school was closed Friday for Professional Development Day. The Valentine's Party was really great and the kids were all so sweet thanking each other for the valentines. We had ice cream sundaes and they all really enjoyed them. Throughout the day, they kept asking me when the party was. Three parents showed up to help.

On Friday, we graded some MUST test, which was bad because we did not know what we were doing. We did that for about two hours and then learned about the SLOs for a half an hour. Then we went back to the classroom and prepared for the 100th day of school for on Tuesday. 

I am kind of worried about getting everything in that I need to for this semester, so I really need to talk to my mentor about everything one day this week. 

College Organization: Tip 11

Different Textbook Editions

I'm sure everyone has noticed that there are different editions to textbooks, but have you ever wonder what the big difference is about them besides the older editions are much cheaper. Before you go and buy or rent you textbooks you might want and check to see if the books are available in a lower edition. 

Sorry the pictures are not the best quality. 

Now, Let's look at two textbooks that I have. 

The Real World: An Introductory to Sociology

By: Kerry Ferris and Jill Stein

I have the First and Second editions of the books. The first is on the left and the second is on the right. 

Opening the textbooks and this is what you see. All the same stuff expect for two of the pictures being different in the books on the left pages. 

Now, lets take a look at the table of contents!

The one picture is a little blurry, but you can see the chapters are the same. You will notice that the pages are different because of the introduction in the one textbook. 

Here is a paragraph from the textbooks and again you can see that it is the same stuff. 

Student Teaching: Pre-Primary: Week 2

On Wednesday after school, my mentor made the comment about how she notices that I always seem to have a look on my face. She asked me if I was nervous or something and I said yes. Then she said that I needed to smile more. This really put me down because I have been observed many times and I was just observed Monday by my Supervisor and she said nothing about that. She and my old Cohort professor had both said that I make this little faces when interacting with the kids, but they didn't say it was bad. They both said they liked it. My other mentor never mentioned anything and I taught many lessons in that class. 

The worst part is that she didn't say anything about if my lessons were good or not and I thought my lessons had gone very well. Besides the fact that she pointed out that I forgot to do closures again, but that is so minor and I have noticed her not having closures before as well. 

I just really need a day off to get everything together. I feel like she is not very organized and it makes me not be as organized as I am usually. 

Thursday ended up being an okay day and she did say anything more about my face. I tried smiling more in general throughout the whole day. Towards the end of the day we had a situation with the art teacher. The art teacher comes to the classroom and at the end of the class we came back into the classroom. The kids were cleaning up the tables with Clorox wipes and my mentor got very upset. I felt really awkward and my mentor was very upset because one of the other teachers had told her just the day before not use them. 

Also I liked the art teacher. She seems nice and I have heard the teachers during planning talk about how they aren't doing anything creative and that she could do better. So they already don't like her and now this does not help. 

After the students had left we were planning and she got an email from the art teacher saying she did not know about that and my mentor got mad. She ended up leaving to go talk to her and while she was walking out, she said I could leave since it already got so late. 

When I came in Friday, she said that the art teacher had already left, so she did not get to talk to her. She also avoided her when she could. On Monday we are going to have art, so that shall be interesting. 

All in all, I felt overwhelmed this week. I felt like I did so well last semester when teaching my lessons and this time I feel like my mentor does not like them or expects more. 

Goals for next week:
Plan a week/time for my cycle of learning. 

Student Teaching: Pre- Primary: Week 1

On Tuesday, the county was closed, so I did not go to the school. I felt bad because the girls in the other county had to go in, though it was a professional development day and they had a two hour delay. 

Wednesday was my first day meeting the students in my pre-primary mentor's classroom. I kind of miss the students in my primary mentor'c classroom. It won't be long when I am back in her classroom anyways. I mostly observed and tried to learn the students' names. My supervisor also stopped by on this day to talk for a few seconds and there was not much to discuss since we do not know much about the semester. 

I was so nervous about going in on Wednesday since it had been a while since I worked with my pre-primary mentor, but everything went well. This classroom is very different my primary mentor's classroom and my pre-primary mentor's classroom from last year. I talked to my mentor for just a bit at the dn of the day,but she had planning and I had to go to college from class. I was in class from 5-7 and I did not learn much. 

Thursday and Friday went well. On Friday I did the opening and it went well. I've come to realize that the teachers in the grade don't get along as well as I thought they did. My mentor told me quite a bit about some stuff on Friday. She has a pretty difficult class this year and she is just stressed. The thing was that she was not suppose to have all of those students and the one teacher has no students with IEPs or ELLs, so it's just not fair to have so many of those students and another has none. 

Though those students have come along way since the beginning of the year from the stories my mentor told me. Expect on Friday two of the students had trouble at lunch and I got to see more of what they are really like. Before they seemed pretty good and weren't having any problems. 

My Final Semester Begins!

Today my semester begins, but I got lucky because it's a teacher grading day and my mentor is staying home to grade. So tomorrow my semester will really begin. I can't believe it's my last semester in college. I know this semester is going to go by so fast just like all the other semesters. 

It was suppose to snow quite a bit, but then latter last night they lowered the snow total and say another clipper is suppose to hit on Tuesday, so there might be no school tomorrow. Which I kind of am hopping for. 

I also want to take this time to talk about when I will be posting. I can't post everyday when I go to my internship because that would be everyday and I will not be able to keep up with that. Instead I will be posting everyday Monday and Friday. On Mondays I will discuss what I did during my internship from the week prior. And Fridays will be whatever I feel like posting.  It might be about how the semester is going or whatever. 

Anyways... on the 22nd we had an orientation about this semester. They discussed what will be happening during are last semester:

Let me first of by saying that I love my university, but they do not have it together this school year. We never got an email about what time the orientation was or which room it was in. So a girl in another cohort thought it was going to be at 10 when she was signing up for Praxis 2 and you can't change the date, well it would cost money. The girl went to leave will the ECED Head was talking and she stopped her. The ECED Head was chewing her ear out. Then everyone was saying we never got an email. Then the ECED Head told us to shush and said that there is new administration. She didn't say sorry. 

Then the ECED Head was talking about our Supervisors and another girl asked her if the Supervisors are the same as are seminar professors and she started to chew her ear out also. Everyone started saying they did not know their supervisors either. She brushed us off again and made it seem like it was our fault.  

Anyways, they are not the same people and basically my Supervisor seems really nice and appears to know what she is doing unlike my cohort professor from last semester. So we shall see. I am nervous to have a new person watching my lessons, but I think all will be fine. 

We will spend 8 weeks with our pre-primary mentor and 8 weeks with our primary mentor. There will only be one intern with each teacher. So I will be with my pre-primary mentor first and Anne will be with her primary mentor first. Then after 8 weeks she will be with our pre-primary mentor and I will be with my primary mentor. 

We will have a teach week during both of these times. This is different from the Teach Week last semester. We also did our Cycle of Learning during teach week because it had to take place five days in a row, but since we are going to be there five days a week it does not matter. One of our Cycle of Learnings needs to be in our portfolio before it is reviewed in April. 

We have a research project that needs to be completed during one of the eight weeks since we need to work with the same group of students. I am going to try and complete that during my pre-primary to get it out of the way. We were not told much and will find out more during our seminar on Wednesday. 

And that's all got I to say because that's all I know. Oh, well I will expect to see my Supervisor some time this week for just a meet and greet with me and my mentor I guess. Nothing big and I will tell you everything that happened this week next Monday. 

Teach Week: Friday

On Friday my voice came back a little more. It was much better compared to the day before. My mentor did make it to the school. 

Friday. What can I say about Friday? 

It was absolutely crazy. 

So much was going on that my mentor did not tell me and I kind of got stressed. As I was giving the spelling test, my mentor has a lady that comes in every Friday and works with the students. I thought it was a whole group things, but no she pulls each student aside and works with them individually. 

So random students were getting up and leaving to work with her during the spelling test. Then they could come back and have know idea where we were. 

Then during whole group time my mentor had a parent volunteer pulling students out to do something. This was when I was explaining their seatwork that they were going to do. So when it was time for some students seatwork they did not know what to do. 

Also before that I completely forgot about the seatwork and did not have anything planned. I felt horrible when my mentor asked me about it. Thankfully we pulled through it and she talked to me latter about what I could do if I was by myself and stuff. 

Latter in the day we took the science test, which I graded latter and would need to the grades for my Cycle of Learning. Needless to say the grades were not that great. But it's a learning experience and I am learning for when I have my own classroom. 

Finally Cycle of Learning my over. I needed sleep so bad and my body would not let me have it. I kept waking up early throughout the following week. 

Lastly, this will be my last post until Dec. 29, so enjoy the holidays and spend time with your loved ones!

Student Teaching; Day 31 (Semester 7)

Today was the last day of student teaching for this semester. I got lucky because it was a half day of school, so I got to leave early. My mentors friend passed, so she left right away also. I did not have anything planned that i was suppose to do, which was really nice not having to worry about it. 

I helped out by doing little things in the classroom with the students. At the end of the day I gave my mentor a a gift card and a letter to so thank you. I did not do anything big because I am suppose to go back to her next semester, so I will do something more when the time comes. 

December Assignments

Oops. I was suppose to post this back on Dec. 3, but I forgot since I was taking that week off, so here it is. 

1-5 - Teach Week

8 - Collaborative Project Presentation, Chapters 15/17

9 - Binder Check 2, Attendance, Final Mentor Evaluation, Cycle of Learning, Phonics Test 3

11 - Portfolio

12 - Final, Lesson Plan, Exam, Informal Assessments

15 - Final, Lesson Plan

16 - Exam

Where has the Time Gone?

Honestly, what happened to September?

I want to go back to that month when I felt in more control. So much is going on and I have very little time left.

I was suppose to post a blog about my teach week, but I just have not had enough time. Finals are here and the last assignments are due. I am trying to finish up everything. Not to mention Christmas is here and I have not bought anybody anything yet. 

Then I found out that I still need to get fingered printed and the place I have to do it at is an hour away from my house. I don't understand why I have to go so far out to get it done. At my daycare they did it right there at the center. There is a police station right down the road. How come I can't go there. Then to top it off, it costs $60! 

I also still need to sign up for praxis 2 and pass all that and stuff. I just really need a vacation and not have anything that i have to do. 

I will post again late Wednesday about my last student teaching day for the semester. Eventually I will post about my teach week, but not right now. 

Student Teaching: Day 25 (Semester 7)

Same old same old. I will say that I stayed late after school to discuss more about teach week. I had questions about certain things as I looked at the curriculum more in depth. We talked a lot and we planned what I am going to be doing during guided reading groups, which is great and one less thing I have to plan.