Student Teaching

They stay more engaged, I think when they are writing with me. But, perhaps we could settle on a sentence and then write it after edits had been made. So, wait sentence by sentence rather than waiting until the whole thing had been written.

I could see being hurt that my words weren't picked if I were nine...

Might make sense to work out possibilities, on your own, lickedysplit, while describing...

and then have them vote. Process, the deal is to teach process. (She who knows nothing opines...)

good thinking, Osso.

School holidays here.

Hows the gym teacher?

Yeah, k, how's the gym teacher? :wink:

He is still cute. He's only there two days a week. He's organizing the senior citizen volunteers who want a placement in our school. He came in during lunch to speak with my teacher. I just sat and smiled politely, nodding appropriately. <sigh> I did double-check the ring finger. And I noticed his gray hairs (I thought he was too young for me, but maybe not). He has twinkly smily eyes.

Today was another rough day. Not so much bad as rough. Actually, there were great ups and frustrating downs. I continued the letter-writing process I started yesterday. Very frustrating. The teach was doing reading assessment in small groups. We had to be quiet. So, to add to my poor phrasing and penmanship, I had to speak quietly - the kids were just about falling asleep.

We did a mid-term assessment of me yesterday - we bulleted my strong points and my areas of needed improvement. It was enlightening. I'm sure that Ms. D could have been more brutal.

Another extreme day. After an entire morning (more than half of the day) of extraordinarily disturbing behavior from the New Girl, she had an extraordinarily productive afternoon. She spent a long lunch with the psych. We got her paper work filed and are moving forward with getting her the specialists that she needs. The highs: she got 9 out of 10 spelling words spelled correctly and in perfectly legible handwriting. I was jumping up and down with joy and fussing over her success. Hopefully that made a big impression.

To unwind from the morning, I spent much of the afternoon fitting the 18 posters the kids made with descriptive sentences into the small amount of cork board space alotted to their class.

The teach told the principal that she would not be able to run the class without me. I hope I can either stay for the year or that she can get full-time support for her classroom when I go.

Ah, cutie, I believe you, Teach does need you, not that she is "less" but that you add ballast. You grasp what is going on and react appropriately.

Not that either of you will be perfect, but, there's communication.

Not at all that she is less. She is a great teacher with a wide variety of history as far as who(m) she's taught. She is good and I confused things for her at the start of the year by reacting to kids in a different way than she did. The kids got mixed messages.

I spent 100% of my time between 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. trying to talk the New Girl up from the rocky depths. She couldn't have taught and done the same. The deal with the principal is this: if 51% of teacher's time goes to the New Girl, she'll be sent to stay in the office. That leaves the rest of the students with 49% to split amongst 17 of them. And let me tell ya, it

Wednesday we meet with her mom.

a cut and paste from another thread:

One student in class is a struggling, but persistent and progressing academic. He is an English Learner and he has ADHD. But, he's bright and eager to learn. Most of the time. He was having a rotten couple of days. Today I pulled him aside and asked what was going on - didn't want to talk about it. Ok, I knew it wasn't major, just wanted to see if I could help (turns out he was kept up until 1am last night because someone was watching LOUD tv). Anyway, he had a hard time focusing on work, was sort of dazed and a little grumpy (I would have been).

We were at library late in the day. He had help finding a book on poetry. He was staring at it, closed on the table. I sat down, opened the book and started reading poems. It was in a random order (one from the middle about a road-killed squirrel, one at the start about the author's grandmother). I was reading our 5th or 5th poem, one about bedtime (Bedroom Ocean, I think). He said, "Stop reading! I'll fall asleep" so I closed the book. He poked at the book, then opened it. He flipped through and said, "We haven't read this one....." I realized he wanted me to stop the bedtime poem, but not the reading. So I kept going. Some of the poems were sad and touched a cord in me. I told him a couple of them almost made me cry. We came to one about a slave. I warned him I might cry. He kept looking at my eyes.

We had a few more poems yet to read when it was time to go. He made me speed read the rest before he'd go to art.

I LOVED THAT! This was a golden moment in teaching

Littlek--

You earned that chance to be a part of that kid's future.

That poor kid. My mom said, "why not let him go to the nurses to take a nap?" I said, "because half of the rest of the class would be passing through the nurse's office and he'd never get any sleep."

Same kid is now angry with me because I am the head teacher for this week (part of my education) and he can't have me by his side all the time. Poor kid.

Hey, I just watched Freedom Writers. It was an okay movie, the story was good, just moved a little slow...

But Hillary Swank's teacher wardrobe had me thinking of you, LittleK. She had simple pieces that mixed easily. Pretty stylish and colorful too.

But, k, on the job, no teacher can be at the side of any one student all of the time. As much as we would like to be, because we're so concerned about that student. Teachers are often so stretched by the many demands on their limited time! No doubt, there are other students who warrant the same concern, as well ......
Sadly, we cannot give each individual student, badly in need of care & attention, exactly the same amount as a parent should provide. It certainly would be good if we could, hey?

Try not to feel too bad because you have to do the whole job. And do give yourself some credit for the good work you have actually done with this student.

Littlek--

Sometimes being a Worshiped Adult can cramp your style.

So how was it being head teacher for the week, k?

MsO - I know I can't. And I do say that I need to be 18 places at once. It's just that he's getting much less side-by-side assistance from me. He's getting over it. And, when I'm done, I sit and read with him.

It's going well. I can feel a shift from brain-popping chaos when I'm in front of the room to a more functional way of thinking and processing.

Had my third (out of 4) observation today. It went well. Tomorrow is my last day of take over week #1 and they spend about 1/2 of it out of the classroom (computer lab, art, library, lunch and recess....). Easy out.

Sounds like you're really getting the hang of it now, k. Well done!

They certainly work you pretty hard, don't they? But this will stand you in very good stead when you are in charge of your very own classes. Incidentally, when will you be eligible to do this?

About the student you're concerned about: any chance of the school's welfare coordinator picking up the thread from where you left off? It's hard being in 18 places at once, I know!