8/7 Self-Reflection

August 8, 2012 at 9:44 am | Posted in E1 | Leave a comment
Tags: EDU 6134, self-reflection

How in the world can I possibly meet the needs of 150 of my students?! On this large of a scale, it seems impossible. But I can break this down into manageable chunks and start to see that it is doable. We talked in class today about getting to know your students better. Greeting them at the door, asking them about their weekends or any recent news they might have. Like we saw in the Wong video, taking the time to setup procedures is also a time to involve the class and build connections with the students. From our reading in Dr. Algera’s class, specifically an excerpt from What’s My Job, why don’t teachers take that first week of class to really get to know all the students and find out what they like or dislike, where their strengths are at, what motivates them and then applying this knowledge to setup your curriculum and assessments? Coaches do this all the time to make their team as competitive as possible and yet teachers are still there trying to cover all the content they are told to cover.

Now as our student teaching time rapidly approaches, I’ve been trying to think of ways to connect with the students that won’t change or disrupt how my mentor teacher usually does things. I am there to learn as much as I can from my mentor, and I want to build and maintain a good relationship with him/her. If at all possible, I want to make use of my observation time to not only observe but be able to get to know as many students as I can. Similar to the name placards we made in this class, I could have the students do that and also add one thing they enjoy. Then when I am talking to them later we would have a conversation starter. At the very least, having my big knee brace will help initiate conversations. What I worry about going into this year of student teaching is how can I get the most out of the experience? There is so much to see, hear, and do along with getting to know a whole bunch of students. I feel more and more excited but also more and more overwhelmed. How do I juggle developing my teaching style, teaching the content and causing learning? These are the major questions kicking me in the gut right now and I just need to have faith that this program is designed like this for a reason and I’ll come out at the end prepared to be a full-fledged teacher.