Day Eleven

WHAT A DAY!

First of all, I had my first supervisor visit/evaluation today. I must say, as much of a pain all of the regimented parts of practicum were and as nervous I used to get for my supervisor visits, I am astounded how well that whole experience prepared me for student teaching. I felt surprisingly confident as I delivered two small-group reading lessons (one two an on-level group and one to a group of struggling readers), which I attempted to differentiate by giving two slightly different assessments. The comments and feedback I got back were so helpful and let me know the types of things I was doing well that I didn't even notice I was doing as well as gave me insight to tweaks I could make to other things I could change. Even with groups with varying levels of competency, I think all of the students really learned from my lesson and that's always the most gratifying part for me.

It is exciting taking over more and more responsibility every day. I gave my first "original" lesson today - a 35-minute social studies lesson as part of my original unit. My cooperating teacher gave me awesome feedback about the lesson and wrote three notebook pages of notes for me so I can review them later. Her main point of praise was my classroom management - she even said she didn't think she could have dealt with certain parts as well as I did, which I have a hard time believing because she is so on top of management it blows my mind.

I do wish I had taken more notes these first few weeks of the things she did, but because I have had to assume responsibility so quickly, I think I've done a decent job of observing what she models and then quickly (attempting) to turn it around and use those kinds of techniques the next time I'm in front of the class. She uses really positive, corrective feedback and her management comes so naturally that it's almost hard to take note of the really specific things she does, but like I said in previous entries, I think that confidence is a huge part of it. She really cares about the kids doing well and she makes it very obvious to them that she does, even when she is correcting negative behavior. This is something I have always wanted to see modeled like this, so I'm glad I'm in a classroom where I get to do such meaningful observations and quick implementation!

Tomorrow I'm doing a puppet show...Hopefully I'll survive.