Well the first three days of solo teaching certainly have been interesting and have prepared me for what it will be like when I become a full time teacher, which means extremely busy. I am learning more and more why teachers believe they are underpaid. The workload is tremendous! But here is a glimpse into what life is like on the inside...
Monday, February 20
I woke up bright and early, just like a kid on Christmas morning waiting to unwrap their gifts from Santa. As I was walking to meet my ride, the nerves began to set in quickly. A surplus of emotions ran through my mind as I went through all of the possible disasters that could occur.
The first half of the day went wonderful with the students. No behavior issues and for the most part, the kids seemed to understand what I was teaching- which is always a plus! As the afternoon slowly went by, the kids began to get restless and unwilling to learn. One student and I just didn't seem to see eye to eye... Apparently he's quite the challenging kid for the most experienced teachers, so I wasn't too surprised when he began to act out. Fortunately, my mentoring teacher was able to provide me with wonderful feedback and help me work out the kinks of the first day jitters.
As soon as I walked in the door, I immediately wanted to collapse and fall asleep, but there was no time for that. I had to prepare for my lessons for the next day, which meant preparing for my supervisor to come and evaluate me. To ease my worries, I took some time to myself and got a good workout in and had a wonderful meal prepared for me-Brunswick stew! Felt like I was back in the good ole South again!
Tuesday, February 21
Another muggy morning here in Perth, with morning temperatures reaching close to 91 degrees! I was very nervous about having John come evaluate me but as the morning went on, the nerves seemed to go away. We got a call from the front office that he had arrived, as I walked to meet him I felt at peace and the anxiety slowly went away. When I began my lesson, for the first time ever it felt like I really was the teacher. Most of the time in practicum experiences, it's hard to find your place into the classroom without stepping on the mentoring teacher's toes. But Melody let me take it away on my own, which really helped me feel much more comfortable and ready to teach. The lesson I taught was a Science lesson on classifying different objects, we used what was inside the student's pencil case, pictures, and even a soup mix to help understand why scientists classify plants and other living objects. This concept, sorting and classifying, can be an extremely hard skill for students with disabilities to grasp and can take much longer that your typical achieving student. During my lesson, I was writing the different ways we sorted our soup mix and wrote the word "color" on the board. One of my lovely students was quick to raise her hand and say "Miss! Miss! You have spelled colour wrong!" I looked back and saw my supervisor about to fall out of his chair from laughing so hard, which definitely helped relax me. I played it off by telling the student I was just testing her knowledge!
The lesson couldn't have gone anymore perfect. The students were extremely well behaved and John really liked my approach to instruction. His thoughts on the lesson- "It couldn't have been done any better, perfect lesson." Relief instantly set in! After a quick workout, John offered to take me to dinner with Chelsea and her host dad. We went to a lovely restaurant in Sorrento called Frotelli's. The meal was excellent, and the wine even better! Len, Chelsea's host dad, and John are very intelligent when it comes to wine so we only had the best! I had a lovely seafood rigotto which included mussels, fish, oysters, prawns in a rich and creamy pasta sauce. I still think I am a bit full from the large proportion I devoured. As we sat and watched the sunset, John entertained us with more of his magic tricks and taught us some new Aussie lingo. We learned that when people say they are "tired and exhausted" it typically means they have had way too much to drink the night before, haha! After dinner, it was back home to get ready for day three. John drove me home and had tons of questions about collegiate football which he believes is quite confusing. I argued that it really isn't and then he asked that I try and explain. As I was going through the rules, I realized how complicated it really is, especially to teach someone who is completely unfamiliar with it! Who knew?
Wednesday, February 22
After a lovely meal, I was able to get a very good night's rest. Wednesday's are always good, because they're the short day. Technically, students don't start until 9, but faculty starts at 8:30 for staff meetings. With this crew, the meetings aren't bad at all! My workload on Wednesday's is also relatively small. However, I do have my young group at the very end of the hot summer day, for English. Yep, English at 2 o'clock, how fun does that sound if you're twelve years old? We took it pretty easy because the kids seemed so exhausted from the heat, but the lesson went very well. My mentoring teacher was out on professional development, so another teacher filled in for relief. After the lesson he said "you are an amazing teacher, I can't imagine how wonderful you'll be on down the road." That really meant a lot to me seeing that he had never seen me teach before and the lesson was with my students on one of the hottest days of the year (temps topped 100 today).
Since my teacher was out, I had to take the bus home from school. Walking in this heat really puts your blessings into perspective. God sure does have a funny way of showing us how fortunate we are! Later after a quick cat nap in raging temperatures, I attempted to go for a long run but was cut short due to this miserable heat. When I came back in from baking, I was greeted by Janette's deputy principal who came by to fill her in on what's going on while she is away. He also was able to help me prepare for my science lesson tomorrow, which was quite helpful. Katherine, Steve and Janette's daughter, also stopped by for dinner.
Well tomorrow is day four, and quite the busy one. Hopefully I will be able to keep you all updated more frequently than I have been. Until then... :)
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