Week 2: Lets Get Started!

                                                            Week Two: In the Books!

I cannot believe that week two has already flown by! It still seems unreal like I am not in my second week of my student teaching internship, but I am and could NOT be happier. This week was my first week of actual teaching in the classroom. This week of course had positive and negatives and definitely had tested my patience, but this week was very beneficial in teaching me to be flexible. I also had my first experience of what an inservice day consisted of, rather than sleeping in and watching movies all day. 

Monday: We had an inservice day, one of my firsts as a beginning teacher. I had no clue what to expect. Here at Bermudian Springs they have all of the staff from elementary and middle school come up to the high school to take part in one large meeting before being dispersing to different workshops. On Mrs. Jarema's and my schedule we had the following professional development workshops to take part in: Appalachia: "Remote Access and More", Managing Stress and Physical Wellness through Aerobic Exercise, The Hidden Gems of Google, and Creating Your Own Website. I gained a lot of new found knowledge through these workshops, however in some the information did not pertain to me. For example Appalachia "Remote Access and More" was a workshop developed by the Tech Department at the school explaining the new system they are going too for teachers to be able to access the school network from home. Its really cool to see where they are going to take this new system to make it "easier" for teachers to put in grades and whatnot. Overall my favorite workshop we went too was The Hidden Gems of Google. This was the most beneficial to me because of all the information that it provided. Google is becoming huge in the education world, especially when students are researching information for school projects and papers. This workshop gave us info on how to search and refine our search to find exactly what we want to know. It then went into the different apps we are able access powered through google. Overall it was a great experience to see what an inservice day may look like in  my future. 

Tuesday: The first day I begin to teach.  I am teaching Ag Environmental Awareness with 9th graders. This class is a blast! I introduced them to forestry and identifying the internal and external parts of a tree. By doing this lesson I was able to get a feel of what the students knew about trees in general, which is slim. The best advice that I have gotten when writing lesson plans "Assume they know nothing" and most times you are right on track with the information and content you have planned for them. One setback I experienced is before I took on this class Mrs. Jarema assigned dates in which students had to get up and say the FFA Creed. We discussed that it would be best to keep these dates and just work around it. We had two students volunteer to go first. Other than teaching I helped where I could with the Ag Mech kids who were either metalworking or electrical wiring. 

Wednesday and Thursday: Talk about being flexible! Mrs. Jarema called it when we were hit with some bad weather, Early dismissal on Wednesday and Two hour delay on Thursday. This meant periods were shortened. So in more defined terms, LESS time to teach! Both days were used to finish up students saying the creed, because there is a class of 18 students and they had to recite paragraphs 1-3.  These two days seem to fly by, and therefore set me behind with what I had planned, but then again aren't we as teachers suppose to be flexible? 

Friday: This was a great day, we were back to full periods and now it was time to get into content and back on track with my lessons. I am unfortunately still two days behind where I would want to be with them but I will get them caught up as fast as their learning and understanding will allow. 

Overall, I feel that this week was great. I was able to really start interacting more with my students, now that they are a little more comfortable with me being there. I feel that I am building great relationships with my students and I even got one student to join the FFA and compete in the coming up vet science CDE at Winter Skills Day. Each day I sit down to see what I need to improve on and how I can be a better educator. With the help of Mrs. Jarema's guidance I am continuing to get farther with my dream. I am still continuously helping and aiding where I can to gain as much exposure and experience as I can. Next week I will be adding on another class Ag Business, and will be teaching them about Global Agriculture. I can't wait to see what this next week brings me!

What did YOU observe this week?

Week 1 at Bermudian Springs High School

I am finally here, I am finally beginning my student teaching internship at Bermudian Springs High School with Dianna Jarema. I could not be happier! Event though the week started off rough, we ended it with a bang. I can not wait to see what next week has in store for me. I am picking up her third period Ag Environmental Awareness class. 

To start off the week, the student teachers were suppose to go to Mid-Winter convention at the farm show complex. However due to inclement weather, my school was not able to attend because the district cancelled school. What started off as a two hour delay, went to full fledged cancellation. So my excitement for beginning this new journey was set back a day. I did not let that get me down, and took the day to relax and get some last minute tasks in. I also took this day to reflect on my past semester, to remember what we covered and how I would implement different methods and skills into my teaching.

It was finally here, the first day of student teaching or should I say mandatory observation. As soon as I walked in kids were friendly. I walked down the hallway to the Ag room where home room was taking place. I walked in to a bunch of students, half sleeping and rebooting from the long weekend. Once homeroom finished, I began my observation. It was mid-term week, so students weren't too eager walking into class to see that they had an exam coming their way in the next few minutes. Students were making faces and you could tell that they just wanted it to be done and over with. Only two exams occurred this day with Mrs. Jarema. The rest of their classes participated in review days.  This helped the student recall information that they learned in the beginning of the semester and be able to ask questions whenever one came to mind. Many students appreciated this time because they haven't studied and needed to refresh themselves on the materials that were covered.

Each class had a different personality in how they would come across. Of course you had your rowdy bunch, the eager to learn and be in the shop, and then the kids who didn't want to be there at all. I noticed that Mrs. Jarema really took to the kids who didn't want to be there and tried to work with them the best she could.  When the class had finished their midterms they were asked to log on to AET and finish recording 20 hours. I was able to help aid the students when they had questions and did not know what do next. Almost every student had a different type of SAE project they were doing. Some of the projects were Worm Farm, Motorcycle Mechanic, Working at a local Market, and Working on a dairy farm. You could tell that most students came from different backgrounds, not your typical farming background. However these kids don't let their backgrounds hold them back. 

One goal of mine is to help Mrs. Jarema work on improving their FFA chapter. They have a good chapter but recruitment is a main goal of ours, in trying to get more members. I feel as though this will be tough, but I am as well as Mrs. Jarema are ready to try. 

Overall, I believe this week went well and I cannot wait to get my feet wet next week by starting to teach.

Final 412 Lab Reflection

412 Lab Overview

It is so hard to believe that just fifteen weeks ago we were beginning this class and wondering what it had in store for us. I remember when we were picking out demonstration lessons from an envelope and I got to teach "How to Make A Origami Butterfly". I remember when I picked this lesson I was like how the heck am I going to teach this to my peers. Well Thank God for YouTube because I could not understand how to do make one by the instructions in the packet. This was the first lesson I taught and gosh was I nervous. The lesson was good though and I got some good feedback from my peers. 

Each week we had a new challenge to face, and how we were going to use it in our student teaching experience. I truly believe that each challenge was something we will be using in our futures. You could see each and every one of us develop as a teacher. Some labs I really enjoyed were Inquiry, Problem-Based, and Interest Approach lab. I enjoyed this labs because I feel like they were the ones that either I really enjoyed or seen personal development in. Especially in the inquiry lab. I used a lesson that was used in the NAPTP workshop I attended at National Convention this past year. I switched the scenario up. Even though the lesson did not go as planned my point got across and I was able to get feedback on how to improve my teachings and the lesson myself. Another Lab I liked was Problem-Based learning. I was very interested in this lab because it made you think and really get caught up in the information that was being taught. I did a lesson on a poultry farmer who needed help because his chickens were breaking open the eggs and losing weight. I really liked how I have the students direct the way the unit would be taught. They did this by figuring out what we needed to know in order to solve the scenario at hand. I cannot wait to be able to teach this lesson at my school. 

Lastly I believe that every lab we had benefited us as teachers because it laid out a foundation of what we need to know in order for students to learn. I am very please with this class and the instructor. One part I really liked was how we were recorded so we could go back and reflect because we all know reflection is key! I know that I will be utilizing what I learned from this class in my future!

Show Me Your Creative Side

Creativity Lab: Dollar Tree Experience

This was probably one of my favorite labs, because we didn't have to plan for it. We just showed up to class and our instructor told us we were going to to the Dollar Tree!! We were all a little confused at first, but then she explained that this was a chance for us to get materials for lessons we are teaching in the spring. By going there we could come up with fun and creative ideas to add to lesson plans. So at first we were told to look for five minutes by ourselves and to walk around before we started helping each other out. At first I was overwhelmed because my creativity skill takes me time to really think of what I am going to do. As I was walking through the aisles I remembered this digestion interest approach that my one classmate did. It was so interesting to me as a person, so I began to think that my students would like it too. I decided to get some plastic bags and panty hose. This is just some of the items I need for the unit, but it is better than not having anything at all. The next item that my other classmate pointed out was some plastic insects. Since I will be teaching an entomology unit and I believed it would be a good idea. I believe I am going to have my students to try and have the students identify them. In the best way they can at least.
One of my favorite parts was how we were able to help each other by finding them materials to use in their units.Another part is that  you would get more ideas as you walked down each aisle of the store. I know that when I have  a program I will definitely be utilizing this method. It  really does help spark you creativity and makes you think of what you can do with your students that would make it fun for the students and you as the instructor. I am so thankful that we were able to participate in this lab and one of the best benefits the center paid! ha! No it was a great lab which I believe they should continue to do.

Life-Knowledge Lesson

Be a Leader!

I taught my life knowledge lesson at Bermudian Spring High School. It was such pleasure to go and interact with the students that I will be teaching with during the spring semester. Mrs. Jarema wanted to me to teach leadership skills to her fifth period Ag Mechanics class, which only has five students. One student happened to be absent and I was left with only four students one girl and three boys.
At first I was a little nervous because all I could keep thinking was these are the kids I will be teaching in the spring and I need to make a good impression. I did NOT want my kids to be like "oh gosh this is our student teacher?!". I was very blessed to say that it was just the opposite, my kids were great and I am super excited to see them in the spring semester. They really wanted to get to know me as a teacher too. I feel that by doing this lesson at my cooperating school I was able to gain insight on my students and really get a feel of what it is like to be a teacher.
I do not know what makes a different but in lab I get choked up on what I am going to say and really second guess myself, but when I am in front of kids I feel that is when I see myself as a future educator. I cannot wait for my internship to begin, I am so nervous but excited at the same time.
I also really enjoyed the lesson I taught because it really seemed to give students responsibility of themselves. Be A Leader is a lesson that I would recommend to any teacher. It gets the students up and moving. Also with just having four students I felt that I got better participation and alertness. Some students were really participating that do not in other classes. When Mrs. Jarema told me that I was so happy and proud of myself. To me that is one step closer in my dream of becoming an Agricultural Educator.
Overall, I believe that this benefited me as a future teacher because I got to know my students and get a feel of what it was going to be like when I finally begin my student teaching experience. My students were really good and they enjoyed the lesson that I taught and had fun.I just hope they know that, that was just a snip it of what they will be getting in the spring! There is more fun learning to be had!