Week 6: What An Eventful Week!

Week 6: Another Week in the Books!

As I continue on with my student teaching internship (which seems to be flying by) I am never not amazed by my students and their achievements. Whether it be big or small they are wonderful, strong students with a good head on their shoulders to truly achieve greatness. They are also making it that much harder for me to leave when my internship is over. This week was a very busy week for not just the students but for me as well, and the way they came together to make sure that business was being taken care of so we could continue to move forward was absolutely incredible. I finished my Global Ag unit with seniors and might I say they were very disappointed that I wasn't teaching them anymore. My Ag Enviro Class is finishing up tree identification and will be starting into Maple Syrup Production.
The week started typical with a two hour delay on Monday and a visit from my university supervisor that same day. Having quite the amount of anxiety I managed to do just fine with the visit and shortened amount of teaching time. Both of my classes were extremely attentive and respectful. I did enjoy being supplemented with an abundance of constructive feedback from my supervisor. This made me realize that I am doing okay and to keep pushing myself to improve each week. 
As I previously stated I finished up my Global Ag students. Even though they were disappointed that I would not be teaching them anymore, they did prove to me that they did learn something. They did current events on global agriculture and took information learned from class and found some really great articles. I would say that seniors are probably one of the hardest groups to work with because of graduation beings a few months away. I did in fact learn from them that they care and want to make some sort of difference, maybe not in agriculture but in the world. I know that I cannot push everyone into the Ag world but knowing that they are making or wanting to make differences makes me have hope for them to continue on and achieve greatness.
My Ag Enviro class is pushing through the gauntlet of finishing tree identification. What I did not realize is that because of the shortened class time because of delays has stretched this unit out longer than what was anticipated. Unfortunately I will not be able to get through the whole unit because there will not be enough time for me to finish the rest of my units if I would continue on with this unit. Overall the biggest take away I want the students to have is the tree identification portion so that if we have a day where its nice we could go outside and properly identify trees. So this next week I have to find a good stopping place so I can introduce maple syrup production.
On Thursday we hosted the AFY county winter skills day. We had over two hundred students and advisors come to participate in the various events. I was in charge of the Ag Mechanics portion. I had two teams compete and a portion of this contest was learning how to lay out a wall and with one day remaining before the contest I learnt and taught the students how to lay out the wall in one day. I was under the impression that my students didn't take it seriously and did not grasp the concept, but I was completely wrong. I had one student win the whole contest, another come in 6th and the other come in 12th. I could not be happier! Hard work truly does pay off.
We also attended the ACES conference this weekend and created so many memories with the students that I will never forget. At dinner they all expressed how they did not want me to leave and that they wanted me to come back and teach. I could never express how much my heart was touched by these kids. Who would have thought that they cared so much? The conference itself was absolutely amazing, reflections and the morning seminar really hit home for me and makes me want to do better both professionally and individually.
Overall the week was good and has me wanting to improve for the next week. I am truly blessed to be here and doing what I love to do: Teach! I hope next week brings in more joy since I will be picking up two classes. We will see!

Week 5: Another Week in the Books!

With the Good Comes the Rough

Another week down for the count. I feel that these past five weeks have gone by so quickly! This week definitely had it's ups and downs. My seniors are getting used to having me teach them and this is both good and bad, depending on the certain situation. My ninth graders are doing very well, but we are hitting a wall with tree identification. We are not sure where to go with it so that is fun for them and interactive to reach all the different learners I have. I am finding more students who like to cause problems but I keep telling myself I am not going to quit. This week has definitely tested and pushed me to my limits.
Seniors are doing well, but some are still not doing or putting the effort into the assignments that I give them. I have some students who just say they are simply not going to do the homework. By having the delays it has put my Global Ag unit behind and it has to get pushed into a few of the days next week. I have found out that the students are not willing to activities until you bore them enough that they want to get up and do something. However in my lessons they have been very interactive and there is always some activity they need to participate in. I like getting them up and moving because if they are not moving they are practically falling asleep from it being so early. I just do not understand how they can beg me to keep teaching the class, but refuse to do the work that comes with it. Hopefully next week they surprise me and enjoy the lessons I have planned for them.
My ninth graders are hard workers. They know that I have set high expectations for them because I only want them to be successful and strive to show off the potential that I know each of them have. I "borrowed" a lesson from CoP and adjusted to do a speed dating activity with them to help them in identifying the list of common trees of Pennsylvania. They really enjoyed the activity,  however they were not grasping the concept of them not just copying each other's tree page. That they actually had to pretend to be the tree that the chose and tell the other person about themselves. However the next time I do this lesson I know which parts I need to stress on and which parts could be adjusted to make the lesson great. 
This week also consisted of me holding an FFA officer meeting.  We have a lot coming up in the next two weeks and I just wanted to check in make sure that they are doing what they are suppose to be doing. We touched on how to make a meeting run more smoothly and how we could actually get through an agenda during a clubs period by using correct parliament procedure.  I will say it is just very hard to get through to students who show no interest. However I did create a system in which they need to come and check in with me every Friday to see where they are at with any jobs that they signed up for. This has gotten through with some of the officers but not all of them so when we have an officer meeting tomorrow I will be addressing this fact again. 
Even though this week was a struggle at some points and made me question myself I believe it definitely made me stronger as a person. I am ready to see how I can keep improving my teaching skills and style. As well as continuing to improve myself personally and professionally.

I brought the kids in candy on Friday for Valentines Day

Student using mechanics knowledge to grind down a barrel drum for band director

Week 4: Time To Buckle Down!

Week Four Recap:

What a week?! My students never seem to stop amazing me. I learn something new from them everyday. We only had one delay and then clubs schedule on Wednesday that again delayed some time spent in the classroom. I am finally moving forward with my period 3 students. We identified ten trees common to Pa at the beginning of the week and ended it with all of my students saying the FFA Creed completely. My seniors are working their way through the presentations on different aspects of global agriculture. 
With my week and workload increasing, I am starting to see what hard work and pre-planning pay off. One major problem I kept encountering is writing my first sub plan. I know that to most it may be the easiest thing, but I had to make a plan for two classes and I kept encountering issues of whether or not the sub would reiterate the concept to the students so they understood too. I had to create sub plans for Friday because Mrs. Jarema and I went go to participate in the record book contest in State College. Which was an adventure in itself. 
My global agriculture kids started the week out with working on and fishing their presentations. They began to presentations on Wednesday of this week. I am having issues with some of my student's and the quality of work they present to me. I hold my students at a high standard, not because I want to show them they are not as smart but because they can do it. They have the potential for greatness, but I am unsure how I can show them that. I feel that these kids have the potential but they are put forth that effort. I know they are seniors and all they are worried about is getting out of there, but how do I ignite the motivation spark to get the to give there best? I guess that will have to be one of my goals this week as I continue to teach them about global agriculture. 
On the other hand my Ag Environmental Awareness class is going pretty well.  I am so lucky to be able to experience the support from this class. We had a rough start in the beginning of the week because the students are not really enjoying having to know different tree species, but by the end of the week I had them excited to do the speed dating activity we will be beginning with on Monday. One part of this class that made me realize just how much I love teaching, is when my students all came together to learn the Creed so they would not have to take a pop quiz. They way they rooted each other on and should the support just melted my heart. I cannot wait to see what this next week brings me and the students in this class.
I did end my week on a new experience and knowledge gained note. I was able to participate in the state record book contest held in state college. I cannot believe the fun and new knowledge that I have accumulated by grading record books. Even though it is a long and tedious process I really enjoyed making the connections with other Ag teachers across the state, and seeing what it takes to have a good record book. 
With another week in the books I am learning and improving my teaching and student relationships. I will be picking up another class: Ag Mechanics II within the next week so I am excited to see what these students bring to the table. They are finishing up electrical and will be moving forward to welding. I hope to continue to improve with my teaching and assignments. Mrs. Jarema is definitely helping me by providing feedback and any suggestions to make a lesson stronger.

Week 3: Flexibility, A Teacher Must Have

Week 3 at Bermudian Springs

Who would of thought that I would learn and be exposed to so much! I am so blessed to be here and experiencing all sorts of things.  Another class was added, new connections with new students while still continuing with the old. I love my internship more and more with each passing week. I do not however love the continued cancellations or two-hour delays we continue to have.  Flexibility in teaching is something that I believe I am mastering in. You never know what the school day is going to bring.

Having this new class is both interesting and difficult at the same time. There are 25 seniors in the class, which is the biggest class I have had yet!   Since they are learning about Global Agriculture, I decided to start them off with a project. Each group was assigned a topic that dealt with Global Ag. Some of the topics were: The Green Revolution- Norman Borlaug, NAFTA, FAO, World Trade Organization, Free Trade Agreements, and World Food Programs. They will be creating a project and “teaching” the class about what they have learned. Also they are creating a ten-question quiz, which will help them in comprehending they information that their peers are presenting to them. So this week and some of next students will be going to the writing center to work on their presentations. However some of them are definitely catching senioritis in not wanting to do the work, but by threatening them with a failing grade they got back to work.

My Ag Environmental Awareness is still identifying trees for the week and the creed. This week paragraphs 1-4 were due. I am having trouble with some of my students not wanting to recite the creed. I cannot express enough how important it is for their grade to just get up and recite it, but they continue to not say it. So I am up to suggestions on how to fix this problem and move forward. This coming week paragraphs 1-5 are due and I keep reminding and stressing the fact that this is a huge chunk of their grade. We will see how it goes!

Before I even started my internship I said that it was going to make it point to get to know these students. I am still a little shaky on names but I recognize and make sure to go out of my way to say hello and speak with them one on one. I love my kids! They listen very well and are attentive in class.

Overall I had a great week with the kids, even with the delays and two cancellations we seemed to cover as much as we could. I have really been flexible with my teaching because of these cancellations or delays and prior scheduled assignments. I cannot wait to see what they next week brings. Hopefully a good week with lots of learning occurring!

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!