Student Teaching

Today I got materials for student teaching in the mail. Packets that I need to give to the Host Teacher and the principal. 12 weeks of student teaching. Had a rough schedule listed for each week, telling me when my observations and reviews would happen. I’m actually excited about doing this. Yes, it is going to be a challenge and a lot of hard work. But it will also be a lot of fun and I will learn so much. I enjoy being in the school and the classroom with students. I know a lot of things about it, but being able to put it all together and do it myself will be great. The capstone event, if you will, will be that between weeks 8 and 11 some where, I will teach the entire thing for 2 weeks. I’m sure that during significant portions of that time she won’t even be in the classroom. And not just teach, but I have to some up with the lesson plans for each day. The good news is that if the schedule is the way she thought it would be, we will have 7th grade science all day, and not little of this and some of that. What that means is that there are 8 periods in each day, and one of them is planning period. So for the 7 periods I have to teach each day, I only need one lesson plan, because each class will be the same subject and get to follow the same schedule. And even if one get ahead or one falls behind some, they will still be the same plans, just on different days. But will work hard to make sure that they all are doing the same thing each day.
Secretaries come back the first of August, so that is when I’ll call and make an appointment to go see the principal, Mr. Nimmo and talk to him about plans and schedules. And try to get in touch with Mrs. Jackson and determine what she wants me to do and what she is willing to allow me to do. Part of me wants to jump right in and see if I can make a go of it. The more rational part of me wants to just watch and learn what I can first. But either way, at some point I’m going to have to swim on my own, right?