the student inside me

Oh my gosh!! I forgot to write my student teaching response!

I guess I can start by saying that I have enjoyed all of these crazy sow days we’ve had. I feel bad because as a future teacher I shouldn’t feel happy when we get to miss school for four consecutive days, but what the heck. I love not having school and spending so much time with my mom and with my brothers. I think the thing that I do worry about is that I am writing my KPTP on the current unit that I am teaching and I have no idea if I’ll get to finish it now. We would have been done with the unit this Wednesday, and I’m pretty sure my CT wants me to move on because we’re already a week behind and now with the snow days we’ll be even more behind. So, that’s the only thing I feel a little anxious about.

            My plan: I think this plan is going to work for two reasons a.) I can show that I am very flexible with my schedule and b.) I still find a way to compensate for the missed days. I plan to have the kids do a research project about an endangered species for our animal unit. I will have them research animal adaptation and homeostasis as it relates to their endangered species. This will allow me to cover the two in about two days and this can be my final assessment.

            In my KPTP I plan on telling the KPTP scorers that we had snow days and unfortunately, I have to keep to the schedule I had. This will not only make me look wise and professional, but also awesome hahah.

            I hope today is the last snow day we have, but I would not be opposed to more snow days. This is student teaching, after all and the student inside me says, “Heck, let it snow!”   

Finding my teacher voice

I started teaching my first two classes on the 22^nd of January, and I was pretty excited to be teaching those classes first. My CT is so sweet and her students listen to her so well that I knew they would behave for me. She simply calls out a trouble maker by his/her last name, and the room goes silent, so that gave me hope because I do not like to yell and I like to think of myself as a pretty sweet person. What this told me is that the students would be used to no yelling and quiet authoritative teachers. Sadly that is not the case...

I don’t yell at my students still, but I’ve been told more than once to use my teacher voice. What does that even mean!?? I’m not a mom, and I have no experience being a teacher, so how in the world am I supposed to find my inner teacher voice before these kids drive me crazy?

Quick story: I was trying to get my students’ attention one day not too long ago, and my para interrupts me by saying, “she’s trying to get you all to be quiet! I am so tired of you disrespecting her, and talking over her. The next person who opens their mouth is gonna get rotated! Do you understand??” And I simply said, “Thanks.” Although this was a kind gesture on her part, she totally embarrassed me! I felt like she had more authority in the classroom than me, which she clearly did. The students stayed quiet the whole time, and worked.

Now, if I have to yell at my students for them to take me seriously, then I am in big trouble. I cannot do it. I also know that you don’t have to yell to get the kids to get them to listen—I’ve seen it with my own two eyes!

Another quick story: Some days after that incident, my para stepped in again, and by this time I was just annoyed because she had been the main problem in the first place. She would not stop talking to a group of girls asking her where she got her clothes… she went on a rant about thrift shopping  and how she gets most of her clothes from Goodwill. Anyway, I wasn’t feeling ballsy enough to interrupt them so I just waited till she stopped talking. So, I finally begin the class and there were side conversations going on, and that’s when she she stepped in. Then I said, “Okay. Now that you guys are listening, I want you to work independently without any talking.” Then a student asks if I can play music while they work and I said, “Nope. I didn’t feel respected by you guys so you get to work in the quiet. I don’t know why you guys have a hard time listening to me and doing what I ask…” Then a student said, “Its cause you’re too nice.” WHAT??? I have no idea what to do.

I don’t want to yell, but I don’t know how to be firm without yelling. Any ideas?