ASSIGNMENT FOUR

This assignment has me look at my goals from the beginning and discuss if I met them or not.  I have listed the goals below, and each one is linked to a discussion of how it is met.  Click on the goal to see the discussion.

1. Learn each students’ name.
2. Make a connection with each while teaching, discussing hobbies, etc.
3. Learn how to have a good control in class while promoting cooperative learning.
4. Soak in as much information from cooperating teacher and supervisor during experience.
5. Make learning fun and exciting for each class

The other part of this assignment is to explain a meaningful experience that happened while student teaching.  There were so many different ones with different personalities its hard to pick one.  The one that I am going to describe is one that I felt helped me as an educator be more engaging.

     This experience was a bittersweet one.  It was my first class of the day.  I had a student with their cell phone out in class so I told him to give it to me and he replied with a not so nice profanity followed by no.  Obviously I sent him to the office and then continued on with teaching.  As we were doing our assignment the class was very uneasy, talkative, disruptive, and unsettling.  I could feel my patience on the edge and I finally raised my voice and made them work quietly alone for the rest of the hour.  This worked relatively well, but the meaningfulness came in the next class.  As I began and had a minor disruption I didn't realize it but one of the students made a whimsical comment of "why are you so crabby?"  I didn't pay any attention to it at first, then while they were working I thought about it and realized that I had let that first class of the day affect my next class when they hadn't done anything wrong.  This was profound to me, and I have been really trying hard not to let previous classes ruin my mood and or level of cheerfulness.  This pleases the students and me too, a win win situation.