this week.

Ok first thing I have a short list of things that I remember from the week that made me smile:
1) Little girl accidentally called me mom. Been waiting for that to happen. It was adorable though because she thought it was so funny.
2) Little girl ran up to me Tuesday and completely randomly gave me a big hug.
3) First graders trying to keep a secret. So adorable.
4) how excited the kids are about my birthday.


On to other things. Taught all day tuesday while sick had a great lesson observed. Taught the majority of the day today. Went good. Kids were fantastic this morning and stinkers this afternoon, thank goodness for double specialists.

My birthday is tomorrow... I am pretty positive that my first graders are more excited about it than I am. They are hilarious. I lost count of how many times I was told, "Don't look in my desk" or "Don't look in my cubby" or "Don't look in my pencil box!"
Can't wait to find out what they are trying their hardest to keep a secret. I will keep you updated :)

Authentic teaching experience

Woke up this morning feeling yucky. But I took the cold medicine and blew my nose and went to school. I had an observed lesson with my supervisor and didn't want to reschedule.
Well I got there and ended up teaching the WHOLE day so my mentor could go help with all school testing.

My observed lesson went great! The rest of the day went well too.

I think this is one of many days in my future where I will teach while sick rather than write those sub plans. At least now I know I can do it and the students were respectful of the fact that I was losing my voice on and off. They did a fantastic job during my observed lesson, I was so impressed.

And to make the day better I got a compliment on my classroom management from another staff member this morning!

first full week of student teaching

So the week started out a little crazy. Got a call from my Fabulous mentor on sunday night saying that she wouldn't be there. So I got to teach ALL day on Monday! There was a sub there but as there were no real sub plans just what I had been told she just let me teach all day long. It was FANTASTIC!
The rest of the week was pretty good. Kids were getting used to the schedule again.
On thursday we got a new student. Lets just say that he will be an interesting case.

Friday was a good day. I taught the first hour of the day. At the very end of that hour however one of the super bees decided to pull out his tooth while we were all sitting in the carpet area. GROSS! Then later in the day another little super bee pulled hers out too! I can deal with a lot of nasty things but kids walking around all day with a kleenex in their mouth trying to pull out their tooth is NASTY! Not only is all of the blood gross but they have their dirty hands in their mouth too...then they try to hold me hand. yuck! Lets hope that all of the loose teeth fell out over the weekend.

Update:December

Ok so I haven't written in forever. So here is an update.
December: I got to teach a ton! We had several days with the substitute so I got to do a lot of the teaching which was absolutely fantastic. We made some cute crafts for the holidays and had a good time. The 2 stories that stick in my mind the most are both about little Outrageous Orange (OO). So the first one was on a day where I did the opening circle then transitioned to my mentor teaching. My circle time went great with the kids paying attention and staying quiet, even more so than usual. I turned the class over to my fantastic mentor and all the sudden they were loud and wiggly and they were just not being respectful of her. She asked them why all the sudden when she started teaching they started talking and OO says, "But Miss B is our teacher." It was completely inappropriate but also quite funny.

Then just before break I had taken the class out to recess about 5 minutes earlier and was in the room with 2 girls who decided to stay in for medical reasons. When OO walks into the room...I was thoroughly confused. So I asked "OO where were you?" (I thought I had taken him to recess...) His response was very matter of fact, "It takes me a long time to poop." Then he got his coat and went out to recess.

First graders have no filters.

I had my conference with my Fabulous Mentor and Fantastic Supervisor. It went great! They think I am doing a great job and gave me great marks. I also earned a 4.0 in my course work at the college!

Now for January: I will start taking over by about the 13th and by the beginning of February I will be teaching full time for 8 weeks! I can't wait!

More stories to come soon I am sure. Back to school on the 3rd! Until then I will enjoy the rest of my break. I will try to update more often now that I don't have big papers to write anymore.

Tuesday + Substitute+tears=LONG DAY

So the day started out good. Mentor explained the whole day to me. Substitute showed up I explained the day to her.
Students come in complete their planners, then it's calendar time (usually 20 minutes)Then I had a pilgrim packet to finish with the students well the calendar time ended up taking 45 minutes. I improvised and finished the packet after recess and only got 2 letters finished in handwriting instead of 3. THe day continued in this way.

Tears- 2 boys who were frustrated=a lot of tears.

Questions: What ideas do people have for explaining Venn Diagrams to first graders? Because I am not sure if they completely grasped the concept with the manipulatives that we used...

headaches...

The day started great. Kids were a bit wiggly and chatty but that is normal for them. We had a great reading group today got a lot done. Then we went to lunch...
When they came back they were a completely different class. THey were loud, rude and constantly moving! I don't know what happened at lunch to take away my wonderful super bees and turn them into loud and crazy hornets but something did. Having one of the most serious assemblies of the year at the end of the day wasn't the greatest thing to happen either. On the plus side the Veteran's Day assembly was pretty great and engaging.
Our students wrote some fantastic thank you notes to veterans this morning!
But in the end I came home with a terrible headache. Long day and now on top of that I have homework. Thankfully my full course load is almost over.

it has been too long...

Well here is a list of the things I have gotten to do in first grade since my last post:

-go on a bear hunt! we went through the candy factory, the jello swamp and the peanut butter river and into the cave. And there were big green eyes, a little bushy tail and screaming 1st graders! (makes for a pretty good day)
-teaching a math lesson at the last second because two other first graders decided to have a shoving fight and my mentor is the intern principal.
-kindergarten testing...she was more worried about the fact that my hair clip was making a reflection on the ceiling than the letter sounds I was testing her on.
-provided LOTS of kleenex and hand soap.
-bleached the desks 4 times.
-taught a math lesson with my supervisor there at which point my students decided that the worksheet was far too hard and so I had to completely change the lesson plan that I had written (6 pages!) so that we could actually explain the concept like they needed...it all worked out in the end because she got to see me working on my toes
-got a LOT of hugs even when I am not sure I want them because all of the kids have booger noses.

It has been a very busy week in first grade and I think it's only going to get busier. Hopefully the candy highs are nearly over because I don't think I can handle it anymore. October was a LONG month. I only get to see my super bees once this week but I can't wait!