Week Five of Student Teaching

This week I asked my cooperating teacher if she would teach so that I could observe her. I know the students really like her and I was impressed with what I saw at the beginning but I never saw deliver new material. So I wanted to observe her teaching so I could get some ideas on how to work on my pacing and to see how she handled classroom management problems. We also continued our poetry unit and she taught them about metaphors and similes. I picked teaching back up on Friday and taught about inference in writing. Our department is requiring we have our students write some six-word memoirs, so I used inference to teach those.

Watching Aubrey teach showed me that even though it's my style to let things go, I need to jump on management problems right away. I noticed that she can come across pretty harsh but the kids still respect and even like her despite that. So I tried to do it but I try to give them the benefit of the doubt and think that they must be talking about the assignment or the lesson. But I also found that the problem perpetuates if I don't jump on it, even if they are talking about the assignment. Another thing I learned is that the students behave better when they are comfortable and understand exactly whats coming, or know how a teacher operates. Aubrey has been teaching these students for half a year so there is an atmosphere already established, so it is weird to have this student teacher come in and mess it all up. So when I have my own classroom I think my style will work better because that is what the students will expect.

In the future I have decided I need to focus on consistency as far as classroom management is concerned. Even though I am a new teacher doing things in different ways if I am consistent and clearly state my expectations then they will quiet down and get in line (not that I have had any huge problems, just talking and the like). I also learned that I am still under planning my lessons. I need to be including more instruction and give less time for students to accomplish assignments. I think it was a good decision to have Aubrey teach a few days, I think I realized some of the weaknesses in my teaching and now I have plans to overcome them.