week 8

well, today i learned a valuable lesson or two.

first, defiantly have a seating chart. especially with freshmen. mr donovan allows the kids to sit wherever they want, but they just cant handle it. first order of business tomorrow = new seating chart. i also learned that you have to set up an ultimatum for the misbehaving student. either be good or else... but i have to be ready to carry out the "or else". luckily, today the girl went with what i said so i didnt have to put up a fight. but i know its bound to happen one day.

second lesson : dont show a film to a regular class full of kids who can't pay attention. we spent the whole class period trying to make them all be quiet. after the film, i quizzed them on what they watched and it seemed that they got it. so i guess thats a good thing. the reason i showed the film to fifth period is because they were a day ahead of all the other classes so i needed them to slow down. next time, ill come up with something better....

oh - cst testing is this week and i so have a job. im a reliever for people to get their prep periods. its not that big of a deal, i just go sit in someone's classroom for 40 minutes while they go meander and do other things... lol. it should be interesting though....

3 weeks to go!!!!

week 7

I learned a lot today....

The lesson I did today had the students doing research on the internet on a topic about communism. They had to find the information and make a poster all in one day because we are presenting them tomorrow. So heres what i learned after doing this lesson: when assigning internet research, give students exact directions. I realized this after first period and started giving individual directions to groups one at a time. it worked after that. first period was a disaster. but then it all came together. lunch time came around and the computers in the library crashed. So, I had a backup direct instruction lesson for the same topic. That one worked really well. The only problem is that now 5th period is a day ahead of everyone else. So Im doing my lesson for monday with them tomorrow while all the other classes present. Then this weekend I will come up with something for fifth period to do. im thinking of having a berlin blockade / airlift / wall day. something sort of fun but still having to do with the topic. then tuesday we will all be on the same track again.

i got lucky that mr donovan has all the same subject for all 5 periods. Its definitely helpful. and having 5th period off is okay because they are the regular class while all the rest are honors.

so tomorrow we do our presentations. it should be interesting to see how they go. the worst that can happen is that they are horrible. oh well. you live and you learn.

tomorrow is the last day of week 7. we have our dinner with everyone else in the program so that they can tell us what to do to get our credential. it all is pretty exciting. now i just have to find a job. ha.

back from spring break

So we had a week off. It was almost too long. The only thing super exciting that I did was to go to the observatory with Jackie. If you haven't been since the renovation, I totally recommend it! We got to look through the big telescope and we saw Saturn and 5 of its moons. It was totally cool. Other than that my break was pretty laid back.

We wrapped up the WW2 Unit before break. The kids did pretty well on the test. I was impressed but then again, it is honors. As for the essays, they need to improve on their essay writing skills because they are Freshmen. When asked for specific examples, they simply said, "just like this". They also used I and Me a lot in the essays.

As for the lesson plans, I'm so glad that I got to see a WW2 unit. Of course I will have to do things differently but I really enjoyed seeing how to utilize films and how to break the information down for students.

The cold war is next. I have started the lesson plans for this week and next. I'm still not sure how to teach Korea and Vietnam but I'm working on it. Its going to be a good 4 weeks. Im excited to be done!

its been awhile.

So i dont think that anyone even reads this but due to the fact that i have to do this for class, here it goes:

the last 2 weeks have been interesting to say the least. In class we have been wrapping up the unit with group presentations and review for the test that is tomorrow. So nothing very exciting. I have been getting a jump on lesson plans for my last month though. I pretty much have the first week back done and so now Im working on the Korean War. Its interesting to search for stuff on the internet for this stuff because its not taught in class very often. But Im learning a lot myself so its exciting. and the good thing about the cold war is that this stuff can be used in both world history and US History. So im getting lots of good experience.

swimming is going good. we are on track to win league, which is always good too. at the meet yesterday we had to call 911 because a girl was having really bad stomach pains and couldnt breathe. interested to hear what happened.

Birthday was yesterday. School, swim meet, then dinner with my fabulous boyfriend. then bed time. I guess im a grown up now.