Another GOOD Week

This past week, I taught about 3/4 of the time, teaching the entire day except for the Math lesson in the morning. It was another good week and I have started to really enjoy my experience when I am in the "teaching" position. Dealing with behavior issues and lesson planning has become a thing of the past or really, just something that is coming naturally now. This has left me with the ability to do more exciting things in the classroom and really watch my lessons flow better. All of this has helped build my confidence as a classroom teacher, leader, and collaborator.

Due to this new found confidence, we were able to do some really fun things in the classroom this week and the students were singing my praises for them! I do enjoy their excitement and it is really fun to watch them take a hold of their own learning experiences and run with it.

Incorporating fun things into the classroom allows me to focus on a student-centered learning environment and reward the students for behavior that is acceptable and respectable. This past week, I did a lesson with counting and charting M&Ms, another lesson included making inferences about objects that were hiding in paper bags, another included doing "sink or float?" experiments, we also played with our shadows on the projector screen, and on Friday they completed a "What is your favorite type of apple?" survey. Who knew 1st graders LOVED apples so much!!! :)

Another opportunity I had this week was to work with our Computer Resource Specialist to create a "Smart Board" flip chart and integrate it into my lesson on -et and -en word families. It was awesome to watch the kids interact with the Smart Board (which is like a large digital

notebook). They enjoyed it so much, I am going to try and do something with it again this week!

This coming week, I go back to just observing. My teacher has set up an observation schedule for me, where I will go to 2 classrooms per day for different variations of times. I am hoping this will be a good opportunity for me to see how different teachers teach. On Thursday, my CT will be out for the day, so I will be teaching full-time that day; but then Friday will be a fun day for me to enjoy my 1st graders for one last day and celebrate with a "going-away" party in the afternoon. :) I really am going to miss them; but I am also looking forward to what God has in store for my next placement - Bring on the 4th graders!!!