Hi all I know I'm a little late with this but better late than never right?
This past Tuesday was my first official observation from Mr. Campbell and I don't know if I could have picked a worse day to introduce one of the long term projects for my Animal Science class. Their project is tracking livestock market values from January 27th to April 21st to if their is a change and factors effecting these changes. I was really excited but all that enthusiasm got the best of me sending clarity right out the door, I was not communicating the instructions as well as what I thought ignoring the need to know and adding to much nice to know. To make maters a little worse I had opened class on a shaky foot with my students giving them a Pop Quiz to gauge where they stood and more importantly where my instruction stood.
When the bell rang to end this nightmare I already new that it had gone awful,
may be horrendous is a better word , it was written all over my face but Mr.Campbell still asked "What do you think?" kinda laughing at my answer that he said he all ready new and went on to tell me that it wasn't as bad as what I thought and I'm right where I should be at this point.
Easy for him to say, I was the one in front of the class digging a huge hole to put myself in. "Remember you know the content,they don't that's why you are here to Teach them as you Learn."
True True. That made me calm down and realize I was over reacting this was week two of teaching and this was just one day, I'd hit refresh and start over tomorrow.
But that pop quiz popped back in my mind. What if they flunked it, I can't do this . The first thing I did was grade those quizzes during lunch, to my relief 19 of the 23 passed it with an 80% or higher (1 student still needs to take it) and those who didn't t thought it was romper room ,because Ms.Ross is a student teacher, the first couple of classes.
Oh oh yes yes yes I did it they got it so I did it, why did I doubt myself, Mr. Campbell was right.
Breathing and reevaluating the days lesson I decided that this project was to valuable for the students just to trash based on today. So I made up a Cheat Sheet with step by step instructions, definitions , and example for each item the students need to find. It turned out that was the key ,now they understand and have something to refer back to. They also know that they just need to ask when they are stuck because no mater how much I hate to admit it I forget and need to refer back once in while.
The rest of the week went much better when the students walked into the classroom and found ruminant puzzle pieces on their desks Wednesday as their ,up and moving, bell work for What is a ruminant?, originally a Beef lesson but was relocated for relevance and a nice review seaway into sheep/goat nutrition. Thursday they found a note on the board to go to the barn, so they could all see the newest additions.
The biggest take away from this week for me was I don't need to be perfect right out of the box "I'm here to teach and intern be taught." I thought I was ready to turn in my towel but with a little pep talk, real data evidence , and some self reflection I can do this and have no desire to have the words I can't cross my mind or lips again.
Til next time !
