Multivitamins and rest

So it's the end of week 3, and I'm at home, sick today.

I was sick yesterday too, but I pushed through and managed to teach my choir lesson at the end of the day.

I assumed that I would get sick at some point during the practicum, but I didn't think it would happen this soon. In a way, I'm glad I'm sick now since it's technically observations for January, but it's making me realize how important it is to take care of ourselves during this busy, stressful time.

Next week I'm going to try to focus on getting to bed even earlier (9pm?), eatings lots of fruits and veggies, taking a multivitamin, and consciously trying to pace myself during the day.

If anybody has any good quick, healthy recipes send them my way!

Rapport

So it's week 2 of practicum. Yesterday I made a student cry. A young girl in choir.

I felt terrible about it, but here is the situation:

In this particular choir there are 14 girls. About 3 are fairly chatty and constantly have to be asked for their attention and focus. The girls know each other very well as it's a linear course and I've observed several classes with them.

I find the most effective way to get somebody's attention when they are chatting is to call their name and ask for their focus or quiet. Instantly their ears perk up and they realize you noticed they were talking.

Anywho, in a 1 hour lesson, I called this particular girl's name 2-3 times, and I called several other girl's names as well. It was a chatty day. Part way through the class the girl got up and left. I assumed she had gone to the washroom and didn't realize something was up until the end of the lesson when she came back in.

She asked if she could talk to me one on one. She said that it really upset her when I called her name in class because it singled her out. She said she has a really tough time focusing and she would really like it if I didn't call her name out. I explained to her that I was sorry she felt singled out, but that my only intention was to get her attention because her talking was disrupting her focus and other students' focus.

After the incident I spoke with my sponsor teacher, and she thought that I responded well to the situation, but that I really hadn't done anything wrong or offensive to make the girl upset. My sponsor said she probably would've done the same thing I did in class, and the only difference is that she has developed a strong rapport with her students.

Rapport is key.

I am going to work extra hard over the next few weeks to get to know the students more. Anything from saying "hello" in the hallways to asking about their weekends and standing at the door as they leave the classroom.

THE ULTIMATE SOLUTION TO EVERYTHING

This whole semester I kept hearing the “solution” to what seemed like every single thing that happened in the classroom, good or bad (mostly problems). Like any solution, it only works if the person knows how to use it. It seems like a simple solution, but upon further inspection, there is a bit more to it. Want to know what it is? It's like I've discovered that the meaning of life is “42” all over again!

HUMOR … that's right... humor. Sure we all have the humorous bone, but do we all have the ability to be humorous? There are so many forms - silliness, sarcasm, dark, puns, teasing, knock knock jokes, absurdity, etc. It is easy enough to say “use humor”, but it is not easy to know when and where and what type to use. For me, I can be extremely sarcastic, not in a mean way, however, people who do not know me are confused by my strange answers to their ridiculous questions. There is a place and time for dark humor and sarcasm because what if a student believes you and runs home to tell their mommy or daddy or guardian. Better be careful.

Subject puns are always fun! If you have a few, bring them out. It's fun. Plus, it can make really dry material somewhat interesting. My entire intent of this post is to bring awareness to the many forms of humor. Just like there are many forms of humor there are many types of students and if you are teasing, know what student you are teasing. Can they take it? Will they understand? Yet another case, where having a keen observation of what students understand humor and what ones don't comes in handy.

Definitely “use humor” because it makes learning and teaching enjoyable, but be careful of the who, the what, and the where.

Know Your Own

In Tatiana's class, Ed-D 430, we had a guest speaker (Caroline, I think) come in and discuss “the job interview”. She mentioned a question that stumps a lot of interviewee's, “What are your weaknesses?”. On holiday, I began thinking about this and surprisingly I was able to come up with more weaknesses than strengths. According to Caroline, many interviewee's have their strengths lined up but forget to think about their weaknesses. Don't even try “I work too hard” and “I care too much”. Those are stupid to begin with. Everyone know that Uvic student teachers work too hard anyway! (for the benefit of future teaching years of course)

A weakness of mine is the fact that I have a very expressive face. It is a weakness because many times I have had people misinterpret what I am thinking. Most of the time I am unaware of the face I am making, but I have had people ask “Why are you making that face? It's like you don't respect me.” I want to bang my head on the wall because the intention is not disrespect, most of the time I am processing what the person is saying. The last thing I want is a fellow colleague or student or parent misinterpreting my facial expression. I cannot change my expressions to a bland face all the time, but I can become more aware of my expressions.

Knowing your own weaknesses can not only aid in the classroom, but getting that job in the first place. So what are your weaknesses?

Teaching Strategy

In recalling a good math teacher in high school, I've decided to use a strategy that he used every single class. Before class started, the teacher would write a series of math problems on the side board so that as the students came in, they might sit down and begin working on the questions. The questions were usually from the concept learned the day before, so they were a sort of review. He would also give an extra five minutes into class for students to work on the problems. Then he would work through the problems with the students.

I particularly liked this strategy because it was a simple review tool, but also to get students into the mind set of “math class”. Every day these problems were on the board and we expected it. A small routine, but effective in my mind. Even though I am a music teacher, I would like to incorporate this somehow into my own routine.

Happy New Year!

Alright, so it's pretty apparent that I'm posting a blog way past the due date, but I think we all can agree that December was so ridiculously busy that I might be forgiven.

As the first day of practicum approaches, I am feeling anticipation, excitement, but still wrought with worry. There are too many what if's to start thinking of them all. Instead, I've decided to not think about anything until I get to the school. It just seemed easier than stressing myself out over what may or may not happen.

I have thought a lot about how I'm going to present myself on the first day and week. This is when the students and the teachers are seeing me for the first time and you only get that one first impression. In many discussions over the semester, we talked about “the first day” and what you set on the first day is what the rest of the year will look like. I am taking this fully into account. Who knows where we'll end up, and having connections with teachers could aid in getting a job or a recommendation in the future. The teachers, therefore, need to see us in a professional manner just in case.

Using Stories to teach

In my experiences, I've always been a fan of explaining things through the use of examples and stories. Though, I'm not exactly the best at doing myself in big groups, I've always liked it when teachers use either stories or really practical examples in their lessons. In particular, stories work really well with teachers who've either had a lot of experience (and thus have lots of examples to work from), or teachers who have done a lot of interesting things in their life. For example, one of my english teachers in high school had worked extensively overseas in Europe and elsewhere in the world. As such, in his classrooms he was always relating things in class to his explorations in greek caves, and adventures driving across Italy. Though, I don't exactly have the experience, or breadth of worldly knowledge that these teachers had, it is my hope that one day I can use these teaching techniques myself.