My roommate has viral pinkeye. Really? Oh this is how my life goes...
On the bright side, I have all my lesson plans for Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday done. :)
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Saturday, July 11, 2009
Week 1 of teaching!
Notes about abbreviations/TFA talk: collab=collaborative group
It is now 11 A.M. on Saturday, and I have officially completed my first week of teaching! It actually went surprisingly well...but there were some interesting moments along the way.
Each day this week I taught the first 70 minutes--opening circle, classroom newsletter, read aloud, and literacy centers.
On Monday, my timing went well, and we had a great start. I had the fun task of teaching them how to line up, and I am SO proud of them--our lines are pretty darn awesome. Plus, they definitely know what it means to sit Criss-Cross Applesauce on the rug.
Monday and Tuesday=assessment days. We needed to see where our kids were so we know what we need to work on the next 4 weeks. As much as you read about and hear about the education gap, you certainly see it at its worst when you are assessing 4 and 5 year olds about to enter Kindergarten.
Now I'm sure you're thinking that at 5 there can't be THAT great a range in our students' assessments. Everyone starts preschool on the same foot right?
I think one of the most shocking assessments I completed was a phonics assessment, where I showed each student a card with a letter on it. One went like this:
What letter is this? 7
What sound does this letter make? 19
What is a word that starts with this letter? 14
We have a student who speaks Vietnamese at home--so while his math assessment (counting, sorting teddy bears, and making patterns with cubes) was pretty strong, he did not say a word during the phonics assessment. He can write his name in cursive (and very good cursive), but it is hard to communicate with him.
During the reading comprehension test (I did a Read Aloud and then the students had to draw two pictures of something that happened during the story, where it happened, and who was there), we had a couple students who did not draw anything even close, and then we had one student whose drawing was impossible to understand, but he verbally explained both drawings and actually scored the highest on the assessment. While his comprehension is high, he does not have the hand strength to properly hold a crayon or pencil, which has been very frustrating.
On Thursday, I tried practicing writing his name with him to work on his hand strength, but he got so frustrated! The only way I was able to get him to continue writing was to have him trace the words: Luke Skywalker, light saber, and Star Wars. He LOVES Star Wars, which may be the way we get him to stay engaged for the next 4 weeks.
On Wednesday, my first real day of teaching (because assessments were finally over), I was observed by our School Director, the head of institute, and some other important person. Talk about adding to my nerves! I am sure that for about half a second if you saw my face you could have seen my anxiety (I had no idea that they were coming), but the lesson actually went really well! We read a book called No, David!, and I was teaching the kids how to identify feelings. They did AMAZING. Thank goodness!!
I have fortunately been sleeping, getting into bed at about 10:30 each night. Some people have been up till 4 or 5 A.M. everyday (which is not so good seeing as our bus leaves at 6:30).
It's been a wonderful second week--I know horror stories always abound about institute, and maybe I will have some after the next 3 weeks, but so far, I really can't say much more than I already have learned SO much, have improved SO much in the classroom, and I can't wait for next week. I will, however, thoroughly enjoy my weekend and resting up even more.
It is now 11 A.M. on Saturday, and I have officially completed my first week of teaching! It actually went surprisingly well...but there were some interesting moments along the way.
Each day this week I taught the first 70 minutes--opening circle, classroom newsletter, read aloud, and literacy centers.
On Monday, my timing went well, and we had a great start. I had the fun task of teaching them how to line up, and I am SO proud of them--our lines are pretty darn awesome. Plus, they definitely know what it means to sit Criss-Cross Applesauce on the rug.
Monday and Tuesday=assessment days. We needed to see where our kids were so we know what we need to work on the next 4 weeks. As much as you read about and hear about the education gap, you certainly see it at its worst when you are assessing 4 and 5 year olds about to enter Kindergarten.
Now I'm sure you're thinking that at 5 there can't be THAT great a range in our students' assessments. Everyone starts preschool on the same foot right?
I think one of the most shocking assessments I completed was a phonics assessment, where I showed each student a card with a letter on it. One went like this:
What letter is this? 7
What sound does this letter make? 19
What is a word that starts with this letter? 14
We have a student who speaks Vietnamese at home--so while his math assessment (counting, sorting teddy bears, and making patterns with cubes) was pretty strong, he did not say a word during the phonics assessment. He can write his name in cursive (and very good cursive), but it is hard to communicate with him.
During the reading comprehension test (I did a Read Aloud and then the students had to draw two pictures of something that happened during the story, where it happened, and who was there), we had a couple students who did not draw anything even close, and then we had one student whose drawing was impossible to understand, but he verbally explained both drawings and actually scored the highest on the assessment. While his comprehension is high, he does not have the hand strength to properly hold a crayon or pencil, which has been very frustrating.
On Thursday, I tried practicing writing his name with him to work on his hand strength, but he got so frustrated! The only way I was able to get him to continue writing was to have him trace the words: Luke Skywalker, light saber, and Star Wars. He LOVES Star Wars, which may be the way we get him to stay engaged for the next 4 weeks.
On Wednesday, my first real day of teaching (because assessments were finally over), I was observed by our School Director, the head of institute, and some other important person. Talk about adding to my nerves! I am sure that for about half a second if you saw my face you could have seen my anxiety (I had no idea that they were coming), but the lesson actually went really well! We read a book called No, David!, and I was teaching the kids how to identify feelings. They did AMAZING. Thank goodness!!
I have fortunately been sleeping, getting into bed at about 10:30 each night. Some people have been up till 4 or 5 A.M. everyday (which is not so good seeing as our bus leaves at 6:30).
It's been a wonderful second week--I know horror stories always abound about institute, and maybe I will have some after the next 3 weeks, but so far, I really can't say much more than I already have learned SO much, have improved SO much in the classroom, and I can't wait for next week. I will, however, thoroughly enjoy my weekend and resting up even more.
Saturday, July 4, 2009
One week down, four to go...
Here is as a brief yet complete an update I can offer:
This week was great but unbelievably exhausting.
Sunday I moved into Loyola Marymount University...yes I am living in a dorm, and after being spoiled rotten by Pepperdine's rooms, I am not 100% enjoying it, but truth be told, the vast majority of the time I spend in my room, I am sleeping.
Our first day of official training started Monday. I am doing ECE (early childhood education) here at LBUSD (Long Beach Unified School District), which is perfect! The kids I will be teaching are entering Kinder in the fall so they are around the age and level I expect my students to be come August. For this week, our bus left at 6:10, which means I had to wake up at 5:20 everyday...to pick up my lunch at 5:55 (Subway all week long), and make sure I made it to our site. We sat in "sessions" everyday from 7 A.M. to 4:45 P.M.
Sessions consist of: extensive training on lesson planning (creating your "vision," key points, etc.), literacy sessions (on phonics, the building blocks of reading comprehension), classroom management sessions, and so on and so forth. They are long and tiring yet extremely worthwhile, and I have learned SO much in just a week.
The staff here is wonderful. My CMA is named Ashleigh, and she is great. I already can tell she will be VERY helpful at making sure I am doing what I am supposed to do and learning as much as possible, which is what I need.
The CS has gotten some not-so-great response from the entire ECE group (there are about 45 of us), but I have spoken to her one-on-one and find her advice great. There is no way that anyone in the room knows everything that is being presented, so even when I'm exhausted I know I am learning something new.
That said, the LS is AMAZING. She wrote the Elementary Literacy text that we are required to read before Institute, and I pretty much am hoping that I can just absorb some of her wisdom. I still feel nervous about teaching phonics, but seeing as she literally wrote the book, she can answer any and all questions I have.
...Okay instead of going into even more detail, as I'm getting tired and want to get to bed, let me just share my overall thoughts:
1. Institute will DEFINITELY be worthwhile and help me a lot. I am surprisingly still excited for the next 4 weeks despite the fact that I've heard how hard this process is.
2. The few things that have been difficult for me lately are:
-Being among such stressed and perfectionist individuals! Goodness knows I hate handing in half-assed (sorry, I couldn't think of a word that is more appropriate that has the right meaning) work or doing less than my best, but I take things in stride, and I know what my priorities are (family, sleep, my health). It's hard to relate to people who stay up until 4:45 working non-stop when we wake up just after 5 to leave for school.
-Actually meeting and getting to know people. ALL we talk about is TFA. Plus, I realize that just because we are doing TFA together, we may not be going in for the same reasons, and we also may not have a similar value/belief system, which is very different after going to a Catholic high school and Christian college.
-Not seeing or talking with family and friends. Being busy from 6 A.M. to 5 P.M. and then lesson planning after that is not exactly conducive to responding to phone calls and emails.
All in all though, Institute really is wonderful. I truly believe that the staff here wants one thing: for us to be as successful and prepared as possible in the classroom in the fall so that our students can be as successful in a year and as prepared as possible upon leaving our classes. I make may jokes about all the acronyms TFA uses (RPR=relentless pursuit of results...no joke, the acronyms abound everywhere), but the organization as a whole and its staff and CMs are doing AMAZING things, and I am extremely excited to be a part of it.
I'll try to update next weekend!
Lots of love,
Alex
This week was great but unbelievably exhausting.
Sunday I moved into Loyola Marymount University...yes I am living in a dorm, and after being spoiled rotten by Pepperdine's rooms, I am not 100% enjoying it, but truth be told, the vast majority of the time I spend in my room, I am sleeping.
Our first day of official training started Monday. I am doing ECE (early childhood education) here at LBUSD (Long Beach Unified School District), which is perfect! The kids I will be teaching are entering Kinder in the fall so they are around the age and level I expect my students to be come August. For this week, our bus left at 6:10, which means I had to wake up at 5:20 everyday...to pick up my lunch at 5:55 (Subway all week long), and make sure I made it to our site. We sat in "sessions" everyday from 7 A.M. to 4:45 P.M.
Sessions consist of: extensive training on lesson planning (creating your "vision," key points, etc.), literacy sessions (on phonics, the building blocks of reading comprehension), classroom management sessions, and so on and so forth. They are long and tiring yet extremely worthwhile, and I have learned SO much in just a week.
The staff here is wonderful. My CMA is named Ashleigh, and she is great. I already can tell she will be VERY helpful at making sure I am doing what I am supposed to do and learning as much as possible, which is what I need.
The CS has gotten some not-so-great response from the entire ECE group (there are about 45 of us), but I have spoken to her one-on-one and find her advice great. There is no way that anyone in the room knows everything that is being presented, so even when I'm exhausted I know I am learning something new.
That said, the LS is AMAZING. She wrote the Elementary Literacy text that we are required to read before Institute, and I pretty much am hoping that I can just absorb some of her wisdom. I still feel nervous about teaching phonics, but seeing as she literally wrote the book, she can answer any and all questions I have.
...Okay instead of going into even more detail, as I'm getting tired and want to get to bed, let me just share my overall thoughts:
1. Institute will DEFINITELY be worthwhile and help me a lot. I am surprisingly still excited for the next 4 weeks despite the fact that I've heard how hard this process is.
2. The few things that have been difficult for me lately are:
-Being among such stressed and perfectionist individuals! Goodness knows I hate handing in half-assed (sorry, I couldn't think of a word that is more appropriate that has the right meaning) work or doing less than my best, but I take things in stride, and I know what my priorities are (family, sleep, my health). It's hard to relate to people who stay up until 4:45 working non-stop when we wake up just after 5 to leave for school.
-Actually meeting and getting to know people. ALL we talk about is TFA. Plus, I realize that just because we are doing TFA together, we may not be going in for the same reasons, and we also may not have a similar value/belief system, which is very different after going to a Catholic high school and Christian college.
-Not seeing or talking with family and friends. Being busy from 6 A.M. to 5 P.M. and then lesson planning after that is not exactly conducive to responding to phone calls and emails.
All in all though, Institute really is wonderful. I truly believe that the staff here wants one thing: for us to be as successful and prepared as possible in the classroom in the fall so that our students can be as successful in a year and as prepared as possible upon leaving our classes. I make may jokes about all the acronyms TFA uses (RPR=relentless pursuit of results...no joke, the acronyms abound everywhere), but the organization as a whole and its staff and CMs are doing AMAZING things, and I am extremely excited to be a part of it.
I'll try to update next weekend!
Lots of love,
Alex
Friday, July 3, 2009
Acronyms you need to know for my next post...
CM=Corps Member
CMA=Corps Member Advisor
CS=Curriculum Specialist
LS=Literacy Specialist
SOM=School Operations Manager
...I'll try to update tomorrow. I'm just so excited to go to sleep and not have to wake up super early. :) Plus, I'm also happy, because I had Chipotle at about 9:30 with a friend. Good stuff.
CMA=Corps Member Advisor
CS=Curriculum Specialist
LS=Literacy Specialist
SOM=School Operations Manager
...I'll try to update tomorrow. I'm just so excited to go to sleep and not have to wake up super early. :) Plus, I'm also happy, because I had Chipotle at about 9:30 with a friend. Good stuff.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Thought of the Day
Waking up at 5:20 to go learn and to teach beats waking up at 6 A.M. for chemo. I am going to have to remind myself of that every morning when I am exhausted, but it ought to make it a bit easier. :)
