Thinking Thursday

Today was the first official day of my third week of student teaching. I am still alive, still excited about teaching, and still sleepy. Today was also my first observation by Mrs. Flowe. It was an even day, so I had some time to collect myself during first block -- public speaking people are interesting. Then, we finished the video of Gulliver's Travels in seventh period. Mrs. Flowe came a little earlier than I expected her to come, so I was able to easily introduce her to fourth period when they came in. In seventh, we finished the video with five minutes to spare, and I had not planned on doing anything beside the video, so the class helped me rearrange for the next class. I hope she doesn't think that I do that every day. (Note to self: I need to come up with some additional (fun) five minute activities for that in the future.)

My fourth period was amazing today. They really seemed to enjoy the journal entry: What do you see as the greatest problem in the world today? Include 3 reasons why what you chose is a problem as well as why it's the greatest problem. Also, write what the solution would be to this problem. Most of them followed my instructions and wrote at least one page. What I had planned for 5 minutes took 15 minutes and they were still writing. I was so proud of them. Amanda asked to share the problems, which I hadn't planned on doing, but I was so excited that they were excited that we did that as well. I could have extended that activity as well. She also really liked the illustrating Gulliver's adventures with mind mapping. Her group's poster was amazing. I can't wait to post it on the wall like I did with my tenth graders' fliers! I forgot to finish the movie for them today, so I'll do it on Monday.

I had one of those moments today that Mama talks about with regard to teaching -- the ones that make up for the lack of money. As seventh period was ending, I was talking to Elizabeth and Sara about the school of ed, and they asked me where I wanted to teach. I told them I'd like to stay at Grafton, and Sara sincerely looked at me and said, "I really hope you do stay here. You're great." I smiled and said, "Thank you." I don't think she knows how much she made my day. At the end of the day, I was working on the computer when Rob came in. I felt like a real teacher when he said, "Hi, Ms. Owen. I was just dropping off my excuse with Mrs. Felder when I saw you working and I wanted to come say hi." We talked about books that he was interested in reading, and he seemed to excited to talk about them and he's going to bring them in because I haven't seen them before.

After school, we had another basketball practice for student/faculty. It was a lot of fun! I'm really enjoying becoming friends with the other teachers -- Laura, Jamie, Drew, Angela, Holly and especially Adrienne are really cool people. I could definitely see myself working with them.

When Marci and I were talking about absences, we started to talk about another student who'd been missing some classes. Marci's wondering if the student could be pregnant since she keeps getting sick in the morning. My heart immediately caught. I knew that this was a distinct possibility with teaching 140 students, but I was like, "She's so young." I know that I'm not that much older than my students, but I see them as my kids. Thinking about school and trying to graduate is so much and then contemplating having a child?? It kind of makes me wonder if our abstinence only sex-ed is really hurting our children...

Yesterday, I think Greg lied to me, which really hurt. Now, I feel like I can't trust him completely and that makes me sad. I want to tell him that I know about the dip in class, but what if I am wrong? Oh, teaching is so much more than just content or management or interactions with students and colleagues. It's all the intricate connections or disconnections with everything and anything.

All I can say about today is that it was much better than my Monday when I had to write up Seb. I really wanted to be able to call Daddy and tell him that I finally get it when he used to say, "This hurts me more than it hurts you." on one of the few occasions that he had to give me a spanking. The more experiences I have teaching, the more that I wish I could tell him.

Well, I have written my four versions of the tenth grade quiz, I need to do more grades.