My Second Day

This was the first Monday that I was at the school. I was a little off kilter in first period when I realized every Monday morning they say the pledge of allegiance. Everyone stood up, turned to the flag, and recited the pledge of allegiance. I immediately thought of my law class that discussed case precedence for students and teachers to have the right not to say the pledge of allegiance. I will need to reread that section of my Law and Education book to review what the law says in this area. It felt odd reciting the pledge of allegiance again because I had flash backs to being a student myself.

Some students in my cooperating teachers 5th period noticed that it was a Monday and I was not here normally on Mondays. They were the only class to ask about that. My teacher had to step out of the room to talk to a student, so I explained to them that I had started teaching the 4th period class. They asked why I didn't start teaching their class. I explained that I would have loved to teach them about circles, diameters, radii, and Pi. However the math 1 classes were starting a new book around this time and I felt more comfortable working out of a textbook. There class was doing supplemental work and handouts around this time which I did not feel comfortable teaching from. This took up enough time for my cooperating teacher to talk to the student.

However when it came to my class I put students names on sticky notes through out the room. Although when I started class I noticed that students moved sticky notes and were not in the seating chart that I placed them in. A few girls moved it all around so they could sit with their friends. I really had to lock that table down and threatened to break them up. They asked for a second chance before breaking them up and I figured there wasn't much time left in the class to move them so I let them be. I am figuring students will not remember where they are sitting tomorrow, but we will see. I will have to adjust the seating chart to where they ended up or they will complain.

However after I got them settled I started in on activity that used both pre test answers and in class answers. I had looked through the pre test and pulled off the answers to the last question before I started the class. I got some interesting results. I had asked the students to list three ways they used decimals in their lives. The one I liked best was vending machines. I then used these words with others provided in class to make a wordle. I had them look at the cover of the book to get ideas of words related to decimals. This helped them make meaning from pictures and is a form of literacy. The wordle turned out pretty good. Some students already knew about it and were excited to see it used in the classroom. I think some were excited to go make their own. I asked them to try and make one on a related math topic to get math log time. Then eventually share it with the class. My class has to do some sort of math outside the classroom. It can be playing cribbage, adding up totals at the grocery store, talking about what you did in math, talking about the wordle they made, or making their own math related wordle. It encourages students to talk about and do math in ways other than homework. This time is kept track in their journal and is signed off by an adult. I will be giving my students a copy of the wordle and have them glue it in their math journal. After that we worked on an estimation problem together as a class. Then I used the last ten minutes to glue in the new assignment sheet for this week and fill out an exit slip. I will be reading the exit slips and their journals tomorrow morning. I look forward to reading their journals since my research topic for my MAT program is on math journals. I will probably be copying some pages of various journals to use as student examples in my research portfolio.

One thing that I am worried about is a very advanced student in my class. This student isn't TAG, but is getting the material much faster than the rest of the class. He had the estimation problem done much longer before the rest of the class. This is a recurring theme through out the class and I am not sure how to challenge him more. This student actually reminds me of the situation I was in when I was stuck in 8th grade core math. I am unclear how to differentiate my lesson for this student. I also worry that this student will just get bored. I want to get this student teaching others more often. I saw this student try to explain a problem and then afterward said to me that it was really hard to teach. I told him that is why I am going to school so I can learn to teach.

There is another student who worries me. So far he has not brought anything to class. He just shows up emptied handed. He has his old math book in his locker, but I didn't want him missing any class to go back for it. He had his current math book since it was in his folder slot in the classroom. He however had to borrow a pencil and paper. Therefore this days work will be separate from the journal as well. I wonder if he will be prepared for class tomorrow? Will this be some reoccurring pattern with this student? He is already struggling since the student is an ELL student and has an IEP for writing.  I saw the exit slip this student gave me was not surprised to see very little writing. I am not sure how I will be able to support this students learning. I think the best way is to provide lots of drawings in class and encourage the student to do their math with drawing. However I don't know how much that will help.

I am excited to see what happens next and will do only best for my students. I am being very critical on myself on my first teaching experience, but it is just in me to want some form of perfection. However I have quickly learned that as a teacher you must really roll with the punches. So I am going to keep on rolling and see what happens.