When the student is ready to learn the teacher will come.

If my journey to become a teacher had a title I think it would have to be When the student is ready the teacher will come. Over the last two years I have been blessed to have just the right teacher at just the right time. And now that I am student teaching that holds true more then ever. I have been with my mentor teacher for almost three weeks now and I think she is incredible. I have learned so much from her and gained so much confidence in my ability to teach since stepping into her classroom.

I had thought that I would be able to post more frequently about my experience as a student teacher but she keeps me really busy. As a student teacher, I am required to keep our mentor teacher’s hours so there are days when it is almost 5 before I get home. Add to that the Saturday mornings we spend at school preparing lesson plans for the following week, getting the materials ready for each lesson, and a family to take care of, I found I have very little time for posting.

But as busy as I have been and as sore and puffy as my feet and ankles have been the last three week I am having the time of my life. The schools, the teachers, the kids in my classroom have all been wonderful. To tell you the truth I really need that. I had hoped to student teach at the school where I previously worked in the cafeteria for the last three years. I had assumed that since they knew me that would be no problem, but when they were asked not one of them volunteered. My feelings were a little hurt but I moved on and accepted that I would be student teaching at another school. Imagine how pleased I was when one of the other second grade teachers said when we were working one Saturday how I should stay and help the other second teachers get ready for curriculum night when I was done helping my teacher. I laughed and said you had your chance when they were asked who wanted a student teacher. She told me I should have seen how fast my teacher’s hand shot up and how many other teachers had wanted a student teacher. It really felt good how much I was wanted, especially after feeing so bad when I left my last school.

I will be spending nine weeks student teaching; I just wish it could be longer. Due to the length of time I have I must move quickly from observing the teacher at the beginning of the year to assuming full responsibility for the classroom. By the start of the seventh week I should be doing it all. Right now with supervision I am planning the math and social studies lessons and I am teaching them as well. I am just now starting to write the lesson plans for the reading program called Foundations and will add reading, and then finally writing.

As I come to the end of my third week I will be having my first evaluation. The evaluation will be a math lesson using technology. At my school that means using the overhead, which is good because they are fairly user friendly. My mentor teacher and my college supervisor will watch me teach a lesson and evaluate my lesson plan and how I implemented the lesson. I will be teaching a lesson on how to use a number line to perform subtraction. I feel pretty good about my lesson and I am feeling pretty confident in front of the class.

It amazes me how much I have grown in just two and a half weeks. When I first walked into the classroom I was a little unsure and worried that maybe, just maybe, I would be one of the very few people they talked abut at orientation that would not make it through student teaching and would be asked to leave. Now I find myself thinking things like when I get my own classroom I am going to do this or that or I would teach a concept this way. The thought of having my very own class makes me feel all bubbly inside. Just give me a classroom and I will show you what I can do!