Week 15

During this past week, I have been reflecting on my whole experience as a student teacher at my placement. In the beginning of my experience, I really wanted to be placed in an environment where I had an amazing cooperating teacher and really great students that enjoyed physical education and did the best that they could do. I felt that the best way to learn how to become a good and effective teacher would be to learn from the best. When I began at my placement and met with many students and my cooperating teacher, I felt like I had been placed in an environment that was the complete opposite of what I wanted or thought that it was going to be. Talking or I should say venting to teachers, peers, and friends I was jealous of the student teachers that had been placed in an environment that they loved and learned so much from. As I was feeling and thinking many different things, I still knew there was a reason for me to be placed in that school and it wasn’t just a jinx.

Since their was no curriculum in place or even a concrete weekly schedule of units or activities, I began to start taking the initiative and creating an environment (as much as I could) that I would like in my own gym. I began to start thinking like a first year teacher rather than an unfortunate student teacher. As a first year teacher, from what I understand is exhausting, challenging, at time frustrating, stressful, time consuming, and exciting all at the same time. I felt that my situation was quite like a first year teacher where I needed to come up with my own activities and lessons from scratch with very little materials left from the last teacher. Having this opportunity helped me become more creative as a teacher, have high standards for myself, passionate, have an open heart for students, and motivated to make a difference (even if it is small) within the environment that I have been “blessed with.”  I started small even though I had a million ideas that I wanted to do all at once. I began with the basics, I began teaching what I have learned, what I know is important, and what I know will impact student learning.

Once my ideas were taught and implemented is when I noticed that other teachers and the principal was beginning to notice me and students were reacting to the change. Students were becoming more interested in what was being taught and the social worker wanted me to become more involved. That is when I was given the opportunity to be a coach for girls on the run and later implement health education within other classes after a grant was passed for the month of April. I began to notice that I was the only student teacher in the building staying after school and volunteering. I was beginning to see that my time and effort was appreciated and welcomed.

As I look back now, I do not think my placement was a curse, but in some way a blessing. I also believe that even though my placement has been a challenge, that maybe I was one of the few that received a placement that really challenged and made me work hard as a teacher and not just a student teacher. I know I still have a ton more to learn about teaching and myself as a teacher, but I believe that I was able to truly get a feel for creating and implementing, managing a classroom and the behaviors, learning about diversity, and forming collaborative relationships with other teachers because I first hand experienced each teaching component myself. According to the IPTS, I believe that my placement has prepared me appropriately plan for instruction by planning and designing instruction based off of students and the community IPTS 4. Also, I have had the opportunity to learn more about diversity by understanding and creating different approaches to learning for diverse learners IPTS 3.   I have also created an environment that encourages social interaction, motivation, and appropriate behaviors IPTS 5.

For this upcoming week, I plan to talk with the assistant principal about the interview process and my placement and to also see what he looks for when looking over a first year teacher’s resume. I know that that opportunity will better prepare my during my future interview process. I also plan to submit more resumes to school with physical education and health education openings. As for teaching, I am beginning to phase out and give back my cooperating teachers classes. I am curious if he is going to change his teaching now that he has seen a positive change within his gym over the last few months.