Student Teaching

I finished student teaching a few days ago, and I have now had enough sleep to properly comment on it. It was great. I loved the students; they were wonderful. I got some really good ideas from it, and I found out how prepared I need to be for each day to run smoothly. We were definitely spoiled, though; I had three other student teachers and a veteran teacher in the room with fourteen students. Our veteran teacher was very supportive, and I really appreciated her letting us take over the class.

One thing about our students I wasn't expecting was their lack of motivation. I can't remember a time when I didn't turn in an assignment on time; I would have had a heart attack if I had to turn in something late. But our kids repeatedly didn't turn in assignments, and had a whole list of excuses. They were nice kids, but they didn't see the importance of education, especially those that didn't have parental support or those that didn't plan on going to college. We also had one incidence of cheating on a test.

Our teacher, right before the last day of school, was informed by a football coach that she would pass one of our students. Our teacher refused to pass the student unless he actually made the grade, but I found out that there is still a chance that the coach will have the grade changed after the teacher submits it. How frustrating.

On the last day of class, the student teachers let the students guess our ages and our first names. It was too funny. They thought I was 24 and that my first name was Jennifer. They thought Sarah's name was Chastity and she was 24. They thought Jake was Jack, age 22 (even with the beard), and they thought Mason was Thomas, age 27 (though there were shouts as high as 32). That was so fun.