Soil Lesson Number 2

Our second lesson on soil went just as smoothly as the first one.  Alyssa and I began the lesson by discussing what we had learned last week, and by asking the students what they had learned with Mrs. K during her lesson the week before.  The students had a lot of things to say about what they had learned, and it was a good way of transitioning into the next lesson.  We drew a KWL chart on the board, and filled the middle section in with the Key Questions for today's lesson, and we asked the students to share any questions they had come up with over the week (which we had asked them to write in their journals as they arose).  We introduced the three materials that we would be observing today, which were sand, clay, and humus, and then had a discussion about what the students knew about each material and where they had seen them before.  We showed a Brain Pop Jr. video to the class on soil, and since we already knew before the lesson that Mrs. K's projector did not work, we had the students join us at the reading rug so that we could all see the video play from my laptop (which worked out better than we had expected).
We did a good job managing our materials and distributing them to the class, but we had a little bit of trouble once again with the washing of their hands (same fancy gingerbread soap that the students couldn't get enough of last week).  The hand washing was less of an issue than it was last week because we were more orderly when getting the students to transition from one activity to the next, and we knew that one of us needed to stand at the soap line to keep the students on task and to get them back to their seats as quickly as possible.  Our lesson was connected to the Massachusetts Frameworks, and the students had an opportunity to write about what they had observed and to describe it using as many descriptive words as they could, like we had discussed in the beginning of the lesson.
I thought that Alyssa and I worked very well together again, and even though we had one student who was fooling around a bit, I thought we did a great job keeping the classroom interested and under control.  It was really funny that during last week's lesson, we were referring to humus as if it was pronounced the same way as the humus we eat with pita chips, and the students were all about correcting us as soon as we watched the Brain Pop Jr. video and realized what we were doing!  The students got a kick out of it, and told us that Mrs. Krauch had realized what we were doing last week and had already explained to them how to pronounce the word correctly, but she did not want to interrupt our lesson to do so, which was very thoughtful of her.  The students had a lot of fun again with the lesson, and were clearly very excited to have us back again.

My First Lesson Ever!

I was really nervous about teaching my first lesson ever to a group of 21 fourth graders, but Alyssa and I knocked it out of the park!  The kids had so much fun playing with the soil in the activity that we did, and I could not believe how well they listened to our lesson and stayed interested the entire time.  We were both really nervous about how it was going to go because we had never given a lesson to a real classroom before, but now that we have one under our belt, we will not be nearly as nervous coming into our next lesson this coming week.  It was hard to gauge how the class was going to respond to us as teachers or to our style of teaching in general, or how interested they were going to be with the information that we were teaching them.  I think it is definitely helpful that the students do not get to learn science on a regular basis because it makes it especially interesting to them when we come in to teach our science lessons, and it is something different and fun for them compared to the typical day that they spend in their classroom with the same teacher every week. 
It was a huge help that Alyssa and I met up and practiced our lesson a number of times, pretending as if we were in the classroom teaching the lesson to our students, because it got us to think about the potential problems and issues that may have arisen if we were to approach our lesson in that specific manner.  We were able to designate who was going to teach what parts of the lesson, and we were on the same page the entire time so that we could both jump in and help if one of us couldn't find our words or got confused (which didn't happen as a result of our collaboration).  We both knew what was coming next and what direction the lesson was going to take at each step, and I think that this connection was apparent in our deliverance of the lesson.  I am really going to enjoy working with a partner for these science lessons because we both offer our own unique teaching styles, and can learn from each others mistakes and successes. 
One part of the lesson that could have been a disaster was when we were having the students wash their hands when they were finished observing the soil.  The teacher just bought a brand new bottle of gingerbread soap, and the students could not get enough of it!  They were washing their hands three times over again, and the line quickly built up and could have easily gone out of control if we did not see this happening and were not there to intervene and move the kids along back to their seats.  Next time, we will be sure to think of a more orderly way of getting the students to wash their hands so that this type of potential disaster can be avoided.  Luckily, the students were really well behaved and responded well to our directions, but this level of excitement that comes from having new teachers in the room, along with a new and exciting topic, could have easily led them in a different direction.

S. R. Experience

I am really excited about student teaching at S. R. Elementary this semester.  I have never had the opportunity to student teach before, so it is going to be a little nerve racking the first day when we are giving our first lesson on soil, but I think the extra pressure is going to help me out in the long run.  There are always going to be people coming into our classrooms to watch our lessons when we are hired next September (hopefully!), so it is something I am going to have to get used to.  I think that if I am prepared to give my lesson comfortably in front of my superiors right from the start, the transition will be a lot easier when the time comes to do it for real.
I am looking forward the most to interacting with the students in the classroom, and I hope they respond well to us, and to the material we will be teaching them about soil.  Hopefully we can make the material interesting to them so they will be excited every week when we come in to teach our next lesson on soil.  I am a little nervous right now about how the students will respond to us on the first day because that transitional period is always the hardest time for me before we really get to know each other, which I am sure will happen quickly and those nerves will fade away.  I am also looking forward to getting feedback not only from Michelle, Bindu, and Jane, but also from the teacher whose classroom I will be teaching in.  I think it will mean a lot to me if a teacher feels confident in me and Alyssa's abilities and has no problem handing her classroom over to a pair of students who have never taught a lesson before, but at the same time, any criticism will not be taken lightly and will be constructive whether it is positive or negative.  It is going to be in the back of my mind until we get that first lesson under our belt, so I am excited to get the process underway to rid some of those nerves and to begin the practical part of the program!