MaritaUndergraduate
Exceptional Education |
MaritaUndergraduate
Exceptional Education |
This week, my mentor teacher gave me almost full reign of the lessons for the week. She provided me with an outline for the week but left the lesson planning and teaching to me.
The school does not have a reading program they follow, for example Scholastic or Fundations. Teachers use a free online program called A to Z reading to find topics and worksheets. I have been placed in many different schools and have used many different reading programs at these schools, but I have never seen a school that has not bought into a reading program. In past placements the reading program the school bought into always had each day planned and prepared for the teacher with topics, presentations, worksheets, etc. The teacher's job is to relay the information provided to them to the students. Here, we pick a topic, for example adverbs, and then I make a presentation, worksheet, etc for the lesson. I enjoy the opportunity to make my own reading lessons and have to research each reading topic to find the correct information and the best way to present this information. I think I was able to create engaging presentations and worksheets for the students and the students enjoyed the lessons. While I appreciate the creative process of making my own lessons, creating a lesson from scratch is extremely time consuming, especially for someone who is still learning how to create lessons in the IB system. I am not always confident I have presented the information in the best way or that the students understand 100% of the information, I am learning a lot about the lesson planning process and what goes into the reading lessons I am usually provided with. Math not going bad but not going great. I had one day this week where I felt confident in the lesson after and I knew the students had learned and benefited from the lesson. The other days of the week I needed to do a lot of reflecting and self evaluation at the end of the lesson. Math is a difficult subject to teach for me. I quite enjoy the subject but find it difficult to relay the information in the most explicit way. The math program provides each lesson with a video of someone teaching the teaching slides. I have been watching these videos to help me prepare for each lesson. This has given me the specific language to communicate the math information. I am met with the additional challenge with teaching the money unit in an international Italian school using a UK based math program. The entire unit is taught using pounds and pence. The students are familiar with the Euro system. I am familiar with the USD. For lack of a better word, the situation is a bit trippy. I quite enjoy the topic of money, making this a particularly interesting unit to teach. The students absolutely love the pretend money. I have been brainstorming how to create a fun real life money lesson into the unit using fake money. Interestingly, ISS does not have scheduled science and social studies lessons. Science and social studies are interwoven into the unit of inquiry. In the US science and social studies are often a forgotten or skipped subject on a day to day basis but not completely left out of the schedule. Adding in science and social studies into the unit is easier for some units and more challenging for other units. In our current unit ‘all the worlds a stage’ adding science has been difficult. Social studies is a bit easier to integrate into this lesson. In other units like energy science is the main focus and social studies takes a smaller role. Learning to add the science and social studies into the everyday lesson has been a great skill and I will be continuing this practice to a lesser degree back in the states. Science and social studies usually have a designated time in American schools but only about 50% of that time is actually used to teach science and social studies. On Friday, I was having a bad day. I was tired and nothing was going my way. I felt off the whole day. I am not sure if the students could pick up on my mood, I try to turn it up positive when I am with the students but it is not always possible to be authentically positive all the time. I had the first two periods where I had to teach math and language. I am finding the money subject in math to be difficult to explain and I never leave a math lesson feeling I had taught the material in the best possible way. On this Friday I especially felt I had absolutely bombed the lesson. Language was better, so I made a Kahoot! on adverbs vs adjectives and the students always enjoy a Kahoot! We then read some poems from a book I found in the library aloud. The students took turns reading each poem aloud. They absolutely loved reading the poems which was a nice positive way to end the lessons. After the two lessons I was drained and felt bad about my teaching. I helped my mentor teacher get the students ready for drama and then we headed to the staff room to work while the students were at drama. Unfortunately, I had left my power adapter at home and had no way to charge my computer. This was adding extra stress because I knew I only had a few battery percentages to send some emails and edit some lessons before my computer would die. Admittedly, I was on the verge of tears by the time I had sat down to open my computer. When I opened my computer a piece of paper had fallen out. A student had left me a mystery motivator in my computer sometime between the end of language and leaving for drama. She used the fish sticker I had given her on a quiz on the hidden note. The note was written in the same format as the notes I leave for them.I do not know if she noticed my mood and was motivated to leave the note or if it was a coincidence she would leave me one after leaving my mentor teacher earlier that week. She left a very personal message that I really needed at the moment. Whether coincidences or an act of intuition, her little act of kindness helped me get through the rest of the day, genuinely, in a better mood. Everyday I am exposed to many, MANY, different cultural experiences. I have, up until this week, really enjoyed my time as a foreigner in Italy. I have embraced every difference, challenge, and experience. Now a month away from home, I wish I could be in my own house, in my own bed, with my own food, with my own car, in my own country just for a little bit. I do not want to leave Italy, but I wish I could have an hour back in my own home so I can drink Tim Hortons, eat a PBJ, and nap in my own bed. I have started listing the things I am excited to do when I am back in the US. Some of these items include driving my car, drinking free tap water at restaurants, flushing a normal toilet, and walking down the street at a fast speed. Friday I was having a rough day. Nothing was going my way and I was missing home. For the first time on this trip, I was crying in my room. I just needed to let out my negative thoughts and the stress of the day. My host brother came into my room and caught me crying. Both him and my host mom were so supportive. My host brother talked with me and we went on a very scenic walk to different parks in the city. My host mom asked if I wanted to eat out or at home and what I would want for dinner. She made all my favorite foods and gave me a huge portion of dinner. I felt so much better. As much as I miss home, my host family knows how to make me feel at home. Please enjoy some more pictures of Meowlena. I was trying to take a nice photo of her but my host brother interrupted to bother the cat and I got a very funny photo.
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AuthorHi! I'm Marita Miller an exceptional education student at Buffalo State student teaching in Siena Italy. Follow my journey! Archives
May 2023
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