Kennard Dale

I had my first teaching experience today. It was a very interesting day for me.

So the day was dedicated to paragraphs, transitions, and topic sentences. I'd prepared a prezi with some basic information about the topics to be covered. Then, we were set to do an activity. Since I had the option, I tried to do a couple different things. For the first class, students got into groups and put a scrambled paragraph in order. Then they sent a representative up to the front of the class and we put the paper in order together. This worked well; I felt it was successful and my co-op did too.

For my next class, I only had fifteen students. So we took the same essay, still scrambled, and put it together as a class. Reading the sentences out loud, the students lined up in order. We compared their order to the actual order, and they also did pretty well. My co-op and I felt this was successful too. This was the class we were actually worried about. Even though they are smaller, their personalities are bigger and they can be a little bit rowdy. They were great and gave me some good feedback on the lesson.

Now, the problems came in the last class. Since I've observed them, I know they are the largest class and the quietest. I wanted them to be engaged, so for them, I used a jigsaw. As a group, they put together 1 paragraph. Then they switched groups and were asked to put the whole essay together. They were not happy. I couldn't get some of them to move, I couldn't get them to participate. They wouldn't budge. And I eventually gave up pulling information and analysis out of them, asked if they had questions and gave the rest of the lesson back to my co-op.

I could tell she was upset at their behavior. Turns out she gave them a 3 paragraph essay as homework and told them she was disappointed in their behavior. She also reassured me it was not my fault, I had been doing a great job and sometimes things like that happen. I was extremely upset.

Now with the experience under my belt, I feel a little bit more comfortable in the classroom. I really believe that it will come with practice. I know that next time I teach them (which I think will be an introduction to Macbeth themes, weird right?) I'm excited even though I'm scared. I will try different things to get that third class engaged in what were doing. It's all a matter of perspective.