Oh Hi :)

Hi Everyone,

I hope everyone enjoys my blog!  I'm so excited to be a teacher and I bet all of you are too :)  Well...enjoy!!

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Parent Lecture

My least favorite lecture was the parent panel! I did not understand why I was wasting an hour listening to parents talk about their children's education.  That was until I had learned about parent engagement in schools and the lack there of in my diverse and exceptional learner class.  It has been a proven fact that the more family involvement that is present in the classroom the more children will learn and benefit in the future.  I wish in our class we would have discussed this important aspect of teaching before the lecture. I know I would have been more engaged in the conversation and would have asked questions regarding this issue of lack of parent involvement.

Wish I Didn't Know This!

50% of teachers quit in their first 3 years!! Really?!?  I would like to know where this statistic came from :)  How depressing!  I don't want to know that the career I'm going into has this kind of statistic.  What makes the teachers that stay teaching and those that quit different?  What characteristics do they have that others do not? Hmm...all I have to say is that I hope I don't add to this statistic!! 

The Office For Teachers

When Chalk started playing I thought I was watching The Office, which is my favorite show!  At first I didn't like the movie, I thought it portrayed extreme cases of teachers who didn't know how to teach. But once I got past this I ended up really enjoying the movie and walked out of lecture knowing the do's and don'ts of teaching.  No matter what grade you are teaching you need to establish authority, you are the teacher and they are the student. The teacher who had never taught before let his students know that he was new to teaching.  By making yourself look vulnerable you are asking for trouble.  Also, there is a fine line between having a relationship with your students and a "friendship" with your students.  The teacher who wanted to be teacher of the year let his students see him angry and vented to his students.  I felt that it was very inappropriate to share his feelings about not winning the teacher of the year with his students.

Being a Teacher With a Second Job

I knew that a teacher's salary wasn't anything to brag about but I was fine with that.  I don't think of myself as a materialistic person so not driving the nicest car was never an issue.  But walking out of the lecture with a teacher panel I was in shock.  Laura, a special education teacher, said that along with teaching she has a second job on the weekends and a couple nights during the week.  A second job?  Really?  Maybe before when I was naive about how easy teaching was I wouldn't have thought it was such a big deal.  But after taking a couple education classes and realizing all that goes into teaching, it gives me anxiety just thinking that I would have to worry about a second job along with worrying about my students.  Ahh, do most beginning teachers have to get a second job?  I hope not!!

Why I'm A Teacher

I had always wanted to be a teacher but somewhere along the way that dream faded and the dream of wanting to be a therapist took over.  In high school I had taken two psychology classes and absolutely fell in love.  It was the only course that I didn't ask myself if I would need to know the material in real life because everything we learned was about how we work as humans.  I love listening to people and my friends always come to me when they need help.  I was so excited that I had figured out what I wanted to do with my life.  But when I got to college and started taking psychology courses I found myself questioning this dream of mine.  Could I really make a good therapist?  Would I be able to help people?  And then a light bulb went off...I had fallen in love with psychology because of my high school teacher!!  He had made the material fun to learn and his lectures never seemed like lectures.  I realized then that I wanted to give this same feeling of excitement surrounding learning to my future students.  And over a tuna sandwich in the cafeteria I made the decision that would shape the rest of my life.  I wanted to be a teacher!!

The Reason Why

Tonight's lecture accomplished what I feel the goal of these lectures was, understanding and appreciating a new perspective of teaching that can't be learned from any textbook.  What really caught my attention was what Mary Kay Lynch said regarding IEP's.

This semester I am also taking Diverse and Exceptional Learner.  A big aspect of the class is learning about IEP's and after being tested I thought I knew most about this part of teaching a special needs child.  But what Mary Kay said about dreading going to an IEP meeting and hearing another aspect of schooling her son can't do, shocked me.  The parents that I have talked to who have been part of an IEP never expressed this concern.  But now that she said that it makes sense, what an awful feeling it must be as a parent to continuously hear things your child is unable to do.  What Mary Kay suggested for us, as teachers, is starting out the meeting with positive things the child do.

No textbook that I read during this class or Diverse and Exceptional Learner included this part of an IEP.  And for that reason, I'm glad that the lecture tonight gave me a new insight on a part of teaching that every teacher is going to experience in their future.

Library Information

Even though it was very nice of Lindy Moeller to take time out of her day and come speak at the lecture I personally felt that what she covered was nothing new.  Because a big part of paideia was the second semester research paper, I had already had the full hour lecture on how the Preus library website worked and how to find books in the library.  At that time I did not know what the Preus library website was nor how the books were organized and it was very beneficial and helpful.

Now the website changed this year and had a few new applications so there were aspects that I did not know about.  However, once you learn the "jist" of how one library system works you pretty much can figure the rest out on your own.  I mean most of us are now in our 20's and I would hope that everyone knows a thing or two about how to find books in the library and on the website.

I would have enjoyed having a speaker come in and talk about there experiences as a teacher.  

To Much Information In An Hour!!!

I walked out of lecture on Monday night with a splitting headache. In an hour I had learned information that I needed to know for the rest of my three years here at Luther. I don't know about you but I don't remember half of the things she talked about or suggested doing. I wish she could have given us a sheet of paper that outlined all the classes and outside requirements needed to be an education major!!!

"Lions For Lambs"

When looking at the video that was going to be played during the Monday lecture my first thought was that I should probably bring coffee. The title did not look familiar to me and watching a video in the dark with less than 5 hours of sleep the night before did not sound like my cup of tea :)But I turned out to be pleasantly surprised.
When the movie started I remembered having seen the previews for it and thinking that it looked pretty interesting and it turned out that I was right. I enjoy movies that have a couple of different perspectives going through out the film, it always keeps you interested! I have never been one to be interested in politics or big world issues but after watching this movie I wanted to know more. I felt that I was just barely understanding what the characters were arguing about and looking back I wish I would have known a little bit more.
I would never have guessed that "Lions for Lambs" could ever be connected back to teaching. So when the movie started I was a little confused on how I was supposed to be interpreting and learning from this film. But the conversation between the professor and the student definitely incorporated a different kind of teaching style and made you think about what it means to be a good teacher.
From the movie I realized that an important part of teaching is being able to identify the students that have potential to be better students and challenge them.