Student Teaching...

    Is HARD! It is great, frustrating, fun, scary, humbling, hilarious, time intensive and exhausting!
 I spend 98% of my time planning lessons and trying to figure out how I am going to fill 90 minutes of class time and keep the students engaged that whole time. I am pretty sure I am doing this the hard way, but that is how I approach most things. I am creating mostly new lesson plans rather than using the ones from my cooperating teachers, I think I may begin using their help more.
     Really, the outcome of a lesson depends on the attitude of the students that day. Teenagers are unique and every day is something new. One day I had this fantastic lesson and the kids loved it and were so involved in the discussion, I was SOOOO excited that day. The next day, I taught the same lesson to my other US History class...they just stared at me. Seriously, you could hear crickets...blank stares whenever I asked a questions....so I ended up with like an extra 30 minutes of class and I had NO idea what to do and they just kept staring at me waiting for me to go away or shut up or let them leave class. So I showed them a documentary about what we had talked about.
   This has definitely been a learning experience and I have been humbled by teaching teenagers. I have more respect for teachers than I ever imagined. Teaching is hard, but great. I have worked harder during the last 3 weeks than I ever have in my life, FOR FREE!
   The plus side is that I have today off and I had my first Friday off too, so that's cool about being a teacher! Good times had by...me? or something.

This is not one of my students, this is a friend of mine, but this is what my students look like 90% of the time.