B is Blessed

Day one at West Side is complete. I titled this post B is for Blessed as I feel extremely blessed for the school I am student teaching in. Already after day one I feel at home in the community of the school. The teachers and students are very welcoming and helpful.

Today was a bit of a whirlwind of trying to get to know the students and other staff members. Throughout the day I will see 80+ plus students, that is a lot of names to learn! Today each class introduced themselves as well as said a fun fact, while they did that I attempted to make a seating chart for each class. 80 names is a lot and I need all the help I can get! I also did a bit of grading today for my teacher. Math is an easy thing to grade as the answers are right or wrong, not much gray area for answers. Today was also spent observing and trying to learn the ways of the classroom. I need to make observations about the classroom management my teacher has. Although I have a bit of an idea already, it will take much more observations before I could articulate my thoughts in my assignments.

The plan is that I will take on one class at a time, most likely one per week. Eventually I will be teaching all the subjects and I will have to do that for at least 2 weeks. After that time I will back off from the responsibilities until I am just observing for the end of my time.

I look forward to the challenges and exciting things that lie ahead! Thanks for your prayers and support today!

A is for Adventure

Tomorrow marks the beginning of Spring Semester 2011. For me this means beginning my semester of Student Teaching at West Side Christian. While there I will be teaching 7th and 8th grade math, along with one section of 8th grade Bible. I have been anxiously waiting for student teaching to start since I began at Calvin. I still have to pinch myself to remind me that my time has come. These last 7 semesters FLEW by, but I could not be more excited about the journey I am about to start.

I hope to use this blog to reflect on my experience at West Side as well as share my experiences with family and friends. It is also my hope that this blog will be a reminder to pray for me as I student teach for the next 14 weeks. I am so excited about the experiences to come, but I know that it is going to have its challenges as well. Pray that I can use all I have learned to teach and impact the students in a tremendous way. 

Thank you in advance for your prayers for me and my students. You all have supported me throughout the years and I would not have become the person I am without each of you.

More to come tomorrow, for now I am heading to bed.