On Lesson Plans and Best Intentions

Tags

adventure, perseverance, student teaching, third graders, time, work smarter not harder, writing lesson plans

So, way back in August I had intended to use this blog a bit more to record my experiences in student teaching. I meant to write about my very first day. I meant to write about my wonderful class of third graders. I meant to do a lot of spiffy blogging things. And I never did. Not only was I tired, but I simply had no words for that first day. Or that first week. Or anything since then. Who’d have guessed that teaching could be so overwhelming? Data teams, FLEX groups, PLC meetings – I don’t even know what those things are! Literacy by Design, FOSS Kits, Everyday Mathematics, Common Core Standards, Literacy First, Reading Counts – how am I supposed to organize it all? To make it all worse, I have to take the pre-planned lessons in the school curriculum and write my own lesson plans using my university’s lesson plan form just so I can get my own grade. I am a firm believer in “working smarter, not harder,” and putting sticky notes in the teacher books seems a lot smarter to me than daily rewriting five or six entire lesson plans that I won’t even have time to use.

Which is what I should be doing right now – rewriting lesson plans. And I will do it. I will do it because I have to, but I still feel like I have no words suitable to accurately describe my teaching experience so far. Although, I must be doing a good job because one little girl hollered out in class that she wished I was the real teacher. Unfortunately, the regular classroom teacher was still in the room. Talk about a sticky situation.

I’ve read that student teaching will be the easiest thing I ever do as a teacher. Considering how few responsibilities I actually have so far, I believe that must be true, but I think it must also be the most uncomfortable and disconcerting position in which I’ll ever be placed.

On Working and Learning

Tags

camp, crazy, experience, job, newbie, perseverance, summer, summer job, time, work

I am going to break tradition and write this blog post without any real topic in mind. Therefore, it will probably consist mostly of ramblings and no real “insight,” but I have sorely neglected this blog, and I think it needs some sort of update, yes?

This week was the first real week of my summer job. This means that I now work about ten hours a day helping keep the day camp running smoothly rather than working six hours a day to get camp ready (I did that last week). It was crazy. I really have no other words for it. First of all, the first session of camp always has the most campers which also means that it will likely have the most injuries. I got to be pretty good friends with the first aid cabinet. Secondly, it’s pretty difficult to know what is expected of you when you have four or five people telling you what to do. I can work more efficiently when I know what is expected of me. Third, did I mention the ten hour workdays? Sure, getting paid hourly means that I don’t really mind, but I come home exhausted. This is not good when my dance recital is coming up soon! As a graduated student I am only in one adult class, but I still need to help as much as I can and watch my sisters. This means I have to be awake. When I was in high school, I always left the house for school before my dad left for work, but I came home before he did. Now I leave the house before my dad and come home AFTER he does. I’m not quite sure what to do with this realization, so it’s a good thing I really like this job! My bosses are great and the campers are always fun. Overwhelming, but rewarding.

However, I am really beginning to see that this job will prepare me for a career in education. I am a newbie working at a paid position in an organization dominated by volunteers (not that education is full of volunteers) who have more experience than me – as a teacher there will be times when I am expected to take a role of authority over someone who is more experienced than me (i.e., parents). The demands of the children and volunteers interfere with my preassigned duties – as a teacher, the students and circumstances will not always allow me to teach what I am required to teach. Yet, somehow, I must work through these obstacles. I will certainly be developing my strength of character this summer.

And now it is time for me to go to bed. Those of you who know me well should still know that I really hate the daily interferance of sleeping, but I do have more respect for the necessity of it.

On Grammar and Perseverance

Tags

Bible, control, God, grammar, greetings, James, joy, perseverance, rest, Sunday, surprise

Today, on the way to my Statistics class, I passed a
man who works for Buildings and Grounds here on campus. Before I say anything
else you have to know something about this man.

1. He is a hard worker. Nearly every time I see him, he is working on something for
   the school.
2. He is very friendly. He rarely lets a person pass him without saying “Good
   morning,” or offering some other greeting.

So, knowing what I know of him, I wasn’t surprised
when he asked of me, “How are you today?”

Of course, I simply answered with the expected
response, “I’m good. How are you?”

But his very simple answer rather surprised me.

“I’m always good…But Sundays I’m gooder.”

Well, grammatical fallacies aside, I truly hadn’t expected
him to say that. So, I started thinking about what he had said.

What would life be like if I was “always good?”
Certainly it doesn’t mean that I would never have reason to be upset, but would
I be able to have a positive outlook on every difficult situation that comes my
way? And what about all those times I’ve said “I’m good” when I really wasn’t?
If I am “always good,” would I be able to tell the truth when people ask me the
how-are-you question?

All of this makes me think of James 1:2-4 (NIV), “²Consider
it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, ³because
you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. ⁴Perseverance
must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking
anything.”

It’s difficult to always have a positive outlook on
life, but it is possible. As Christians, we have hope in God’s perfect
strength. I have to remind myself of this all the time, but I need never worry
that my trials will break me. They can bend and pull all they want – and that
bending and pulling gets even worse when I tell God that I am strong enough to
handle it on my own – but I will never be broken.

“The testing of your faith develops perseverance.”
That part of the verse reminds me of the last part of this man’s reply: “But
Sundays I’m gooder.” What is Sunday for? Church, yes, but most importantly it
is an entire day that is set aside as a time for us to rest in the love and
peace of our Heavenly Father. Sunday is the day when we have to step back and
say, “God, if You, the Creator of the universe, took a day off from running all
of creation, then I think I need to take a day off from trying to run my own
little world, and give it all back to You.” It seems that Sunday is the day
that reminds us that we are only human, and we can only do so much. It is an
odd fact that a dose of humility from God can be encouraging. So, we face
trials to develop perseverance, but this is not the kind of perseverance that
you see on the faces of marathon runners during the last quarter of the race.
This is the kind of perseverance that we find when we look to God and lay everything
down and let Him take care of it. This is the kind of perseverance that comes
from trusting in someone other than ourselves. It is the most difficult type of
perseverance, but it is the most beneficial. It’s the type of perseverance that
makes Sundays better than all of the other days in the week, but it is also the
type of perseverance that should be practiced every time we try too hard to
direct our own paths.

I want to be “always good,” and on Sundays I want to
be “gooder.” I want to look at my difficulties and still be able to think
positively. Then, I want to look at God and thank Him for the chance to take a
rest from all of my worries and let Him do the planning. I’ve never found this
to be easy, but hopefully now I will be able to remember it a little better
thanks to a man who simply asked me a question.