Summer Prep

I was hired on for my FIRST real job two and a half weeks ago. I've been finger printed and drug tested and will hopefully get keys to a classroom soon! I'm only 21 years old (and I mean just turned 21) so this all seems pretty unreal. The last few weeks I have been constantly monitoring pinterest for some awesome classroom ideas as well as talking with some of my other teacher friends. I have seen or heard so many good ideas lately I don't know how I'm going to keep up with them all or remember to use them all! But I guess I will do my best! Right now I just want to figure out what grade I'm teaching next year! (it's still be decided if I'll be put into sixth or seventh, at least I know it's going to be science)
Just so you know, I'm very new at blogging, and by very new at this I mean I don't know what I'm doing at all. I'm also not the best speller (good thing I'm not an English teacher). All of the previous posts on this blog are from my student teaching experience last spring. I really hope I do a better job this year of updating this than I did during my internship. Anyways, back to pinterest. While looking through pinterest I found some awesome pins pertaining to science notebooking. Once I started clicking I quickly found out they all went to the same blog, appropriately called 'Science Notebooking'. I must say, since finding this blog I have spent way too much time in front of my computer reading through the very helpful posts. In fact, I even used one of her ideas in my student teaching without even knowing it. Anyways, I thought I'd post the link to her blog so others could check it out. I know I don't have very many followers but I know at least one is an education major (Tori) so maybe it'll help out. Either way I'm super excited to start Inter Active Notebooking soon even though I still have a million questions.

Click Here for Science Notebooking Blog

1/2 way done already?!

I realize it has been a very long time since I've posted anything and for that I apologize. Being an ag teacher is a lot of work I have learned and I'm exhausted! What has gone on since my last post? Well I attended an awesome conference that focused on STEM education at the Daytona International Speedway. We learned about how we can incorporate racing into our curriculum and then highlight the science and math that goes into racing. It was really cool. We are also just wrapping up our National FFA week celebrations here at HMS. We had an awesome time yesterday flying kites with the kids after school. I didy first farm visit recently and had an absolute BLAST helping this young man improve his showmanship skills and looking at his heifer. Finally, I've been helping some students prepare and perfect their Ornamental Horticulture demonstrations that they will be performing and competing in next week. The students are doing a great job and coaching them is a lot of fun. I can't help but count down to spring break though (4 more teaching days)!!!

Planting Cucumbers!

I would like to take a moment to almost brag about the success of my classes cucumber planting on Monday. I have heard middle school teachers complain about the chaos that ensued when they had their students planting seeds but I am proud to say I found a way to make it work- at least for me. Since they were planting them in trays I knew the whole class couldn't do it at one time because only do many kids can fit around a tray at one time. So I had students do a worksheet that the answers were found in one of the chapters of their book and I called three or four students at a time to the back for planting. I drew pictures on the board and explained the procedures and then the kids worked together to plant three or four cells in the tray. Now I'm just praying they will grow!

Early Release Days are difficult!

Today was my first day teaching on an early release day (we have them pretty much every Wednesday). By the time students get a mind mover done and settled they only have like 30 minutes! Today we did a couple of cool activities: one class did posters presenting the data from the bubble gum activities and the other class did marketing and labeling for the popcorn we popped yesterday. I have found that when you take the time to slow down and go through an activity like you want to, even though it takes much longer than you thought, the students do much better. My first period class is still doing good though considering they are my trial class-poor guys. I'll add some pics of some of the stuff the kids made today, they did a great job!

It's a learning process alright!

The past two days have been the first days I was teaching actual lessons. At this point in my internship I have only taken over the first two periods of the day (7th grade). I have discovered SO many things already though! For instance, at the University I would have my teachers and Ta's tell me, "That activity is only going to take the kids 10 minutes and you're trying to give them 20 to get it done." Actually, I hate to say it but I don't think they were right on this one. It takes middle schoolers forever to do anything! Especially in a group work setting where they have to interact with each other will they quickly get off task. The activity that I had planned for one day has now turned into a three day activity (they are finishing it tomorrow come hell or high water). On the other hand, I also found out that you don't need to put too much popcorn in a dry air corn popper at once, it might almost blow up on you. And I have had to learn really quick how to deal with situations like your corn popper almost blowing up and the rest of the class not getting to finish an activity. But on a more positive note I will say this: I am proud of the way I've been handling all of my situations and I can tell that in the last few short months I  have changed drastically in my ability to 'roll with the punches'. Last semester (especially lab 9 in the high school), if some of these things had happened to me I would cry all the way home (again). But now I am taking it all in stride and I know it's ok to make mistakes. It's ok that I'm not the best teacher in the entire world. It's ok that my one day activity is going on it's third day. It's ok that my first period class is my guinea pigs. Even though it seems that nothing has gone right yet I'm still so excited for the weeks to come, so excited to move into more challenging content. These kids are awesome and I can already tell I'm not going to want to leave in a few short months. Let's just hope the weeks start going a little smoother.

First day in charge tomorrow!

Today I had a small taste of being in charge of the classroom and I was met with great surprises. My classes that are the absolute worst stepped up to the plate and were very well behaved and respectful and the classes I didn't expect any problem from tried to take advantage of me. Lesson learned: do not start letting them go to the bathroom. Evidently needed to pee is a virus and can spread quickly, soon the whole class needs to go to the restroom. Despite the difficulties of the afternoon I am excited to work with the students some tomorrow and get to know them. We're going to play some get-to-know each other games and make name tents!!!! I'll let you know how it goes! I'm adding pics of my name tent example and my first chalk board ready to go for tomorrow :)

Getting Started

I'm new to this whole Blogging thing so forgive me if I get off to a rough start. I'm writing this so my readers can learn about the experiences of an agriculture education student-teacher. So for a little background knowledge I am a senior in college, 20 years old, and interning at a middle school in Central Florida. This is a pretty urban area so my students don't have much of an agriculture background for the most part. This has only been my second day at the school and I haven't been leading the classroom at all yet. I know I don't have a lot of patience and that will make this job extremely difficult so one of my goals for the next three months is to work on that. I'm working away at lessons and getting a lot done so I'm excited to start being in charge of the classroom as much as I am afraid to be in charge of the classroom. I take over Friday for the first time so I'll be checking back to let you know how it goes. Oh and thanks for reading :) Have a great day!