In Limbo

Today was my FIRST day to teach a lesson!!! My teacher told me what she wanted me to talk about, gave me the notes that went in their interactive journals, and said here ya go! So I made the brief  (2 slides) ppt on Chemical Formulas and the Law of Conservation of Mass. She only added in one thing and said it was excellent! She gave me three suggestions after I taught the first time and that was it. I wasn't NEAR as nervous as I thought I would be. Now that I'm thinking about it, I think it's because she has no more than 15 students in any of her classes. That probably helped a lot. I said the vocab words over and over, I put the definition into words I thought they could relate to. I made connections between previous experiments and the notes. I randomly called on students to answer questions (after I saw my teacher do it). I asked them to repeat what I had said. Now let me say, this was the most important thing I stumbled upon today! So I really only got to teach for about 15 minutes max btw. Anyway, after I repeated a definition of a word in about two or three different ways, I called on a student to tell me the definition. It was incredible how many students actually started to pay attention! I will say, the deer in the headlights look freaked me out quite a bit. I wasn't sure if they weren't understanding what I was saying or if they were just zoning out. The hardest thing, and something I didn't take into consideration when I was making the lesson, was that my students hadn't grasped a previous concept. By not understanding that concept, they weren't able to fully understand the notes. If I had more time I would have gone back and reiterated that concept, but the bell rang and I ran out of time. However, it was SOO much fun!!! I wasn't nervous in front of the kids and I just did my thing. It was...exhilarating! I can't wait to do it again!!

Rude Awakening

I guess I hoped that 8th graders were still innocent. I couldn't have been more wrong. Last week one of my students asked us why all the teachers were pregnant but we keep telling the kids not to get pregnant. After I realized she wasn't kidding, I was speechless. The common sense answer, "The teachers are married and have careers," wasn't enough for this student. As the conversation went on my mentor teacher and I told her that she had time to have children and she needed to enjoy life right now. In response she yelled, "I don't have time!"  It was mind boggling. What's more heartbreaking is if she wants to get pregnant in high school, she can. And she probably will.

So I know teachers aren't supposed to have favorites but let's face it, we're human too. So I was helping one of my favorites yesterday and the teacher's aid pulled me aside. She told me to look at this student's wrists.  Sure enough, she had three vertical cuts down her wrist. They weren't newly fresh but they were about two days old. It hit me so hard that I had to leave the classroom. I cried for this girl on my way home and prayed for her my entire drive. For some reason I thought 8th graders weren't this verse in the real world. Man oh man was I wrong. It's saddening. It's depressing. It makes me angry. But most of all, I want to love on this girl even more now.

On a lighter note, my teacher is letting me teach chemical formulas tomorrow!!!! She gave me the note taking strategy that she usually uses and told me to come up with a short powerpoint to explain chemical formulas and the Law of Conservation of Mass! I can't wait! Mondays and Wednesdays are my favorite days of the week!! Besides football days. :D