Week 7

Student teaching has continued to improve for me and every day I feel more like an actual teacher rather than a college student. I was just telling my co-op this week that I am finding myself putting more effort into my lesson plans now than I did before when a lesson plan was an assignment for class. My most valuable experience from this week occurred in my computer applications class. The students are currently learning how to type and while they are learning, they are required to use a keyboard cover. When used correctly, the covers students use do not allow them to look down at their fingers. On top of these covers is an image of a keyboard which allows them to figure out where keys are but also need to make the association in their head as to which finger to use. Some of the students try to cheat and look over the top of their keyboard covers at their fingers when I'm not standing right next to them. What they have yet to realize is that even though I may be on the other side of the room, I am still paying attention to what they are doing. One day this week, I had three particular students who would not listen to my instructions to stop looking at their fingers so I took away their regular keyboard cover and taped a piece of paper to their keyboards to use as their cover. They did not enjoy this and realized their old covers were better since they had the keyboard image on top they could look at if they needed help. The next day I allowed them to use the normal covers again and for the rest of the week these students did a great job with keeping their eyes on their computer screens, or if they needed help, at the keyboard image on top of the covers. It was rewarding to see how a change I made help them to fix their behavior and hopefully to learn the keys.

If I could change something from the week, it would be with my money and banking class. I gave them a packet of questions that were taken from a booklet about currency in United States history. It was my co-op's assignment and he would use it by assigning it as a homework then reviewing it the next day in class. I decided to try the same thing. It is a thirty question packet, so I divided the packet over three nights for the students which gave them 10 questions per night. The first day when we were to go over questions in class, I planned too much and didn't have enough time to even begin covering the questions. The next day we reviewed some questions, but again I did not leave enough time to get through as much as I would have liked. Then on Friday, after taking a short quiz, all we did the rest of the period was review questions out of this now infamous packet. The reason I kept trying to push through it is because some of the information is going to be on the students' upcoming test. Also, it has good information in it I think the students should learn anyway because it helps to explain why our money system is how it is today. Long story short, the students were bored and I was bored. We still have almost half the questions to cover and I know I will begin to lose the students if we continue with it how we are. For the rest of it, I am going to pick out the most important questions, have the students conference with each other about those questions, and then review them as a class. Hopefully it will work!