Done with Block One!

I am officially done with block one minus my final conversation! I cannot believe how fast this semester went. I worked really hard and I really hope all of my hard work will pay off! My Taskstream came out great and I am really proud of it. I am proud of all the work I completed this semester in EDU 315 as well as all of my other block classes. I am now one step closer to becoming an elementary school teacher! :)

Last Day

This week was my last week in my practicum classroom. I'm really sad I have to leave my first graders! I had a great time in their classroom and learned a lot from both my host teacher and the students. I hope I can come back to visit them next semester. Who knows, I may even be placed in the same elementary school again! Before I left the students all hugged me and I really didn't want to leave. I cannot believe how fast this semester went. Only one more semester of college left, where has the time gone?

Thanksgiving Break!

No practicum this week due to Thanksgiving Break! Time to catch up on some homework! :)

Social Skills Lesson Plan

This week I taught my social skills lesson plan to my first graders. I decided to do a lesson based on Thanksgiving, since Thanksgiving is coming up next week! I read a story about Thanksgiving and then asked students what it means to be thankful for something. The students made a list of possible things to be thankful for, and they each wrote what they are thankful for on a paper feather. We then glued the feathers to a turkey I created and hung it up in the classroom. Lastly, students shared with their classmates what they are thankful for as the rest of the group actively listened. Overall, my lesson went really well and I really enjoyed it!

Lots of Work!

This week, I was very overwhelmed with the amount of work I had to do for my classes, but my first graders put a smile on my face and made me feel less stressed! I had a great day at observations and I feek I am really helping the students learn.
Here is a video I found which I found very inspirational:

Halloween!

This week in practicum, it was Halloween! I was very surprised when I came into my host school that the children were not allowed to dress up for class in their Halloween costumes. I remember when I was in elementary school that we had a big parade and everyone was allowed to wear their costumes to school. We also were allowed to have a big class party and everyone's parents came. In my host classroom, Halloween wasn't really celebrated, although they did do many learning activities centered around Halloween.

My Class Gets a SMARTboard

This week in my practicum classroom, my class recieved a SMARTboard. The students were extremely excited about the SMARTboard, and my host teacher incorporated the SMARTboard into many of her lessons. I think the SMARTboard is very beneficial to any classroom, because you can use it in so many ways and it is so versatile. After teaching my SMARTboard lesson to my EDU 315 class, I learned a lot of cool techniques to incorporate into a lesson. I even got to show my host teacher a few things I knew how to do. I'm hoping I will have a chance to use the SMARTboard in her classroom to teach a lesson!