Wednesday

We're finished! My group and I are teaching this week. It is exciting to see our finished product, and how everything came together. It took a good amount of planning, discussing, writing, and revising but it does eventually get done. I am excited for Wednesday to get up and teach. Our group had a good time planning and preparing this lesson, so hopefully that shows in our lesson. I am also a little nervous because we are new at this whole teaching thing. We have our lessons planned but it is impossible to know if everything will work out as planned- and that is what makes me a little nervous. Overall though, I know this is a learning experience so I’m prepared to learn things that work and things that do not. I think I am ready for Wednesday.

I think what I learned most looking back on the past couple of weeks is the amount of planning and work goes into just one lesson plan. There are thousands of things to consider, and you really do have to consider them all. Last week, when we thought we were pretty much done, we met with Shannon and she had has think of things we did not even really consider- but were necessary to think about. Without doing so, I don’t think we could say our lesson is complete and ready to be taught. I think this project has made us all realize the amount of work we will have ahead of us but I also seeing and applying our finished projects will make us excited for what is ahead of us.

Groupteach

You know how many people say that teachers have it easy? I do not think I ever really believed that, but now I know I completely disagree with that. This group teach is not easy- and this is just one three hour class. Soon we'll be doing this everyday, exciting and a little scary.
What I have liked about getting this group teach together is choosing texts, activities, and what we want our students to learn. I like that you can go many different places with just one text; I like that one year I may choose to teach American Born Chinese and focus on discrimination and the next I'll teach the same book but focus on identity. There is always something new or different that you can do with the same text and I just like that we can do that. This group teach has made me realize this because each group member has had different approaches to the same texts. It is not like only one group member is right; it's just the book(s) can be taught in so many ways (and I love that).
What I haven't liked is the uncertainty that goes along with every lesson. I do not know if it will work. Will it run smoothly? Will it engage my students or bore them? Will it clearly get the point across? I don't know until I try it and even if it works the first time it may not work the next time. I am just not a huge fan of the uncertainty.
Overall this group teach has been interesting. It makes me excited to plan my units, but it also has shown me how much work I will have to put in to diminish some of my uncertainty and worry. There is no way that any teacher has it easy.