The end of the road

Today is my last day student teaching and I am writing this to sum up my documentation of student learning. I think that the most important thing I learned at Augsburg and at Crosswinds is to take my time when thinking things out. I see teaching as more of a management position rather then a boss position. By letting the kids make their own decisions as teammates rather then me telling them what to do we build a relationship faster. I also have learned that different schools have different rules for staff and what they can and can't talk about. Crosswinds was very free with no fear of repraisal for anything said. I liked that we could be vocal and that it was listened to rather then shot down and frowned upon. Through my time at Augsburg and Crosswinds I have learned that student behavior is usually a result of a lot of things and that you can't blame just one person for the way a kid might act. I have also learned that parents expect you to cater to them if they do not want to do something. But then again there were parents that went out of the way to make it an easy transition for their child. The open school environment was a great way to learn and the kids were great. I loved working as a team and having team meetings all the time. All in all my experience was positive and I took a lot away from it. It helps to get outside of your previous experiences and really learn new stuff.

Congratulations Dana!

Today is your last day at Crosswinds. I'm sure it will be like a whirlwind with it being the last day for the students and Kristin until Sept. You have made your mark at the school, and certainly established yourself with the students. They will miss you.

This blog has helped me to read about your experiences, and it will be a great way for you to reflect upon your time at Crosswinds. I have certainly learned a lot from the school about how they set up a school and district, the curriculum that they bring to the students etc.

Enjoy your future making a difference in the lives of your students.
Gretchen

Just another Manic Monday!

With the last two weeks of school closing in the kids have been getting a little wacky- and so have I. Class today was a little crazy and a lot of fun. I planned a Jeopardy with the facts the kids had learned about the 40s and 50s with each group having a barnyard sound instead of buzzers- I don't have any of that stuff. The kids seemed to think that louder meant they would get the answer first even after Kristin and I said that being loud was going to get them lots of nothing. The game lasted 40 minutes and they all had a great time and I could tell who had done the webquests and who had just messed around. The rest of the class was a reading assignment, a choose your own reading adventure that Siskow put together. We are back to team teaching so she and I are splitting the classes. Wednesday and Thursday will be about the 70s and we are going to look for a movie about the 70s to show the kids. On Friday there will be a 70s costume day for the whole house. I allready have the coolest hat!

Feed My Starving Children

Today was a great day. We went to Feed My Starving Children and volunteered. We made 34 boxes of food which will feed 7344 kids for a day or 20 kids for a year. The process was interesting with the adults running the sealing machines and the kids scooping the nutrients into the bags. Each bag got rice, chicken flavoring, veggies, and soy that will make six meals. This food goes to Africa and all over the world. The only bad thing was that they mentioned God in every other sentence- with our public school and then they invited us to pray over the food- so a little awkward for some of the kids. The program was in Brooklyn Park and it took us an hour to get out there, an hour to prep and 25 minutes to make food, and then an hour and half to clean up and get back. We also had Dairy Queen, yum, before coming back to finish the day with the webquests that the kids who had stayed behind created about the 40s and 50s. The day was good and the field trip ran relatively smoothly. We are going to have a Jeopardy game as a review on Monday of the 1940s and 50s and then have the kids read and summarize the sixties for an assignment.

Thursday the 19th

Today went well for the last two core classes to do the webquest for the 1940s. The students did a ton of work today and every kid, and I mean every kid did the work without complaint or making snotty comments. Today in E-Core I helped with Tennis and it was great. The kids were having a good time and they all were really good sports. Class met in the library and they even cleaned up when I asked them to. I have noticed that the kids are on my side now, they seem to genuinely like me and want to listen. My teaching hasn't changed all that much but the way I relate to the kids has loosened and I am more of an older sibling then a teacher- they like me but respect me too. I joke and they joke back- the kids are doing well and I am doing well with them. Here is a picture of the kids working on the 1940s webquest with their partners.

The day of the sick people

Today was a day for the record book. Out of the six team members from Earth House three were absent. Maggie is on bed rest, Dunlap is on maternity leave and then Siskow had to leave before Core becuase her daughter got sick. The day was a little crazy becuase of the high temperatures and the kids getting excited for the end of the year. I ran our class in the library and had the kids do a webquest on the 1940s with half the class doing one part and half doing the other. On Friday they will meet and go over the answers. The rest of the class was work time for their projects which most kids did not work on very hard- so I am not crazy about giving them an extra week without any consequences. Tomorrow is progress report day and we do not have any new grades to add so it should be easy. Today one of the kids said that I should get a job at Crosswinds because I was a good teacher, and then another kid agreed and it was nice to hear. Over the past three weeks I have noticed that my relationships with the kids have grown and I have taken on more of an older sibling roll then a teacher roll. We are getting along better and I haven't had to write up any of my problem kids in a while. Today I also planned a field trip to go and see Hairspray on August 2nd. We will be walking the two miles to the theater and back. They were only showing the movie during hours we couldn't go but I talked the manager into showing it at a time convenient to us so that we could come. I made the permission slips and Siskow copied and got them out to the other teachers but forgot to get them to me so our first class will have to get them tomorrow. Not much else is happening right now, I am writing the Friday lesson plan that Siskow will follow while I am on the field trip and I am thinking of murals, maybe.