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Home : 2002 : January : 29
Student teaching was not a good time for me at all, and I feel like in reality I am a fairly competant teacher.
Sometimes my lessons were disorganized (with small things similar to forgetting to punch out holes) because I was so busy focusing on the big picture and mentally rehearsing my lesson in my head. Or just because I missed a detail as I was thinking it through. To help this my teacher wanted me to organize everything after school, when I would have preferred to prepare at home and come in very early in the morning, instead of staying for 1.5 hrs in the evening (which it sometimes took). A friend of mine had a cooperationg teacher, though, who stayed after school with her and casually helped her get set up asking "do you need me to do anything? did you remember to set this up? we need to make sure this gets done." It worked very well. My friend and the teacher also talked over the day's performance during this time. Even if it was only 20 minutes or so, I know it helped her. Also with them both there to prepare (the teacher would do her own work sometimes as well) I think it they were able to more casually talk about the student teachers teaching in addition to formal conferences (for some people I think these are scary). Also, when going through my lessons I, too, forgot parts, especially toward the beginning. Just because I couldn't remember everything at once, and was trying. It helped me to make short outlines to help me remember (in addition to the longer lesson plans which I couldn't read through well as I was going and would miss things). I am talking single words and bullets. I don't speak well unrehearsed, so I am improving with this as I teach. As far as following your lead, I know my cooperating teacher wasn't specific. We were very different and things she expected automatically from me weren't things that seemed obvious to me. If she would have clearly outlined it at first, what she wanted, I think I would have been better able to infer things as we went along. But being specific with what you want her to do might help if you are not already. Maybe if you just say "Be in charge of the class" (which you may or may not) She may not know what this looks like. You might need to say 1. Make sure students finish the assignment 2. Clean out desks 3. Get bags ready and bring them to their desk 4. Take home homework folders 5. line up, etc. And then after a time or so you could have her tell you what she thinks she need to do (broken down) and you add in whats missing, and then just have her do it. When you say she is not demonstrating enough competence, I still would like more information. Is she not able to control chaos? Is she not confident enough to finish leading it? Is she missing lots and lots of relevant details? For me one thing I would have liked: I am only alright when told about a way to teach and then trying it...BUT, it really helps me to observe a lesson and then teach the same one. For some people this might not work, but I think it is worth a try, especially if you let your student teacher know that when she teaches the same lesson, or a similar lesson it doesn't have to be exactly the same. So maybe if you are working on writing the letter "P" one day you could do the lesson and then let her do the letter "Q" in the same style the next day. Doing the same or very similar lessons (esp if kids are already somewhat familiar) has helped me feel more confident in my teaching skills, and do better in my own lessons as I was learning. And don't be surprised if you hear the exact same phrases out of her mouth. I think sometimes the problem is that it is hard to know what it looks like to teach a certain thing. It was a very long time ago that we were the age of our students, and your student teacher probably hasn't spent much time in an elementary classroom in many years. I am now a substitute teacher and I know I was much more unsure when I started. Just being in several different classrooms and around different teachers and seeing what they expect of their students and how their routines and classes work has helped me to come up with my own. Maybe she can't see the overall picture. I student taught 6 year olds and had never worked with this age before. What was normal? Even if you are more familiar it is hard to know if you are new to teaching. Try to interact with your student teacher in positive ways (praise is good!) but specific praise. And don't make whatever problems she is having seem too serious too quick. I had discipline problems when I first started student teaching. My cooperating teacher and professor made such a big deal out of it that I felt even more nervous trying to do it right (there were also other issues though). I STILL feel on the spot as far as discipline goes, because they made me SO self conscious about it. So specific is good but don't overdo. This is hugely long, and I don'tknow if any of it helped, but I really hope so. I am willing to email you if you want any more imput. I have not had a student teacher ever, but as one recently through the process there are my thoughts. Good luck and I hope you and your student teacher create a better and more successful experience than my cooperating teacher and I did
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