Week 12

This week was a short week because of job interviews in Florida and spring break beginning. I am really starting to feel comfortable in my placement and enjoy the students a lot. I taught all 7 centers this week and video taped a few. I had to get a giggle out of the students reaction with the video camera. All of them were in awe of it and had lots of questions, so it was difficult getting them on track for the lessons. I have found different motivators for students and it has been very helpful. One student likes to work for drawing a picture. another student will work for gum, and another will work for iPad time. It has been good learning all the various motivators and how to best meet my students needs.

Like I said, I made a quick trip to Florida to have an interview with a school down there. All my students were excited to have me back and ask me questions about the school in Florida. What a fun bunch of students I get to work with.

My last day of the short week ended on being observed for two lessons. I was amazed with the stuff my teacher had said about me. I never really knew if she thought I was doing a good job or if she enjoyed having me be a part of the team. Apparently she is very happy with my work and what I have been doing in the classroom. This was very encouraging.

Something I have felt challenged with this past week is not necessarily related to the students, but more so the staff. My teacher is very open about her lack of religion and she often speaks of her bad experiences with Christians. I have felt my faith challenged here. My teacher is not disrespectful, but she is very bold about her lack of religion and it puts me in difficult situations at times.  In my opinion, the work place is not a place to talk about politics or religion, but I have been put in situations where I have had to say something. It has been a challenge to know how much or little to say or do. I just keep praying for staff and showing my love for God through my actions and words. I pray that this will reflect my heart and that it will be something positive for them all.

Next week is spring break, so school will not start back up until April 4. When I arrive back, I will be teaching all 7 centers and beginning to add group sessions in my teaching load. I am very excited!

Week 11

Monday-

This Monday I was able to teach 6 out of the 7 reading centers. I added on a few more students to teach. I am having a blast doing the centers and it is good to seen the growth each day and week with these kids. I am thankful that the students have been so willing and comfortable having me take over the center as well. I have only had a few issues with generalization. The student that I really struggled with generalization last week did amazing when I had my cooperating teacher observe me. GO FIGURE!

Tuesday-

The students did not have school today, but we had a PBIS professional development training. It was good to learn more about PBIS and how to implement it in the classroom. My classroom I am in is one of the only STAR classrooms implementing it right now, It was interesting to learn the pros and cons about it and be able to see it in my classroom.

Wednesday-

This was another community outing day. We went to Reavis High School for their abilities fair. The abilities fair is a group of students from the High School who have disabilties presenting things that they are successful and interested in. This was so awesome to see and have the students go and ask them questions. A few of the tables had information on resumes, books, Disney, and nutrition. My students favorite was the performance done by three students. They sang songs from Byonce, One Direction, and Kiss. They put on a huge performance and gave their histories. Such a cool experience! After this, we went to Burger King to practice requesting by order food. This was a fun end to a day and the students got to play in the play place there.

Thursday- 

Today our social work station paraprofessional was sick, along with many students. The flu is going around in my classroom. I had the opportunity to teach all 7 social work centers for the day. This was a fun experience because I learned about a different center and what the students do there. I also was able to see more of their accomplishments and I had a lot of fun teaching!

Friday- 

Friday was a pretty normal day. I taught all 7 reading centers so that my teacher could have time testing a few students. I loved this! I finally got to teach all of the centers. We also found out today that we will be having a new student come to our classroom at the beginning of April to join us. This new student has Down Syndrome. I am very excited to meet him and see how we will incorporate him into our day.

Next week is going to be a CRAZY week. I am being flown down to Florida for an interview for a teaching position for next year. My teacher is flexible and has been very supportive through this all. I am getting prepared to take over all the centers next week and be observed on Thursday. We will not be having school on Friday because it is the start of our Spring Break. 

I am really started to feel useful and a part of the classroom. I am happy and excited to continue to get to know these students and teachers. I am thankful for how God works through our situations and lives and is constantly their for us. God is so good!

Week 10

These are 6 of my 7 students and they are adorable. This week Friday we went on a community outing to the Planetarium downtown. We do a lot of community outings with this class, so this is one of the many I am sure that I will have the chance to be a part of. The reason we chose to go to the planetarium was because this month they are learning about he sun. Exploring the planetarium, they had the chance to watch a show about our planets and our sun. We played in the various rooms that were all planet, star, and sun related. The kids loved it and actually learned a lot from being able to see and experience it. On these community outings, the students are paired up with an adult partner. I got to hang out one-on-one with one of the students (the one in the green shirt) all day long. I had a blast getting to know him a little better and building that rapport because I had some difficulties with generalizing with him this past week.

I have always heard of generalizing, but I had never experienced it until this week. I had observed my teacher work on IEP goals with one of my students and he worked great and had almost all of the items mastered. I took over this past week working on IEP goals with this same student. He appeared to know nothing when he worked with me. After some frustration, I asked my teacher about it. She explained that some students have issues with generalizing, so they may not be able to do a certain task with a certain person because it is not who they learned it with. Some can do the mastered skill at their center, but not at their desk because it is not where they learned it. She told me not to be upset because she even has difficulties with this when she takes over other centers that she normally does not teach. This was so frustrating and sad, but it helped me get into the minds of my students just a little bit more. Structure and repetition is huge!

There were a few points during this week that I felt frustrated. I know that in this placement, things are going to be different for me. I understand that when I take over full-time, it will look much different than when I took over full-time at Rehoboth. I have to keep reminding myself  of this because I often get antsy in my placement. I am not the type of person who likes to sit around, play with toys, and observe. I am a "do-er". I like to be busy and constantly be working. I often find myself sitting around waiting for students, the students take a lot of breaks in the day (which are VERY necessary), and there is not as much for me to do because there are so many helping hands in the classroom. This is hard for me. I also will constantly be asking my teacher if I can help in more ways or do more for the classroom and she usually does not have anything for me and says that it is all taken care of. I want so badly to feel useful and feel like I am needed, but I do not.

Next week, I plan to take over teaching  two more centers, so that I am teaching 5/7 centers. I look forward to working one-on-one with more of the students.

Week 9

This is my second week in this classroom with these students and paraprofessionals. It has been a very different experience for me and I am struggling at learning my place in the classroom, how to support the staff and students, and how to be a special education teacher. With saying that, I am learning a lot about special education and I know that God has placed me in this classroom for a reasons. I can already see ways that this placement is going to make me a better general education teacher.

Monday was a very different day. One of our students who had severe behaviors was transferred to another classroom due to the safety of the students in my class and the general education students in the building. The classroom atmosphere was strange because we moved this students stuff out and had to move some of the stations around to spread out the classroom. Needless to say, the change was hard for the students. All week they would go to the wrong stations and were asking where the other student went to. I could see how change was very hard for these students. At the same time, I got to see many more of the students open up and relax because they finally felt safe in the classroom, which was awesome to see!

This week I did a lot of "pairing". I did a lot of playing with the students and building rapport. I have learned that pairing and building rapport with students who have autism is really hard to do, especially when they have a hard time communication socially. I have been learning what students like and what they do not like, which I think will help me a ton when teaching. My philosophy has always been the better you know your students, the better you can teach them. The problem is, it is so hard to get to know these students! 

I had the opportunity to start working with two of the students at the reading center. I have begun working on their IEP goals and the teacher has helped me begin working on this with them. It has been a lot of fun working one-on-one with the students and learning more about what they know and what they are working on. For the other students, I have sat in and observed my teacher working with them one-on-one, learning about what their IEPs are and how the teacher teaches them.

I also had the opportunity to sit down with the Social Worker this week and go over the behavior plans for two of the students in the class. I had to sign off on some papers and I now feel a little more comfortable knowing what some of the behaviors are in the classroom and how to handle it. Even though, I am not aloud to restrain students or get hands-on with behaviors. 

This week was a much more positive week for me. I feel like God did prepare this placement for me, even though it is not exactly what I want to be doing. I know that I am here for a reason and I am growing and learning about things that will help me in the future. I am surrounded by an awesome staff who really care about the students and are very knowledgeable. I am thankful for the opportunity to learn, grow, and be stretched.