Change-up

Ever since my student teaching experience in the fall of 2010, I've felt an extreme sense of urgency. I just wanted to be in my own classroom. Teaching kids. Putting all this theory into practice. I likened my emotions to those of a horse or his/her jockey at Belmont, at gate, anxious to hit the ground running ("Let me at it!"). Which is similar to the emotions evoked by this situation (for all of you competitive Super Mario Karters like myself)

That feeling of excitement (due to the adrenaline rush), coupled with an overwhelming amount of anxiety due to the unknown. You might have an idea of what the experience will be like (some rolling boulders with smiley faces, or snowmen strategically placed along the track), but there are always surprises (oops, banana peel! or, hello, ink blot obscuring my vision), and you never know what the outcome will be like (unless you're a true Super Mario Kart pro, in which case, we're not worthy!).

This summer at institute gave me a sneak peek as to what having my own classroom would be like (except, of course, I shared it with 4 other individuals), and it got me even more pumped up to find out what grade I'd be teaching, and to have my own classroom to decorate, and my own set of kids to micromanage and worry about (almost) every hour of the day (I obviously did not have a healthy work-life balance mentality back then, oh so long ago). I was fortunate enough to have been hired on the first day of induction (fast. turnaround. ever.), and so all I was waiting on was my actual placement (what grade I would be teaching). I kept my fingers crossed for first grade, until I found out last week that the 1st grade team had long been solidified. Which left me with K or 2 (lower elementary teaching!), which was cool too.

Finally, last Thursday, the long-anticipated email from my principal arrived. My placement for the fall would be *drumroll* a learning specialist! A what?! A learning specialist. This definitely took my by surprised. I'm certified for general education 1-6, and and I had interviewed for a teaching position. I also have absolutely no experience with students with special needs, nor will be formally educated in this area (my TC program is for Curriculum and Teaching, and I don't qualify for a master-certification program through TFA due to my current certification). And here I was, slated to be a learning specialist, which, according to Columbia's office of disability services, entails working with students on an individual basis to help develop strategies that will help them compensate for needs in certain areas. So I would be working with students with special needs...in some context (which, as of now, is unknown to me).

BAH.

So many questions-do I not qualify as a teacher? Why me?! Yes, I'm sure that I'll love the job, I actually work super well in small group settings, and it'll be a good experience for me should I choose to become a classroom teacher at some point. But I'm pretty sure that there are more people that are better qualified than me for this kind of work, and the few learning specialists that I know had classroom experience first. And I was REALLY preparing myself for some hardcore classroom teaching. And what, exactly does my job entail?

So yes, there were definitely some feelings of disappointment and confusion. But, I think I'm good now. I absolutely love the school culture (it helps that they're all about teacher sustainability now; on a side note, we just had a beast of a session yesterday...3 hours...on "The Together Teacher"...AMAZING, Maia H-M. is my hero!), my colleagues are chill, and I'll still be working with kids!

So I've experienced my first banana peel. I slightly veered off-course, but I've recovered and shaken it off. In the words of my now-21-but-then-8-year-old-cousin, "LESSGO!" (let's go)

Whose house? ....Lighthouse!

So this is a little out of order, but there has been a request that I add "more photos! more action!" Now while I'm not quite sure how I might add more action...I do have photos that document the beginning of my official teaching career.

As you may or may not know, I spent much of the past month at a lovely little place in the Bronx. I worked in a collaborative of 5 individuals, and together, we taught a spunky bunch of rising 3rd graders (going to 3rd grade in the fall). My teammates are still holding down the fort, but I had to leave prematurely, due to my fall teaching placement commitments (more training! whoo!).

But even though I'm not with them, I think about my kids every day. We're a pretty good looking bunch:

...and sometimes pretty silly!!

Wishing the kiddos best of luck on their end-of-institute assessment tomorrow!

A New Chapter

Today was the first day of new staff training at my placement school (where I'll start teaching in exactly 3 weeks!). It was phenomenal. I love the energy. I love the people. I love the facilities (although I realize that my actual school will not be as night). I love the structure. I love the fact that the co-CEOs take the time to get to know us by running the majority of the sessions, despite the fact that they've both got families and probably have places to be, people to see, educational reform to contribute to.

As is the case with any new setting, I came into this new staff training anxious (and it doesn't help that a few of us are living in the basement of a hotel in an abandoned...yet safe part of town). But all of that anxiety was dispelled by how awesome the people are. If only I knew what grade I'll be placed in...it's frustrating to be kept in the dark! THE SUSPENSE IS DRIVING ME CRAZY.

Still, I don't think I could've asked for a better placement to help me with this transition into the real world. That they really prioritize human capital (i.e. our happiness) doesn't hurt either. Bottom line: I'm excited to be a part of an amazing network of individuals and can't wait to get in the classroom and hit the ground running!

Institute Reflection

The past two and a half weeks have quite possibly been the hardest two and a half weeks that I have experienced in a long time.

During the first week of training, a period of time adeptly christened "Induction," I was excited. Maybe it's because I had low standards going into the experience (a result of the false belief that people that do TFA aren't actually concerned about education..they're just using the two years as a stepping stone for grad school), but I was hugely impressed by the people that I met at induction. I was ready to go close the achievement gap!

Then institue began. I soon learned that waking up at 8:00 AM was a luxury, and that I would probably average about 20 hours awake-2 hours devoted to commuting on a yellow school bus (2 yellow school buses full of teachers, a comical sight), 4 hours with kids (teaching or fulfilling breakfast/lunch duty), 3+ hours of session, and countless hours of lesson planning. As someone who really needs sleep (8 hours), I was miserable. In addition to my reduced sleep, my already compromised emotional stability was exacerbated by the fact that I was not feeling successful in the classroom.

Lesson planning was difficult, and I was having difficulty explaining concepts such as ordering and comparing numbers. At one point, I chalked it up to the fact that these concepts were just things that we took for granted and thus couldn't really break it down to 2nd grade lingo. Yes, I still believe that that's a factor, but I now realize that there was so much more to it.

My execution was atrocious, and it didn't help that I spent the precious 50 min. I had with the students trying to unravel these simple yet complex thought processes running through my mind-"Well to order numbers, first you look to the tens place. Then you order the numbers based on the digits in the ten place. Then you move to the ones place. Then you order the numbers within each set of ten according to the ones place." .....what?

After each unsuccessful lesson, I would breakdown. Sometimes, it was more visible to others; more often than not, it was a mental breakdown during which I would question my place in the teaching profession. After all, I was going into this experience having had more experience than most, and yet seemed to be suffering more than most.

On weekends, I would go visit my boyfriend in New Jersey, and for the two weekends that I visited him, this feeling of dread would come over me each time I departed for training. In fact, the second week, I pushed my departure time from 6 PM to 7 PM to 7:30 PM (I had a meeting at 10, and 7:30 was really cutting it close). It was awful. I was miserable.

But I knew that I wanted to teach. I just hated that I felt like I was constantly failing and resented the fact that I was getting close-to-no sleep. This last week, I was scheduled to teach reading. Which ironically, I feel more comfortable teaching, despite the fact that I am more of a mathematician than a reader. I decided to take my success and happiness into my own hands, and start with a relative blank slate with this new content area. I really utilized resources provided by TFA and google, and got cracking on my lesson plans, well in advance of the draft deadlines. I pushed myself to be in bed by 11 PM, and asleep by 11:30 PM. I played with fire as I pushed back my wake-up time from 5:15 to 5:45 (with a bus loading time at 6:10).

The changes were enormous. Because of my better lesson plans, my lessons made more sense, my CMA (corps member advisor) was able to provide better feedback; because of my increased sleep and prioritizing my sleep and happiness, I was more energetic and more "chill" with my kids; my confidence (also a result of my increased experience in the classroom) shot up, and my behavior management improved ten-fold, and my students were engaged. I felt a "transformational change" within myself and my teaching, if nothing else (i.e. student performance...although that did improve as well, also a result of better daily assessments).

A huge "buzz idea" in TFA is that teacher mindsets. knowledge, and skills ultimately affect student outcome (TAL impact model). This experience proves that there might actually be some validity in the TAL impact model after all.