I got my job as a first year teacher!!

So June 25th, I had my very first teacher interview. I was so nervous! Who wouldn't be! Anyway, my interview was in a small town in a coffee shop. Not what I expected, but it made me a lot less nervous. The interview was very casual and the principal was very laid back and easy to talk to. I was nervous for nothing! He offered me the job at the end of the interview!! Then he tells me he used to coach my husband when he was in high school! I am so excited!! 

I will be teaching kindergarten, along with 4 other kinder teachers. I am going Thursday this Thursday to get the key to my very first classroom!! I have been on Pinterest looking for ideas to put into place in my classroom! So many awesome ideas!! I think I'm going with the owl theme! :)

As soon as I start getting my classroom together I will post pictures of my new adventure as a kindergarten teacher!! 

Vanessa

June

Currently....

Thinking: I really need to put together my teacher portfolio to take to my teacher interviews. 

Hoping: I get some phone calls for new interviews.

Missing: My students I student taught. I will never forget them.

Listening: Mickey Mouse Clubhouse... My daughter Kaeli never gets tired of watching.

Loving: The warm weather, despite the tornado warnings and thunderstorms. I love warm nights and mornings. 

Wanting: A new lap top. I prefer a Mac since every other lap top I have ever owned has failed me. I love my iPad but doesn't quite do everything I need it to do. Besides, I really want to fancy up my blog. 😜

Wishing: This summer will contain many memories and blessings for my future.

Needing: Dinner and laundry to do itself. 😁

Vanessa

How my child likes to watch cartoons. 😆

Interview

So now that I officially have my teacher certification, I have applied in several school districts. I had an interview with Amarillo ISD personnel; however, now I am waiting to hear from principals for a position. School is over this Friday so I am hoping I will be notified for interviews for my first teaching position. I am really eager to begin my career. I am really nervous and scared about not getting a job this time around but I am willing to do whatever it takes to help me achieve my goals. I have been reading a book to help ease my nerves about any upcoming interview. I don't think my interview I had with AISD was great because I was so nervous and not as confident as I would have liked to have been. The book is called, "Ace your Teacher Interview," by Anthony, Fredrick's. It has been a great read so far, I just need to practice my own answers so I will be well prepared for my own personal interview.

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Substitute Teaching

Now that I have completed my 12 weeks of student teaching, I currently got hired at Amarillo ISD as a substitute. I have been subbing at Puckett Elementary mostly with the first grade students I have had the pleasure of working with all year. It brought so much joy to the students to see me back in the classroom and I have really gotten attached to them. I miss being with them everyday. I have grown so much as a teacher/student and I loved going back to hear some of the things they learned from me. Such a rewarding experience and makes me feel wonderful as I am making a difference. They truly have the love of learning as I hope to continue to achieve with all my students in my future career as a teacher.

Author Study- Mem Fox

I really enjoyed the many author studies we did each week. We did an author study on Mem Fox and did many activities that I wasn't able to get pictures of but I have a few.

Below are a few of the stories we read by Mem Fox. We focused on characterization and comparing characteristics between these stories.

With"Feathers and Fools," we focused on the characteristics between the two birds in the story. We created a Venn Diagram as a class and discussed similar and different characteristics! They did such a great job!

With "Hattie and the Fox," the students individually created a graphic organizer to list character traits. I traced the cover of the book and gave students construction paper to tear an glued onto their hen. We used a googley eye which was a cute touch!

The last story was "Boo to a Goose." Instead of character traits on this book, I decided to have the children write something they "would do,but wouldn't do." In the story, the author writes silly things like, "I would......, but wouldn't say, "boo to a goose!" The ones the students wrote were hilarious!

State Sybols

We also learned a lot about our state symbols. I created a Power Point, but I'm not sure if I can post the attachment from my iPad so I will have to look into that. I am still new to blogging, so I will figure it out eventually.


We learned about the Texas Flag, state mammal, state tree, state flower, state song, and much more! They loved it all! I wished I would have gotten more pics of the things we did but below are a few pics of the blue bonnet. They used paint and their thumb prints for the petals.

Since this was Texas week, we had the students take home a Boot to decorate however they wished. I read a book called "Armadillo Rodeo"! The kids loved it just as much as I did! ;) After the story the students described their boots on paper, but without telling each other which boot was theirs! For example, my boot is smooth, shiny, and colorful. The students had to guess whose was boot whose! The kids really enjoyed this because they really had to use good describing words so their classmates could figure it out without giving away too much!

Retelling

We really focused on how to orally retell stories during guided reading, and whole group, and had the students tell a partner during their "read to self" center. We practiced writing the parts of the story as well and instead of just writing the Character, setting, problem, and solution, I had them write at least 3 main events that lead to the solution of the story. We practiced whole group, small groups, partners, and then individual practice.

Below is a picture of the written retelling on s sentence strip and created the character (walrus) out of construction paper to create a fun activity for the students!

Below is another picture of written retelling. We read a story called "The Three Tamales," and after we wrote, we rolled them up like little tamales! :)

National Symbols

I meant to talk more about The National Symbols week! We did a lot of fun activities and learned so much, but I didn't get as many pictures as I would have liked! We learned A LOT of interesting facts about the US Flag, Statue of Liberty, Liberty Bell, the Bald Eagle, and a few other important symbols of America. Below we made a graphic organizer listing things we knew about Bald Eagles and then the students created bald eagles by tracing their hands for the wings! It came out pretty cute!

So behind on my blogging!

So I am really behind on my blogging! How embarrassing, but luckily I saved some pics to share! I am also finished with my student teaching! It was a bittersweet kinda day for me!

Before I discuss everything I have learned about my student teaching I want to share some of the Writing skills we have learned! One of the skills we learned was how to write a letters! I really loved showing the students how to write letters properly, because it is a skill they will always use and they loved it! First, I introduced the 5PARTS of a letter! (Heading, greeting, body, closing, signature) I taught them a little song to go along and it really helped! I used the Gradual Release when teaching this skill. After the first day of introducing the parts of a letter, we put together a large poster letter as a class, then  I made 5 huge poster letters (at home) and had the students work together in small groups to put the letter together in the correct order. The next day I had the students pair into partners and put together a letter and glue onto construction paper. Below is an example.

So after we learned the parts of the letter and what goes into those parts (ex. Date into the heading, name- signature), I gave them the opportunity to practice writing letters to a friend in the classroom. This week was also dental week and so we also read cute stories about the Toothfairy, for handwriting I read "Dear Toothfairy!" 

This story went perfect with our writing skill, because of the letters that were written back and forth 

between the little girl and the Toothfairy! The students LOVED IT! So as a class we wrote a letter to the Toothfairy asking her questions and a few other things the kids thought would be fun to tell her, such as, we were learning about money and how to write letters and we were taking care of our teeth! I told the kids I would put the large envelope to the Toothfairy under my pillow to see if she would write me back! ;) the students loved me for that! Lol Below is the silly envelope I "put under my pillow for the Toothfairy!"

The kids could not wait to see if the Toothfairy would actually write back! Guess what!? She did! ;)

Below is the TINY letter the Toothfairy wrote back to the class! They thought it was just FABULOUS!

These are a few examples of the letters the students individually wrote to the Toothfairy and created a fairy from paper! They enjoyed this!

Presidents Week

We had Presidents week a few weeks ago, and we had a lot of fun learning about several different Presidents. We mainly focused on Abraham Lincoln and George Washington, but we researched several others. With a small group, the students researched a President of their choice and wrote a report and presented it to the class. The students did a great job. They even made their President out of construction paper! :)

Here is a picture of a couple of the reports!

We worked on this all week by planning the report, writing, revising, and finally we shared the reports on a Friday! The students learned a lot of interesting facts about each President! :)

Dental Health Week

Last week was actually dental health in science, but unfortunately we had a blizzard and missed two days of school so we continued this week. We watched a video about dental health and discussed what we learned. As a class, we made a big anchor chart and discussed the good/bad foods for our teeth. We did a few other activities, but that was before I decided to take pictures of our day! Luckily, I was able to get one!

Below, in the picture, the students created themselves from construction paper and wrote everything they knew about dental health! They are so creative! They learned they had 20 primary teeth and you can tell where the students were missing a tooth! :)

Teaching dental health was fun, and we also read some really cute books about teeth! We also had a few students leave school a little early for a dentist appointment that week! I guess they were worried about having a cavity! ;) Next week is spring break so when we get back we will be learning about plants! I can't wait!


Mrs. Hooper

Introduction

I wished I would have started this blog when I first started my student teaching, but I guess it's never too late! I have been doing my student teaching at Puckett Elementary in Amarillo, Texas since the middle of January. I am teaching first grade and the students are absolutely wonderful! I have been learning so much from my cooperating teacher. She is a master teacher and I am so very thankful to be learning from the best! My student teaching experience has been wonderful and I could not have picked a better career. It truly is the most regarding job! We have learned so much in the past few weeks and I have only about 5 weeks left so I will share all I can!

First, I would like to share our schedule, behavior chart, and classroom rules!   

The first week and part of the second week I spent most of my time observing and and learning the routines, schedule, and the names of the students. At first it was a bit overwhelming because it seemed like so much in just one day because they are learning and working so hard, but after I learned the routines and schedule I felt a lot more relaxed. I also tried to help out as much as i could, such as, collecting homework, grading, making copies, and anything I could do to keep the class organized. One of the most important things as a teacher is to be as organized as possible. In a
classroom full of first graders you never want to be unprepared! :) I have also learned to make sure ahead of time, to have enough materials for activities! You don't want to be scrounging around for materials while your students are waiting! If you want your students to be prepared they should expect the teacher to be prepared as well! :)

My second and third week of student teaching I had already started teaching my first lessons. I was really nervous because I wanted everything to go perfect. I had planned the lessons with my cooperating teacher and she was very helpful in making sure I had all the materials and gave me great advice. I wish I had photos for that week, but I was teaching them capitalization of proper nouns. The next week I began taking on as much as I could, such as, giving the spelling test, guided reading, and of course planning. Every week we meet with the other first grade teachers to help each other plan. I think these meetings are very beneficial because we help keep each other up to date with the TEKS and give each other ideas for activities.

The fourth week I had began teaching about 75%. I never realized how time consuming making lesson plans can be only because you want to be sure your plans/activities/sources fit the TEKS and are going to beneficial to the students. Luckily, my cooperating teacher has tons of sources and we also use Pinterest and Teachers Pay Teachers for fun, yet, relevant ideas. One thing I love is that my cooperating teacher gives me the freedom to take a big part in planning. I don't think my student teaching experience would be as beneficial if she did all the planning and let me just do the teaching, so I am glad she isn't so picky! I'm sure if there was an issue she would let me know! If she does notice something isn't working she steps right in, but its part of my student teaching, and its nice to have someone fill in the blanks when needed. I also had my first observation this week. I am getting my teaching certification through Region 4 (Houston), so my field supervisor who observed me was from Region 16. My first observation went great, although I was quite nervous getting into the lesson, I did my best and the teaching just came natural.

The fifth week and up to this point I have been teaching 100%. My cooperating teacher stays in the classroom most of the morning when we are doing guided reading. I really enjoy guided reading. It's really interesting to see the different levels and the strategies my cooperating teacher uses. I typically read to the three higher levels, while my cooperating teacher continues to work with the lower groups. I have also learned to do running records and its great to see as they move on to the next level, but I have also noticed its important that as they may be a fluent reader, they must also be able to retell and comprehend what they read. This week we have been really focusing on oral re-telling and writing it down.

I think I have summed up my experience with student teaching so far. I will continue to post as much as possible and share all the fun we have in first grade!! Have a great day!

Mrs. Hooper