I Am Not A Teacher...

So apparently I looked mad all day? But I wasn’t! I was having so much fun. I promise. In the morning I decided to stay inside stay out of the sun for a little while. I worked the scooter and cup stacking relay station. I thought that there could be possibly nothing that could go wrong because all elementary school children love scooters. Well much to my surprise, I have never seen a group of more lazy kindergarten through second graders. They were moving at snail speed, so I made sure I reemphasized that it was a race. When I said go the energy picked up about .00000342333495%. I was almost dumbfounded. I decided that maybe they just were not in the mood to use the scooters so I had them put the scooters on the wall as I set up the cup stacking race. They were all super excited and squealed in that tone that only early childhood students can make. I said go and the next thing I know they are walking between the stacks of cups! Seriously? What kind of student walks in a relay race? That group of kids had a college student observing them who was just hanging out and watching them play. She probably thought I was absolutely incompetent in what I was doing. But whatever. The rest of the groups were great and actually had a little competitive nature in them at least.
The second half of the day was spent outside playing corn hole. I loved watching the students get excited when they would make the bean bag into the hole. They jump up and down and scream like they just made the winning shot of a championship basketball game. This would happen every time. Throughout the day I had been kind of keeping track of the record number of points an individual from each grade could get in the ten minutes. The day was almost over and all of a sudden I look over and one of the third grade boys was crying. So I go to see what is wrong. I thought he was whining about his partner not sharing the bean bags. I told him it was okay and that he was a big boy and that they could figure it out. As I am trying to get him to dry his eyes he proceeds to tell me that his partner was not being time efficient (obviously not using those words) and that at that rate they would never be able to beat the record. He was so set on beating the record that he upset himself thinking he would not be able to achieve it. Pathetic, I know… but also sort of cute. He was obviously smaller than all the other boys in his class, and my guess he was not as emotionally mature as the other boys. I gave him an idea of how to make the game go faster he grabbed my hand to go tell his partner. I explained what the boys could do, and from then on he was just fine.
For reasons like the second part of my day are the reasons why I want to be a teacher. Eww… teacher, I hate that word. Even though obviously I am studying to be a teacher, I do not feel like one for some reason. In my EDTE 150 class, I felt like I had such a different outlook on things than everyone else in the room. Anyway, I want to be a teacher because when I helped that little boy find the solution to his problem and saw the light go off in his head, it just brought joy to my heart. Whatever… I still do not like the word teacher, but I love physical educator.

iSing... ?

Friday was a good day. Pre-school was a joyful way to start an early morning. I am not going to lie, I was not expecting to stand up in front of the room and sing the Chicken Dance, the Itsy Bitsy Spider, and Head and Shoulders, Knees, and Toes to the whole class. One thing that I do know for a fact is that God did not bless me with talent in the vocal signing department. This is like my worst nightmare. Actually having to sound good up there? Who cares about the 20 four year olds in the room, I was freaking out about the 10 of my peers. Thankfully the tunes of those songs are not very difficult and I think it went just fine. In the car on the way home, Stu told me that I did not sound too bad. And usually Stu is brutally honest, so I am glad I got the reaction I did.
Mr. Goodwin is a great teacher, and I like the attitude he has with his occupation. He is laid back, however strict enough that he gets his kids moving and they do not stop. It was amazing the difference of my nerves from the last time that I did a mimic teach. I still remember week one of the quarter driving from Pleasantville to Bremen, about ready to throw up because I was so nervous. Today, there was nothing. I sat and took notes on what Mr. Goodwin said and did not even think twice about have to repeat this lesson in three hours. I am not trying to sound cocky, but that is how I felt.
Teaching the scooter lesson was fun. I had never seen the helicopter spins before, but those are so cool. I taught the scooter part of the lesson and then Stu taught the ball skills part. I would have to say I defiantly had the fun part of the lesson. Thankfully all the students were very well behaved and there were no crazy scooters flying all over the gym. I did not even have to sit a single student out. These are my kind of days. I love it when everyone is cooperating and getting along, and able to keep themselves entertained and moving without distracting their neighbors.
I am excited about my last teach that is coming up. I think that the students at Morrison seem to be great kids and will be fun to work with. I am really sad that elementary methods are coming to an end. I am finally getting used to interacting with the younger students, just in time to be done with the class. However, I suppose that means that this course did its job.

Twister Twister

Starting off the day watching the little gymnasts just made my day! It warms my heart to see those little girls just starting their adventure of gymnastics.

Field day was so much fun! When I was younger field day was a day of hardcore competition. Even though the events were all mostly just for fun, the kids seemed to be having lots of fun. I got to work the Twister station. Some of the positions those kids managed to get themselves into were hilarious. After the first class, I ended up not using the spinner very often. I would just call out whatever I wanted and twist them up myself. The students only had eight minutes at each station so we did not play normal Twister rules. Normally, when a player falls down, they are out. Due to our lack of time, if a student fell over they just started over. About half way through the rotation I would stop them and tell them to stand up and stretch out.

When the students got into the room, I reminded them of their right and left and for the most part everyone did okay. The younger ones hand to be reminded which was right and which was left, but no big problems. In the afternoon I thought that I was going to have all older students so I was not even going to worry about going over right and left. Soon enough my first group walked in and they were pre-schoolers! Ah! Pre-school students and twister? I knew that was not going to work. I ended up making up my own game and putting them in positing by telling them to move a hand or both feet. During the pre-school class I stopped them 3 times during the rotation to stop, stretch, and shake it out. They were so cute and tried so hard. When I told them to line up, their teacher came over and told me thanks for being such a good sport and changing things for the pre-school students. She told me I did a really good job adapting to them.

I want to teach high school so badly, but I am starting to like teaching the younger students more and more. They are so fantastic, and always so excited to do whatever you tell them to.

Even though I know that the field day was all for the elementary students, I think my peers and I grew closer through this experience. We have all taught together, but being in the more fun and relaxed atmosphere was good for us. We are all starting to enjoy each others’ company and being around each other. This is such a blessing to me. Even though we don’t all hang outside of the class, knowing that your peers are there for you and understand what you are going though is a comfort. I love our little PE family, and am glad I am not in one of those popular majors in which I am in the same program as 400 other people on campus.

Flipping Frogs

Due to a week of no sleep, my expectations for today were not very high. When I got up this morning I felt like death and did not want to do anything but stay in bed all day. Despite my unwillingness, I dragged myself out of bed and into the shower. As I proceeded to get ready my allergies were so bad that I was imaging teaching with snot flying out my nose. Thankfully, my meds finally kicked in as I was walking to my car, and I had about five hours until I had to teach, so I knew I would be okay.
As the day progressed I started to feel a little better, but still had no voice by the time it was my turn to teach. My first class walked into the door, there was no turning back now. Even though I did not feel so well, I was excited about my lesson and ready to get the next hour and a half over with.
My first class went extremely well. The frog stations I had set up, kept the entire class occupied and on task. I was in no mood to deal with students messing around, and only had to sit one student out, and only one time. I was afraid that the boys would think that pretending to be frogs for 20 minutes would be stupid. But who was I kidding, they are first graders! Being a frog is cool. The station called “Flipping Frogs” was by far the coolest. I discovered this great phenomenon; that if a bean bag is set on top of a playground ball, and then drop it; the bean bag goes flying to the air. When I practiced the skill, the bean bag went straight up, but when the kids tried it, the bean bags were flying all over the place. It was hilarious. They would go flying in every direction, hit them in the face, or shoot right over top of their heads. The students had a blast trying to catch the unpredictable “flipping frogs”. Other than slowly losing my voice, the class went just fine.
The second class is always late. 15 minutes into class two girls showed up. Really? Where the heck was the rest of the class? They showed up about 7 minutes later and I had a whole whopping 10 minutes to teach the 40 minute class. Oh good Lord, let’s see how fast I can efficiently explain instructions for the five Frog Pond stations. They listened better than I thought they would, considering my mouth was running a mile a minute. Thankfully they all got to make it to every station, just in time to let them grab their backpacks and run to the bus. Shew, that time when by crazy fast.
The day was overall fabulous! My time analysis should be much better this week. Which is good, I am not sure it could have gotten any worse.
During Chris’s lesson, I had a kindergartener walk over to me and tell me that he loved me. It is amazing how feelings develop over tying a tennis shoe.
I am stoked that Mrs. Thomas liked my lesson, and am really glad I got to work with her.

"HI MISS B!"

When I walked in the building of the school I saw three girls from the second grade class I was getting ready to teach. They all got really excited and ran over and gave me a hug. I told them that I was going to be teaching their class today, and they all got really happy. That was defiantly a great way to start off my day, and give me a little extra confidence booster. I hope the girls had a fun time in my class and think that I am a good teacher.
There is defiantly a big difference between a 25 minute class period, and a 45 minute class period. The first class of the day went really well. I had fun, and I think the students were having a good time. I had them working together on teamwork skills, and they all really cooperated and worked together. Some of the tasks seemed so simplistic, but the students had a blast and they were moving the whole time. Throughout the class period they worked by themselves, in pairs, in small groups, in half the class, and in boys verse girls. I liked the variety that was provided with my different activities.
My classes were back to back today. Thanks to my allergies, I was about to die by the end of the first class. My voice was just about shot, but I got a quick drink of water right as the second class was entering the gym. Oh boy was I in for a treat. The activities I planned had very minimal and simple instruction, however I needed about 20 seconds of quite in order to explain. I am pretty sure I got about .000037648 seconds of quite the whole class period. The students were in no mood to be quite and listen. I stood there, waiting. Finally, a boy in the class got frustrated with his peers and put up two fingers. YAY, something I can work with. After the knowledge that two fingers meant shut up, it was much easier to get things accomplished. I survived through the first few activities just fine. When we got to the HoopDrop, which was supposed to last about maybe five minutes, I think it took about 10. They were supposed to be quite after they picked their hoops back up, but they just could not do it. Students find this game fun, anticipating me to yell “Drop It”. However it ended up being a punishment because they could not get quite. Finally, they were kind of quite and I instructed them to put their hoops down on the floor and stand like statures. With in the next 2 minutes, I took away 5 hula hoops of students that could not grasp the concept of statues. I took three pieces of equipment away from one boy throughout the class period. I was ready to sit him out, but the look in his eye, I knew he was not going to get up quickly and move. I felt like I did not have time to fight with one student, when the rest of the class was trying to pay attention. Taking his equipment away worked, but I had to take everything away once, for him to realize that he needed to behave. He was slightly exhausting, and I know by the end of the period he hated my guts. Oh well, that is the way it will be sometimes I suppose. His class did not even get to do the last activity that the first class did, because there was so much management time. Great, now my time analysis paper looks horrible because I constantly had to stop and wait for them to shut it. It is so hard when I do not know their names. Scolding a student using their name has so much more impact than me scolding, and then the student finally realizing I am talking to them
All day long, the grades had one good and one bad class. My nerves level this week was much lower. My confidence is growing, slowly… but growing. I liked teaching the first two classes and then being done. I think that helped with my nerves, not sitting there thinking about it all day long. Next week I teach the last two classes of the day. We will see how that goes.