a week in the life of a high school teacher

All these things have happened this week:

•  student tried to give me his phone number and told me he loved me. 
• a girl fainted during her test in second period because she did not eat anything after she gave blood. 
• a girl cheated on her test by looking up the answers to multiple test questions on Google and I had to awkwardly talk to her after class. 
• I had at least 10 students in my room after school on Friday afternoon all trying to ask me questions at the same time. 
• One kid asked me to not mark him tardy because he was barely late and he couldn't make it up since it was the end of the term. I reluctantly agreed and then another kid in the room was there and asked me if I could do the same for him. I said no because his tardy was awhile ago. Whoops! Teacher mistakes... sometimes it is the only way to learn what not to do. and I make a lot of mistakes every day! 

Journal Entry 9/29/13

Well, the sad news for today is that I have lost my journal. I cannot find it anywhere. I really hope I find it because I wrote about my entire study abroad in there and I worked really hard to try and write every day so I will be pretty upset if I cannot find that.

This week...

My high school students took their midterm test. Not sure how they did, but I will just say the students who worked to study did well, and the ones who didn't really do anything extra did not do really well. We did a light lab on Wednesday and Thursday, and the students (hopefully) had fun playing with glow in the dark stars, tonic water and UV light, solar bugs, and glow sticks. I was super nervous for the lesson I taught on Friday because I didn't know how to teach electron energy levels and excitation in a way the students would understand. Luckily for me, my mentor teacher has lots of good toys to help explain electrons and light. We started off the class with looking at atomic spectra with her lamp and of course the students loved it. I walked the students through taking notes in their book during the lecture to help them get a sense of what they should know and where to look to study for their next test. I then taught them about the atom being quantized by pretending to be an electron. My mentor teacher has a ladder and I climbed up and down the steps (that represented the energy levels) and then threw off "photons" (colored ping pong balls) to help show them that different transitions back to the ground state have different wavelengths and different colors. This also helps them understand that electrons can only reside in certain energy levels because it is impossible to stand between two steps on a ladder. and who doesn't love having ping pong balls randomly thrown at them? At the end of the lesson, I tied in some of the different types of light they observed in the light lab to help them make a connection between the lab and electrons getting excited. Even though I was super nervous about it, my mentor teacher said I did well and she liked some of the things I did. (Sorry if none of that made any sense... it's a lot of chemistry vocabulary!)

Student teaching has made me more sure that I want to be a teacher. I know even now more than ever that it will be a lot of work and the part I am most nervous for is being able to create a good classroom environment where students follow the rules and respect each other. I know this is the hardest part because usually teachers with an established reputation and practice are much better at this. But I know that once I establish this, I will love teaching. It's a perfect mix of organization and planning and also working with students. I was worried about enjoying working with high school students, but it really is not that different than working with younger ones. They are just as fun and they are way more well-behaved and easy to manage. They still say hilarious things that make me laugh (which will definitely be shared in a later blog post). I think the other part I will not like about teaching is the negative reputation it gets and all the dumb government stuff. Like how they are always trying to cut the salaries of teachers and imposing new standards on education that teachers don't have much say in. but that's a whole different thing.

I went to a meeting on Thursday with all the other students doing their physical science student teaching right now. Our teacher, Duane, was supposed to give us directions on our Teacher Work Sample, but he pretty much just bought us all pizza and left so I am not really sure what we are supposed to do with that. but anyways... free pizza pie cafe. I am not complaining!

I started working this week and I am excited to make some money! Saturday at the testing center was crazy and I ended up being there from about noon to 5:15 pm. woohoo more money! I am also working like 10 hours this next week. yay more money! haha I have not been making anything and it has been pretty bad. I need to start saving up for graduation since I will be on my own and will have no income (well, hopefully I find a good job... substitute teaching most likely). Plus, I love working at the testing center. I always forget that until I go to work because lots of awesome people work there.

Fun things I did this week...

Bradford had a poetry party on Tuesday. We went to his house in Lindon and sat around a campfire reading poetry. It was a great little London reunion (Emily, Lisa, Katie, Kaylee, Jared, and Heather all came. I think that was it). The poet was Matthew Arnold, who was from London and wrote some pretty depressing poetry. But it reminded me of all the good times we had randomly reciting poetry everywhere we went in England. I am so excited for the big London reunion we are having in November!  I got super London and Scotland homesick again this week, probably because I was dreaming about it. I really really really want to go back.

I went to the International Cinema Friday night for the first time. and watched the most depressing movie ever. It was about a kid whose parents were resisting the government in Argentina and his uncle and his dad died and he could never do anything fun because he was in hiding most the time. and then his mom died and he was taken away by the police and left at his grandma's. and never got to see his baby sister again. basically, it was so depressing. Then, I went to bed at 10:30 because I am lame. actually, I did that because I mess up my sleep schedule too much on the weekends and I am trying to fix that.

Saturday after work, I went to Keith's for a crepe party and only stayed for like 20 minutes so I could watch the RS broadcast. which was super good. Then, my roommates and I went to Walmart for some groceries and I just bought stuff I wanted to eat that looked yummy. Like Honey O's, the best cereal ever that you can only get at Walmart or Target and not at regular grocery stores.

One week until General Conference and less than 2 weeks til I go to Vegas to visit my family. I am pretty excited!!!

Relief Society Broadcast

Favorite quote... and very timely for the things I have been thinking about! 

"There may be times when you feel detached -- even isolated -- from the Giver of every good gift. You worry that you walk alone. Fear replaces faith."

"When you find yourself in such circumstances, I plead with you to remember prayer."

-Thomas S. Monson. 

student teaching

aka, the thing I was most scared for... Would I like it? Would I do well as a teacher? Will I come home every day overwhelmed and exhausted? Will the students like me?

Well, I have to report so far that it has been one of my favorite parts of college. I do miss learning and being on campus and in classes with my friends, but I love being at high school even more.

I am learning so much. Some days, I don't know how to explain things and I struggle. Luckily, I have patient students and a mentor teacher to step in and help me when things get tough.

I am amazed at how similar to working with 7 year olds at a summer camp being a teacher is. I do a lot of the same tricks to get students to pay attention and to get them engaged. I still have to repeat things a lot. I thought that high schoolers would be less likely to relate to me and look up to me, but I have seen that same thing in many of them. Students who ask me questions and want to know about college and what it is like. Students who say hi to me in the hallways and make me laugh.

I still have two months to go, but I know they will be a wonderful two months!

where has the time gone?

I have spent weeks partying and making London feel like home...

tonight I am packing up my flat and doing some last minute cramming for finals. after our finals tomorrow, we are off on one more trip around England. and then it's time to go home.

A lot of the girls here are ready to leave. I am sad to leave. There are a lot of things about England that I won't miss, but I love the time I have spent here. and since I don't know when I will be coming back, it's really hard to pack up my stuff and get ready to head back to the United States.

but seriously, this semester has been amazing and I am so grateful for it all, even if I am sad to leave!

what being in London is like during the summer

you think it would be all fun and shopping and gelato and nice summer days. it was.

but then it turned waking up drenched in sweat and being so hot every day all day. with no swimming pools and no air conditioning anywhere. and the very first day of this unbearable wave of heat we had no water in our flat for five hours! :(

I may have wished to go back to the U.S. with air conditioning this week. it's that miserable. I didn't feel as guilty for wishing this after reading this article:

http://www.thestar.com/news/world/2013/07/18/surprise_uk_heatwave_kills_hundreds_buckles_train_tracks.html

well, that's it for today!

highlights from week 2 in London

How has it been two weeks already? but what a wonderful two weeks they have been! I am so grateful for the friends that I have made while I am here and how kind they are!

On July 2^nd, we went to Hampton Court Palace. We only toured a small part of it because we had to leave and go do homework, but it was amazing. I can’t believe people actually lived in such a huge place. The gardens were huge and so gorgeous and I would have loved to live there just for them. The funniest part is that one of the main exhibits was called “secrets of the royal bedchamber” and the film they showed listed all the things they used the royal bedchamber for and it was a little awkward if you get my drift. But Henry VIII really had some lavish beds and rooms… complete with silk bedspreads and silver basins. It was cool to look at. Once again I have no pictures inside for the most part since pictures weren’t really allowed. I also really liked the chapel inside the palace, and it was cool to see Henry VIII’s crown which had tons of jewels. Some of our friends also did the maze in the gardens and Michela and I tried to lock them in, but we ended up locking someone else in which was super embarrassing and we ran away. So mature.

gardens at Hampton Court Palaca

can you tell I love the gardens at Hampton Court?

Here’s a good story… we don’t get as much sleep here because we have so much going on. After I sent in my history paper, my teacher sent me an email titled ‘blank email’ and instead of reading it, I thought “oh, it’s a blank email so I can just delete this because there is nothing in it.” But really it said that the email I sent her was blank and didn’t have the attachments. It was just silly when I thought about it later that I did it because I was just so tired then. actually it's not too great of a story, but it seemed really funny to me.

The next day we went to the Tower of London. We got to see the crown jewels which was super cool, but the rest wasn’t that cool and it was super crowded. The creepiest part was going in the torture chamber and seeing all the things they used on the prisoners. It kinda grossed me out. my camera was also dead so I didn't get any pictures!

I didn’t get to do anything too American on the 4^th of July, but all my friends painted their faces with red, white, and blue and we did go out to lunch for cheeseburgers. But I did go see Phantom of the Opera. It was AMAZING. I LOVED the music and the sets were so cool. And the costumes as well. Everything about it was so phenomenal and I almost wanted to go see it again. I know now that I definitely have to go see Les Miserables and Wicked because I am just loving the musicals.

the beginning of Portabello Road market

On our second free day, a group of us went shopping at Portabello Road. It is full of blocks and blocks of awesome stalls selling jewelry, antique books, clothes, souvenirs, food, and more! I bought some cool things for my family and a cute tanktop to wear and we had a lot of fun. I tried on this bracelet I really loved but the guy operating the stall told me it was 69 pounds (about 105 dollars) and I was like “no way, dude.” But it was so cute. 

Anne Hathaway's cottage garden

Our day trip yesterday was to Anne Hathaway’s (Shakespeare's wife, not the actress) cottage and Stratford-upon-Avon. I loved the Hathaway cottage because the gardens were so cute and it was fun to see how they lived. Can you tell I really love all the gardens these houses have? I guess I am going to need to have a house with a garden. We then went to this other place associated with William Shakespeare’s life, but it was dumb because the guy that owned it tore the down the house because they were tired of showing it to tourists. He also chopped down the tree Shakespeare owned and made things out of it and sold them. Ingenious man. I think I might have done the same thing. But I don’t see the draw in going there is there is not even an actual house. Then we went to go see Hamlet at the theatre there. It was the WORST play ever. At least in my opinion. Some people in our play liked it. But it had one too many sexual innuendoes (our professor was a little embarrassed about that) and Hamlet was not at all like I imagined he would be. He seemed crazy from the beginning of the play and not like the introspective, self-motivated Hamlet I imagined. So I may have taken a little nap during the play. but nonetheless it was a good day trip.

 Well, that’s pretty much it. Look for more exciting installments in a couple weeks hopefully!