Almost Thanksgiving!

This week all of the Elementary MAT students got together for a pot-luck Thanksgiving dinner! It was so much fun. I cooked the turkey (first one I've ever cooked) and it was certainly an adventure. I had to dedicate pretty much my entire day to it, but I'm proud to say that it turned out edible - maybe even yummy!!!! It was nice to have a social gathering before we all go home this coming Tuesday for a little vacation.

All of our classes are wrapping up right now and we have a bunch of projects/papers due this coming week. Our Social Studies unit that will be part of our final portfolio is due tomorrow which includes 5 lessons, a content outline, and an annotated bibliography. We also have a research paper for Social Studies coming up after the holiday. My topic is the integration of Math and Social Studies and I have learned a lot of interesting ways to integrate the two subjects. We also have a Science Research Project due as well as a Literature Circle assignment for our Language Arts class. We have been reading books in groups (much the same way our students will) and each person has a job to do while they read the book. My job was to find vocabulary words that might be difficult and define them for the group.

It has been a busy semester but I have really enjoyed it. I'm looking forward to Student Teaching starting after Christmas!

I am quite possibly the worst blogger ever! I'm sorry that it has been so long! I've gotten so wrapped up in this semester and student teaching that I've let a lot of time go by since I've blogged.

Things in the MAT program are going great. I registered recently for both the Praxis II's that we are required to take and will spend most of my Christmas break studying for them. I would like to begin studying before that, but I really do not have enough time during the week! I'm hoping that our 5 methods classes this semester have prepared us well for the tests, but because this is a fast-tracked program, I know that there will be some material that I will have to learn on my own.

This semester has been a challenging experience for me as a student. As a future teacher, I'm somewhat of a perfectionist and like to be organized and work ahead on projects. This program has really challenged me for many reasons. One, it is graduate school and the professors give assignments that tend to be a little general and expect us to interpret the assignment and add our own flair to it. This is hard for me because I really like to have specific assignments and know what is required of me - I've really had to adapt to this style of teaching and learning. Two, I really like to work ahead but our work load and time schedule generally does not allow us to work ahead more than a day or two (possibly!).

Tomorrow, we are presenting one activity from our Social Studies units (that we wrote this semester) on film. If they turn out well I'll post them for you to see!

Happy almost Thanksgiving!

Assignments online...

I'm working on getting some Webspace through ECU so that I can post examples of assignments for y'all to see. I have a neat Science Experiment PowerPoint as well as a Fiction Writing Assignment that I'd like to share.

I taught my first lesson at Ayden on Thursday about Hurricanes. It went well, much to my relief, and the students really seemed to enjoy it. They had a million questions and wanted to hear all about Hurricane Floyd. Luckily, I had lots of pictures and they loved looking at all of them.

Because this blog is only from my perspective, I asked the other students in my class if they would be willing to write a little about their opinion of the program and include a picture. This way you can see what its like from other perspectives - let me know what you think about this. I'll post them as I get them!

The first bio is from Brittany:

"My name is Brittany and I recieved my undergrad in Psychology! I decided I wanted to come back to ECU and earn my Teaching License and why not get your Masters at the same time? This program is challenging and you will learn the important skills needed to teach today! I have met some wonderful friends and have learned so much already!"

Time Flies When You're Having Fun!

Wow - its been a while since I've blogged! I write it on my planner every day under the "Things To Do" column but lately I've not managed to finish my "To Do" list very often!

School is going great. The past couple of weeks have been particularly busy ones and we've all been inundated with work. I recently presented an experiment in our Science Methods class and next week will be completing a research assignment for Science on "Hurricane Education in North Carolina schools". My clinical teacher seems very excited about the research so I'll let you know how it goes!

In my other classes, we are working on a variety of different projects and assignments - a Fiction story for Language Arts that we are going to send off to a company that will bind them into books, a filmed Writing & Reading lesson (also for Language Arts), a Unit on Government for Social Studies, and two lessons for Phonics! Its easy to get bogged down in the day to day assignments and work load - but the actual work is interesting and I know that it will be helpful to me once I have my own class.

I'm off to the dog park to let the dogs get some exercise!

Hurricane!

Its been a while since I've blogged so I'll try and catch you up. I have started student teaching at Ayden Elementary and absolutely ADORE the students and teacher in my classroom. We all already seem to mesh well and have gotten off to a great start this year. The first Thursday I student taught was the Thursday before Labor Day. I mostly just walked around the classroom and observed the students to get acquanted to their policies and routines. Then that evening, I was of to Morehead City to spend the weekend at the beach! The weather was absolutely perfect and I spent my time out on the boat or playing with the dogs on the sandbar.

The past week, I finally got in to the swing of things school-wise. I have been to all of my classes a couple times and am getting used to the different teachers, their expectations, and ALL the work that we have to do. The good thing about the work is that none of it feels like busy work to me; it all seems to have a dirent link to what we will do in the classroom, so its not too bad.

This past Thursday (9/4), I student taught for my second day and spend most of my day doing DRA reading assessments with the students. It was great because it gave me the opportunity to work one-on-one with them and really find out what their reading level was.

Then Thursday evening, I went to hear Dierks Bentley in concert at Minges. It was a blast. I've uploaded a couple photos from that night for y'all to check out.

Now I am sitting in my apartment riding out Hurrican Hanna! Wish me luck!

Getting in Shape

Last night, the girls and I attended a "Fusion" aerobics class at the gym. It was a step/weights combination class. I wish I had had my camera with me because I know that the pictures would be hilarious! It was a good stress reliever for all of us and we had a great time doing it. We are all signing up for the classes so that we can have an outlet to relieve stress from school and it will be another activity that we can all do together. We are going to go again tonight to a "Rejuvenation" class which sounds much more low key class but I'm excited!

Only Monday and already looking forward to Labor Day Weekend

Fall Semester is under way! I created a notebook today for my clinical teacher so that she would be aware of all the assignments for this semester. I start my Student Teaching on Thursday and I'll give her the notebook then so that she can read through it and help me come up with topics for the lessons I have to teach.

Tonight some of the girls went out for our friends birthday dinner at Ham's. We ordered a chocolate chip cookie dessert that was warm, gooey, and delicious. Its nice to be able to balance school and time with friends. I think that making good friends will help us all keep our stress levels low and enjoy the program more.

This weekend is Labor Day weekend and I'm really looking forward to heading down to Morehead City to spend some time on the boat and in the sun!

The picture is all of the girls at my apartment one night - we have so much fun together!

Technology Module and Birthday Cupcakes

It just hit me this afternoon that Fall semester has actually started. I figured I should get myself together and get a start on the Technology Module that is due at the end of September. The module consists of: creating a spreadsheet that calculates grades, a powerpoint that can be used in your content area, a Webquest, and answering some questions about copyright laws and acceptable use policies. A couple of the MAT girls and I got together and got started on it. As we worked, we motivated ourselves with the idea that if we did some work, we could go to Japan Inn for sushi for dinner. I got a lot of it done and felt much better about it and the sushi dinner was delicious.

After dinner, we went over to our friend's apartment to make cupcakes for one of the girls in our program. Tomorrow is her 25th birthday and I know that she'll be excited to have cupcakes at 8 am tomorrow!!

This is our first real week of classes so I'm interested to get a better idea of what this semester is going to be like...

Senior Seminar Workshop

Today, all the students who are beginning their Senior I internship this fall had to attend a meeting from 8:30 - 10:00 am. The goal of the meeting was to prepare us for our internships and have us fill out various forms and information. I left feeling totally stressed and overwhelmed about all that has to happen this semester. Senior I on top of 5 methods classes plus two modules (projects to complete licensure requirements that only MAT students have to do) is seeming a little overwhelming.

I've included in this blog several pictures from our MAT Girls Weekend on the Albermarle Sound. It was great to spend some time with the girls from school outside of the ECU environment. We spent the weekend laying out, eating too much, and sleeping late. It was wonderful!

The Marathon Begins...

After the sprint of summer school, the marathon that is Fall 2008 has begun. Our classes started yesterday and we experienced 3 of our 5 methods classes - Science, Math, and Social Studies. They are each challenging and interesting in their own way - I think its going to be a long semester but a very rewarding one.

All the MAT girls got together for dinner last night at Chico's. It was great to see them all - even though it had only been a couple of weeks, we had a lot to catch up on! We are so lucky to have such a great group - it makes going to class much easier!

I attended Ayden Elementary's open house tonight - I will be doing my Student Teaching in the 4th Grade. I loved the children and their parents and my clinical teacher and I hit it off right off the bat.

I will be updating this blog regularly and will go into more detail about classes and student teaching as the year progresses. Please feel free to ask me any questions or give me suggestions about things you would like to hear about.