Now that it is the end of the year in my interning class, I've been reflecting on all the goods and bars this year (mainly the good). A poem that describes this year really well is Roller Coaster by Lorraine Courigan. In the poem it talks about nausea, and during my year my "nausea" would probably be this first time I taught a lesson. I was super nervous and thought the students were going to be horrible and everything was going to go wrong. In reality it was one of the best lessons I taught and I got so much confidence out of it! This year really helped me understand that I want to become a teacher, from the students running up to me and hugging me while they tell me they love me, to teaching them and watching them grow. I love teaching and I know that I want to do this as a career. I wouldn't have known this though if it wasn't from the help of my mentor, Mrs. Webster, she's helped me become the teacher I want to become and given me so much good advice about dealing with teaching. One thing that will stick with me that I was told is that the students have to earn their grades, they don't just get handed out to them. I strongly believe in this and will carry it with me forever. If i could go back and change anything, I wouldn't, I loved this year and wouldn't make anything different. I'm really going to miss my intern class and hopefully my first year in teaching with be this awesome!

High School Teacher Creates New Education App

Creating apps for classroom is very useful and convenient for students. When I took Pre-AP Pre Calculus, my teacher created an app for our classroom where we could get all of our assignments and if we missed class, and she also video taped herself teaching the lesson and posted it on the app for us to watch. If I were to create an app for my classroom, I would create an app similar to this one, because I think it is very handy for students who were not in class that day. It saves time for the teacher during class to not have to explain and re teach what was already taught to a student who was not there.

The Ron Clark Story

Ron Clark's story is amazing with what he did with the students in the Inner Harlem School. He created 55 rules to keep order and earn the trust and respect from his misbehaving students. Out of those 55 rules, I believe that having respect for other students, saying sir and mam to an adult, and be the best person you can be are the three most important rules out of those. These three rules are extremely important because they deal with having respect for yourself and for others. In order to be the best person you can be you have to have respect for yourself and others to help you get there, saying sir and mam is just a polite way to show respect to adults. I will carry these three rules throughout my teaching career and also these two other rules:

1. Absolutely no bullying or putting down of others
2. Be confident in yourself

I feel like these rules are important to carry along in every classroom for students to abide by. In my classroom I will most definitely use almost all of Ron Clark's 55 rules.

The Advantages of Technology in the Classroom

Technology is growing bigger and bigger in classrooms and now almost every teacher is required to use technology. Erin Shreiner believes sternly in using technology in the classroom, he wrote an article called The Advantages of Technology in the Classroom. In the article he talks about five main points of how technology helps students: Accessing Information, Editing of Written Works, Providing Supplementary Information, Communicating, and Motivation Students. All through high school and even through college all five of these topics are going to benefit me greatly in learning. Probably the top two that help the most are Accessing Information and Editing of Written Works. Using the internet to get information I need is probably the easiest and most helpful thing about the internet. Instead of having to go down to the library and search through countless number of books, I can either pull it up on my phone or grab a laptop in class and have the information instantly. Also I remember in elementary and middle school, whenever we were writing papers, if we had to revise and edit the paper, we had to completely re-hand write the paper completely instead of using Word and fixing it without have to write your paper all over again. Just these two topics alone make school so much more easier.
An advantage that Erin Shreiner did not mention in the article, is that using technology in the classroom is preparing the students for technology they are going to have to use in their future jobs. The students are more likely to get hired if they have an expertise in technology so that the bosses do not have to teach it to them. I feel like the more technology used in the classroom the better, because if prepares the students and gives them a fun way of learning.

My Involvement in TAFE

This year I have become a very active member in TAFE. At the beginning of the school year in the region TAFE conference, another intern and I got together to co-author a children's book as part as the Count on Character competition. We did not make it to state, but we still have a great children's book to read to our students. Later on in the year, I got elected as the class historian as well as 3 other interns. We were to create a chapter scrapbook that we would present in the State TAFE Conference. After many long hours of work and stress, we were presented with a blue ribbon! I was very proud of myself and I wouldn't change one thing about how that scrapbook was created. As well as entering in the scrapbook, I was also apart of the breakout session we taught called "Are You Pinterested In Teaching?" This break out session had lots of fun teacher activities you can do in your classroom with your students, or teacher appreciation ideas. The State TAFE Conference was very successful and our chapter had a lot of winnings in the competitions!

Who is Stacey Bess?

Stacey Bess is an amazing teacher and person. She has endured many hardships that probably none of us will come into contact with. Yes, Stacey is a teacher, but her classroom is not an ordinary classroom. At first Stacey started teaching homeless people in a hut under the freeway, eventually she got her own classroom in a homeless shelter. Stacey has a different class almost every day and never knows if she is going to see her students the next day.

• I don't know if I would have the strength to do what she does everyday, it would be to emotional for me.

While Stacey took some time off to take care of her newborn baby, she would find herself writing about her life stories more since she couldn't be out there living them. She published this book and it is called "Nobody Don't Love Nobody: Lessons on Love From the School With No Name." Later on she had a movie made about her life called "Beyond the Blackboard".
This Sunday I am getting  chance to watch her movie on a charter bus on the way to the TAFE State Conference and I am also getting to meet her during the conference! I am super excited and can not wait to watch the movie and meet her




Resources: Newspaper Article   Movie Info.

Bullying In School

I feel like almost every child and/or teenager encounters bullying throughout growing up. Especially with how many social networks are out there now, there are more opportunities for children to bully others. Though some bullying happens at school, most of the bullying happens outside of school either over the internet or through cell phones. A good example of bullying at my high school is over Twitter, a student created an account called "Bash Birdville". Each day they would post a mean tweet about someone at Birdville. The school got it shut down, but it took a good month for the school to realize what was happening. Teachers need to be more aware of bullying that goes on during school and needs to be more strict on punishment when they catch it, because the person who created that twitter account did not even get in trouble. If the school really wanted to they could have found out who created that and punish them correctly. When I become a teacher, I am going to take bullying very seriously and take the necessary actions for when I catch a student bullying another.


Resources: FW ISD