If at first you don't succeed...

Wow, what a day. The one thing that I did right was I actually went to bed a decent hour. Granted, I scrapped doing homework for personal reasons, but at least I was well-rested. That turned out to be a lifesaver. The morning was devoted to the highly scripted, very fast-paced reading program. We got a new student and so my Cooperating Teacher (CT) had me tutor him in several units to try to quickly catch him up to speed. I felt sorry for the kid and this huge volume of material was crammed into his head. I am not knocking the program per se, but I just couldn't believe the sheer volume he was expected to learn in a very short amount of time. Then it was off to a lengthy collaboration meeting about the reading program and students' progress.

About halfway through the meeting, I had to dash out and begin my work sample. I am teaching a nutrition unit and felt so out of sorts as I taught it. Thoughout the first half of the lesson I crashed and burned. Thankfully, the end went a little better. Just as I was finally hitting my stride, it was time to switch to writing. I am simultaneously teaching my work sample and my action research writing units back to back. There is a lot of preparation and aftermath that goes into these units. The time parameters make it a real challenge to fit everything in.

As I taught the writing lesson, I realized I didn't really have a clue how to teach it. I was ill-prepared and didn't have the right know-how to do it properly. In a nutshell, the kids weren't sure what to do with the information I taught them and it was another disaster. After school, I told my CT what had happened (he was still in the collaboration meeting and missed it). He told me to be very specific and clear in my expectations. I will be reteaching the lesson tomorrow to redeem myself. It adds more pressure, but hopefully they will get it this next time. The great thing about this process is that even though I screw up, I definitely learn what to do for the next go-around. Baby steps I guess. Who knew teaching would be so complicated? I have learned that the hard way. Week four is almost over, so I am grateful that time is a-flyin.