Movin' On Up...

Ah blogs, I can never remember to write them. Grr.

Alright, recap on last weekend...The girls and I took a trip to Waiheke Island to look around a bit. Unfortunately it was rainy in the morning which put a damper on our plans, but still got some good walking in, as well as peering in artsy shops and viewing some vineyards (there's a lot of them on the island). Sunday mine and Katie's host mom Rachel and her partner Ken took us to Bethel's beach (a black sand beach) for some hiking ("tramping") and a picnic on the beach. Us courageous women braved the ocean for some swimming (and let me tell you, it was not a hot day), though suffered shivers and headaches afterwards from the FREEZING water. Still, good fun, and a very nice weekend.

Now, on to school. I have to say, it has gotten a lot better this week! Not that it was "bad" before, but I'm finally just starting to feel comfortable in the room. The students are starting to listen to me when I try and manage behavior, and I felt like I could pick a lesson during the day if I needed to. I was also able to sit down with my cooperating teacher again and really talk about lessons coming up, which really helped me relax and focus in on what I needed to do. Wednesday I had the chance to observe a few other classrooms of the same age level while my teacher and some of the class was gone on a field trip, and that was a great experience to see different teaching styles for the same age. I took some notes and I think I'll be able to analyze and reflect on our class and see if I can try any of the other strategies I saw in other classrooms with my students.

As for today, it was quite a busy day to say the least. I had planned on doing a Guided Reading group as introducing my new Narrative Writing Unit, but that kind of changed as soon as the day started. While I was marking off students for attendance as they were coming in, the principal walked in, and my cooperating teacher whispered to me something like, "Quick! Do the role!" ...so, I did. I then just continued with the rest of the morning routines and activities, and went right into my Reading lesson, and then on to my Writing lesson. By then it was break! Everything went well in the morning; I had a lot of participation and evidence of connections during reading, and my teacher really liked my writing lesson, so woo hoo I suppose! :)

Then, after break, my teacher asked me if I wanted to do the math lesson, as she would be out and a sub in (teachers at my school have time they can take for planning and scoring). I said sure of course, but I got a bit nervous because the first part of the lesson was about metric conversions...not my specialty obviously. Still, it was alright, and I definitely got to use my math brain when we had to go over certain problems on their sheets. Next, we practiced time (digital, analog, and 24 hour), and they did that really well. So yes, my throat's kind of dry, but a pretty good day.

This weekend we're heading to Rotorua, where I'm going to have the opportunity to learn a bit about the Maori culture, and oh yeah, bungee jump! Excited? I'd say. Hoping my feet don't turn into jelly at the top; I've always wanted to fly, even if only for a second. :)