Weekend Fun!

Living here in Celebration has not only given me a great opportunity for teaching, but also some amazing experiences outside of the classroom! While not working on lessons and stuff for teaching, I have been having a blast enjoying what the Orlando area has to offer. Let me tell you, my weekends are way way different than a weekend in little Ashland, Ohio..

Last weekend all of the current interns went to Gatorland with the past interns that now have jobs down here. It was really neat seeing all the alligators...but a little scary. They had a lot of giant ones that were caught all around Florida and were considered dangerous. One of them, "Chester", was known for eating dogs. I sure am glad that we don't have alligators in Ohio!!!

  

Hannah and I are very close with our host family. I couldn't have asked for a better family to live with. It really feels like home here and that's so nice when you're in a place that is new to you. We get to sit down and have dinner with them every night and just hang out with them. They make sure we are always having a great time whether that means riding bikes, cruising around town in a convertible, going out to dinner, playing pranks, or just hanging out. The family had us create a bucket list and are making sure we get to do everything on it. This weekend from our bucket list we picked some oranges right off an orange tree! I'm eating one right now and it is sooo good!!!

Their two kids are in high school and we're loving hanging out with them. Cameron, our "brother", races dirt bikes so we surprised him this weekend by going to a race! We made shirts with his name and number on it even. Later that day we went with Savanna, our "sister", and one of her friends to Magic Kingdom in Disney. It's so crazy that when we get bored we can just go right around the corner to Disney World!

I've been able to do so much in just these two weeks that I've been here. I'm so blessed to have this opportunity and can't wait for what the next weeks bring!

Teaching, Teaching, Teaching!

Obviously I have been extremely busy because I haven't been very good about updating! I have so much going on from planning all the way to simply adjusting to teaching in Florida. I really like teaching here, but it is SO different from teaching in Ohio!

I find that the state standards are probably the biggest difference. They are given weekly benchmarks from the district. Every school in Osceola County is learning the same thing by grade level. All of the materials are provided for the teachers from online resources to textbooks and workbooks. One thing that I really like is that the school has all of their textbooks online as well. Each lesson from the book has a really neat Smart Board lesson included with it. My class is made up of 17 gifted and high learning children which makes it really neat and allows more time for lesson extensions and time to challenge them.

The school itself is really great. I love the communities of "prides" in the school. My favorite thing is getting to walk outside any time we leave the classroom. When the kids go to gym, music, art, and lunch we get to enjoy the sun because the hallways are outside! I love love love getting some sunshine during the day other than through the window. Recess is great in the warm weather and we even have a school garden! In addition to the regular specials that the children go to, each Friday they get to pick a "student enrichment cluster" to attend. They get to go to classes such as cooking, dancing, drawing, games, etc. I'm helping out with the jump roping class! On Wednesday's the kids have an early release (yes every Wednesday), and the teachers have a meetng after school until the normal release time or they get extra worktime in their rooms. I'm really enjoying all of these new experiences and learning how to do things in a different way.

I'm loving my students and my classroom. I started a new behavior program called the O.S.C.A.R. Awards and they LOVE it! It's working sooo well. One of the best things is that my class is so diverse. I even have a girl from Russia and a boy from Puerto Rico, and several others strong backgrounds from different countries. I actually have a girl from Westerville, Ohio in my class too! So like I said, they love the O.S.C.A.R. Awards. It stands for Our Students Can Act Responsibly. I give the children tickets when I catch them doing good things. They get to collect their tickets and save them to earn prizes. There are different prize levels, each of more value as they save tickets. In addition, when their behavior gets a little out of control they have to move a clip with their name on it from Take 1, Take 2, Take 3, and Cut (levels with different consequences). They are so well behaved now because they don't want any of their tickets taken!

My days at school are going very fast. I can't believe that I'm approaching week 3 already! In the morning I am teaching reading, spelling, writing, and centers. In the afternoon is math, science, and social studies. This past week was kind of crazy because of Halloween. Here in Celebration, Halloween is a really big deal. Each house not only gives out candy but they also decorate hardcore. The students all wore costumes on Monday and we held a "Fall Festival" in the afternoon. The teachers were asked to dress up as storybook characters so Hannah and I dressed as Ms. Frizzle and the Magic Schoolbus. It was a hit!

On Monday I'm having my first supervised lesson. I'm teaching about clouds. I'm very excited and can't wait to do the activity. We've been doing a unit on weather and I'm loving it. I even did a lesson with Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs, my favorite book. The kids were so creative and wrote neat stories with pictures. I'm planning on working hard on lessons and having some fun enjoying Celebration and Orlando this weekend! Hopefully getting some time seeing everything and maybe even going to Disney!

Teaching in Florida

Today was my first day at Celebration School. Hannah and I woke up bright and early and got ready. We packed our backpacks, yes backpacks, because we rode our bikes to school! Our host mom got up with us because she wanted to take first day of school picture for us! The school is only about a mile away so the ride took a little less than 5 minutes.

We walked into the school and were welcomed by the assistant principal. We met our supervisor, talked about the school and what we're going to be doing, and were off to meet our teachers and see the place! I love the school. It's divided into different buildings called "prides" that have four classrooms in them and a center open area for group work and parent help. Parental involvement is huge within this community. My classroom is so nice. I am going to have a classroom full of 17 gifted students and can't wait to meet them tomorrow! The curriculum is different in Florida. Teachers are given weekly plans to follow that are mandated by the district. I'm excited for this new experience and learning more about the state education system here!

Tomorrow is my first day with the students. I miss my kiddos from Ashland sooo much. Hopefully I get a great group again :) I'm sure I will!

The Adventure Begins

I'm in sunny Celebration, Florida! The weather today was absolutely fantastic. Super sunny and 80!

This town is beautiful. A little history...
Celebration is right by Disney World (outside of Orlando). Everyone probably has heard of the Disney park "EPCOT" or "Experimental Prototype Communityof Tomorrow." What you might not know is that Walt Disney originally planned for EPCOT to be a community where people could work, play, and live. Although this isn't how the park turned out, the Disney company decided to fulfill his orginal vision.
In 1994 the town of Celebration was established. The Disney Company used 4,900 acres of land to build Celebration. Almost every home has a porch so that its residents could sit outside and talk with neighbors. Garages have been built, but in almost every case, they are behind the homes with an entrance through a smaller alley-like street instead of through paved driveways (this is sooo confusing when trying to get around!). This was done so the fronts of houses would not look ugly. What Walt Disney wanted was a town that looked somewhat like his hometown.

I'm loving living here so far. There's so much to do and the weather is great to just go outside and relax! Our host family is amazing. Hannah and I were very nervous walking up to the door but our host mom greeted up with hugs and was more than excited to have us. We have two "siblings"...Cameron and Savannah. They are both in high school and a lot of fun to hang out with. And our host dad is so funny. Hannah and I feel very comfortable here and they really feel like family. Our apartment is so cute! We have to walk up a spiral staircase outside to get up to it. We're going to spend a lot of time in the house with the family though. And we have a pool for all this hot weather!

Today our host family treated us to some Chipotle for lunch! Later in the afternoon our host dad, Hannah, Savannah, and I went on a bike ride around town for a couple of hours. Everything was so neat to see. There are these awesome boardwalk trails through these forest jungle areas all over Celebration. We even saw an alligator! We're loving it here so far and can't wait for what the rest of this time brings to us. First day at Celebration School tomorrow. It's a teacher inservice day so no kids yet.

"Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened."

Today was my last day with my kiddos at Montgomery Elementary. I had such a great day filled with surprises from my amazing students! First I got two cards from my morning students. Then I went to my third grade inclusion class and they had a whole party planned for me with cookies and lovely cards from each of them. They were sooo excited to give them to me but didn't want me to go, which made me feel worse. I finally told them my first name after they have been asking for the past four weeks. I made them guess first and got some pretty funny things names like Elmo, Abstract, and Kiki (do I really look like a Kiki?!). I am really sad to leave them. They all asked to come in my suitcase to Florida but I highly doubt that would go over well with parents. I promised that I would keep in touch with them and I definitely will. We had so much fun together!

From there we went back to our room where I spent the next party with my amazing students. I actually got to surprise them with a gift! I made them cute little snacks of cinnamon toast crunch cereal, chocolate chips, and mini marshmallows and wrote them a note that said, "I hope I have S'more students like you in Florida!" They loved it and a couple of them thought it was the funniest thing they ever heard. About 5 minutes after they dug into their goodies one boy even started laughing so hard again and says "It's still funny the second time you read it!" They are so cute and I'm really going to miss them. The small gifts I gave was just a simple thank you for allowing me to be their teacher and working so hard :)

As the day went on I was feeling more down about leaving my students but keeping my head up on this awesome experience ahead of me. Saying goodbye to my second grader was the absolute hardest. I had the biggest lump in my throat and wanted to cry. She's been such a great student for me and we really worked well together. I'm pretty sure that for the next couple of weeks I'm going to be quoting her with her "WOAH!" and "Trick you!" comments. I wish I could just take her with me to my next second grade class. I think what made it even more difficult is that I don't think she really understands that I won't be there tomorrow and that just breaks my heart.

Just when I thought the surprises were over I walked into my kindergarten class to a giant swarm of students with cards and telling me good luck and that they'll miss me. My day was absolutely amazing and made me appreciate being a teacher even more. I am definitely in the right job for me and can't wait to see what my next student teaching journey will bring. I am truly blessed to have so many experiences to help me and that I have met amazing people along the way. I couldn't have asked for a better mentor teacher, school placement, or students for my first six weeks.

Tomorrow starts the next chapter :)

Is this really the last week?!

Well regardless of my thoughts that I could manage a blog while student teaching, running an organization, playing basketball, and working it definitely didn't turn out that way! I have been a busy bee over the past 5 weeks with teaching and making lessons. I haven't even had a moment to sit down and breathe!

I can't believe it's already been 5 weeks of student teaching in Ohio. I am very excited for my last week but I hope it moves really slow (I know who says that about a week haha!). My experience has been awesome and I wish it didn't have to end, but I'm excited for this new chapter in Florida!

So a little update about my time in Ashland Schools. My days in the school were the fastest thing ever. I was constantly on the move between inclusion rooms. This is one of my favorite things about being an intervention specialist. I am a person that always needs to be doing something so this occupation really fits my personality! I also love having kids that are from all different grades. This made me super nervous at first but it's a nice change of pace. If I ever misssed being in a general ed classroom I always had inclusion to fall back on. My inclusion teachers were absolutely amazing letting me jump and lead the class. My mentor teacher also was amazing about letting me do my own thing. It was really nice being trusted with lessons as a professional. She also put up with all of my moments that I spent panicking on lessons.

I am really really going to miss my kiddos though! I had 7 main kids I worked with throughout the day. What a difference than the usual 25 at once! They each have their own unique personalities and having such a small group I really got to know them. We had so much fun together. I even taught a lesson using real hamburgers (from a cow that used to live on my mentor teacher's farm -- ahh!). I am excited for what this week has to bring but I don't want to say goodbye :(

Back to the lessons and packing for me!

First Day Jitters

Excitement - anticipation - butterflies - JITTERS!

Friday was my very first day of student teaching and holy cow was I nervous! I stayed up half the night before going through my information over and over making sure I was fully prepared. I had five alarms set just in case, and I woke up an hour earlier than I really had to.

Just like a child starting their first day, I had all those questions jumping through my head - Will the kids like me? Will I like my school? Just like the kids, I had to show up regardless of my "First Day Jitters" being in full swing. This book is a perfect description of me:

For those of you who haven't read the book, the story goes on with the main character making up excuses to not go to her new school because she is so nervous. The end has a funny twist of the nervous character being the new classroom teacher. We get jitters just like our students!

With all these nerves built up, walking into my classroom for the first time in the middle of a meeting didn't make me feel much better, but it was refreshing to sit and listen to them talk about the students and definitely got me back into classroom mode. As the day began and I started to meet the students I would be teaching, I felt a little better but still very shy (hard to believe for those of you who know me well!) and nervous. I just really don't want to mess up and only having 6 weeks to get to know my students doesn't help these feelings...

I began my day observing a one on one session with a second grade student that I will be working with on my own soon. We then went to do inclusion work in third grade. As I stepped into that room my nerve level went from about a three to an eight with all these kids staring at me trying to figure out who I am! I stood off the the side and observed what I would be soon doing myself, and quickly realized that I saw a familiar student in the class. I was soooo excited to see one of my students that I had in second grade from my last school placement now in my third grade class! This changed my day. I felt so much more comfortable knowing I would get to work with a familiar face and already know many of her needs. It's amazing how a child can turn your day around :) Hopefully I make her feel more comfortable at a new school too!

With my jitters being under control, I fell right back into my role as a teacher. I can't wait to start working with these kids! I even had a first day challenge of giving a spelling test to two boys at the same time with two different word lists. Of course I was able to do it and even got to have a little fun making up sentences for the words that made them giggle and have fun taking a test. That's the best!

I finished my day working with the kindergarten class and boy was that so much fun! They are just so cute and hilarious and don't even realize it. I love their creative minds and how they are so willing to work. One boy drew an awesome "wubber wobot" and was so proud to show me (His Robot was made of Rubber -- Isn't that the cutest thing ever?). I am very thrilled with my school placement and I love love love being an intervention specialist. The day goes by so fast because you are constantly changing your pace and working with different children. I can't wait to see what this experience brings for me! Tomorrow begins my first full week teaching! I'm actually excited to wake up early and get to school! (Am I coming down with something?!) I have my clothes picked out, my lunch all packed, and my five alarms set!!! These next six weeks are going to be awesome!

- Miss Shirley