A highlight for me this week was being able to successfully lead a discussion in my English class. My teacher told me ahead of time that I would be teaching on Thursday and that she would let me know what I needed to do for it. Thursday morning rolled around and I had still not received any notifications of my teaching. I was extremely nervous as I walked through the school absolutely unprepared. She decided I would just be leading a 15 minute discussion, which eased my brain quite a bit. I was still quite nervous during each of the discussions because I wanted to make sure I sounded intelligent and like I knew what I was doing. Each class period got progessively better and my teacher complimented me for my ability to mold to each class and ask continued leading questions. This was a huge confidence builder and I thorougly enjoyed it.
I have pondered a lot this week about questioning during a discussion. Many of the teaching strategies presented last week were on questioning and I found myself noticing all of the positive and negative aspects of my own questioning strategies. I think being aware of what we are teaching and how we are teaching it is extremely vital to our success as teachers and our students sucess.
I was observed today and it was a fun experience. I had taught two previous periods before I was observed so I felt prepared but every class is different so there was still some anxiety. My students were very supportive and contributed great to the lesson. While visting with my observer he said something that I will never forget. He was a coach and an adminstrator throughout his career so he knew a bit about motivation. He talked about how you always need to motivate your students in order to win the game. He said, 'Teaching is like playing a different ball game every period, and of course you want to win. When the students learn you win, and they win.' I loved this approach to teaching and I will always remember it during my teaching career.
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