Diving in Head First: My first week of Fall Semester
Kicking off the Week
When I came into this first week of my "Senior" year, I expected the normal syllabus talks and introductions to courses that we have all become accustomed to throughout our educational years. Boy was I mistaken. Within 2 hours of #AEE412 on Monday, I had my first challenge presented to me. One of our lab instructors Carson set out some packets of 10 minute lessons that we were tasked with teaching in Lab on Wednesday. This means that we had approximately 48 hours to prepare a lesson based on whatever packet we picked up in lecture on Monday. While these weren't super difficult tasks, most of them were things that we had no familiarity with, so it would not be all rainbows and butterflies. I flipped the packet that I chose over, and I learned that I would be teaching some origami.
My Preparation
I am using a term pretty loosely here when I say "preparation". While I don't think I was super ill-prepared, I do think that there were some ideas and strategies that I overlooked when thinking about how I wanted to go about teaching. When looking at the origami butterfly lesson, I felt that a simple demonstration would be the best way to teach this skill, so I prepared my materials and practiced for a while until I felt adequate enough to teach it to my peers. So, I finished making my materials for the morning and went to bed Tuesday night confident in my plan and abilities. RUT ROH.
Lab Day
I stepped up to the front of the room after volunteering to go first for my lab section, and my origami demonstration began. Everything was going well, I demonstrated a strategy that I learned at the #psuaged23 instructional bootcamp, called "Teacher Says, Teacher does; Student Says, Teacher Does; and then Student Says, Student Does. The only thing that I did not anticipate was the crazy idea that maybe, JUST MAYBE, some of my peers doesn't learn the best in an auditory/demonstrative way. Well, this was the case as I had student(s) that did not quite understand the one fold that I was trying to explain, with no visuals or anything presented by me as the instructor. This made me feel like I failed my peers in the moment, and Carson pointed out that we as educators have to anticipate situations in which we have students that learn in different ways, so we should be prepared to have the resources available to help them accomplish the task at hand.
Looking Back
Never did I think that I would show up to class this first week of the semester and be teaching something within 48 hours, but I think that's what makes this Ag Ed program here at PSU so darn special. We do things differently because we want to produce the best possible teacher candidates that can be prepared to change and inspire young students wherever we may go in our educational journey. As Dr. Foster has said multiple times this first week, "We don't make widgets!", and this is true because of these unique experiences that we undergo here at PSU. So even thought I think "widget" is one of the coolest words on planet earth, I am okay with not being one just this one time at least!
- Thanks for checking in and I'll chat with y'all next week!
Baylor
Baylor,
ReplyDeleteIt was so much fun to learn the origami from you in lab! I promise I did not try to be the difficult student, but I do think that each of us will encounter similar moments when we get to the real classroom. You did an awesome job at helping me to get the right fold and we all came out with a butterfly origami for proof! I can't wait to grow and develop our teaching skill set in lab this semester and learn from each others mistakes along the way!
-Morgan :)
Baylor, as the person that had the origami task for my lab group, I can say that I sympathize with you feelings about how you taught. I approached the lesson the same way, but quickly found out I wasn’t being clear enough in my instruction. I love the point you raised about learning styles, that is especially important when teaching lessons like this. Great job Baylor!
ReplyDeleteBaylor, I thought that your origami lesson went really great. I liked that you took the time to help students who might have been struggling. It was nice that you worked along side us to help us learn. Great job!
ReplyDeleteHey Baylor! Your blog was a really fun read and totally relatable! In some ways I am really struggling to stay on top of all of the responsibilities that come with this unique system, but like you said it is preparing us to be the best teacher candidates we can be! Even though I was on zoom for your demonstration I thought you did a really good job helping the students who were struggling. Do I think that it may have helped to have a presentation? Maybe, but you will always have some students who get confused and take a little bit longer no matter how much you prepare for different learning styles. Saying this, I think you did a great job at being patience with the people who didn't understand and gave them individualized attention which is just a must when teaching new skills. Keep up the good work!
ReplyDelete