IDK man it's like my 3rd day out here...tackling SLLC w/ Central Columbia

     Let's just say that my first weekend of student teaching was not a letdown by any means. I started at Central Columbia with my observations on Thursday, March 23rd, and by Sunday I was en route to Harrisburg for the Student Legislative Leadership Conference with Mrs. Kristie Good and two of our upperclassmen FFA members, Rebecca Lehman and Brooke Kelty. These girls represented the Central Columbia FFA chapter exceptionally well, as they always have in the past according to Mr. Brown and Mrs. Good. Now, let's jump into what went down at the Sheraton on Sunday and Monday. 

    We got to the Sheraton after a quick bite to eat and within an hour or so my students were headed off to workshops. The focus on Sunday evening was on advocacy, learning how to get your point across effectively and with a purpose, along with some basic dinner etiquette to prepare students for breakfast with their local legislators on Tuesday morning. Rebecca and Brooke had both been to SLLC last year, so they knew what to expect when it came to the latter portion of the weekend. During this workshop time, I was able to catch up with my cohort, which I have not been able to do in person since way back in January at our pre-internship seminar, which ironically was also in Harrisburg. Oh, how I love when things come full circle haha. Anyway, they are almost at the finish line in their AgEd journeys at PSU, while I am just beginning my final push towards graduation in my internship here at Central Columbia. I got some valuable advice and I plan to use some of my peer's experience to better prepare myself for what my priorities should be while I get ready to get into the classroom teaching. 

    On Monday, the students had a day filled with legislative workshops. They started by getting assigned a specific bill, and then they were sent off to meet with fellow FFA members who had the same bill as them. They were also assigned roles, as the majority or minority, with each individual case. They were then tasked with debating the bill in their groups and making amendments that they felt were necessary if it could allow the bill to better suit the community. During this time that my students spent in their workshops, I got to sit down with Mrs. Good and talk to her about my plan for instructing her portion of Ag Science I and III, which I will be taking over for her and Mr. Brown on April 17th. This served to be very helpful; being able to sit down and get everything straightened out as I got settled in made me much more comfortable for the weeks to come. Coming into these courses in the middle of the semester is far from ideal, and extremely difficult to plan out ahead of time. The one unit that I intended on teaching is about to end during my first week of student teaching :/. Oh well, I have always been a roll with the punches type of guy anyway, so I don't get too worked up. 

    Then, on Tuesday morning we got to sit down and have breakfast with Columbia County's representative in the PA House of Representatives, Robert Leadbetter. Representative Leadbeter is an extremely personable and down-to-earth guy with that out students had a great time conversing with him and getting to learn a bit about his role in the Capitol and how what he does affects the people of Columbia County. After a good breakfast, Reperesantive Leadbeter had an hour or so before meetings to give us our own personal tour of the capitol building. We even got to go onto the House floor and listen in to some current hearings that were going on at the time, which was pretty sick. After our tour, we hit the road to head back to Bloomsburg and recharge for the remaining portion of the week.