iTeach

Last night we had our celebration for completing the teaching certification program. I still have two more classes to take in the Spring to get my Masters, but I can now officially teach people. Maybe people will start listening to me now.

I will post pictures of the event and talk more about the actual night in a later post. But honestly, right now I just want to enjoy the fact that I made it through the program. It was basically a year-long teaching boot camp.

What makes the program unique and rigorous is that you are in the classroom as an intern, from the second week of January. There are three internships, each five weeks, during the Spring semester. I was in seventh grade science, and two separate third grade classes. With the internships, we gradually increased our actual teaching experience. At first we were just doing the copying and grading papers. By the end of the semester we were teaching much of the day.

During the summer, we co-taught with another iTeach classmate in our district's summer school. My co-teacher and I taught students going into 4th grade. We were completely responsible for every minute of the day. I had a great co-teacher, Sam. We worked really well together. It was stressful, and fun. It was challenging. (E.g. we were given one ream of paper to use for the summer). And when it was over, I felt like I was ready to have my own classroom.

I could not have asked for a better student teaching experience. The model we were following was a co-teaching one. In this day and age where a teacher's pay is based on student performance, there is no way a Mentor Teacher was going to give up total control of their classroom to a novice. I feel so lucky to have gotten placed with Kelly. I got to work with someone who I enjoyed hanging out with everyday. We had very similar teaching styles and the students could sense that we were a united front. I learned a ton and I looked forward to going every day. And probably the best part is that I have a new friend.

The iTeach coursework was a heavy load. In the spring we were in the classrooms three days a week, and we took 18 credits that first semester. During the summer, we taught M-TH and then had class all day Friday. During our student teaching semester, we were also writing our action research paper. My paper was about Cognitive Guided Instruction in math. Basically, I was exploring whether the use of manipulatives and CGI effected how struggling 3rd graders learned subtraction with regrouping. Also, if in a large classroom (we had 32 students at some points), CGI and the use of manipulatives made students less reliant on direct instruction.

Most days, my commute to my field work and my own classes was 45 minutes to an hour. So two hours out of my day were spent driving. And I was the only one in my program with kids. When AJ and Shawn's soccer schedule started getting more complicated, Shawn was gone two nights a week and most weekends coaching soccer. Many times I simply felt that there were not enough hours in the day. I would often get up at 4am (and a few time at 3am) to get homework and lesson planning done.

Despite the crazy soccer schedule, there is no way I could have done this without Shawn. Many times this past year he was the main parent and caregiver to the boys. He showed up at events that I could not get to, and even went to things like (ironically) parent/teacher conferences when I teaching my own classes. His support was complete. He gave me a hug, a pep talk or a beer, depending what the situation called for and my state of mind at the time.

In a few hours, I will start my new job teaching fourth grade. They have given me a few days to set up my classroom and get settled. I have my students starting on Monday. The iTeach program was hard. There were several days I just wanted to walk away. I am so glad I stuck it out. Am I nervous to start my new job? Yes. Am I terrified? A little. But, I do feel prepared.