This past Monday we went out on another school visit this time it was to the middle school. I thoroughly enjoyed this visit and it opened up my eyes to what I really want to do in life. Before I went I was contemplating on which grades I wanted to do, but after visiting the middle school I know that I want to teach the middle and high school age. These students seemed to be a little bit more mature and will not need as much instruction as the kids in elementary school would need. I also want to be able to coach a sport especially softball and it would be a lot easier to develop those relationships already with the students that way when they play sports they might have a little bit more respect for a coach.
When we got to the school we met with one of the assistant principals and she was going over some of the instructions what we would be doing. I was the first in line when we went down the sixth grade hallway, so I went to the first classroom, which was a Language Arts classroom. This class was your typical Language Arts class with your vocabulary and writing in your own personal journal. One thing that I really liked that the teacher did was she used a fun vocab game known as mad libs to help them learn the parts of speech. She then took her students down to the computer lab to let them be interactive and help them learn at the same time. The kids really enjoyed this time and while I was walking around the kids were working with each other to figure out what figure of speech was what and they were actually using very descriptive words that some high schoolers wouldn't even think about. I don't want to teach Language Arts and was wondering why some of us couldn't go to a PE class. I also didn't understand what this class was going to do to help the PE majors, but it wasn't so much the type of class that taught me something, but the environment we were in is what really opened my eyes to my future.
I think that is great that you want to be a coach as well as a teacher. I was also thinking about that, I think it would be a great way to get involved with the students especially if you are teaching at a middle school level. I also agree with you that it was cool that the teacher had her kids play mad libs. That is something that is fun and the kids enjoy but also educational and gets them to think.
ReplyDeleteKeeley,
ReplyDeleteI am glad you saw the value in visiting a language arts class! As I stated in my previous response, you are now required to teach more than PE. So, hopefully through this visit, you were able to learn some strategies and ideas for implementing other subject areas into PE.
For PE it would be extremely difficult to get the young student to listen to you! Which is frustrating at times. And wanting to be a coach as well the younger grades don't have sports yet. Sometimes it doesn't matter that we're not in the same environment as what we will be, but we can really learn something through any experience. I have learned more from walking down the streets and seeing some people than I have from some of my classes.
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