Mentor Teacher

Alright, so you may have noticed I changed the name of my blog. I still don't like it, but I knew it needed a change. I am still trying to figure out a name that is a little more creative that relates to teaching. Suggestions will be taken. But anyways.... I met with my mentor teacher last week and she is awesome! I have a great feeling about my teacher, the school and the classroom I am going to be in. She is a wonderful lady who is very organized and has had a lot of experience with Michigan State interns, so she already knows what to expect. The techniques and structure she uses in her classroom are things I want to have in my own classroom, so it will be awesome to see that implemented in a classroom. She uses reading and writing workshop, which I am very excited to see used in the classroom and she has an ELMO and a Smartboard, but it's called something else, but it's basically a Smartboard. She was telling me how they use Everyday Math and that they do social studies and science, but she typically rotates the subjects, so one week there is science and another it might be social studies. We talked about word study and that the students do a hands on activities during science and social studies to make it more exciting. She doesn't believe in doing centers that involve doing tough work because she knows the students will half-ass it (I'm so happy about this!). She says the centers she does is games or fun activities and she moves the centers around so the students are not constantly wandering around. The one thing I found the most interesting and exciting was the school's and my teacher's philosophy on teaching the students to be modeled citizens and teaching them rules. My teacher talked about how she assumes that the students come into the school or the classroom not knowing how to do things such as being respectful, pushing in your chair when you get up, lining up to leave the classroom correctly etc... The school teaches the students how they need to act in the lunchroom, in the hallways and on the playground. She says that they will review this after report cards are handed out just to remind the students. My teacher says she does the same type of things in her classroom, but she says they talk about what it means to be respectful and how to be respectful instead of just saying all the time 'be respectful'. I think if Reo took this mentality and philosophy the school would be more successful, the students would not act out as much and they school would be a better learning community. I am very excited to see how Webster does this and I will be taking detailed notes on how this works out because I think this technique could be useful in an urban setting, which is Webster is an urban school, but from what I observed last week there are many more Caucasian students than in Reo. My teacher also gave me a book to look over this summer on comprehension because this is what she is going to be use in her classroom. She also gave me a blog to follow (All about Comprehension), which is written by the author of the book she gave me that I will also be keeping up with. I am following her through this blog. I am even more excited to be a part of this classroom then before and am going to be reading books, articles, blogs and whatever I can get my hands on to prepare for this internship. I can't wait!