First Day of Second Grade!

Yesterday was the first day of my student teaching and I don't think I have ever been so nervous. I am usually so outgoing and bubbly, but I felt so nervous being in a school on the first day again. It was a half day so I had a general idea of how things work in the classroom and I learned all the student's names. Oh yea, we have 32 students :-p We had 31 out of the 32 there the first day while a lot of the other classrooms had 4-5 students missing. I am not sure what happened today, if that other student showed up, but it is defiantly going to be tough having so many bodies in the classroom. I can already tell days are going to be pretty exhausting, but never dull, which is good. It was nice to see what happened on the first day of school and where the students line up every morning and little things like that. My CT told me that she sees this year as a partnership or two teachers in a classroom and not one teacher and a helper. She really made me feel like this on the first day when she let me practice with the kids the countdown or the 'if you can hear me clap once' techniques to quiet the students. She said she wants the students to get used to hearing my voice as well, to respect me as a teacher and listen to me just as they do the same for her. We talked a lot about respect and what types of things second graders should be doing. Webster really emphasizes behavior expectations on the playground (which we talked about that first day) in the hallway and in the lunchroom, specifically they talk about being respectful. My CT showed the students how to sit properly on the rug and what they should be doing when someone is talking (look at them and no talking). To look at someone while they are talking and to not talk when someone is talking is showing respect. I think I heard the word respect easily 10 times that day, which I find really important. I wish that Reo did something like this at the beginning of the school year, which maybe they did, but if they did you could not tell. After every marking period the students will hear about the expectations in the classroom, lunchroom, playground and hallway again so there is constant reinforcement of the rules and expectations of the students. With so many students in our classroom it will be really important that the students understand the expectations and follow the rules, so my CT said we need to take things a little slower and to make things simple. We want the students to really learn the procedures and rules first before we dive into new content. I am really excited about this school year and cannot wait to experience my first full day in the classroom!!