Back to school!

Well my first placement is in the books and now its back to being the student. The first week back in class was a good one, the first day was mostly spent debriefing and then we got back right into the swing of things. During my placement I used a lot of technology. Things as simple as using the iPad to take attendance and insert grades, to more complex things like using apple tv to make the whole gym wireless.

When i first got to my school, my CT was talking to me about how another teacher had set up his gym wireless and he want to do the same. So we set up the apple tv and ran a cable from the apple tv to the gyms stereo system. So we could play music over the sound system through our phones and we could control the volume and what songs played all through our phone. It was great because before that we always had to go into the office and now we could do it from anywhere! The other awesome thing was we could play videos off the iPad from YouTube and project them on to the wall with the projector. It was something i used a lot with workout routines and warm up videos. Another great use for that was we set up a scoreboard with the iPad. We downloaded a scoreboard app and it worked great. So instead of having to spend a few hundred dollars on a new scoreboard, we bought an 8 dollar app that did all the same things.

I used a lot of technology during my placement, and it was great to see all the different ways it could be used in the classroom. One day when i have my own classroom i definitely want to emphasize the use of technology, it makes things easier and much more efficient and for the most part it is very easy to use.

My student teaching experience

When i first went out to my placement 5 weeks ago, i was a little nervous. It was a school i had never been in aside from the time i had met my CT. But it did not take long and those nerves were gone and i was excited to be there. I had a great experience, my CT was great, the school was fantastic and overall the students were great. I was in a grade 11/12 phys.ed class, a great 10 phys.ed class, a grade 9 ICT class, and gym supervision was also one of my "classes." Basically we just supervised the gym and it was the period when we ran all the intramural programs.

The first week i observed my CT and got myself familiar with the students and the way the classes were run. The second week, i took over all the classes and started teaching but for these weeks i taught my CT's lessons. Weeks 3-5 were all my own lessons and i had full control of the classes. I ran a basketball unit, a floor hockey unit, and the final week i taught health. For the ICT class i just taught my CT's units, i mainly taught how to use publisher while i was there. I had the students create a few different projects like a menu, a magazine cover, and i had them create their own product and they had to market it.

I got the full teacher experience while i was out on my placement and i couldn't have asked for a better first experience. I learned a lot over the five weeks and i cant wait for my next placement to begin and even more than that, I cant wait until I am a full time teacher with my own classroom.