The Student Teaching Journey Begins...

Going to step away from the Disney part of the blog for a moment and talk about a journey I am beginning in my educational/professional life. Yesterday, I got my official letter from my Senior Seminar class saying who my cooperating teachers would be for student teaching! I have received my first choice, which is Claymont Elementary School, a school that is about 5 minutes from my house and where I went from 4th through 6th grade.

My Official Letter!!

The principal there, Jim Grant, is the principal my mother worked under at Darley Road Elementary before the school closed down and my two cooperating teachers are women that I know and have worked with before from Darley as well! My regular education placement is with Maria Natalie in her first grade classroom where I will be from Jan 10th to the end of February.  My special education placement is with Rachel Goldwasser, a teacher in the Delaware Autistic Program and she teaches Kindergarten through 2nd grade.

I am really honored and excited that these teachers are going to let me become a part of their classroom family and I cannot wait to meet the students! Now that I know my placements, my next step is to go to the classrooms and spend at least 5 hours in each and write a paper on my experiences.  I am planning to go to Mrs. Natalie's classroom next Friday to visit and will see Ms. Goldwasser's room after Thanksgiving.

I am still deciding how I want to blog about my experiences. I know I will be updating with big events, but for smaller updates, I am possibly thinking of doing a video blog update.  Not sure yet though, I will have to see as they year continues. 

Reading Writing Thats the Rule

This time next week, I will be going to Neumann University, and beginning the classes that lead off my very final year of school.  Yes, my senior year of college begins next Tuesday, with an 8 am Classical Music class no less.

Being a senior year, there will obviously be harder classes as I come closer than ever to my major, but there will also be some extra challenges.  The first and hardest will be entering my last semester participating in Neumann Music.  This music program has been amazing and I have learned so much, I will dearly miss it.  And this last semester of Music comes directly after learning about the departure of a dear music teacher and friend.  Her family has to move to Morocco, so it will make the department at the University very different.

This first semester will have a very challenging class in it, Senior Sem, where I will be learning about everything I will be doing in the spring during Student Teaching.  I know I will be blogging about the crazy stuff I will have to do there, so look for those.  The other challenge for this semester will be working on my Honors paper.  These are usually written in the spring semester, but because of student teaching, I have to write the paper this fall.

It shall be an interesting 10 months, so look for the occasional update as to the status of my classes and the challenges I face with Student Teaching.