Half and Half: Working at the Middle School and High School

Flexibility, flexibility, flexibility was the key to surviving this week. This week started with me splitting days at the high school and middle school. I observed at the high school and started working with students at the middle school. The week ended with 2 half days for final exams and a teacher inservice day.

Middle School Assignment

Middle School

• Clarity: Keeping middle schoolers on task and engage can be a challenge at times.I learned that what can take me 5 minutes to do takes them the whole block. I worked a lot this week on how to keep assignments clear and assessable. I am excited to do a soils lab with them next week and see how running this lab on my own goes. 
• Creativity: The classwork given to the students was mainly inquiry based and the student got really into it. The 7th graders worked on a resume and cover letter. They had a basic rubric just laying out the parts of each but, the job applying to was all on them and the detail were all on them. Students got really into it and were also then learning about said careers at the same time. I was really impressed with their work and creativity in this class. 

High School students finishing their fermentation labs

High School

• Exploring: How do we encourage students to break out of their comfort zone and try new things? We let them explore and want to try new things. In Into to Ag this week I got to see students pushing out of their comfort zone with public speaking. Each day they tried a new technique and speak more of the FFA Creed. This was done by encouragement from the teacher. He created a safe space for them to explore in because they couldn't fail in that space.

Goals for next week

• Teaching: I pick up a 7th grade class, an 8th grade class and Into to Agriculture (9th grade) class. I want to focus on making sure I have organization of how I am handing out materials and collecting work- mainly becoming familiar with schoology. I also want to come up with basic class procedures and implement them. My into class is a brand new class coming in so establishing routines will be critical.
• Lab: I will be teaching a lab this week. I want to work on instructions while doing this lab and demonstration of steps for my students.I also want to learn more about equipment in the labs on site.

Questions

• How do you help new students coming into a program set up their SAE? Do you spend a class period on it using AET? This part will be graded so, how can I create the "felt need" besides the grade?
• Middle School Lab: How can I efficiently set up the lab to make it run "smoothly." Do you give them the whole procedure and let them work or a few steps at a time? What advice do you have for a first time teacher doing a lab in class?