Week 1

So I've finished my first week of Teacher Assisting and it continues to show me that I'm in the field that I belong in. I did have my fair share of first day jitters, but after each day I feel a bit more confident in what I do within the classroom. I felt a little useless the first day or two in the class, but I feel as though Jill and I have figured out a few things that we can focus on throughout the day.

The first hour class we're present in is Algebra 2, while second and third hour are Algebra 1. However, third hour runs a little bit differently than the other hours. Third hour is co-taught with a Special Education teacher, which means that nearly half of the students are special needs children. This is an extremely valuable experience for me since I've had little to no interaction with students with special needs. I'm definitely thankful that I'm able to have a range of students to learn from.

Within the classroom thus far, Ms. Cole has shown us how to grade homework assignments, enter them into the computer, and where all the printing occurs. Ms. Cole also has a warm-up problem on the board for each class to complete before they discuss new material, and she has clued us into the types of problems that she's looking for and for the past few days we've been able to write them up ourselves.

The struggle now is learning all the students' names! But my favorite part of this experience, thus far, is being able to interact with the students after the lesson by helping them when they become 'stuck' on a problem.  I can finally see what I want to do with my life, and I'm excited for what's to come :)