Monday September 7, 2015

Today is Labor Day. Most student teachers have been setting up their rooms
and attending professional development workshops for the past few weeks and are
anxiously waiting to meet their class tomorrow. This however, is not my situation. I
have already had one week of professional development and two weeks of
classroom experience with my cooperating teacher, Kelly Donohue, and her first
grade class at St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic School. I am a little bit behind on my
official journals but have been taking daily notes and small reflections about my
experiences. I will begin with the first week of professional development.
On Monday I arrived to school at 8:30 and met my teacher as well as many
other staff members. We participated in a full day Universal Design for Learning
workshop. We really got to know each other with interactive activities and learning
through our shared experiences. The workshop was very informational even though
I had learned about UDL in some of my classes it was all a very good reminder to
use different teaching strategies and not to stay set on a single learning style.
On Tuesday the scheduled PD in the morning was canceled. We had a quick
review of blood borne pathogens training then worked in the classroom all day. I
worked on setting up students chair bags and creating joint lessons for science
buddy time. On Wednesdays we join with Mrs. Stegehuis class for 4 th grade science
buddies. We planned two lessons. Both abut the senses. One of the lessons included
going outside to the schools habitat and the other had to do with experimenting
with senses. I will discuss more about those later. Planning the lessons went very
well. The teachers were very organized typing up the lesson on the board as we
discussed it. In the afternoon I made a sign for the classroom with our years theme,
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. This took longer than I
thought it would. I had to find all of the letters in an unorganized pile of alphabet
cutouts and even use tape for some extra makeshift letters. After I finally spelled all
of the words I glued them to construction paper and rounded the edges. At the end
of the day I was proud of my work. Also on Tuesday I got a lot of great things from
teachers. I picked up some signs and calendar resources for my future classroom.
The second grade teacher Mrs. Lake, came in with a box for me. It was filled with
teachers editions of the Bridges math program that the first graders will be using. It
was very useful to have that set of curriculum to follow along with Kelly when she
teaches and when I start to teach lessons myself.
Wednesday morning we worked some more in the classroom. I helped set up
packets for the parent meeting that night. Before lunch we had popsicles in the park
where I got to meet a lot of my students and their parents. It was a great way for
students, parents, and staff to meet and greet each other. It was a great way to
ease the nerves of any first graders, especially those new to the school. In the
afternoon we had a staff meeting where we discussed lunch, recess, and dismissal
procedures as well as signed up for services. The meeting was very helpful for m to

get all of the procedures straight before students came. That night Kelly held a
parent night just to meet the parents and let them k now a little about the school
year and her classroom. She ran a power point that she made and it worked well.
We had a good turn out and the parents were great. I could tell Kelly was a little
nervous but everything worked out very well in the end.
Thursday was amazing. We had a staff retreat at the Franciscan Life Process
Center in Lowell, MI. It was a little rainy but that did not dampen our spirits. The day
was filled with staff bonding and faith building activities. We walked the Stations of
the Cross, attended mass, played team building games, held discussions, and
participated in a service project for the center. I really enjoyed my last day of PD. It
brought everything together. The first week even with just the staff I felt 100%
welcomed and comfortable to be myself at my new student teaching position.