Reflection#1

Weekly Reflection #1: January 21-24 This was my first week at my practice center The Palmas Academy at Humacao.

It was a very interesting start; because many things happened that challenged me from the get go, I believe these were meant to show me as a person what I was capable of doing as a teacher. I will not deny that I was very nervous on day one, but everything flowed so well that by the next day I wasn’t nervous anymore. That is, until I found out my cooperating teacher was absent because she was so sick. Still, I took a deep breath and faced my challenge head on. After letting my professor know that my cooperating teacher was sick I went to school. My plan was to maximize my time and start all the projects that I knew I had to turn in, like my nucleus study and my group profile, however, it seemed that life had other plans for me. I got to my cooperating teacher’s classroom to sign my attendance sheet and I find chaos. I see a teacher, “trying” to calm them down in all the wrong ways and I couldn’t help but feel like I just had to do something. After looking at my teacher’s plans and consulting with the teacher that was there, I decided to take charge and give the class.

I decided to review their spelling words because they were suppose to have a test that day. I made a little game and after fifteen minutes of class the substituting mom was there to take over the other classes. Then I thought well this is my chance, I took charge, I settled the situation, I think she can take over from here. But, surprise, surprise, the substituting mom liked what I was doing and asked me to do the same with the other groups. So here I am my second day of practice teaching and I’m literally teaching. Since I knew the sequence of the material that was being given to the other groups, I gave the lesson plan that was supposed to go in the curriculum sequence. The substituting mother was with me all the time, supervising and giving me tips and suggestions.

By the end of my four hours, I was already familiarized with the book and the lesson plans. I explained her what needed to be done for the last two groups and I left for college to take my two classes. The next day the cooperating teacher came back but she was still sick and her voice was not very clear or understandable, so she asked me to help with her class; team teaching. The day after that my cooperating teacher was absent again. She was too sick and her throat was too soar to even talk, so just like the first day she was absent I got there and took charge again. The same substituting mother was with me so she was more than happy that I was there to help. She rewarded me with many helpful tips on how to deal with parents in this institution because they are very difficult to deal with according to teachers. It is to be expected I guess, it is a very expensive school after all and even I would be here if I was paying this much money for my children’s education.

Over all it was an amazing experience. I received really good feedback from the mother and my fellow teachers. I am grateful for this experience because it made me get out of my comfort zone and it proved me once again I was born to teach.