1)During this past week I observed another teacher and was watching how she dealt with discipline in the classroom. The particular class that I observed was large and during the long lunch period. There were many students who had difficulty focusing and staying on task and other students who must forget materials quite often. There were 3 different teachers in the classroom and 2 of them dealt with discipline. The same student was doing some things that were distracting to other students. One of the teachers dealt with the student by getting on his level and talking quietly to the student. The other teacher tried to talk with the student, but ended up moving the student to a separate desk on the side of the room. I think both options were effective, but by moving the student he was able to focus more and was much less distracting to the rest of the class.

2) So far I have not heard about how teachers deal with cheating in their classroom. I have not seen any cheating on homework occur, rather students just don't do their homework assignments. I think in my own classroom I would allow students to work together on homework, but both students must be contributing. If I see cheating I will definitely address it, but I would want to talk to both students separately. I would want to talk to both students about what they were doing and why it was wrong.

3)My high was that I taught my first lessons this week. I thought the lessons went well overall and really enjoyed teaching. This made me excited about the rest of the year. My low during my week was when my students did not respond right away during the group work time of my lesson. I started to panic, but just kept going. In the end it turned out fine and I think the students will work well together in the future.

Autumn Goals

I have 2 goals for this quarter:

1. Teach lessons in which students are engaged with one another and are learning dring the lesson.

2. Teach lessons with confidence

I chose the first goal because I want to impact the students I teach as much as possible. I know that my lessons will be falling in between my mentors lessons and I don't want the lessons to seem as an interruption in the curriculum. Instead I want students to get a lot out of my lessons and hope to interject as seamlessly as possible.

The second goal is personal. In the past I have been nervous teaching in front of mentors or someone who is evaluating my teaching. Usually when I teach to students without being evaluated I don't feel nervous at all. However, I really want feedback from you and my mentor in order to become the best teacher I can be. Therefore my goal is to be less and less nervous when teaching in front of other experienced teachers.