Break Week

Thank goodness for Break week. I spent the majority of break week trying to play catch up from being sick and from the fast pace of the semester. I definitely did work, but did not check off nearly as many items off my checklist as I had hoped. Part of what I am playing catch up on in my Portfolio. As I had mentioned earlier in the year, as part of the Seminar class we are taking this term, we are creating a portfolio that we will bring with us on our job interviews. This includes our teaching philisophy, our community contributions, exemplarary lesson plans, a test we have given that we spend time reviewing and assessing, our resume and many other items. I actually was introduced to two MAT Alumni yesterday, one who teaches in NJ and the other in East Greenbush, who both said though the portfolio takes some time to do, it is worth it and they both used it in their interviews. They said it was great to be talking about something that you did and be able to pull out your portfolio and refer to it, it really provided the supporting evidence. It was nice to hear this from alumni. Though we have been told this often by our professors here at UGC, it is also nice to have them reinforced by those that are going through what we are. I am also the type of person that as long as I know all of the hard work will pay off, I am okay with chuggin along and making sure it represents me to the best of my ability.
  Let's see, today was my first day back to my internship. I think both myself and my students were not quite ready to be back. Returning after break is always the hardest, but I did my best to help them get back into the swing of things. Today was the first day of a busy week. I am having my supervisor observe me this week and we are also doing our three way meeting. This is when myself, my mentor and supervisor get together to discuss my progress this term, determine where my strengths and weaknesses are, what I want to accomplish from here forward and then discuss what I think my grade should be.... though I don't get my grade until grades come out. So hopefully all of that will go well and I will continue to do well with the program. This week we also start the fetal pig dissection. I am overall looking forward to this, though the smell I may be able to do without. Some of my students are really excited to be able to do the dissection, while I have few that are more skeptical. I had one student say "well then I am not coming." It should certainly be an interesting couple of weeks. I think I am going to go out and stock up on my antibacterial hand gel and some hand lotion.
  The end of the winter term is rapidly coming to an end which I am glad for, except for the MAT that means my MAT project is due. I have a lot more to do before I reach that point, but I guess something to look forward to. Once March 15th hits my MAT project will be complete and I will be looking ahead to my last officia term of Grad. School, which is exciting and scary all at once. I am glad that all of the hard graduate work will be complete, but then will be the task of finding a job. I had a Mock Interview at the Career Center at Union last week. I am really grateful I took advantage of this opportunity. They provided me valuable insight on how I can better sell myself, by really just making sure to highlight the important things I have to offer. He suggested if I had a hard time highlighting my strengths or how I would describe myself, to ask those that work with me, such as my supervisor, my mentor, my previous boss and those that work with me. They will be able to provide be some insight about me and my work ethic that I might not recognize, which I think is a great point. I was also provided some guidelines on my resume and other pointers that might better convey who I am and what I have to offer, so overall great experience.
  Okay that is it for now. I will keep you posted.

Any comments, questions, concerns, please let me know!