UGC MAT Student Blog

Update

2011-01-11T21:08:00.000-05:00

Hi All! I know that it has been a long time since I have last posted and I certainly have a lot to update you on. To keep it brief because I should be planning, I did get a teaching position 1 week prior to school starting. After tutoring all summer, I was hired by a private school in Schenectady, N.Y. I am currently teaching Living Environment, Chemistry and College Biology. I must say my first year of teaching has certainly been exhausting and rewarding all at the same time. I feel so fortunate to have gotten a job in the economic market that was awaiting us on graduation. I really like where I am. The teachers, staff, administration and students have been great, its hard to believe I am almost halfway through the school year. Last year has certainly prepared me for this year. I still feel very overwhelmed at times, but that is the nature of being a first year teacher. I have spoken with many of my other classmates and they are all feeling the same way, but we all know we will get to the end of the year with flying colors. On that note I am back to doing some work, I will try to touch base again soon. Good luck to those in the program and for those that are considering UGC make sure to take a close look, it is certainly worth it!

Officially Graduated and Certified

2010-06-22T09:00:00.001-04:00

   It has now been official for over a week that I have graduated from the UGC MAT program and I am certified by NYS as a Biology and General Science teacher. I was thinking today how quickly it all went and can still hardly believe that I graduated over a year ago. The program here at UGC was certainly an intense one, but it went by so quickly and was well worth it. This past Thursday was my last day at Troy High School. I cannot belive my time is over there and though so many of my students may not believe me, I will miss them all greatly. I can also say that 100% of my students passed the Living Environment Regents exam, so I was thrilled to see that all of my hard work as well as theirs paid off. I ended my last day my going out to dinner with the entire Biology department and one of the other UGC Biology interns. They were such amazing individuals to work with and I learned so much from all of them whether it be about Biology, teaching or staying sane, they were always there to lend a helping hand or ear.
   Graduation itself was a beautiful ceremony and though the weather did not quite hold, I took in every moment because we had all worked so hard to get there. I am currently in the process of applying for jobs, so keep your fingers crossed for me. I will be working at UGC all summer with the School of Education Office and the President's Office, so if you have questions, concerns or just want to say hi stop over and see me. I think that is it for now.
   Looking forward to dinner tonight with my supervisor, mentor, fellow intern graduate and her mentor. Nice way to celebrate the year. I feel very fortunate to have worked with such a great mentor and supervisor who were there to support and encourage me every step of the way this year and for me to learn from. I truly feel that I have grown so much due to their expertise and guidance.

Only 5 Teaching days left!

2010-06-03T14:31:00.000-04:00

I cannot believe I only have 5 days left with my students and that graduation is 8 days away. I truly cannot believe how quickly the end of the year is approaching. It is both exciting and scary all at the same time. Graduating means that I have finished a very long year full of hard work, but it also means that I am back out in the real world in pursuit of a job. Right now there are very few teaching openings to come by so it is a waiting game all around. I am confident it will all eventually work out and I just hope I find a school that is the perfect fit. Once I graduate, I will still have a week left at Troy, where I will help students that need to to finish labs, opportunities for review and then Wednesday, June 16th they will take the Regents. I will help with the proctoring and will be there for the grading process. Once that is complete I will have a weekend before starting my job at UGC. I was given the opportunity to come back to UGC to help out over the summer with the School of Education, School of Management and the President's Office. I am glad that I will be able to work with some of the amazing professors and staff that UGC has to offer a little longer. Hopefully during this time a job will become available and I will be hired, crossing my fingers. I still do not think it has completely set in that I am so close to being done. It has been something we have all been working towards this entire year and it seems surreal that I will finally have reached the end. I completed two of my courses this week and the only course left is seminar which I have this evening and for the last time next Wednesday. It will be such a relief when all of my work is handed in and there is nothing left for me to really do but walk across the stage to graduate.

Please let me know if you have questions!

Super long weekend, Love it!

2010-05-27T15:21:00.000-04:00

Today starts the beginning of a four day weekend. We have Monday off for Memorial Day and Friday they gave as a teacher compensation day. After class tonight I am heading to NH to visit family and tomorrow I am going to a Red Sox game. Other big plans for the weekend, so excited for a break and to get away. Alot of school work to do for next week, considering it is the last week for two of my classes. Plant Biology meets for the last time Tuesday and Computer class Wednesday. I have one major project in Plant and 3 in computer. Luckily my plant project is almost done. We had to collect tree, shrub and herb/weed specimens that we had to mount and then idenitify. It was alot of work, not hard, but just took alot of time to find the specimens, cut the specimens down appropriately to fit on construction paper, mount and label. I took some time last night to do all of the identifications so I only have a few loose ends to wrap up which was a relief. Now I just need to get cracking at my computer stuff, which I seem to be making progress. Things at Troy are quickly winding down, only 8 days of classes, which is crazy to me and the Regents on June 16th. Graduation is 2 weeks from Saturday, this year has just totally flown by I can hardly believe it. No other updates to report I think. Hope everyone is staying cool and please let me know if you have questions!

Have a Safe Memorial weekend!

Last visit

2010-05-18T13:38:00.000-04:00

Today was my last supervisor visit most likely and last three way evaluation meeting with my mentor and supervisor. It is so amazing to me how quickly things are winding down. I am waiting in anticipation for graduation and waiting to see what pans out with jobs, please keep your fingers crossed. I must say today's meeting and observation was the best yet, I was told it was my best lesson yet, so going out on a really positive note is always a great thing. I had a great lesson with my students, they were very engaged and asking really good questions and I had their attention. The past couple of weeks have been stressful and classroom management has been difficult, so I am not sure what about today was different, but it worked and I am thankful. It was also neat to see the students having a discussion and I utilized their feedback well.
Yesterday, I had the oppportunity to be involved in a mock interview. The Career Center here at UGC organized the opportunity for MAT students to do a panel interview with 3 individuals, most UGC alumni, to get us comfortable with the panel interviews we will be encountering when applying for jobs. It was a really great opportunity, that I am thrilled I was able to take advantage of. They asked some great questions and provided valuable feedback. I figure the more practice I get, the better I will get so that I can do a great job in an interview to hopefully get a job.
Other than that, not too much more to report. Just working on final projects for the term and hoping to end things on a high note and be closer to a job that I will love!
If you have any questions, please let me know.

Only about a month left

2010-05-11T15:38:00.000-04:00

Just looked at the calendar today to notice that I only have about four weeks left until I graduate! It is hard to believe I only started this program about a year ago. It is amazing how much time flies. When they tell you the MAT Program is intense but goes by faster than you can blink it really does! It is amazing how much has been accomplished in a relatively short period of time. I am not going to lie, it is a lot of work, and most of my time and energy have been devoted to school, but to be done in one year and applying for jobs, is a time and money saver and gets the job done right, faster. And if you plan right, you can still squeeze in some fun things to keep you sane and healthy. Also, having the year long internship where most of us started teaching our classes right away, I can certainly say with speaking with prospective employers is something that truly impresses them and sets us apart. It is amazing to me after having gone through almost the entire year to imagine not having a full year internship. It has been great to be able to see the curriculum all the way through, especially since it had been approx. 5-7 years since I had dealt with most of the information in addition to seeing what types of struggles the students have as well as questions. In addition to be able to know the students, to be a constant in their lives is huge and very rewarding. I have seen a lot of growth in many of my students, and smaller growth in others, which is still progress. It is hard to imagine not walking into Troy High everyday next year, it really has become home for me. I know many of the other teachers, the hall monitors and some of the other staff, I am truly going to miss it. For those of you that are starting this summer you are in for a real journey. The summer though at times seems overwhelming was truly one of my favorite parts of the program and is just the beginning of the workload. So enjoy the summer program, take in all that you can, because it only gets a little crazier. Hopefully I will get to meet many of you over the summer as I will be working at the Graduate Center this summer, so please if you see me, say hi and ask any questions if you have any, I remember being in your shoes and the more questions you ask, the better it will be!

Hope to meet many of you soon!

Moving along

2010-05-05T14:02:00.000-04:00

So last week's post did not publish as I thought it had so I ended up posting it today though it was last week's information (sorry about that). This week has been pretty busy so far, here I thought it was going to be on the quiet side. My supervisor came in today and I gave a quiz yesterday and I am just trying to gear up for interviews, job applications, wrapping up the school year preparing my students for the Regents, it is just crazy. As I had mentioned last Friday I had the opportunity to chaperone a field trip of my mentor's AP students to RPI. This was a lot of fun and the weather was great for walking around RPI's campus.We had the opportunity to get into the labs, where the students and myself were able to dissect fruit flies (well I attempted, it was really hard!). We were also able to see microprep, which was all the preparation needed so they could run different samples they were testing, so many steps for the small amount they end up with at the end. We also were able to see the process where they were able to test drosophila wing muscle, to see how strong they were and various other items. The students seemed really interested and was a great learning experience for them. We were able to have lunch in the dining hall, which was nice to regroup for the afternoon. Overall a great day and a great way to end the week.
As I had mentioned a few times last Friday, was the Wine 101 hosted by our very own Dean Allen of Education. He was our host for the evening and walked us through the wine tasting process, as well as introducing us to eight wines, share what they should smell and taste like and what meals they went best with. There were also appetizers and desserts served. It was an enjoyable evening and I have some new wines to try, I am definitely a white wine fan, so there is a new one, beginning with a V that I need to go out and get. We received a booklet that listed the wines we tried and other future suggestions, which is always helpful. Great food, beverages, conversation and company. This Thursday actually marks the last TGIT of the term. It will actually be a fundraiser for the Cancer Society, so they ask us to donate $3 per student which all $ collected will go to the Cancer Society, so we are hoping for a large turn out. So I am hoping to finally make it since I have been unable to during the year. This Friday will also be our last Urban Roundtable. It is amazing how quickly things seem to be coming to a close. Only a little over a month until Graduation it is so hard to believe.

Well I think that is it for now! Please write with questions!

Busy Busy week

2010-05-05T13:32:00.000-04:00

   This week has been extremely busy, even busier than I had been expecting, not quite sure why. I know part of the reason is my large presentation for my seminar course is tomorrow so I have been working like crazy to put the final touches on it. I really love my topic and I am super excited to talk about it, but the overall delivery always makes me nervous. I am very glad to be getting to present earlier rather than later. I feel like the later on in the term it gets, the more work there is so this is one less thing I need to do. I may have mentioned earlier that my topic is KIPP schools. One of my classmates is doing a presentation on charter schools,so I had to find ways to cover what makes KIPP different, which is easy enough to do, but just wanted to avoid any overlap. It is an hour to an hour and twenty minuted presentation, which I think to date is the longest I have had to present, so I am hoping it all goes well. Part of the presentation is supposed to be interactive, so if I planned it right takes some of the burden away from me.
   This Friday, the very much anticipated Wine Tasting event and food is being held. I have been looking forward to this for weeks and has been what I have been looking ahead to with this busy week. I will certainly let you know how it goes. Also Friday, I am helping my mentor chaperone his AP students to RPI. My mentor had worked in one of the labs at RPI over the summer and thought it would be really neat to bring his AP Biology students there for the day to tour the facilities and learn about the different research that is being done right across the street. We will also be doing lunch there, so this is a great way to end the week and I am really interested myself to see what is being done at RPI.
  Well I think that is all for now. Hoping the weather gets warmer soon, it is freezing today.

What a whirlwind

2010-04-22T14:30:00.001-04:00

   All of a sudden life has picked up and is going at a supersonic pace. Cannot even believe last week is over let alone almost this week. I literally hit the ground sprinting coming back from break and really have not stopped since. I have a pretty big presentation coming up on KIPP schools (Knowledge is Power Program). I had the opportunity to visit one of the KIPP schools in Albany yesterday where I was able to tour the school with a current student and then speak with the school's co-founder Dan Ceaser. The school and students truly amazed me. There were pictures and displays of work everywhere. The students were so well behaved and respectful and the teachers and staff were extremely friendly. It was great to hear about the school from a student perspective and I am excited to share my visit experience with my fellow classmates next week.
   Last week I spent a great deal of time gathering my transcripts and letters of recommendations so that they could be uploaded onto Interfolio. This way when I start applying for jobs my items can go out immediately and all go out together, rather than having to individually request them each time from each teacher and each college. Things with my internship feel like they have picked up quite a bit as well. We just finished the first of three units on Genetics. Genetics is certainly a harder concept for them to understand so it has taken quite a bit of planning and preparation on my behalf to get through it. Their quiz is tomorrow so I am kind of nervous for them how they will do. I really slowed down the pace, making sure to constantly ask them if they are with me and if they have questions. I also strongly encouraged them to see me before school tomorrow to review, so I am hoping some of them will take advantage of this. I stressed that I know Genetics is not easy, I remember, but that I am here to help them get it and that I want them to do well. So tomorrow will be the true test.
   Next week I am very excited that our very own Dean of Education will be hosting a Wine tasting event here at UGC next Friday. He is a wine connoisseur we have heard so I am excited to learn more about some wines that I have not tried before along with some great food and company. It will certainly be a nice and relaxing way to end a crazy few weeks. By then my huge presentation will be done. Other than that not too much more to report. For those that are starting the summer program this summer, so exciting, some of us were saying we are going to miss it. For those that are still deciding, it has been a great experience, I cannot imagine going anywhere else. Let me know if you have questions!

Gotta love breaks!

2010-04-08T12:52:00.000-04:00

So we are yet on another break, our last full one before the year is over. Because graduate classes are in session it never really feels too much like a break, but the weather was so nice over the weekend I took an overall break from work. Next week I am starting a new unit which I needed to work on from scratch so I had been working on it alot but needed to make some final alterations on it before I coped it today. I also had to write a lab which I finished as well. I now need to test out the lab today to make sure it works or no minor tweaks need to be made. I have also been trying to gather my letters of recommendation as well as making transcript requests so that when the job search gets in full swing (which I hope it does) I will be well prepared.
I started my 3 graduate classes for the Spring term last week. So far so good. I actually have to do a presentation in my seminar course on a type of education reform and the one I was able to get was KIPP schools. I actually found a great book that gave me alot of valuable insight titled Work Hard. Be Nice. It was very helpful so I am hoping to utlize that as well as online articles and I am hoping to visit the local KIPP school in Albany. I am really hoping to make that visit because to be able to meet with the staff, teachers and students, to sit in on classes and see how it is done, would be valuable to me on so many levels. Not only for presentation purposes, but so I can become more informed as I head through my job search and I can also share with my peers what things are being done there and things that might be useful for us to try as teachers. Luckily this week I did not have any classes, but certainly had work in their place. Being two of my classes are held in actual schools, we are unable to be there when the school is closed, so we were given assignments to work on in lieu of that fact.In seminar we were given a book to read and needed to write a proposal for our project, so this week has been crazy.
On a fun note I am giving myself a break and heading to Boston on Friday for the weekend to celebrate my bestfriend's birthday! I hope the weather holds out for us, Boston is a great city, especially when the weather is great.
Well that is it for now. I will check back in next week, which I am sure will be a crazy one. New unit, new lab, supervisor visiting on Monday, full week and all 3 graduate classes, can you feel my excitement?! I like my classes this term, but I must admit I have a bit of spring fever and will be excited when classes are over and I know my plan for the Fall.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Rain Rain Go Away!

2010-03-30T13:39:00.000-04:00

Yuck all of this rain is definitely not a great way to start the week. I keep hearing good weather is on the way, but all of this rain is making me sleepy and both me and my kids not wanting to be in school (not that I would admit that to them). You can tell we are all ready for April break which luckily starts on Friday. So it will be nice to have the time to regroup, except we do have graduate classes, so it will not be a complete break. I will hopefully start getting my act together in preparing for the application for jobs process. I need to set up an account with a company called Interfolio. It is a company that the MAT program recommends for us to send all of our letters of recommendations and transcripts and the company will compile all the items into one file and when we apply to a job we just tell them who and where to either mail or electronically send what items. That way it all goes and once and we can pick and choose what items need to be sent and how. It may get a little costly, but having to request transcripts each time as well as letters of recommendations, gets a little crazy so hopefully this will prevent chaos.
  Tonight I start back with my classes so hopefully I can get back into the swing of that quickly, though I must admit it is going to be an adjustment to go back to three classes and my last one each week being Thursday. I was spoiled only having classes Monday and Tuesday last term and now having them Tuesday-Thursday is going to be an adjustment. Luckily though after this term classes are done so I am trying to focus on that.
  We just finished up on our Human Reproduction unit, which I think my students might actually be sad about. Though I started off hesitant about how it would go, I was really glad to see they were excited about a topic and were open and willing to share their questions. It was a good thing to be able to clarify any misconceptions and educate them on things that they had no clue of. It was fun to see them excited and eager to learn. They also asked many questions that I wasn't totally sure about, so it was a great opportunity for me to do further research and come back to report to them.
  That is all for now. Check back in next week!

It's Official!

2010-03-24T14:17:00.000-04:00

It is official that I have completed and passed all three of my Teaching Certification Exams as well as received my grades for the winter term, so I am officially moving on to my last term in the MAT program. I can hardly believe how quickly this year has gone and that in less than three months I will be graduating and have my Certification and Masters Degree. Now it is all about the job hunt and working with my students to prepare them for the Regents. Today I took my first step towards the job seach by attending the Education Expo down at the Empire State Plaza. There were approximately 25 school districts represented, both public and private. The majority were from the local area and NYS, but there were two schools from Maryland, one from Nevada and another from Alaska. It was a bit nerve racking, but I am glad that I was able to get a sense of what they were looking for as well as what job opportunities might be available this fall. Unfortunately right now, without the school budgets having been passed, many schools are unsure of what vacancies they will have and thus are not posting open positions. So I will need to keep an open mind on places and locations, which is okay for me, because ultimately I just want to teach and be able to work with the students.
   Currently in my internship I am teaching Human Reproduction, which has certainly been an eventful unit. My students are very interested and open to asking questions on just about anything. I was surprised by their enthusiasm and interest in the subject, but welcome the opportunity to have their full attention and to be able to answer their questions. It is great to see how comfortable they are with me by the types of questions they are asking. They are extremely curious and look to me to find the answers, which is quite rewarding.
   Other than that, not too much more to report. The spring term classes start next week, so I am relishing having my evenings free from class and grad school work, so I am trying to get ahead in my internship planning as well as catching up on life.
   For those that are looking to start in the summer, I highly encourage you to apply and choose UGC. It has been an amazing experience. You will learn so much about yourself, teaching and most importantly your students. The one-year internship has truly changed me in ways I never imagined and I do feel that I will be so prepared for when I have my own classroom hopefully this fall. The staff and Professors here are so helpful and knowledgeable. Everyone is always willing to lend a helping hand or ear and help to make the busy year a little less stressful. If you have questions, comments, concerns, please post a comment and I would be happy to help!

Spring is finally on its way

2010-03-17T15:28:00.000-04:00

   Hope everyone is enjoying the sunshine and warmer weather, I know I am. It came at a perfect time as the Winter term was wrapping up. I have submitted all of my projects, including the largest one, MAT project and I am trying to catch up on everything else. Let's hope I can make use of the next two weeks before classes pick back up and the job hunting season begins.
   Let's see, nothing new to report at my internship, still liking the school, my students, my mentor, other teachers and staff. It really has been a great experience so far and I look forward to continuing learning as the months progress. It is hard to believe April is next month and school will almost be over. I am very grateful this has been a one year internship. It would have been really hard on me to leave my students mid-year and as much as they can give me a hard time, I think it would've been tough on my students after just having gotten used to me, to learn another teacher and their style and expectations. Also, I will have one full year of experience under my belt, have one year of lesson plans and will have seen a full year's curriculum including Regents preparation as well as proctoring and grading the Regents. I think it will make my teaching hopefully next year that much easier.
  On a non-school related note, as I have mentioned before I am a Siena Alumni, and the Saints won their third MAAC Tournament in a row which means they are heading to the NCAA tournament. Their first game is this Friday, at 2:30 in Spokane,WA against Purdue (#4). We are all hoping for a win and that they progress on. Looking forward to seeing them on tv. Another fun Siena note, a recent Siena grad Kenny Hasbrouck was signed by the Heat and is now a member of the team. I remember watching him at the TU and am so excited he got this amazing offer, go Kenny.
   Well I guess that is it as far as updates, thanks for reading and if you have questions/comments/anything I should talk about, please let me know!

Winter Term is almost complete

2010-03-10T15:46:00.000-05:00

  Hi All, hope everyone has been enjoying the sunny warmer weather, I know I have been trying to soak it in. This past week has been a whirlwind yet again. I submitted my Portfolio last week and actually got it back and graded already this week, which was a relief. I submitted three labs modified for my Final Project for Biological Instrumentation. All that is standing in my way for the end of this term is my MAT project. I met with my advisor yesterday and she talked about changes I can make to my paper to polish it for the final submission on Monday. I think after meeting with her I know what needs to get done and now all I need to do is do it. Though this project has had its challenges, I have learned so much about myself, teaching, the research process and reasons why my blog for my students could be very successful. I truly hope I am able to implement this plan once I get a permanent teaching position.
  Today we started to wrap up the fetal pig dissection. All the students have left is the optional brain dissection and separating out the intestines, so we can measure who has the longest intestine. Separating the intestines without nicking or cutting them is something that requires a lot of finesse and patience, so I am excited to see who wins in the end. Today, third quarter mid-term grades were due. I was quite pleased that quite a bit of my students have increased since last quarter, so hopefully they can keep up the momentum for the rest of the quarter.
  On a side note, this past Friday, the Graduate College hosted an etiquette dinner at Glen Sanders Mansion. It was open to all UGC students, for $15 you paid for a four course meal with an etiquette expert. I initially wasn't sure if I was going to go, but thought having more exposure to proper dinner etiquette as well as a great meal with great company how could I go wrong? It was a great evening, the food was excellent, the room we were in was nice, the etiquette speaker was knowledgeable and entertaining and there was a good crowd from UGC that participated. I am thrilled I went, it was definitely a great different way to spend a Friday evening.
   Well that is all for now. I will check back in soon!

And March has arrived

2010-03-01T14:50:00.001-05:00

Hi all, cannot even believe that today is March 1st. Time is flying by, I can hardly believe graduation is in just about 3 months, that is craziness to me. Last week was a blur, that is for sure. We came back from break to have crazy weather which caused a snow day on Wednesday, which I must admit could not have come at a better time. The amount of work left to be done and my students still coming off of a break put me in high stress mode, so Wednesday was very much needed for me to get some work done and be able to breathe. I know all that needs to get done will get done and the end of the term will be here before I know it. We started working with the fetal pigs in my class last Friday, which overall went smoother than I thought. I had a couple of students that protested at first, but before I knew it, got involved in the process. I think alot of it is the fear of the unknown and not knowing what to expect. I think it definitely helps that at the beginning we give students the choice of how involved they would like to be. Giving a choice and allowing them to be somewhat in control and have a better sense of what is expected certainly makes a difference. I think alot of them really liked being able to be hands on and do something different. Hopefully the momentum continues as we move through. It really is a great opportunity for them to be able to dissect the fetal pig because they are able to connect all of the units that we learned talking about body systems. They are now able to see what the structures actually look like, consist of and where they are found. I think being able to make these connections makes what we have taught them that much more valuable.
   We will soon be registering for Spring classes, we can actually start doing that today online. This is the first term we will be able to register online, which I think will be helpful in time and paper trails.
   Other than that, pretty much done with my portfolios, just putting the final touches on them. I say portfolios, because we make one copy that we will use to take with us to job interviews and one that we leave for the Graduate School Education Office, for them to show future students as well as show for accrediation purposes, to show the work of the students in the program. Though it has been a busy time writing all the pieces, when creating the binder of pieces I could start to see how it is all coming together.
   Hope everyone is well and muddled through the crazy weather week last week. Talk to you all soon!

Break Week

2010-02-18T15:54:00.026-05:00

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!

Parent Conferences and Week before break

2010-02-08T15:12:00.001-05:00

Hi All, hope everyone is staying warm on these blustery cold days. Last week as I had mentioned, parent-teacher conferences were held Thursday evening and Friday afternoon. Overall I was fairly pleased with the turn-out. I would have liked to see a few more parents, I had three Thursday and one Friday, but I will take what I can and do what I can to help the students. My mentor was able to see a lot of his parents families, so he was really excited to have that opportunity. It is just a great opportunity to check in with the family, update them on their students progress, what they might be able to work on and also sometimes find out a little more information we might not know. These meetings can often be quite enlightening, especially when the student attends with the parent/guardian and you are able to see their interactions as well. The families I was able to meet with, I had some really productive conversations and was quite pleased with the discussions. It is very interesting to hear about my students from the parent perspective, gives me a little bit more of a fuller picture as to who they are and what they are about through the parents eyes. This weekend I spent trying to catch up on work and I was able to attend a Siena basketball game vs. Iona. The Saints had another large win and are continuing on their very successful season. It was a nice way to unwind from the week and gear up for getting work done.
This week is going to be a crazy one, as is every week before a break is. I was surprised at how energetic and not focused my students were today, I can only imagine how it will progress through the week. A lot of today's work called on previous knowledge, so I was extremely pleased when the students remembered that previous information rather quickly. It made me feel better to know that they are paying attention and are actually retaining the information. Some of the students asked really great questions about the excretory system. I was glad that I had anticipated some of their responses ahead of time, so I was better able to answer their questions. I must admit I am just as excited as they are, that next week is break. I have a lot of work to catch up on and I wouldn't mind a little extra sleep as well.
Well that is it for now. I will try and check back in later in the week.

Third Quarter has officially begun

2010-02-02T13:39:00.000-05:00

It is hard to believe that the 2nd quarter has come to a close and we have already begun the 3rd quarter. Today I made a new seating chart and switched up everyone's seats and oh the moans. Making a seating chart that is condusive for all is next to impossible. Trying to separate chatty students, put students closer to the front that need to be closer for vision or attention purposes and trying to keep in mind where they might want to sit is a complicated task. I do my best to place the students where I think they will do best, unfortunately does not make them happy with me in the least bit. The amount of groans and disgruntled students on seat moving day is the highest usually for the term. It is always interesting to see how the dynamics change and students that you didn't think would chat would or students who normally don't volunteer seem to want to participate. I was out again yesterday do to illness so some of my students were glad to see me return, which is always a comforting feeling. This week is an odd week. Wednesday is a half day for Professional Development and Thursday and Friday we move into parent teacher conferences again. Thursday evening is parent teacher conferences as is Friday afternoon, so Friday is yet another half day for the students. Therefore this may be yet another one of those weeks where the student focus is lacking a bit and will be hard to keep them all on task. They thought I was mean for giving them a quiz on Friday, but it shouldn't take too long. I was going to give it on Thursday, but after realizing that Wednesday is a half day, I didn't feel we would have quite enough time to review for the quiz and I wanted to make sure they were amply prepared. We are currently covering the Human Respiratory System, which they seem to understand and actually seem to enjoy (though they would not admit it). I am hoping that they all do well on their first quiz of the quarter to start off the term on a good note. So hopefully parent teacher conferences go well Thursday and Friday and that I get to see quite a bit of my students families and maybe even some of the students. I will try to post another blog after the conferences are over and let you know how it went.

Have a great week!

Thank Goodness for Regents Week!

2010-01-27T22:15:00.000-05:00

Let's see where I left off. Sorry I have not blogged in a little while. I have been sick and thus have missed some of my grad classes and my internship. On a positive note, everyone has been so helpful and understanding in working with me to make up my work. My mentor also covered my classes for me while I was out which I was so grateful for. I went back to school on Monday and was observed by my supervisor. I was extremely nervous how it would go after having missed a week of school and the fact I was still not 100% and it was a short week. Luckily it went pretty well and my students were cute. One of my students high-fived me to welcome me back. Some even commented how dedicated I was by coming in when I was still not feeling well. So even though it probably was not my best day, I really felt a connection with my students which is so important to me. Monday, was the last official day of the quarter so I had to calculate their 2nd quarter grades. I am happy to report many of my students are doing much better this quarter and I am so proud of them. It is amazing how rewarding it is to see such a huge improvement in some of my students and I cannot wait to share that with them when we return.
So I mentioned this week is a Regents week. Tuesday-Friday of this week January Regents exams are being held and for those not taking Regents exams, they do not need to report to school. The Living Environment Regents exam was held Tuesday morning. I had the opportunity to proctor my first Regents exam and to work with the committee of teachers as they graded these exams. This was a valuable experience because it was helpful to see what types of questions students asked on the exams and where they got stuck. To see the grading process it was interesting to see the process, how the Regents set forth to grade the exams and how the students actually responded. I am glad to have gotten the opportunity to do this so I am prepared for my students taking the Regents in June. Now I have the rest of the week off to try and get caught up on life and homework and hopefully get myself back up to speed so I can hit the ground running on Monday.

Well that is it for now. If you have questions, comments, please post a comment, it would be nice to hear from you!

Busy week and good times

2010-01-16T18:24:00.003-05:00

   Hello All! Hope everyone is having a great New Year so far! Let's see this past week was a busy one with a lot due in my seminar course and starting a new unit. We started a new unit in my internship on the Human Circulatory System and the blood. My students have been really intrigued so far and it is nice to see them excited. On Friday, I was able to show them a dissected cow heart. I was able to show them the structure of the heart so they could start to put what they have learned so far together. A few of the students were less than excited, but did look, while the majority put on a glove so they could touch the heart and see what it felt like. They were so excited, out of their seats looking on and ready to check it out. I even had one student who asked if she could take a picture of it. This was a great moment and it felt good that they were this interested.
   This week I was pretty busy with my work study job as well and the UGC was in an excited flurry due to the ribbon cutting ceremony to commemorate the opening of it's new building and thank it's generous donors. Unfortunately I was unable to attend the event due to my internship, but I heard it was a great success. We are lucky as UGC students to have such generous individuals that recognized the good work that UGC has done and is doing and were able to make this new building possible.
   Last night was the Winter Semi-formal that UGC held at a local restaurant, the Van Dyke Lounge. We were in a private room upstairs, which was a huge, gorgeous facility. The food was phenomenal, the atmosphere was great and we had a great time dancing. I was initially unsure of whether to attend, but must say I had a fabulous time as well as everyone else. It was also great that some of the professors and administrators attended as well. It was nice to have them join us and to be able to see them outside of their environment as well.
   Well time to get to work, three day weekend with lots to do!

Below are a few pictures from the semi-formal.

Happy New Year

2010-01-09T22:53:00.002-05:00

  Happy New Year All! Hope everyone is off to a great start for this new year! So far mine has been jam packed and started off as a sprint. Let's see. Since I last posted, I started and completed my Middle School Experience. As part of the MAT Program, if you are placed in a high school for your internship, you have to complete 20 days in a Middle School and if you are placed in a Middle School, you must complete an alternate experience of 20 days in a high school. I had the opportunity as I mentioned before to work in a Physical Science class with 8th graders at Doyle Middle School for the end of November, month of December and beginning of January for 2 periods in the afternoon. This was definitely quite a change from my High School experience, it is amazing how much students can change in two years. I loved the cooperating teacher I worked with in the Middle School. He was great to observe and work with and had a great rapport with the students and provided me with a lot of information and insight. It took me a couple of weeks to get comfortable with the students and for them to get comfortable enough to work with me. The material being covered required some extra effort on my part as we covered acids and bases, organic chemistry and something I am definitely not familiar with, nuclear chemistry. It was a great experience and I am grateful at having had the opportunity.
  The winter term is now in full swing, this term I am taking three classes, two of which meet at night during the week. The third class, is the MAT Project, which is for this entire term. Each student who is working on the MAT Project is assigned to an advisor, that they work with throughout the brainstorming, research and implementation process. My advisor has been great so far. We even met on New Year's Eve day to discuss a possible topic, which I was grateful for, because I was having a hard time working out my topic. I am still working out where my project is leading. What I can tell you is I am going to start by analyzing student usage of a computers at home and hopefully end up creating a website/blog for my students, to provide additional information on units we are covering, provide opportunities for them to comment on posts that I write and also provide a location where students can communicate with other students, myself and parents. We only have 10 weeks to complete this project which consists of research, some implementation in our classroom and then analysis of what we have done and want to do in the future.
  The other two classes I am taking this term are Biological Instrumentation and a seminar course. The seminar course is focused on assessment, the meaning of testing and development of our portfolios for job interviews. So far this class has been a bit overwhelming, with a lot of work so far. The good thing is, is all of this work is to help us create the best portfolio possible to best represent ourselves in our (hopefully) many job interviews come this spring and summer. The Biological Instrumentation course is actually held at a local middle school and is being taught by two middle school teachers, one of which taught this summer during the summer program at Union. They are both great and I look forward to learning from them. This class is extremely class intensive with less outside class work, which is a welcomed relief. This class exposes us to the different types of technology we may encounter in our future jobs to show us how to maximize their capabilities and to enhance student learning.
  Just so you don't think we don't have any time for fun, last month I traveled to NYC to see my roommate from college and to see the tree at Rockefeller Center and have dinner at Serendipity, which was great! Also, another fun thing coming up, is the Graduate College is hosting a semi-formal for it's students to get together and celebrate. It is being held Friday at a local restaurant, so it should be a great time had by all. Not sure yet if I will be able to attend, but I know a lot of my fellow classmates are planning on attending and are very excited.
  That is it for now, but I promise to continue posting again and keep you updated on all of the happenings. If you have any comments, questions, concerns or something you want to know more about, please comment and I would be glad to help!

Below I am attaching a photo from the city.

Classes are over and Parent Night is Thursday

2009-11-18T15:52:00.000-05:00

So all three of my graduate courses for the fall term are officially over and as much as I learned from them and enjoyed them, I am glad they are over. It will be nice to be able to put more of my focus on my internship and also on my new middle school placement and being able to put alot of the practices that we learned in these courses in place.
Tomorrow night is the first day of parent teacher conferences. The first part is being help Thursday evening from 5-8 p.m. and the second part is Friday, 1-3 p.m. How it works is in order for the parents to get their students report cards early, they must come and physically pick them up at the high school. Once that happens they have the option of visiting any of their student's teachers to talk about their students progress. Teachers can also put a comment on the report card, that they request a parent conference to hopefully encourage those parents to attend a meeting with the teacher. The only problem is if the parent or guardian is unable to make it to pick up the report cards, then there is not an opportunity to meet and help the student. So I am hoping I have the opportunity to meet many of my students parent or guardians, to talk about their child's progress and enlist their help where applicable. To encourage my students as well as my mentors students, we decided that if our students attend the parent-teacher conferences, we will give them 3 points extra credit on their 2nd quarter average, which is quite an incentive for some of these students. To have these students come, will allow for a more productive conversation and to make sure everyone is on the same page for what is being done well and for any actions that need to take place. As you can see by the time I am spending writing this section, meeting with the families and my students about their classroom performance is really important to me.
I forgot to mention, yesterday I met with the Middle School teacher I will be working with starting next week. He seems really nice and has selected two classes for me to observe and then we can decide which class will be the right fit for me to observe and eventually teach a bit. It was a little bit of an adventure to get to the middle school which is attached by a walkway to the high school. I had only been there twice which was the very beginning of the school year. So suffice to say, I walked the way I thought I needed to, took a little detour but eventually got there. The building is uniquely designed where the even number classrooms are on one side of the building, while the odd are on the other. So luckily the part of the building I walked into was the odd side. We chatted briefly, and discussed that he is currently covering Chemistry in his classes and will be moving to Physics after their holiday break. So I am looking forward to speaking with him more and getting to meet the students and see what the Middle School is all about.

2 Classes Down and 1 more to go

2009-11-16T13:53:00.000-05:00

  So far I have finished with two classes for the term and the last one is over tomorrow evening. It will be a relief to have a little break from classes and be able to focus even more on my internship. I am meeting my Middle School mentor tomorrow and get to learn what it is like to teach in a Middle School. I found out I will either be teaching organic chemistry or nuclear reactions and most likely electricity, eek!! Not going to lie as a Biology major, even though I took chemistry classes, the idea of those topics scare me! So I have a feeling I will be spending a lot of my free time learning chemistry, hopefully some of it will be relearning, but I am sensing it will be like seeing it for the first time.
  I have registered for me classes for the winter time, most of which start in January except the seminar class. The seminar class starts the first week of December I believe which will run through the winter term, but will give us a class or two off over our internship breaks which will great. Also, the first week of December, we will meet to discuss our Projects. For the MAT program, students have the option to write a thesis paper, which is two terms in length, while the project is one term. I chose the Project because I do not have plans to go on for a PhD in Biology and the project is something that I can develop and actually hopefully implement in my classroom. The winter term is supposed to be the toughest, so let's hope I can grin and bear it and make it through with flying colors. One thing I would recommend if you have the opportunity, is to start taking classes before you start the summer program and doing your internship. I know some of my classmates did that and it means they only have to take two night classes a week or in the spring only have to take a seminar class. Basically the more you can lighten your load when you are interning the better, so most of your focus is on your internship the less stressed you will feel and the better prepared you will be for your internship.
  This past Friday as I may have mentioned, we held the 2nd installment of our Urban Round Table Series. One of my classmates mentor's from Schenectady High School came to speak with us and did a wonderful job. We overall had a great turn out and hearing from this teacher was great! She was very animated and had some insightful information to share, so I think it was a success. Just booked the speaker for our third installment, so we are keeping the momentum which is great.
  Tomorrow, back to Troy, the 1st Quarter grades are due, so I have been calculating grades and trying to give my students an opportunity to get some points back by handing in late homework for half credit,which created more work for myself as the late assignments trickled in, but it is the 1st Quarter and I had a little leeway to do so. I did explain today that this will not continue this quarter. I also moved their seats today, to mix things up. As you can imagine there were a lot of groans and complaints, but I explained we were starting over and in the real world we may not like everyone we work with, but we have to find a way to get along and get through, so they need to start that adjustment.
  Well I am going to get back to work study. I will check back in again soon!

Can't believe the term is almost over....

2009-11-08T20:08:00.001-05:00

As the weekend is wrapping up, this is my last week for two of my classes and next week the last class will be finished. The term has been so busy, but I can hardly believe 10 weeks have come and gone. This weekend I spent quite a bit of time on my final lab for Biological demonstrations. I ended up selected a lab on enzymes, where students test different juices with jello as well as canned, fresh and frozen pineapple in jello. The reason for doing this is certain fruits have enzymes in them, proteases to be exact that actually can act as a meat tenderizer as well as have various properties that can be used for medicinal purposes. Pineapples for example, have an enzyme, bromelain, that has been used to treat third degree burns, arthritis, autoimmune diseases and various other ailments. The enzyme is predominantly found in the stem of the pineapple. Kiwi and papaya have their own enzymes as well. When the juices or fruits with active enzymes interact with jello the jello will not solidify as usually due to the enzymatic activity, really kind of cool. I have practiced it a few times and hope all goes well during the actual lab in class. This week marks the end of the 1st quarter, so it will be my first time fully calculating grades and next week we have parent teacher conferences, where parents can come in, get their students report cards and meet with their teachers. If the parents/guardians do not come in, the grades will be mailed one week later. Also this week is Veterans Day, so I will have Wednesday off, which will be a nice break in the middle of the week. So this week will be really busy graduate class-wise and I am sure a little chaotic in my internship with a day off and it being the end of the quarter.

Below I have included pictures from the egg demonstration I did right before Halloween so you can see what the students saw. So the brief background, eggs have a semi-permeable membrane under the shell, so in all of the below pictures, the egg shell has been removed and has been tested with different substances to show diffusion to the students (molecules moving from high to low concentration). The first two photos, the egg expands and turns orange. The second photos were not in any solution, but show the nude color egg (nude color is their membrane). The next photo is of an egg in water, it expanded, the next photo is a different angle of an egg not in solution and the last photo is an egg in corn syrup, it shriveled.

The below picture is of an egg w/o it's shell in water with orange food coloring

Same as photo above, at a different angle.

The below photo is of an egg w/o it's shell.

The above photo is of the egg w/o it's shell in water.^

The next photo is an aerial view of an egg w/o it's shell.

The photo the left is of an egg w/o its shell in corn syrup

Oh how I love days off!

2009-11-03T13:52:00.000-05:00

   Hello, hope everyone is having a good week so far and a great Halloween weekend. Today, I had the day off from my internship because it was voting day and Troy was holding a Professional Development day which turns out to be review of information I learned in my Wednesday evening seminar class. It was nice to wake up a little later, get work done and then head into my work study job before class.
   Let's see where I left off last. This past Friday, I had probably one of my best days in my internship so far. I was teaching new information which the students seem to get and I felt I explained it really well and students who don't usually, asked questions and answered questions. My favorite part of Friday was I did a lab demonstration for my students, since it was the Friday before Halloween and my mentor did not want us to start the lab before the weekend. I did a lab demo of an egg. This was something I did in my Methods class over the summer and my fellow classmates really liked, so I was excited to see what my students thought. I set everything up ahead of time. I first soaked 4 eggs in vinegar overnight to remove the egg shell. Once this was done, the next day I put one egg in water, another egg in corn syrup and one egg in water with orange food coloring (in honor of Halloween) overnight. The last egg I kept separate so that I could show the students what the egg looked like without the shell. The reason for doing this activity, is to start getting them to think about permeability and diffusion, prior to the NYS lab on diffusion that they have to do. I created a worksheet so they could follow along and I asked them a bunch of questions to get them thinking about what might happen and to start to build some suspense. I must say the students were engaged and the most focused and enthused I have seem them in class. It was so great to have their attention, have them guessing what might happen and to have them excited, it truly was an rewarding experience. So Friday, was a great day all around for myself and I hope too for my students.
   Monday on the other hand, was a tough day. The students were coming off of a weekend, it had just been Halloween, they knew they had Tuesday off and the end of the 1st quarter is approaching. Suffice to say, the students were not nearly as attentive and were a little more unruly than usual. They have a test tomorrow so I created a review activity of Jeopardy to make it fun as well as provide them the opportunity to review two units. Due to the fact they were broken into two teams, one team took the lead really early on, which meant the other team gave up, which made for interesting classroom management. Thus, I ended the game early and just did straight review, but ended the class a little frustrated. So I am hoping the rest of the week will go a little better than the beginning.
   This past weekend, on a fun note, was my friend's birthday so we went to the Parting Glass to hear Hair of the Dog in downtown Saratoga. They are a local Irish group, that are absolutely phenomenal and so much fun to listen to. So great food, great company and great music, was a nice way to wrap up the week.
   Things are coming up quickly.... I cannot believe the term is over in two weeks. I will be wrapping up classes and starting my middle school experience, with Thanksgiving in between followed by Christmas. Our second Urban Roundtable Series is next week, in which we have a teacher from Schenectady High School and I am very excited to hear what she has to say. I will also be taking my next teaching exam in December (have to remember to sign up for that this week), which I am not looking forward to, but I am trying to space them out and give myself time to retake one, in case the unthinkable happens.
  Well that is more than enough for now. Please feel free to post a comment, ask a question, or anything, I would be happy to help and hear from those that are taking the time to follow my journey with me.

I will try and post pictures of my egg demo later this week, so you can see what I was talking about!

Have a great week!!!

It's a Rainy Wednesday

2009-10-28T14:56:00.000-04:00

Let's see, what has happened since I last blogged. Last Friday we held the first of our Urban Round Table Series, which myself and a fellow classmate are in charge planning. This is an event that is held once a month and each month we invite a different teacher to speak. This past week we had a teacher who is actually a mentor of one of our interns, he is also a graduate of the Union MAT Program and also went through National Board Certification here at UGC, so he was able to provide a lot of insight on both our internship experiences as well as the program. The talk was supposed to last an hour and it went two hours and over 20 interns attended. He was so helpful answering all of our questions and being open and honest with his experiences and how he has dealt with different situations. I think the timing was perfect for all of us, at having been interning for almost two months now, it helped to have a different perspective and also hear how our fellow classmates experiences are going. This weekend I was hit by the change in weather, long days and stress so suffice to say I slept a lot and still not feeling well called in sick to my internship on Monday,which was hard for me to do, because I don't like missing things. What I realized is I would not be at my best for my students and I did not want to get anyone sick. My mentor was totally okay with it and I went back yesterday. Yesterday was a little rough, but today was much better. I am looking forward to doing a demonstration for my lab on Friday, hopefully my students will be as excited as I am. I gave a longer quiz today, which I was glad to see some of my students did much better than they had been, so I was extremely excited to see that. I think my students enjoyed today's lab. They got to look under the microscope at an Elodea leaf, which was still fresh so they were able to see chloroplasts moving around, which they seemed to think was pretty cool.
My supervisor is coming in again tomorrow, which I am interested to see how it goes. The last time he was in, my students were a little less behaved than they normally are, so I am hoping I can get them to stay on task and listen to the notes I am giving them. I am looking forward to any insight my supervisor can provide to help keep the students more on task and keep the flow of the class go more smoothly. Sometimes it is all dependant on the day and the student dynamics, so you can never quite predict how a class might go.
Well I think that is it for today. I will let you know how the demo and supervisor visit went next week!

October is Flying By

2009-10-20T14:43:00.000-04:00

I can hardly believe today is October 20th and the month is almost over. One thing I kept hearing over and over about this program is it is a lot of work, but the time flies by. It seems like just yesterday, I was starting my first day of the summer program not knowing what to expect. I just found out last week who I will be interning with at Doyle Middle School starting in December, which I am glad to know. Part of the MAT Program, is you must do an alternate experience, so if you are interning for the full year in the high school, you must spend time in the middle school and vice versa. Due to the fact that Troy HS has a middle school attached to it, for convenience I will be interning there for the month of December, when UGC has its break. Our break is pretty much the month of December, so when we do not have Graduate classes, to best use our time and not overload ourselves, I will be doing a half day with a science teacher at the middle school and still continuing my half day at Troy HS. I am not quite sure what to expect. Some might think middle school students would be easier to deal with, but from what I can tell and what I have heard; December might be an interesting month.
Halloween is next week, so I am trying to think of something fun, yet on task that I can do with the students. I will have to consult with my mentor to see if he has anything in mind. I have a few options for Halloween for myself as far as plans, just not sure how next week is going to play out, but should probably decide if I need a costume right?
Something different that I had to do this week for my Biology Demonstrations class was to make a model. It had to be 3D, but could be a model of pretty much anything that could relate to a concept in Biology, except a lung or cell. I chose to make a model of mitosis and meiosis. I know these are areas that students have a hard time with trying to compare the two, plus I am not all that creative, which I may have mentioned, so I thought it would be somewhat easy. As I started to think about it more and started to work on the logistics, it was not as easy as I thought, but I had already committed to it and wanted to give it a try. Originally I thought I would use shoelace licorice and candy buttons, but soon realized this was not as feasible as I thought. So through walking around the craft aisle at Walmart and talking with my professor, I used paper plates, pipe cleaners, puff balls (pom-poms) and yarn that I then attached to a tri-fold posterboard. After many hours of toiling with it, it is now about as good as it is going to get. I have to present it to the class tonight, so wish me luck! I love crafts, but some types of creativity and artistic abilities are certainly not my strong suit.
Okay, time to get back to work. I will try and post a picture of my project soon, so you can see the final project that is if it travels well to survive.

Short Weeks are Always the Crazy One's

2009-10-17T23:30:00.001-04:00

So even though this week was a shorter week, it has been jam packed. Today I was observed again by supervisor and video-taped. Overall it went pretty well, it was a little hectic, but I am glad it is over for now. I ran another review activity, this time we did Bingo. We are having a quiz tomorrow on Biochemistry, which was a tougher unit for them to understand, so I was looking for an activity that really helped them to prepare. So I talked with my roommate from college who is a high school Biology teacher and she suggested Bingo. So I created a Bingo table and came up with 24 words, and then I either provided a definition, structure or question that would lead them to one of the 24 words. Whoever had Bingo received 5 extra points on the quiz tomorrow. I was definitely not as nervous for today, which was quite a relief. I think I did okay, the students were a little more chatty than usual, but overall the activity ran smoothly and I was able to get the whole class involved and participating.
Last night I had my seminar course, which ended up really interesting. We had a guest speaker, who was the resource officer at Burnt Hills Ballston Lake School District. He is a New York State Trooper, that his main job is to patrol the school district and schools, to get to know the kids, to be someone that they know and feel comfortable talking to. He is the eyes and ears for the school and I can see why the kids like him. He is very down to earth, will tell you like it is and his main concern is the safety and well being of the ~2400 students that he is responsible for, which is quite an undertaking, but he seems more than happy and qualified to meet the challenge. It was extremely helpful as a future teacher and current intern to hear what he had to say. He was very insightful and forthright with his thoughts and experiences. I was very glad to see that they have this type of resource to help keep the schools safe. New York State after Columbine, allotted $14 million to provide resource officers to school districts in New York State. There are approx. ~100 schools that have received this opportunity and many schools are on the waitlist for one. Some school districts use their local police agencies to provide an officer for their school.
Literacy Thursday, was a little different than usual, but it was nice to try something different. We had been reading about incorporating picture books/children's books in our classrooms, so we all had to bring in books for ourselves and others outside our content, that another classmate could use. I chose one that talks about what happens to a hamburger (digestion). It has a lot of great pictures and shows exactly what happens in each stage, in a simplistic way, that students would understand. We broke up into small groups and had our classmates make suggestions on how we could incorporate writing assignments for our students utilizing these books. It was a great activity and I walked away with some great ideas as to how to use my books for a lesson plan I have to write this week. This class has really challenged me, always pushing me to think of relevant ways to incorporate literacy into my classroom, which in science is so important.
Let's see, Friday evening I attended my first Science conference, which was held at Siena College (my alma mater). In NY there is an association called STANYS, which is for science teachers in NY. Our local Eastern STANYS organization held a conference for our region Friday evening, offering a variety of options of sessions that we could attend to learn more about particular science topics. I chose one on the brain and the other on science literacy. The brain one, was very interesting and they distributed a lot of materials that we could take with us to use in our classrooms. Then there was dinner, which was an opportunity to chat with our colleagues. I was able to catch up with my fellow UGC science graduate students, which was a lot of fun as usual. Then there was a keynote speaker from RPI, that gave a lecture on Global Warming.
Then today, I took my first of the three state teacher exams, required for me to receive my initial teacher certification. This one was the LAST, which is the Liberal Arts and Sciences Test. It is a four hour exam that consists of 80 multiple choice questions and one written response of 300-600 words. Luckily it was an afternoon exam so I was able to sleep in and be mentally prepared. Overall I hope it went okay, it has been a long time since I have sat for a long exam like that, so it was a bit draining. Results come out next month, so wish me luck.
Well it is time for bed, but thanks for checking in. As I mentioned before, if you have any comments, questions, topics you would like me to talk more about, please post a comment and I would be happy to respond!

*Below I am attaching some pictures I have had, of the new UGC building taken at night. It really is an impressive facility and offers a lot to the Graduate students.

I could get used to these three day weekends!

2009-10-12T16:10:00.004-04:00

his week went by so quickly, I can hardly believe it is the weekend already and a three-day weekend at that! So excited to have another three day weekend.... starting to get used to them, which probably isn't so good. I decided like I may have mentioned to take advantage of my three day weekend and work at my old job on Saturday, at the Environmental Lab to make a little extra money which is always good to have.

As far as school this week, I think things went pretty well. Instead of a quiz Wednesday, I gave my students a Crossword Puzzle which would test them on their knowledge of different Kingdoms, Phylums and Classes in our Classification unit. Overall, the students did really well and I actually made a couple questions extra credit, so some of them were really excited to see they had earned extra credit points. We started a new unit on Tuesday, Biochemistry. This unit has been the toughest so far and the students do not seem to be thrilled with the difficulty and a lot of notes, so it is taking a lot of extra explaining on my part for them to begin to understand.

Grad classes were pretty intense this week. On Wednesday night, in my seminar class, we had a guest speaker come in and do our SAVE training which is required to substitute and for NYS teachers. The speaker comes in to talk about at-risk students, students who have been abused or are being neglected. She gave us an idea of what to look for in our students and what the intervention steps were and that we as teachers are mandated to report any abuse that we suspect. It was kind of an overwhelming presentation and some of it was kind of hard to hear, but I am glad that I now am equipped with this information so if god forbid, I ever come into contact with a student that needs my help, I know what to do to get them the assistance they need.

After Wednesday's class I went to the Times Union Center to see Keith Urban and Sugarland. What an amazing concert, I had a great time with great friends and amazing music. Sugarland was phenomenal, Jennifer Nettles is so unbelievably talented, I wish they could have played the entire time. Keith Urban was good as well, didn't have quite as many uptempo songs as Sugarland, but what an amazing voice and not so bad to look at either.

Thursdays literacy class, was a little different than usual. We had read prior to class the usefulness of Children's books in our classrooms, so we had a discussion and then went through a book in class. We had a variety of tasks to complete, but were shown first hand, how a children's book could be integrated into an adult classroom, even at the graduate level and promote so much thought and creativity, quite a neat exercise.

Next week will be busy, I have my supervisor coming in again next week, will probably need to videotape again and have a few larger assignments due.

Time to get back to work!

*Below are a couple of photos from the concert that I thought were fun and worth sharing!

Once again if you have any questions, comments or suggestions of what you would like to hear about, post a comment!

Whirlwind of a week

2009-10-06T13:44:00.005-04:00

Just wanted to check back in and update you on what has been going on for the past week. So far everything is going about the same with the internship. Still getting comfortable with the material again and getting used to classroom management. The past two days in lab have been fun because we are doing a lab on Pond Water which the students seem to enjoy. One of the Biology teachers collected water from a local pond and we have the students prepare slides with the pond water to view the organisms that live in the pond under a microscope. They get really excited when they see things moving like a paramecium, hydra, water mites, and different types of worms as well as algae. When they see something move they get excited and call either myself or my mentor over to show us. They have to observe these organisms, draw them and identify what they are. A student today said "I love this lab, my favorite so far!" Which was nice to hear. It was nice to hear her enthusiasm. Other than that, no tests/quizzes this week. I did create a review sheet for the topic of Classification we have been working on and will be giving it as an in class worksheet grade, kind of like a quiz but they can use their notes. So hopefully it will go well and the students will find it helpful and do well. We started on the topic of Biochemistry, which is an area that I would not say is one of my most favorite, because I am definitely not the best chemistry person, so it is taking some extra review on my own and preparation, but in the end I think it will be fine.
This week is getting busy; I had to write a lab for my Graduate Class using materials I could find around the house. I ended up finding a lab on the internet whichI tweaked, and made a lab handout with questions. The area I had to pick from was genetics so my lab was on Protein Synthesis. I have a hard time with activities like these because I am not a "think outside the box" type person and that is what this class helps us do, which will be good in the end, but something I am struggling with at the moment. Hopefully I get better with time, because I think it is valuable and important, but certainly a weaker area for me.
So excited for tomorrow evening, on a fun note. After student teaching, work study and night class, I am going to the Times Union Center to see Sugarland and Keith Urban (huge country fan)! I bought these tickets before I started classes and it is going to be a super long day, but I am sure well worth it. Everyone needs a break now and again right?
Speaking of breaks, another three-day weekend this weekend! Columbus Day is Monday, so I will have three days to get work done and regroup. I will actually be working at my old job, at an Environmental Lab on Saturday since I have the extra time and can certainly use a little extra spending money (I keep expanding my teacher wardrobe, oops:).

Okay, time to get back to my work study job, thanks for reading and I will post again soon!

**PS if you have any comments or questions about UGC or the MAT Program, please post a comment and I will be happy to respond!

Phew, glad that is over....

2009-10-01T14:21:00.003-04:00

So today was my first of many days that I was to be observed by my supervisor and video-tape my class. I must admit I was very nervous about today and how it would go, but overall I am pretty happy with it. Today was a big day for review, because I am giving my students their first test of the term so I had to make sure I provided an opportunity to review a lot of the key concepts that will be covered on tomorrow's test. Review days are hard, because it is not new material, so the students sometimes are not as focused or willing to participate because they have seen the material already. So I created two review sheets. One was a conversion handout to help them practice converting millimeters to micrometers and micrometers to millimeters, the other handout was a crossword puzzle. I had them work on the conversion sheet first, which didn't go as smoothly as I had anticipated. The students had a lot of questions, so I was moving from student to student trying to help them. Most of the time they just didn't know the answer off the top of their head and wanted my help, but when I talked it through with them, asking them questions, they realized they did know how to do it, they just had to walk through the steps to get to the answer. Once this started to happen I felt a little better. My first thought was OH NO, this isn't going well, but in the end it worked out okay. So once they got through the conversion chart and moved on to the crossword puzzle things seemed to move along well. They seemed to actually enjoy it and didn't have too many questions. So overall I think these worksheets helped them prepare for their test and were a great first observation for my supervisor because I had a lot of interactions with my students, which I enjoy. After class was over, my supervisor and I met and he asked what I thought I did well in today's lesson and what I thought I needed to work on. After we discussed this, he broke down what he thought I did well and made a few suggestions as to how I could make what I was doing better. So overall, I thought a really good first meeting, took some of the pressure off. As far as the video-taping goes, we have to video-tape ourselves teaching every two weeks and then have to view the video and critique ourselves. We had to do this over the summer as well, and though none of us looked forward to this, I always found it to be really helpful. I was able to see more clearly what I did do well and little things I could do better or try to avoid.

Yesterday I gave my first test, which we did a lot of review for. I was even a little nervous for the students, because they seemed stressed out over the idea of the test. Even though this test was only 10 more questions that the last quiz. Anyways, I was overall fairly pleased with the outcome.

Something that I am currently planning that is in the works, is the Urban Roundtable seminar. This was something that was started last year per the request of a now UGC grad, that was placed in an inner city school district. She wanted the opportunity to hear stories and get advice of teachers who teach in these districts and to be able to talk to her classmates that were going through the same experiences. This year, myself and a fellow classmate, Tricia, were asked to plan this discussion that will be held one Friday every month for an hour in the later afternoon. Our job is to recruit teachers in Urban districts, book the room, invite our classmates and then run the evening. We are currently trying to get the first event planned, so wish us luck! I think it will be a great opportunity to hear from the experts, experiences they have had, and how they dealt with it and handle obstacles they handle on a daily basis. Plus, it will be a nice time to catch up with our classmates and counts towards our required Professional Development.
Anyhow, glad it is Thursday and the weekend is around the corner. So far so good, looking forward to relaxing a little this weekend.

Fall has arrived!

2009-09-26T17:12:00.001-04:00

Hi all, sorry it has been a little longer than usual since I have blogged. This past week was very busy. On Monday my mentor was out, so we had a substitute, so I had my first opportunity to teach for the better part of the day. I taught three Living Environment classes, two labs and helped out with AP Biology. I was quite nervous about doing this, but think it was a really great opportunity for me to have a full day teaching and being there without my mentor, to know that I can do this. The students were overall good and we got a lot accomplished. That is the nice thing about me being there everyday and helping out when my mentor is teaching, because the students know me, so they know I am there everyday and won't take advantage like they might if there was just a sub. I for the most part taught my class on my own this week, which overall felt good. I am still getting comfortable with the material, being up in front of the class and trying to master class management skills. I think all of this will come with time and practice. My mentor said it took him 2-3 months where he felt like he had the hang of it and felt more at ease. It is really helpful that my mentor has gone through the Union Program and has been out 5-6 years now, because he knows what it is like and what I am experiencing because he did it not too long ago. So it is helpful to hear that he says I am progressing as I should and each day I seem more comfortable. Which is good that I appear comfortable because I certainly don't always feel it.

Let's see, what else happened this week. Thursday night instead of my literacy class, I attended Troy High School's Parent Open House. This was an opportunity for parents and/or guardians to come in and meet their student’s teachers, to learn what their student’s will be doing this year and what the expectations were. I think it went really well and the families we met were extremely nice and asked some great questions. We did not see a lot of parents, but I know it is hard with work schedules, families, games and practices, that parents are usually running all over the place. It was nice to see how the evening went and observe the families changing classes, and being able to see their student’s schedule, which I think many were surprised at how far their student’s had to travel from some classes. The high school is a good size and some students have to travel from the first floor on one side to the third floor on the other. For the most part they try to schedule students classes on the same floor or as close together as possible, but there are usually a few classes, they have to travel a little further for.

This weekend is a three day weekend due to Yom Kippur on Monday, which is nice because it is giving me an extra day to prepare for the week. My supervisor is coming in Tuesday for the first time to observe me teach. I must admit, I am nervous, just because it is another person watching me and I want to do well. Though I know the main reason he will be there is to see how I am progressing, tell me what I am doing well and provide feedback on how I can be better. So ultimately he is there to help make me the best teacher possible for my students, which is a good thing, but still stressful. We also in the program have to videotape one class we teach every two weeks. We then have to watch the video and essentially evaluate ourselves. I have decided to do this for the first time on Tuesday as well, because I am doing a review lesson and thought it would be a good time to get this started. So wish me luck!

On a fun note, I know I am always talking about the internship and grad classes, but I do make some time to have fun and take a break. This morning I woke up at 4:30 a.m. to head to the annual Adirondack Balloon Festival in Queensbury, NY. This is an amazing opportunity to see over 90 hot air balloons take off at sunrise. I used to go quite often as a child and went a few years back, but because it conflicted with work, I hadn't been in a while. So I was quite excited to be able to go. We were able to see 4-5 balloons this morning, but unfortunately the fog was so bad today, they cancelled the rest of the morning launches. The festival runs all weekend from Thursday-Sunday and has evening and morning launches. So I will have to wait until next year.

Well it is time I get some work done, so I am prepared for the week ahead.

Below are a couple of photos that kind of came out this morning. The fog made the photos not quite as clear as usual.

Officially finished my second week!

2009-09-19T11:49:00.000-04:00

It is hard to believe I have just finished my second week at Troy High School. This week was especially busy because I had all three of my graduate classes this week and had my first full week of student teaching. This week I also met with my supervisor. Each intern is assigned a mentor, the cooperating teacher they will work with the entire year and a supervisor. Each supervisor has approximately 3 students that they are responsible for. Their job is to visit their interns every two weeks, for an entire class period to observe their class. They look for many things such as classroom management, use of multiple modalities, keeping the students engaged, and much more. I am sure I will have much more to add to that as time goes on. So my mentor and I met with my supervisor to discuss the expectations of the year. The meeting went well, but left me feeling somewhat overwhelmed by the end, but with the support of my mentor and supervisor I know it will be okay.

As I had mentioned earlier in the week, I gave my first quiz. For the most part I was fairly pleased with how it went and was pleasantly surprised how well some of the students did. First quizzes are usually tough, because the students don't know what to expect with the quiz (even when you tell them) and are still learning how best to study for each class and teacher, so it usually takes a few quizzes to get a sense of how it will go. Friday was the first class that I taught almost the full period. It overall went well. I realized that I am really tough on myself, so it was helpful to hear from my mentor how he felt the lesson went. He was able to pick up on a variety of things I did well as well as a few things I need to be aware of or practice. I thought I would take the critique a little harder, but I know it is being said only to make me better and alot of the things he said, I was already aware of that I needed to work on.

I did not make it to TGIT this week as I had hoped. I had some lesson planning to do and prep for Friday and made the choice of school first. This weekend, I have a lot of lesson plan writing to do. The reason being my supervisor said, at any given moment I should have my lesson plans written three days ahead. So when he comes in to observe, he should be able to go to my binder and see at least three days out. If he does not, then I cannot teach on those days. The reason being, if we are out sick, we need to have plans established. Also, planning is integral in knowing where we are heading and what we need to do to get there. So I decided each weekend, I would write for the entire week. Except Monday, would need to be written Thursday for Friday, so that my mentor can review it ahead of time to make sure I am on the right track. I have learned so much already about myself, my students and the teaching profession. I am very grateful that my internship is one year instead of the traditional semester. It will allow me to see the entire school year in regards to the curriculum and will allow me to truly establish myself as my students teacher. They will see me as a constant person in their life, instead of me only being there a few months and knowing I am leaving. I am excited to see how my students change over the year and hopefully all of their successes on the Regents exam at the end of the year.

On that note, going to go work on my grad homework and lesson plans.

Have a great weekend! I will update you on Tuesday!

Getting my Feet Wet

2009-09-15T14:54:00.006-04:00

So I have been at Troy now officially for a week and I already feel at home. Each day I become a little less nervous and get a little more comfortable with my role as intern. I have slowly been teaching small parts of my class and it is great to be involved. I also think I know all of the names of my students, which I am really excited about, because I was nervous I would struggle with that, but know how much it means to have your teacher know who you are. Something I forgot to mention is on the first day of class I had my students fill out an index card about themselves. It is a great way to get to know your students a little better, but was something I always grumbled at as a student. If you ask the right questions, you are able to get an idea as to what your student’s are about, or at least be able to find a connection with them. I would certainly recommend to future teachers, if you did not do this to try it when you have your own class, it can certainly help you make a difference. My mentor has been really helpful working with me to team-teach until I feel comfortable enough to take over. Today, I taught for about half a class and I could feel the nerves beginning to fade as I began to speak. I think it helps that I get to observe my mentor first period so that I am that much more prepared for my fourth period class. Plus, each night I review the materials and make notes so that I am more familiar with what is going to happen the next day.
Today was a review class, so I took the opportunity to get a little more involved. I decided to make a review sheet for my class, because it is always nice to have one sheet that has the important information that you need to know. Plus, it gave the students an opportunity to work together and for me to walk around and to see if they were getting it. It was interesting as I walked around to see which students decided to work together and which opted to work on their own. As my professors in the MAT program always said during the summer, you can learn a lot about your students when they work in groups and when you get to observe them. This was one of my first chances to really observe them, when the teacher or myself was not talking. I am interested to see after their quizzes tomorrow, if their review sheets made a difference. I will be able to compare their grades to the other two sections, as a gauge for me if review sheets help or not. Obviously each class is different, but I wonder if it might help with some of the tougher questions, so I will keep you posted. Today is my first night class for Biological Demonstrations, so I am excited to get a sense of what that is all about.
I am currently trying to stay on top of my work for my internship and grad classes, because I am hoping I can attend TGIT, which is an event put on my UGC every Thursday evening at Clinton's Ditch. It is a great opportunity to see friends and faculty in a relaxed setting with some good food and company. This is the first gathering for the year, but I have heard nothing but good things, so I am hoping I can take advantage of the opportunity.
I think that is all I have for now. Have a great week everyone!

1st Week of Student Teaching

2009-09-13T20:26:00.004-04:00

Let me try to recap the first week of student teaching and grad classes. Tuesday, I started my first day at Troy High School, minus the students. Tuesday and Wednesday were Professional Development Days, in which there were various workshops and opportunities to meet in department meetings and get acclimated to the school. My mentor for my internship is also a Union Graduate, so it is extremely helpful to work with him because of his expertise of the program and because he has been teaching for a few years. I was able to work with him to help set up the classroom for the year and also talk about how he grades, does seating, set up our grade books and talk about the materials for the year. The students came on Thursday and you could feel the anticipation of the teachers that morning prior to the students entering the building. I must admit I was quite nervous and excited about the arrival of the students, thus I did not sleep all that well on Wednesday night. I think being an intern, became that much more real, knowing the students were arriving and I was just hoping all would go well.

The students came and it felt like everything truly began. I met the students I would be teaching and all of the other students that my mentor would be teaching. For these classes, I helped pass out papers and interacted with the students, but played more of the observer role. In the classes I would be teaching, I was a bit more active, team-teaching, more talking, with my mentor, to establish my presence as their teacher right off the bat, boy was I nervous. On Friday, I was still feeling anxious, because I knew my mentor wanted me to step in and teach a bit on Friday, so I was brushing up on my Biology and trying to calm the nerves. On Friday, after observing him teach a class, we discussed afterward how I felt I wanted to continue. We decided to co-teach, going back and forth, so I was not teaching the whole time, but so the students continued to see me playing an active role and so I can begin to get comfortable. I felt a little shaky, but I think I did okay. I am just starting out, but know it will get better. The other science teachers are so supportive and helpful as is my mentor (who is extremely supportive and encouraging), that having such a strong support system will certainly make a difference. In addition, there are eight other Union interns at Troy, so it is nice to see a friendly face and someone else who is going through all the beginning steps, together.

As far as Graduate classes, classes started Wednesday, so I had two of the three classes I will be taking. I had Special Needs Seminar (about at-risk students) and Literacy. The professors seem nice and the work seems overall doable, though as always, getting the course syllabus and realizing how quickly the semester will go is a bit overwhelming. The Literacy class is kind of interesting, because it is actually two sections that are taught as one class, which is fun, because I get to see a lot of my classmates from the summer. So far have a bit of work to do, that I tried to get a jump-start on during the weekend, so that I am not too overwhelmed during the week. This week I am starting my work study position working with the Special Assistant to the President and VP of Enrollment Management and Student Services. I am excited about having this opportunity and because of this job, actually had a preview to the new Graduate Building, which is amazing. The Graduate College has almost completely finished a new building, located just off Union's main campus, is spectacular. It will house all the offices for the programs, as well as the curriculum library, classrooms, student work areas and many places for students to do group work or work quietly on their own. So much thought and time went into the design of the building and I would have to say my favorite part is the lounge area when you first walk in. It is a large room, with many large windows, a fire place, a 50" flat-screen TV, coffee area and comfortable, moveable chairs. I am looking forward to its' opening on September 21st and having an opportunity to use this new space.

Well, I think it is time I get back to my work so I can get so I can then rest up for the week. I will keep you posted on the week's on goings soon!

**Below I have included a few photos of the new Graduate Center. The one on the right is of the lobby, prior to the furniture moving in, but gives you a sense of the size and beautiful windows.

Summer Program

2009-09-12T13:34:00.010-04:00

Welcome and thank you for joining me as I journey through my MAT experience. The summer required portion of the program was a blending of experiences and I cannot even begin to explain how much I learned as a student and future teacher. The summer began with a lot of nerves and questions. Would I like my classmates and professors? Did I make the right choice in Union and becoming a teacher? Could I handle the work? What do I expect? We all began the first day quiet, not overly chatty, with a presence of fear and excitement in the room. This all changed after we had a class retreat on the second day. Now I have to be honest, the thought of going on a retreat with complete strangers, being outdoors and in a cabin, left me feeling not too excited and dreading the two days. The experiences and friendships that developed after the two day excursion to Skye Farm, left me feeling extremely thankful at having had the opportunity to have this experience and getting to know my classmates. We returned to class the following week and the professors had to wait for us to quiet down because of the loud chatter and bonds that had been created. I will talk more about our Skye Farm excursion, because it was truly an experience I will not soon forget.

The classes over the summer met Monday-Friday, and often ran from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. These classes taught me so much about literacy, teaching strategies, how to plan and execute a lesson, how to think like a teacher and student and so much more. The morning classes were Psychology of Teaching and Literacy, followed by our Methods class (which corresponded to our discipline), followed by lab where we taught lessons to our classmates. The most nerve-racking part for me was the lab, because I had never taught before and teaching a lesson to fellow graduate students, scared the living daylights out of me. What I found though was endless support from my peers. We all encouraged one another, really emphasized the positive, but provided constructive feedback to each other, to help them better themselves. The professors over the summer were supportive, encouraging, provided so much knowledge, expertise and things to think about, I could not have asked for a better opportunity and professors to help me become the best teacher I can be.

Now I make this sound like the summer was not a challenge. The summer is tough, it is a lot of work and so much information being thrown at you, but it is completely doable. You are challenged. You are challenged to not only think about learning from a student perspective, but a teacher perspective. You are taught to think about what you are thinking about your thinking (if you have not heard the work metacognitive, you will hear it over and over and realize how important it is). The summer is a challenge, or at least it was for me, because I had been out of school for four years and really did not have much background in education, except for my schooling experiences. So I was learning a lot of information and was a student again.

Thanks for joining me on this journey. Much more to come on my internship and my path to becoming a teacher!

*Below, I have included a few photos from Skye Farm of the group and of us canoeing on the last day there!