Genre Reflection #1: My Time

I am sitting alone in the back of the classroom.

I am sitting alone, with no space of my own.

I am sitting alone, unable to make connections.

I am sitting alone, struggling to find my own place.

Will I ever feel welcomed?

Will there be a day when I can take total control?

Will anyone take me seriously?

Will they participate?

Will they stare off into space and fail to provide even monotone responses?

When I take charge, everything will work perfectly!

When I take charge, not one pupil will respond.

When I take charge, each student will demonstrate enthusiasm in participation.

When I take charge, no one will approach the board.

This is my time!

This is my chance to prove that I can be a teacher!

This is my opportunity to create lessons that students will remember!

This is my interval to capture the students and change the world!

This is my time to make a difference.

Lesson #1: T2 Language! Linguists!

As I continue my observations, I have had the opportunity to teach pieces of lessons. Although I was incredibly nervous, and for some time was convinced that this was not the career meant for me, I have come to learn from this experience and am working diligently to improve my teaching style, and learn from my CT.

In my placement, the freshmen class is a T2 Language! course where the main focus is on grammar and sentence structure. As described in chapter 15 of Building Adolescent Literacy in Today's English Classroom by Bomer, this class feels more "like a battle between races, generations, and levels of privilege" (266). Although the course has a strict outline that is meant to be followed by teachers, my CT has noted what her students struggle with the most based on their placement exams prior to high school, and will often tweak steps based on what her students need more focus on during class.

When I took my place in front of the class for my lesson, I could feel my nerves getting the best of me, and it wasn't long before I was stumbling over the material and hiding behind the podium, hoping to disappear as I realized how confusing I was sounding to the students. It did not take long before my CT jumped in and took control of the class, hoping to salvage the lesson that I had bombed.

As I work to plan my next unit with my CT, I plan to print out the slides prior to class beginning, allowing myself a quick reference of upcoming slides if my nerves kick in and I begin forgetting what is coming up in the lesson. This happened during my first lesson, and I jumped forward to a point that I was not ready for with the students, thinking for some unfathomable reason that it had been left off the slides.

I hope that my future lessons will be more successful and that I can regain my confidence in myself that was shattered during this first lesson attempt of the semester. I hope that with more work and communication with my CT and US, I will be successful with my lessons in the future, and will learn from this experience, rather than live in remorse from it.



Works Cited:
Bomer, R. (2011). "Making More of Grammar: Studying Language Like Linguists". Building Adolescent Literacy in Today's English Classroom (pp. 265-278). Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.