Level III Experience Summary

I had a wonderful experience working with my corresponding teacher for my Level IIIs. I truly can say that this experience empowered me as an educator, because I learned so much. The first day that I started, a tragedy struck at the high school. As a teacher, we never wish for sad things to happen to our students. It was so heartbreaking and devastating, and it reminded everyone of just how precious life is. When misfortunes happen to schools, teachers have to keep on going. I learned that students look up to teachers and are happy to be at school while doing my experience time at Brookings. Students come to school early and always leave late, because they genuinely love to be there, and kids are greatly influenced by the teachers.

We had a junior achievement day, and our classroom was assigned an insurance agent to talk about ethics. I will always remember what students said in response to the speaker’s question posed to the classroom. The speaker asked all of the students where they learned their ethics from. The students that responded boldly to the whole class said “school” and another said their “teachers”. Every student agreed with his response, and I was a little bit taken back. I do not remember learning ethics from school – but I know now that so many students do learn ethics from school. This just goes to show that teachers teach beyond the classroom. Teachers have a greater influence on students that we will never begin to understand.

I have learned a tremendous amount from my corresponding teacher. Her classroom management and classroom motivation is to be admired. I plan to use some of her techniques, and I will always remember certain things she did to motivate some students. She utilized a seating chart, which makes classroom management much easier, when you can control where students sit. My corresponding teacher also stressed the importance of following policy to me, and she taught me to relax with some students and send them to the office. In business classes, we will have many children with disabilities join our classroom. Total, we had about 8 students on an IEP (Individual Education Plan) in her combined business classes. I am very excited and slightly worried about this. When I teach, I want to meet the needs of all my students, and having students on different learning levels will be a challenge. It brings me joy that in personal finance, students learn so many valuable lessons on money management; I am almost certain that students will take their skills and use them in the future.

It is of extreme importance to motivate your classroom everyday. My corresponding teacher did an excellent job in showing caring and kindness to her students, and I plan to exhibit those traits as well. I feel that a motivated learner comprehends so much more than that same learner, unmotivated. I think it is vital to be positive and cheerful in every class I will teach, because it will make students want to be there, and want to learn. I will strive to better myself everyday, because in teaching, there will challenges, and I need to be prepared for a multitude of situations and different student learning levels.