Shippensburg: Week 1

Hello all! I hope that all of you had a wonderful first week. At Ship H.S. things were very good. The students are used to working hard in Mr. Massara's class since he demands that they take class very seriously. He has virtually no classroom management problems and in the rare event that students get out of hand he is quick to correct it so that no one is derailed for long. His first rule is essentially give respect, get respect and it seems to work. He also is friendly and ask students about how sports games went and other things that show he cares about them not just their grades.

The class routine is the same everyday. Students first read the minutes which helps remind students what they did the day before and helps absent students know what they missed. The students take turns writing and reading the minutes so the responsibility of paying attention falls to them. They also play The Game which is a question put on the board that students answer using voting cards. The grammar questions were just finished and I started with the literary terms questions today and will continue with them during my placement. Students are used to doing several things in Mr. Massara's class. They often work in groups or pairs on questions or something else concerning their current novel. If they are in the middle of big projects they usually get some notes to help them (this week it was outlining for a speech) and then they get work time.

Mr. Massara's teaching style is a mix of direct instruction and discussion base. The students are often put in groups or pairs to explore something in a novel as I said before. At times he also gives them power points and notes that have fill in the blank so that they are forced to follow along and aren't just sitting idle during a lesson. He has a pretty good rapport with his students and usually brings a lot of energy to the lesson. He also has high standards for his students (college prep and Honors and even his elective, Myths and Folktales). Students are expected to respond to questions to the best of their ability and if they don't know the answer or if they don't answer completely Mr. Massara will try to help them get to the right answer by asking more questions.

This post is getting rather long so I'll try wrap it up quickly. I don't know much about the socioeconomic status of my students and so far I'm not sure what kind of outside pressures the kids are facing. I hope as I spend more time with them I'll get to know these things better and then I'll be able to help the students if I can.

Shippensburg is a friendly and inviting school. I've met several of the teachers and I feel comfortable and welcome there. They are used to getting student teachers so its nice and relaxed.

I would also like to add that I will be starting to teach Myths and Folktales next week and I'm very excited and I'm looking forward to the experience. When I taught the game today I tried to improve every time. There were things that I could have done better but the biggest help was that Mr. Massara wrote down some things I did well and some things that I could improve. I'm looking forward to continued recommendations and suggestions.

Have a great second week! Sorry to make this so long, I apparently had a lot to say :)