Week 4: Sara

This time has flown by! I can't believe that we're going into our last week already. This week was interesting as it always seems to be in Kindergarten. I did my second read aloud on the book called Lady Liberty. It was about how the Statue of Liberty wanted to see the country that her people created and she traveled "from sea to shining sea" to find "amber waves of grain". Our theme for this week was traveling and the USA, so this book fit really well. I had to ad lib the book a little bit because some of the wording was too advanced for Kindergarten but I couldn't find any other book. It went really well though because I ran through the book a little bit before having to read it. Jamie and I also did two read aloud lessons and made a lesson plan for them as well. The first group we had was the bottom of the class in reading and that was trying and an interesting time. They have a hard time with the easier sight words, even. It just kind of amazed me how the class has students that can read at a fifth grade level and then there's students who can barely read at the Kindergarten level. The second read aloud was with the middle group. These students were working on their word blends such as -ch, -tion, -ou, -ur, -ir, etc.
 This week the behavioral student I had previously talked about really tested my patience and made me grow as an educator. He was very sassy and liked to back talk during group activities this week and did not take Jamie and I very seriously when we told him he had a warning. So, I had to learn how to put my foot down and how to discipline properly. My cooperating teacher is excellent and classroom management and I am learning so much from being in his classroom. I learned that I have to realize that I can't always be gentle to the kids because there is a time and place for firm foot and being stern. I'm really enjoying all the skills I'm learning and I can't wait to see what the last week has to hold.