Top 10 Tips from a Student Teacher

Preface: I am half-way through my student teaching experience starting week 6 today. I am in a small (and by small I mean tiny) community where classes average around 26 students. As in, there are 26 students who are going to graduate in the senior class. There are no stoplights, street lamps, or gas stations. I teach 8th and 9th graders on a daily basis, and live alone in a room that I rent from a local homeowner.

10. Student Ag Teachers - Make sure you bring those boots and jeans! I have worn professional dress a total of 1 day. That one day we went to the school farm and drove T posts during the 8th grade class and visited a quail brooding pen during the plan period. Not to mention, there are two welding classes! Needless to say, at the end of the day, my dress pants were beyond trashed... Lesson learned. If the principal says you can wear jeans, don't feel the need to dress up for class... Because you WILL regret it and those $40 pants will be wrecked.

9. Invest in a DVR - Especially those student ag teachers out there in a tiny community like me! I am going, going, going for a week or two with no evening time and then I stop dead in my tracks and I am bored out of my mind in the evenings for a week or even on a weekend. What better way to catch up on grading than watching a week's worth of new shows? Or, let's get honest, procrastinating that Submission 3 artifact page or avoiding lesson planning. Why not online watching? Well, Hulu has gotten stingy and cannot be trusted to have the newest shows up for free, not to mention, I really like surfing the web with my ethernet cable, so I don't want the dang Hulu all up in my business. Thus a DVR would be a wonderful investment.

8. Get to know your copy machine and teacher resource room. As a student teacher, you are a glorified assistant secretary about 28% of the time. Trust me.... You will ALWAYS run out of paper the day worksheets are critical to the lesson and (of course) no one is around to show you where the paper is.... Learn from my mistake! And, figure out that staple/sort feature real quick! It is a TIME SAVER when you have a 15 page packet of notes for a class of 22 students. You don't have a student aid folks... Because you ARE the student teacher aid.

7. Get use to that constant state of trash around your room. Apparently the concept of "organizing and keeping track of papers" doesn't really kick in until post-high school. (And even then there are struggles if you know what I mean..) I am ALWAYS finding old worksheets and papers stuck in nooks and crannies around the classroom... Literally found one from 1996 last week. Not to mention, it looks like a recycling center on the floor of my classroom by Friday. I have yet to find a successful way to encourage and implement organization for the students in my classes. Open for suggestions!

6. Use cartoons and comics in your PowerPoint and put the title as, "Get It?" Those are the best times watching the students one-by-one getting the humor behind the comics. It is great to watch their expressions shift from confusion to understanding to laughter. Trust me. Totally worth the search on Google and the 2 minute distraction in class!

5. If something happens that you have no control over, blame it on the ag teacher! You are a student teacher, and being as such, you are not obligated to take the fall for the not so "cool" things that happen in the chapter or the ag classroom. Throwing the blame on the principal or cooperating teacher is totally acceptable at this point in your career.

4. Never underestimate the power of positive reinforcement on papers that you hand back. Hint: Stamps are cheaper than stickers. Invest in some quality stamps and stamp pads or a quality roll of stickers. My high schoolers LOVE them! And, you FINALLY get brownie points for being the student teacher (more often than not, you are berated, bashed, or made fun of for being the illegitimate student teacher) because the "real" teacher NEVER gives out stamps or sweet stickers! Rack up those brownie points, they help later on down the road!

3. Make sure you have a large budget set up for your diet coke (or another beverage addiction) needs. It may be cheaper to drink out of cans from a 24-pack but it is a hard hit on the grocery list when they are $8 per case and you buy 3-4 cases at a time. Just saying... The bill gets high QUICK! Also, make sure you keep that fridge stocked. Nothing is worse than having no cold cans of DC at 3:30 pm on a Wednesday afternoon.

2. Keep it real with students. Or at least as real as you possibly can. I have found that the best way to build rapport and get students on my side is to be honest. As a student teacher, they don't really give you the respect that they automatically give another adult in the building. You are one step above a substitute, but still many steps away from the librarian or secretary. There is a definite line that I do not cross (don't be their biffle!), but a little bit of honesty and real-life chats can go a long way. Be careful and use discretion, but if done correctly, you will reap some very helpful benefits in managing the classroom and building solid student teacher-student relationships!

1. Never underestimate the students in your classroom. They are sneaky, weird, silly, immature, wise, uncanny, witty, clever, dumb, ridiculous, loud, silent, curious, bored, engaged, fascinated, hating, and loving and every where in between... at any point in time during the day... It can change on a dime, so don't get comfortable. Go with the flow and don't become too discouraged when I student makes a gun out of his hand and fake shoots himself during your lesson or says the following phrase after you have passed out the worksheet you have labored over for 2 hours, "This is &#($^@ing stupid." While I would encourage you to make sure you shut it down and discourage similar behaviors in the future, I would similarly encourage you not to dwell on it. This seems to be totally normal and should be expected from high school students! Remember, you may be the first teacher (student or real life) that has asked them to do work in awhile. Some resistance at first is understandable.

In the end, the important factor remains to keep on keeping on, because you are an educator in training. And even though it is training for you, you are still teaching the future adults of the world. Every day, all day.

A daunting, scary, and exciting thought, right?!

Cheers to you all in college. Soak it up, because even though this is only semi-real life, it is an experience that makes me MISS college an indescribable amount.

- Miss Jones
Teaching. Is. Life.