Day One

Day One My first day in Mrs. Carrolls 8th grade science class was very interesting. All the kids were very loud today. They seemed wound up. I suspect that it was because I was there for the first time. One kid in there I knew already. His name is Thomas Shirley. Obviously he is Kates little brother. I am friends with his sister so he was excited that he was the only one who knew me. He acted up the worst of all the kids.The room was more decorated since the last time I was in there for my observation. It had posters if volcanoes, rocks, and earthquakes/faults. There are no desks in the classroom at all, just tables. There are two tables that sit side-by-side in each row and two kids per table. Mrs. Carroll is a very sweet woman. She didnt have very much control over her class though. I actually had to tell a few of the girls that sat up front to keep the volume down on my first day.Mrs. Carroll expects a lot from me during this experience. I have a feeling she is going to push me to become a good teacher. Well of her class anyways. You know she doesnt want a teacher teaching her class if they cant teach well or handle her students. I can honestly say that I cant wait to teach my lesson. She told me that she will help me with my lesson and to prepare for it. I just hope the students will respect me as a teacher and not just as an older student than them. She seems very excited to have me in her class. She told me she wished she had me for all of her class because she needs help. She also told me that I was with the merit class and they are the better behaved out of all her classes. If thats true then Mrs. Carroll has her work cut out for her.Day Two Today my students behaved a little better. They were still very loud though. Mrs. Carroll had to hush them many times throughout the day. They started in a fault lab yesterday and they had to finish them today. They had to color the faults and make a cube out of it. After they finished all that they had to answer questions about it.They saw the questions to be really hard for some reason even though all the answered were on the cube they just did right before they answered the questions. Before they even did the cube they did a whole lesson on faults and earth quakes. My name (Ms. Moody) was being called from all over the classroom because they had questions. That gave me a feeling of good and bad. Good because they already trusted me enough already to answer their questions but bad because I didnt know the answers. I couldnt remember from all the way back in the eighth grade. So when they asked me a question to an answer I didnt know I had to go interrupt Mrs. Carroll with another student so I could help the student I was with. It kind of made me feel dumb.I also learned how to use to copier machine today. I learned how to make two papers front and back. I had to run all over the school today for Mrs. Carroll. She had me run stuff to the office, make copies, answer students questions, and go ask other teachers questions. I felt like I was her personal secretary. She had me doing everything. Not that I minded it but I was there to learn how to teach not do her chores. Today was a very productive day!

Day ThreeToday is Friday! It was more of a relaxed day today. All Mrs. Carroll had the student do today was watch short video and then take notes on the next section afterward. Im finally learning the kids names. I know Thomas, Cole, Alexis, Bryson, Matthew H, Matthew W, Torri, JT, Rebecca, Rachel, Breanna, Jordon, and Sera. Thats it so far. Matthew Westridge is one of the funniest kids I have ever met in my whole life. He just randomly breaks out singing a song off of commercials or anything. Everyone just laughs at him, even Mrs. Carroll. There really isnt much you can do about him. He kind of reminds me of myself sometimes. When I was a little younger I would do the same thing. Just start out in song if I heard one word that was in the song I would just start singing it and have everyone laughing. My teachers didnt laugh like Mrs. Carroll does though. That might just be because I was interrupting class and they didnt like that very much.Thomas Shirley was talking to me today I looked away for a second to talk to Mrs. Carroll so he yelled hey Heather. I was like nooooooooo. So the kids that were near him and heard him were like Heather? Who is Heather? Then they looked and me and we like oooo Heather. They asked Thomas how he knew my name. So of course he went into detail of how his older sister and I are best friends and Im always over at his house. At least they all went back to calling me Ms. Moody though. Thank goodness. I was scared that since they learned my first name they would start calling me Heather and I wouldnt really like that because that would make me feel like I was their equal and I am defiantly not. I am soon to become their teacher.

Day FourThe kids are finally starting to warm up to me. They are showing me their true colors. Today is Monday so they have their stories from the weekend. They all wanted to come up to me and tell me what all they did in GREAT detail. They even asked what I did and I told them I didnt do much and they called me boring.Every morning I come in there all they did was stare at me like I was some weird being now all they do is jump at me and want to tell me all about themselves and ask me all about myself. They ask me some really personal information.I coach a cheerleading team for the recreation center and I saw Bryson there at a game one time. I learned that he played for the Demon Dekons when he was younger and his dad coaches it. Cole likes the Blue Devils which is the team I coach cheerleading for. Tonight both of the teams play in the championship and they were making bets on who was going to win and asking me who I thought was going to win. So of course I had to side with Cole who was pulling for the Blue Devils because thats my team! This whole conversation was going on during class so Mrs. Carroll stopped the class and I was afraid they were going to get in trouble because I had a part in the talking but instead she just joined in on the conversation. We didnt do much today though. All they had to do was finish taking notes a mini lab. Mrs. Carroll us treating me more and more like a teacher each day. She gives mew more responsibilities each day as well. I am now in charge of attendance each day on the computer and in the book. She trusted me enough to have her login name and her password. I dont think Ill forget it for a long time.Day FiveToday was a very slow say. They had projects given to them since before I started teaching there and they were due today. I started my experience out teaching rocks but we werent on that lesson very long because they were doing that before I came. So all they did today was present their projects.Some of the projects were actually really good. One girl names Rebecca made a childrens book about a mineral. I honestly think she did better than I would have done and I am a senior in high school. I really sounded like an actual childrens book. I was very impressed!I kids behavior was terrible today. It wore today than the first day. Thats bad because I was new and they were all excited about me that day. I dont understand why they were so talkative today. I even had to take control over the classroom because Mrs. Carroll had to step out of the classroom for a few minutes. Thomas, the student that already knows me, called me Heather again today. It made me pretty upset with him even though it was an accident. So now that Thomas called me Heather some of the other kids are starting to think that its ok to call me Heather and it isnt. I told them I wasnt going to answer that because thats not my name anymore. I will only answer to Ms. Moody. Cole actually believed me that my name wasnt Heather. He even asked me if my friends called me Ms. Moody. So I had to tell him no they call me by my first name but it was pretty funny. I got my laugh out of it so it was ok. Over all today was a good easy day!

Day SixToday wasnt such a good name for anyone really. Mrs. Carroll was in a terrible mood to begin with and it all went down him from there.Im not quite sure why Mrs. Carroll was in such a bad mood but I could tell from the minute I walked in before the students were even there yet. I know she didnt feel good so Im sure that played a big part in it. Maybe she had a rough night in her personal life last night but she brought it with her this morning and I can tell. It kind of rubbed off on me and thats not good because the students didnt do anything to deserve two teachers in a bad mood.When the students came in they were rowdy and when I looked at Mrs. Carrolls face I saw that she was not happy about that. As soon as they came in she yelled at them to sit in their seats and be quiet. Normally in the mornings before the announcements she lets them socialize for a little so they dont have an excuse to do it during class, even though they do it anyways.When Mrs. Carroll is in a bad mood the best thing to do is leave her alone and be quiet which the students wanted no part of today. So today all we do was some review stuff from the previous week to catch up on things and the kids decided they needed a lot of help so I jumped right on that so it didnt make her mad. She was complaining about every little thing. I found it kind of unprofessional. I understand that people have bad nights and mornings but when youre a teacher you cant bring that to class with you. Its not your students fault what happened to taking it out on them is not the solution.Day SevenToday was a much better day compared to yesterday. Thank goodness! Mrs. Carroll was in a much better mood. She even apologized for yesterday. It was so cute because the kids were like we understand!Today we had a test and the kids totally forgot about it. I wouldnt say all of the kids but the majority of them did. Im sure ill be grading these test so I hope they do well. I hate grading test. I also had to distribute the test. The test was on faults they started a long time ago. This unit was a very long one. It felt like it went on and on. The test was supposedly the biggest one they would take this year. This unit was also the biggest unit they will do as well. The kids were excited to hear that they test in the future werent going to be as big. They hate when the test isnt multiple choice so when they saw that it was they were sort of relived not much but a little more. After the test Mrs. Carroll just gave them some word crosses and jigsaw puzzles because the test took too long and she said she didnt feel like starting a new chapter today with only fifteen minutes left in the class. So today was a very boring day for me. All I got to do was sit there really. I started grading tests but like I said there was only fifteen minutes left in class so I didnt get to get very far with them.Today was the worst day so far. I mean it wasnt bad. Nothing bad happened it was just really boring. I could hardly stay awake. As a teacher falling asleep in class probably isnt the best thing to do.

Day EightToday we have an assembly to go to. We didnt do anything in class at all. All we did was take attendance and the kids dropped their stuff off and we left. So I had yet another boring day. Two days in a row. I wasnt looking forward to sitting in an assembly for the whole class period.As we walked to the assembly Mrs. Carroll made the kids walk in a line. One of the other teachers classes was really loud and my class got blamed for it. That actually made me mad. I was like excuse me thats not my class thats your class screaming. I felt rude but I couldnt help it I wasnt going to let my class get in trouble for someone elses class. She apologized to me and everything. So once we got into the little theater we realized that it was freezing. So Mrs. Carroll asked me if I would go get our coats and her water. So I had to walk all the way back to her classroom which is all the way in the back. Once I got back in the little theater I got to sit with the teacher which made me feel like a teacher instead of a student. That made me feel good but when I got in there Mrs. Carroll was not even in there so I just laid her coat down, The assembly was incredibly boring. It was about duke energy and engineering. Yet again I just wanted to fall asleep but of course that would look terrible. The speaker was the one who made the assembly boring. She was very mono tone and not interesting at all! The kids were beginning to talk and be rude because she was so boring.At the end she asked if anyone had questions. Of course our class clown Mr. Matthew Westridge had to say something. That kid never stops.Day NineToday was back to normal. No more test or assemblies, just a normal day with notes and labs.Today we did a mini lab on fossils because thats the next section we are going to begin on this week. This is the section Ill be doing my lesson plans on. She wants me to do a lab and notes. She gave me this whole huge notebook to dig through and find a fun lab on adaptation or on fossils because they all run together eventually. I picked a fun one on fossils to do. I know if I would of pick a plain regular one they wouldnt of had fun with me teaching and therefore not listen to me as I teach. Without the respect from the kids I wouldnt want to teach them so in order to keep their attention I picked something they will all enjoy.The other lesson plan I have to do will be notes. Ill teach them the notes on fossils before my lesson. So the notes that I teach and give them will go into the lab that I will do with them the next day. I cant tell if Mrs. Carroll is excited Im going to teach her class or nervous. I can understand if she is nervous because she likes things done the way she does them and she cant really interject. I think she is both but more excited than nervous because she gets to take a couple days break to grade papers and get stuff done. She told me that if I could do this once or twice a week for her that would really help her out and get stuff done that needs to be done that she cant do while her class is in the class. Unless they are doing a worksheet or test where they have to work alone and be silent.

Day TenIt has been ten days and I feel like this is my class already. I feel like I should be in here the rest of the year. I love these kids so much already. I have already gotten close with mostly all of them. They all trust me enough now to ask me questions and actually treat me like a teacher. I am going to miss them so much when I leave.Today was a good laid back day. Mrs. Carroll likes to have those. Today she gave the kids their progress reports and highlighted the things they were missing or needed to make up, I though that was really nice of her. I wish they did that in my classes for me. So today we spent the whole day just talking and making up work.Today my students decided they wanted to know a lot more about me. One student asked me where I wanted to go to college. One student asked me why I looked so young for being eighteen. Another student wanted to know if I had a boyfriend. Keep in mind that this was a girl student. Of course I only answered the appropriate questions that didnt have to do with my personal life. Like if I have a boyfriend or not. They learned a lot about me today. I have this hear monitor on and the kids never asked me what it was until today. I guess they figured since they were asking question why not ask what that big black thing I carry around with me everyday on my hip is. I didnt go into great detail as to why I am wearing the heart monitor but I went into details about what it was and how long id be wearing it. They all seemed pretty concerned after I told them it was because something was wrong with my heart. It made me feel good to see they cared about me already. I could also see a sign of relief that they finally knew what it was and glad that thing wasnt my phone because thats what they thought it was.Day ElevenToday was a good day. Well as good as a Monday can be. Mrs. Carroll always is grumpier on Mondays then any other day. And of course the students are excited to see each to other because they didnt get to see each other over the weekend. Oh and it doesnt help that we just got back from Thanksgiving break so the kids are even more excited to see each other than normal.The kids were full of stories of what they did over their break. There is this one girl names Sera and she is always sick. She really does have something wrong with her on the inside. Im not positive as to what it is though. I think its a swollen gal bladder. That poor girl is always missing school and having to make the work up. I can sympathize with her though. Im always out of school for my heart issues. Matthew Westridge is so crazy! He always has something to say no matter what. It never fails. I think Mrs. Carroll secretly doesnt like him. I honestly think he gets on her nerves even though she will never admit it.Thomas and Cole didnt stop talking to me once today! Their desks are right in front of where I sit so they talk to me all class period. Thomas kept repeating Ms. Moody, Ms. Moody, Ms. Moodyetc. It was so annoying. Mainly because I hate my last name and I hate hearing it. He also has this crazy loud high pitched laugh. I have never heard anything like it before. He is so crazy. I had to listen to his laugh the entire class period and Im not over dramatizing it. He is so much like his older sister and brother in many ways. When I see him I see a little of each of them in him. Thomas makes my day everyday regardless if he is being annoying. He starts my day off with a smile.Day TwelveToday was a long day. A good one though. I was more tired today than I was yesterday and yesterday was a Monday.Mrs. Carroll wasnt very happy to be here again today. She just got back into the school mode. There is this one group of girls who sit in the back I just cant seem to get close to. They will talk to me but they wont really carry on a conversation with me about anything. I feel bad but I am trying to reach out to them. They are just so stand offish.Today Mrs. Carroll and I discussed what I will e teaching for my two lessons again. I am actually kind of excited. At first I was nervous but now I cant wait to be and feel like a real teacher. The only thing I am worried about is the kids not giving me the attention and respect I deserve when I am up there teaching. I am going to try my hardest so I expect them to give me their undivided attention. I mean the lab is meant to be fun so of course they can talk but when I say its time to stop talking they better listen to me.Right now we are learning about volcanoes right before we get into fossils. I am actually finding this information kind of interesting. I mean most of it is review from when I was in eighth grade. Its just the pictures she shows that class are just really cool and festinating. The last thing we did today was hand out another progress reports to see what their new grade is and handed out a longitude and latitude worksheet for them to do for homework. When Mrs. Carroll gives homework the kids get all mad because she never gives them homework so when she does they think it really stinks.Day ThirteenToday was a really fun day. They got to play Jeopardy! It was really fun because they got to play this instead of working on their study guide all day. I got to be the host. I was also the point keeper. Lets just say I need to get back in math and work on my simple mental math! I messed up on adding up the points and one of my students tried to correct me but I caught it right when he said something about it. After a while of playing the game it started to mess up so Mrs. Carroll had to do it from her computer, Even then it was still messing up on there so that made Mrs. Carroll get very angry. When the game made her mad it made her take it out on the kids. Every litter conversation the kids would have she would yell at them. I mean really, they were playing a game they are bound to get a little rowdy.After the game she gave them their study guides for the test on Friday. Thomas asked if they could work with a partner but Mrs. Carroll already said that they could only work with the person sitting nearest to you but Thomas asked if they could pick their partner so that didnt go over so well. She flipped on poor Thomas.After that she made them work the rest of the class period silently and alone. One little noise someone would make she would yell. I think it was a mixture between her not feeling well this morning and the game going terribly wrong for her. Why did the game have to mess up? It was putting her in a good mood before it went horribly wrong.

Day FourteenFridays are always good days! So of course today was a good day. Mrs. Carroll is always in such a good moos on Fridays. All week she complained about having to be at school. So she knew that today was the last day until her precious weekend. I hate to say it but I totally agree. This week has gone by so slow.This week we went over our small unit on volcanoes. We started it Monday and took the test on it today. Im sure the kids loved that. Some of the kids were complaining that she was going to fast but from my point of view it was a really easy chapter and not a lot of work went into so the test shouldnt be too hard to do good on. I defiantly learned some new stuff on volcanoes.After the test was given out and taken back up, Mrs. Carroll gave me a word sequence game to hand out to the kids to play entertain them for the rest of the class. I gave them all around twenty words that made a story and they had to choose five words at a time and make a hypothesis on what they think the story will be about. There were like five or six groups and each group came up with something different. The results were actually pretty funny. I had one person from each group come up to the board and write their answer so that everyone can compare. There were some pretty weird stories. This class loves to do stuff like this. They all get so competitive and frustrated when they dont get something exactly right. It id do entertaining to watch them get so mad at each other and fight over who is right and who is wrong when really neither of them are right. There was no right answer.

Day FifteenToday is a Monday. So I just knew how Mrs. Carroll was going to be. Just as I thought she was in a terrible mood. I was very tired today; I didnt get much sleep last night. My procedure is tomorrow so thats all I could think about so I couldnt fall asleep.So today I was kind of distant from the class and what was going on. I kind of felt bad but I couldnt help it. Im very stressed out right now. I feel like I can have one personal day.The kids were very good today! I was very surprised since it was a Monday, which was very helpful to my nerves and Mrs. Carrolls bad mood Mondays. With the exception of one kid, JT, he keeps calling me Ms. Heather and it really is getting on my nerves. I keep telling him he cant call me that but he just wont listen to me about this. I dont know what else to do about it. I can only do so much. Im already in a bad mood and he is just making it worse. No, I didnt take it out on the kids. Yes, I look a little out of it but thats it. They just thought I was tired and thats ok.I couldnt really find a way to get out of my funk so I just tried my best to ignore it. Today Mrs. Carroll and I introduce the fossil unit because in a few days is when I will be doing my lesson and I cant wait! I brought home all the stuff to look over it! I really hope they like it. If they think it is boring they are just going to ignore me and do what they want and not give me the respect I deserve.

Day SixteenToday was the best and worst day of my experience by far. The worst because I was in major physical pain from my heart procedure I had done Tuesday. I was out Tuesday though Thursday on bed rest and walking around so much today was causing me a lot of pain. I wanted to cry at some points but just like a real teacher I sucked up the pain and acted like there was nothing wrong. Since today was my first day back when I got there I had get well soon cards and we will miss you cards all in one from each and every kid. My student Bryson wished me luck at college. When I read that I was like aw how sweet but then I kept reading and he said dont go to any crazy college parties without inviting me! Matthews card was just ridiculous but it reminds me of just how he is so its perfect. Oh, and Thomass card was like an entire page long as where the other students cards were like a paragraph. He is such a nut job. It really did make my day!It also was my best day yet! I actually felt like a teacher doing my lesson plan today. It just felt so natural. I felt comfortable up in front of the kids. They respected me as a teacher today and I loved it. I thought I was going to be nervous but I really wasnt. It just felt so right. Everything went perfect and the kids loved it. They had so much fun with the lab I had them do. I was worried they wouldnt be happy and satisfied and not pay attention but it was quite the opposite. I loved every minute of it! There is nothing that I would have changed. There was no way that could of gone any better. If there was ever any doubt in my mind about being a teacher or what grade level I want to teach they are gone, gone forever! Teaching is most defiantly the profession for me.Day SeventeenToday was another boring day. I guess I think its boring because compared to last Friday when I did my lesson everything would seem boring. All they are doing today is going to another assembly then coming back to take a test. WOW! What a lovely day.The assembly that we went to today was just as boring as the last one. This one might have been worse! It was about the nuclear plant. I mean that might have been more interesting to someone who is interested in that but not a bunch of eighth graders. They picked the wrong crowd for this presentation. I really didnt enjoy it at all. I sat next to Matthew Westridge during it and boy was that a mistake. He and three other boys were doing this weird arm trick and it was making me laugh which isnt good because im suppose to be the teacher. But its ok because Mrs. Carroll was laughing at them to. Something else thats funny is Mrs. Carroll was sitting behind Matthew and she was looking at his head and found gray hair! She told him about it right in the middle of the assembly and he freaked out. It was so funny because everyone stared at him. She pulled it out for him and gave it to him. Five minutes later she found another one. Then I leaned over and told him for every one gray/white hair you pull out another five grow back. Youre going to have to buy some hair dye soon. He freaked out again. That was the highlight of the presentation. At the end like every other assembly the speaker asked if there were any questions and of course Mr. Matthew had one. He told me the only reason he was asking questions was because he didnt want to go back and take the test.After that we hurried back to the class to rush and take the test. They only had fifteen minutes left but there were only four questions on the test though. Every kid in there started complaining on how there was nothing on the study guide that is on the test. They were very disappointed.

Day EighteenToday is my last day. I am so sad its ridiculous. I didnt think that I would be so sad. I really am going to miss these little munchkins. These kids really have touched my heart. I will never ever forget this experience. I can easily say that Mrs. Carrolls eighth grade merit science class has made my profession decision so much easier. I love them!We didnt do much today. All they did was take notes for yet another unit. They werent too thrilled. They wanted to finish a movie they had started earlier. In the end Mrs. Carroll gave in and let them watch it because she didnt feel like doing noted with them today but she told them they would still have to do them. I thought it was a better choice to watch the movie today because I didnt feel like sitting there watching them take notes. I really dont like doing that and they do that a lot in this class. When the movie was over Mrs. Carroll just let them talk the last twenty minutes of class. They all told me they were really going to miss me. It about made me cry! One student told me not to leave because Mrs. Carroll would get mean again. I was in shock when they said that but it made me laugh. I really dont want to leave but I guess I have to. One student I didnt think we got really close gave me to silly bad bracelets of hers. I thought that was so sweet because she wasnt one of the ones that really connected with me. It really made everything worth it in the end! All the hard work was nothing compared to the happiness that these kids brought me.