Two weeks in… a lifetime to go

I am officially two weeks into my teaching career and what a two weeks it has been. In just these two weeks life has gone from hectic to so fast paced I have to remember to stop and take a breath, this lifestyle has not left nearly enough time for reflection on the art of teaching.

 

I am teaching 5 different classes which at this point are going well, I mean I have shown up every day and and content has been taught. I keep saying to myself I will make that a little better a little more engaging and little more exciting, but then I find more pressing issues that override these thoughts. I keep jotting notes for next year as I know there will come a time when there is more time. People have always told me that year one is about keeping your head above water and that sure is the case. I have decided to pick one class as a time to start getting to those items with. 

The monster I have chosen to tackle is Ag Business, a class filled with the ever unmotivated seniors and a subject that none of us are overly found of. However it is my job to find a way to engage them in the content. Over the past two weeks we have waded through the content with e-moments, group work, and discussions but it hasn't hit home yet.  So I began Thursdays class  with asking them what they wanted from the course.  As a student it wasn't until my junior and senior years of college that a professor or teacher ever asked me what I wanted to learn. I showed up the first day and they just told us this was our year. So what does my senior group want out of a class?

They want discussions instead of lectures, they want to teach, they want videos, and they want group projects, they want simulations, and if possible they want to do nothing. Now its up to me to discover how to modify the content into these forms and meet at least a few of their requests. I told them they would have to work with me, that I couldn't transform the class over night but I would do my best to incorporate more of there wants into the plans. We will see how this goes, I don't expect these students to come out of my class and all want to go to major in agri-business, but I hope they will have a greater appreciation for what agribusiness really is.

Well I suppose I should get to lesson planning for the week.

Till next time...