Moodle! YAY!

I am so excited that we learned how to make a moodle site! It is going to be PERFECT for my tutoring classes! I was planning on organizing my classes for my students during the winter break and now I have somewhere to put all that info! Plus, the students can log in to see what they will be working on that week and what their homework is so they don't forget! I am so excited to be better organized for my tutoring lessons next semester... Now that I have 5 students I have to be really organized and I'm hoping moodle will aid me with that!

Even better news!

I E-mailed one of the teachers that I spent some time observing and she said she is going to talk to the Vice Principal and see if I can have one of her grade 10 or 11 English classes next semester! SO EXCITED! I also asked her if I could shadow her drama class if it is in my spare block or maybe even teach a few classes! How much fun would THAT be!?
Life is pretty good.. Now I only have 2 course wrap up small papers to do and 1 exam!!

A Review of Blake's Video

More Exciting News!

I found a bunch of FREE MATH TEXT BOOKS in the curriculum Lab! There are a bunch of social studies ones too so I suggest everyone come check it out! I'm not sure how often they do this but I was stoked! I even found a textbook and a teacher's guide for a grade 9 one and then I found another grade 9 one and an applications to math 11! Xmas holiday learning here I come!

Update> Lisa just told me they have this all year round. Why didn't anyone tell me about it!? I could have been in here every day checking up on things!!

Ask and yee shal receive!

So today I met with phil about my placement....
A) I am going to Parkland for my 5 week (almost positive)
B) I am going to more of an 'inner city' school for my 8 week (So excited!)
C) I am going to try to teach a Planning 10 class during my 8 week practicum, meaning that I will be doing 4 classes a day, 100% of my course load! WOW!
D) During my 5 week my plan is to do 2 classes of English, and then 2 weeks in Spanish, 2 weeks of psychology and 1 week of planning 10.

Craziness! I am so excited for all of this stuff and I am just about to work on my Plan Book for my seminar class! Life is G-O-O-D!

I have come to the conclusion that there are 2 kinds of teachers...

1. The ______ Teacher: This teacher is hopelessly in love with their subject area. They are experts. They know everything there is to know about their subject. They are passionate about their subject and their goal is to get their students to be just as passionate as they are, or at the least, more interested in the topic. TOCing is their worse nightmare because they are thrown in to classrooms where they may not know the subject area very well.

2. The Teacher: This teacher is dedicated to teaching. Give them a subject and they will teach it to the best of their ability. They get excited about every new day because it brings a new challenge. Their goal is the same for both them and their students: To learn something new every day. TOCing is exactly what they love: a new class, a new subject, a new day.

I am definitely #2.

What do you think? What kind of teacher are YOU?

Indigenous studies....

Today was a great reminder for teachers to KNOW YOUR RESOURCES!! 
I think it is so important for teacher's to be in touch with their school and community! There are SO MANY DIFFERENT RESOURCES OUT THERE, you just have to find them. I think it would be a fantastic idea to hear about YOUR favourite school resources. My favourite? The Librarian! I am an English teacher and the school Librarian know so much stuff and has a lot of helpful information about both current and classic novels. Furthermore, they often have supplies like graphic diagrams and so on. What/who is YOUR favourite resource??

In our seminar class we are suppose to get a book ready with a few lesson plans/seating plans/etc. I think having a list of your school and community resources would be a great thing to have.
For instance:
A list of names/Emails of the Principal/Vice Principals, and Counsellors.
The head of the career and personal planning unit, the school social worker, the sheriff in that community etc.