Learning is a Journey- Alissa's Blog

Today, our class had a substitute teacher. It was expected to me that all teachers will have different teaching strategies, but today was a bit harder for me to accommodate to the substitute's teaching style. The teacher was completely different from how my cooperating teacher directed the classroom by the way she disciplined strictly and taught the lessons in a different way that my teacher normally would. It nonetheless gave me another aspect as to how I should follow through with another teaching strategy and learn from that as well. I'm glad that I got to observe a different teaching strategy other than my cooperating teacher's and how it worked with my class. It was something to learn from, no matter how different!

Roommates. This situation can go one way or the other; either good or bad. This year, my situation has been really good. My roommates encourage me, push me to be a better version of myself, take time to listen to me, laugh with me, cry with me, and do everything and more. As I'm sitting here writing this, I'm surrounded by the constant love, laughter and positivity that this household always has when I walk through the door. They truly bring my mood up when having long, tiring days like today. Having roommates like these make me realize how important it is to surround yourself with people who uplift you and encourage you to do better both for the world and yourself.

I am apart of a sorority at Texas State called Chi Omega. Speaking of, I'm currently sitting here in our chapter meetings that we hold once a week to constantly update our organization as a whole and any other additional information to get involved with Texas State and our sorority overall. This fraternity has taught me to really grow out of my shell and formed me into the woman I have become today. A lot of the times, especially in my senior year, I get tired of coming to these meetings and don't have the motivation to really go, that is until I actually show up and am reminded of how uplifting and encouraging my sisters can be and how quick my day can turn around. It made me think and relate to how sometimes this may occur when I have my own classroom, how some days will be rough or I'll be tired, etc. until I am reminded of how positive and uplifting I can be for my students because they're doing just the same for me. Moral of the story of this Tuesday, how you go a

This Tuesday marks the halfway point of our semester. There are ONLY 7 weeks left in the semester until I student teach. How crazy and exciting is that?! I've been thinking about that a lot today and how time really flew by in the semester but at the same time it's almost been going by pretty slow. If that makes any sense and if anyone can relate to how that feeling is. I have mixed emotions because I've been liking the time that I've had with my 1st grade class and I'd probably be emotional leaving them, but I'm also really excited to student teach and be one step closer to having my own classroom hopefully! Throughout the stressful time that any semester brings, I think that we should take a step back and really enjoy the moments that we get to have with our students before it's already the end of the semester and we move onto the next classroom. So, from this moment forward, enjoy each minute you get to spend with your kiddos in the classroom!!

Today I worked with some of my students on clapping out syllables in different varieties of words. A lot of them naturally clapped one syllable words as two, considering that the beginning of each word would be known as a syllable, when really it was one all together. For example, "ball" would be clapped by the students as "/b/ /all/" instead of "ball" all together. My teacher reminded me of something that stuck with me throughout that day in how I observed my students, that some habits are hard to break and that it would be a repetitive process to break that habit. Hearing that encouraged me to help the students fully comprehend how those words that I tested with them were only so many syllables. Like said, it was a process but nonetheless a rewarding moment when the students were able to distinguish the correct syllables with the words given. I learned that these students really don't have bad habits, just probably were taught in a different way