Trial and Error

 Week five of student teaching brought lots of snow and ice, which meant having one two-hour delay and two Flexible Instruction Days. This left me with just one day of "normal" instruction. Tuesday was a two-hour delay day, so I only had 30 minutes with each class. This proved to make my goal of having review and closure at the end of each lesson even more difficult. Thankfully, Wednesday had normal length class periods, so I was able to get seed and germination labs done with the Ag Science I students.

The real challenge came Thursday and Friday with the Flexible Instruction Days. At first, I was bummed out because each remote day feels like a set back. I soon realized that I should be looking at this as an opportunity to grow my skills in virtual teaching. I  was able to test lots of different websites and platforms and figure out what I liked best. While there were definitely some technology fails, specifically with nearpod, there were also some successes! Some of my favorites that I tried including using the "challenge" mode on Kahoot, which allows students to complete a Kahoot at any time before the deadline you set, and using Go Formative to review concepts and quickly see how students are doing with specific questions or concepts.

I hadn't tried these platforms before (or hadn't utilized all of their features), because I'd been worried about whether or not they would work out. Using them this week, and not having things go perfectly to plan, was good for me. It helped me to accept that not everything I try in the classroom will work, and that the failures are just as important as the successes. I want to continue to challenge myself to test out new materials and methods in the classroom as I continue on with my student teaching journey.