Time for Microteaching!

    Hey everyone, welcome back to my blog page! In this post I will be reflecting on my Microteaching experience that I had this week. I had a great time finally being able to teach students (even though it was virtual) and it provided me the experience I needed to get a better feeling for being in front of a class. However, it is now time to reflect and after going through the feedback the students had for me, I know what I need to improve upon before the springtime. 

    For the past 3 days I've been virtually teaching Mr. Rider's Small Animal Care 1 class at Stuarts Draft High School in Virginia. I was able to choose amongst a list of various small companion animals and I chose to teach about pet birds. On Tuesday, I provided students with an introductory class on the different characteristics of birds and their evolution, then we played a Kahoot game.  The next day, we talked about the 4 different types of pet birds and the various species that exist within those categories. The students engaged in an activity where they chose a pet bird type and created an advertisement for that bird. The purpose of the assignment was for the students to showcase the benefits of owning that bird as a pet and to persuade someone to want to buy that specific bird. On the last day, the students learned about the housing needs of a bird and then drew their own bird enclosure. 

    This experience relates to what I know about teaching because I was able to use the skills I've gained through lab this semester to instruct the students. I made sure my lessons each contained a warm up and  interest approach activity and then I went into the content. I tried to make my interest approach activities engaging to spark students' curiosity early on in the lesson. The Microteaching experience relates to what I know about learning because I attempted to keep the students actively thinking by changing up my instruction every 5 to 10 minutes. This semester, we learned about the importance of keeping the students' attention spans by changing the activity up often, which I tried to do throughout my three lessons. 

    After reviewing the feedback from the students I taught, I learned a lot about my personal teaching characteristics and how the class reacts to certain activities as a whole. Overall, the majority of the class loved the Kahoot game, especially because it was a tool we can use virtually that brought on a sense of competitiveness. Now I know to utilize online games more often in my lessons so that the students can test their knowledge while also having fun. I also learned the importance of allocating enough time in my lesson plans for students to take notes. A few of the students stressed the need for more time to take notes or to provide them with guided notes, since they felt slightly rushed through the material. I hope that this issue will be slightly eliminated by teaching in-person, as I will be better able to gauge the room and see where my students are at in their note taking process. 

    Everything I learned from this experience will enable me to become a better Agriscience teacher for my future students at Oley Valley and beyond. I also learned that to put it kindly, I need to grow a backbone, which I will say is something I struggled with my entire life. Gaining the confidence I need to be a successful teacher won't happen overnight, but I hope as I continue to go through these experiences that I will gain the knowledge and abilities to become more confident and assertive in my future classroom. :)

Thanks for joining me on this journey and feel free to leave any comments or suggestions below!

Lauren M.