Dylan Ryzner

Student Teaching Journal Entry #8

This was another very productive week in my student teaching experience, as I am getting more
comfortable having all the responsibilities of a full-time teacher. Once again, time management
has been crucial this week for making sure I get everything done without feeling too
overwhelmed. I am starting to get into a nice routine that I can follow day to day, which is
comforting. One takeaway from this week about time management is making sure I am staying
well ahead of pace when I am planning lessons. This ensures that I am not doing any last-minute
planning and gives me a cushion in case the time I spend planning that day is cut short. Planning
farther ahead also makes me feel more confident when I am delivering the instruction, because
the material is not as fresh in my mind.
As far as teaching goes this week, we had a review and test on the stocks and bonds unit, then
started a unit on renting and buying. Since there is no lesson being taught on test days, I have
learned that these days are great opportunities for me to catch up on anything I need to, whether
it be grading, planning, contacting students, etc. I also made it a point to keep up on grading the
tests in a timely manner, so that the students are not waiting too long to see how they performed
on the test. I also like to analyze the test data to see how the class did, which questions were
frequently missed, and identify students who may need some extra help. The start of the new unit
on renting and buying is going well, as we are currently discussing rentals and leases for cars,
homes, apartments, etc. Student participation for this unit has been okay so far, with more
students actively participating while we are working on math calculations. Today I was able to
get the students participating a little more as we had conversations about different scenarios that
involved deciding to either rent or lease a car. I have noticed a trend that there is much more
student participation towards the end of the week, and less participation in the beginning of the
week. One thing that I am still trying to perfect with my teaching is judging how much time a
lesson will take to carry out. As I get to know my students better, and fine tune my teaching style
I think it will get easier.
There was also another math department meeting this week that I attended where they discussed
some long-term changes to the curriculum of the course I am teaching. It was very interesting to
hear everyone’s ideas about what to change and what not to change, as all the teachers wanted
what was best for the students. For example, there is one lesson in an upcoming unit that has an
extensive amount of material to be covered plus a quiz for the students to take. My mentor
teacher explained that in years past, a lot of the content in the lesson was skipped during
instruction to allow students enough time to complete the quiz. To solve this, the lesson will be
broken up into 2 separate lessons in the future, making the unit last a day longer. However, the
students will not be overwhelmed with an extremely long lesson and a quiz in one day. Overall,
this week has been great, and I am shocked at how quickly the home stretch of my student
teaching experience is approaching. I am excited to continue teaching and learning in these final
few weeks.