PhyreBards

Well...LIFE is coming at me pretty fast right now, and I feel like venting, and this is a place where at lest two of you lucky ladies get to listen and comment!

Placements...I have 2 of them. I have to teach a total of 13 lessons and administer 4 informal assessments. I'm not too concerned, I just know that there is a lot of work that must be done, and I'm thinking that now is a good time for me to work on breaking out of my procrastinating ways.
One placement is at Western Middle, only 5 minutes away, and the other is in Mebane....slightly farther (about 20 minutes away). How can I be at too places at once? I guess I will find out in the next few weeks! I am excited about my placement at Woodlawn... It is with 8th grade students. I have only had experience with 6th graders in my experience thus far, and I am pumped to work with a different age group.

Praxis...Technically, I only have to take 2 sectios of the Praxis...both on Special Education General Curriculum. However, since I do not know exactly where or what I will be teaching, I think I am going to go ahead and take the Middle Grades Language Arts section as well. Any thoughts on this? I just think it will be good to take it now while the content and theory are still fresh in my mind.

GREs...I'm planning to get my masters right after graduating. I found a sweet program where I can study curriculum and instruction, and it is developed for people coming right out of their undergraduate experience. Is anyone else taking the GREs? Has anyone already taken them that would like to offer some words of wisdom/encouragement?

Well...thanks for listening/sorry for complaining, but I figure a lot of us are in the same boat! See everyone later in class :o)

...when you have a student like Mitch? (I don't remember the boy's name, so we're calling him Mitch.)

My teacher pointed Mitch out to me the other day. He's not in our class, but we saw him in the library.

Mitch believes he is from outer space. Believes. Not Mitch is really interested in outer space and believes in aliens, but Mitch believes he IS an alien. Granted, Mitch would be in special classes at some schools, but Williams is full inclusion, so he shows up in "regular" classes. Every teacher has the same chance of having Mitch in class.

Mitch also loves horses. His purpose in the library that day was to pick up some more reference books on horses.

So what do you do with Mitch when he's in your class? Honestly, I'm asking you guys. I never thought about the possibility of having someone in my classroom who believes in an alternate reality that is so different.

My first thought is to treat Mitch as though he IS from outer space. Talk to him about his planet and tell him that now that he's on Earth, he needs to learn about Earth's culture through literature and how to communicate with Earth's people through writing. Thoughts?