Student Teaching with Riane Finger - EL ED

Rachel O'Malley

McKay Student Ambassador

Elementary Education

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Student teaching is often described as the moment where everything becomes real, and you wrap up your college experience by being in the classroom full-time. Riane Finger, a BYU student studying Elementary Education, is currently student teaching and describes how it brought both challenges and rewarding experiences.

What surprised you most about student teaching?

Riane describes how, going into her first day, she thought it would feel just like practicum, but it was very different. She felt very overwhelmed the first week because she was thrown right into teaching. Within the first few days, she was teaching one lesson, and by the end of that week, she was teaching everything except small groups. Her teaching requirements went from 0 to 100.

She describes how you are also way more involved at the school as far as planning, contributing to grade-level teams, and being responsible for students' learning. She remembers her mentor telling her about an important writing assignment that the students had to do. It was graded, required specific skills, and she was fully responsible for teaching it as she was teaching CKLA (a type of curriculum). Her mentor said, "No pressure". That being said, it can be a little scary knowing you are responsible for teaching students on your own. However, she was grateful for the support of your mentor, CFA, and grade team. She describes how important it is to ask for help.

What instructional strategies have worked best for you?

• Hands-on (if you can add movement, get them physical things to look at/touch, act out scenarios)

• Make instruction fun! If you're bored teaching it, so are your students (adding games,

  throwing a ball to have students answer, reading things in a silly voice, etc.)

  
  

What strategies helped you build positive relationships with stu

dents?

• Question of the day (asking my students get to know you questions and having rapid fire answers)

• Engage in conversations (They're telling you something that they think is important, so don't be dismissive!)

• Positive praise (especially for students who aren't meeting behavior expectations)

• Greet them in the morning and when they come back into the classroom

  
  

What is one mistake you learned the most from?

One mistake that she learn from was related to classroom management. She was having a hard time with aggressive behaviors, and she told her students that they would be getting a consequence if she had to warn them again. She did warn them again, and again, and again, but she never followed through on the consequence. Riane was worried about enforcing the consequence and being the "mean teacher". However, she describes that follow-through is so important, especially in your first few weeks of teaching. Students need to know how you expect them to behave and that you are actually going to hold them to it. Riane emphasizes that if not, students will walk all over you! It also helps build mutual respect, and while you may feel like the mean teacher the first few times, students will begin to understand, and you won't have to enforce the consequences as much.

What has been the most rewarding part of student teaching?

Riane describes how the most rewarding parts of student teaching have been building relationships with students and seeing their progress. She says it was such a cool feeling to teach a full math unit on her own and then see that most of the students passed the test! She loved seeing what actually worked and that the students were learning from her teaching.

What advice would you give future student teachers?

She recommends jumping right in! Riane describes how it's totally fine to observe for a few days, but not to make your mentor teacher ask you to do things! Start small! Volunteer to take the students to specialties/lunch, take over recess duty, or start teaching small groups. Another piece of advice she gives is to try to get on top of planning. Her first few weeks of student teaching felt like she was drowning because she had to plan all the lessons the day before she taught them. While she was prepared, she knew it would burn her out eventually. She recommends picking one day during the week to do small box planning for the following week, and then on a different day, make more detailed lesson plans. This way, you are only planning on two days, and you have a rough outline of lessons for the coming week.

Student teaching may feel overwhelming at first, but as Riane discovered, growth happens quickly when you jump up and have a willingness to learn!

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