Release March 15 and April 12 Morris

I really enjoyed releasing Mrs. Morris because I am familiar with her classroom and the students. I believe that because the students know who I am, they are also more comfortable with me. During her release times, I covered math. One day, she was teaching integers and adding positive and negative numbers. This is something that I am fairly good at compared to my other math knowledge and background. I worked with students throughout the time on three different math pages in their math journals. Mrs. Morris didn't use any special teaching strategies with this lesson except for a number line, which is generally used to teach integers.

On the next day that I released Mrs. Morris, she was giving a test. But, this was a take home test that the students had been given to take home on Friday and they were finishing it in class on Monday. This test also had to do with integers as well as exponents. The only thing that I was instructed to was to review the directions for the test and remind students that in class, they were not going to be allowed to use a calculator. While the students were testing, I answered a few questions as to how to go about solving problems. I also graded several papers that had been turned in for makeup work.

During these two release days in Mrs. Morris's classroom, I found that I am more comfortable in teaching math than I initially thought. I am not sure if it was because I was teaching integers and I was comfortable with them or it it was because I was familiar with the classroom and the students. Either way, it was a great feeling!