School Begins...

I always loved starting school in September. New text books, new notebooks, new computer, clothes, or whatever else I bought. This year was no exception - I was probably more excited than in past years. I was a bit anxious though. I was sure they had made a mistake in accepting me and I figured at any moment someone was going to come to me and tell me I was not allowed to be there.

My schedule looked pretty good. When I went to York you got to pick pretty much your entire schedule so this was new for me. I had my Music Curriculum and Instruction (C&I) course for 2 hours twice a week, same with my History C&I. These were my two teachables and they ran all year. As I was going to be teaching at the Intermediate/Senior (grades 7 - 12) level I had to have two teachables to get into the program. I also had 4 hours of my Teacher Education Seminar (TES) class once a week all year long. I had a 4 hour School and Society class that ran once a week for one semester, and then the next semester that was replaced with a 4 hour Educational Psychology class. The last course I had was a four hour History Wars class that studied issues in history education. That was also once a week for one semester. I then would have 1 month of placement in one teachable, one month in the other, and then a one month internship that I would get to choose down the road. These placements were what we were the most curious about, but we didn't find out about them for several weeks.

I remember handing in my first lesson plan in History. It was part group work, part my own, and I was petrified to get it back. History was definitely my weaker subject. I was elated when I got it back and got 100% on it.

I was so insecure about my abilities as a new teacher and one professor in particular, Dr. Janet Markus, picked this up immediately. She was fantastic, and really got me through the school year. She was my TES course instructor. We all loved her. So my first month was off to a good start. The next hurdle to jump over was placement number one.