Shadowing

I went on my shadowing yesterday, and I was really happy with how it turned out. I was initially really excited about it because I saw I had Mrs. Gonzalez and she seemed really fun and energetic when we were at the orientation. The day didn't start out that great because I got really lost and ended up being 10 minutes late, but she was really understanding. It was interesting seeing the classroom dynamic because it was such a small class at first, with only about 7 students. These students were just learning English and didn't speak it or write it very well. They seemed to comprehend most of what they were hearing though. I loved how Mrs. Gonzalez ran her classroom. She was both attentive to the children's needs but had high expectations for them. After their class she switched with the other half of ESL learners, and they were able to speak and write English much better. When they were asked to write about what they liked most about this country, I was really happy to see that most of them said they liked it because they were able to learn a new language. Obviously they really enjoyed learning English and had a desire to learn more. After their lesson the other students came in and Mrs. Gonzalez taught them with the help of the other ESL teacher. After that she did with them math, history, and science. When they were working on their history lesson, they were making posters, so I got to talk to Mrs. Gonzalez for awhile. She talked a lot about difficulties of the job, such as teaching students with such a wide range of English ability all four subjects, to problems such as lack of funding, and finally the infamous consequences of NCLB. I was really happy with how everything turned out and can honestly say it was a really rewarding experience.