Student Teaching Weekly Log

Directions: Answer these questions each week and email them to your student teaching
supervisor by Sunday evening.
Name: Alison Trimble

Week: 10 11/16-11/20

1. How did you spend your time this week? What responsibilities did you have?
This week I started to transition the classroom back to Mrs. Henry. Mrs. Henry is starting with A
days, and I am continuing to teach B days to focus on my classroom management skills. I went
though and entered unit grades for photosynthesis and cellular respiration. We had the students
start by analyzing their own individual traits. This was followed by having the students compile
statistics on their classroom trait composition. The students then ended their first day by
graphing the data and analyzing the data for dominant and recessive traits. Next we had the
students make babies from a genetic pool of traits. Working in pairs for this lab, each pair
created two babies seeing how even though they were working from the same genetic pool of
traits, the two babies they made were very different. Students then analyzed and answered a set
of questions that they turned in as body of evidence. Lastly, we used Nearpod to present
information regarding genetics to the students. The students used this to be connected to
individual laptops or ipads as information was presented to them, and we assessed their
understanding. Here I witnessed firsthand how having the students connected through electronics
to the presentation of information facilitated their engagement with the lesson. Following taking
notes engaged by Nearpod, the students worked on an individual assessment of their
understanding from the lesson. This was lastly followed by the students working in Moodle to
create a Furry Family in an online genetics simulation that connected the making babies
activity to their present understanding of Mendelian genetics.
I see great benefits to using Nearpod in the future, to decrease students need to be connected
through their cell phones. I also see the benefit of Nearpod for assessment in that you can
incorporated formative assessments that you can see as the students perform the activities.
Lastly, I graded and entered the students
2. What were your most satisfying experiences? What were your most challenging
experiences?
My most satisfying experiences this week was entering the students unit grades. Here I
evaluated the students according to how well they had met the scales we were teaching. This unit
was unique in that we had one summative assessment that was the same in the photosynthesis
unit as the cellular respiration unit, contrasting how the two are affected over time of day. Here I
was able to see how students knowledge of the content had grown as they learned more.
My most challenging experience was that students are realizing that I will be leaving soon as we
transition back to Mrs. Henry leading the class. I really am feeling like I dont want to go and in
many ways wish I could stay in the classroom even longer.
3. What are the plans for the upcoming week?
The upcoming week we only have two days of school. I will teach our B day classes the
Nearpod/Assessment/Moodle lesson plan. I will also continue to transition back to observation. I
will also Observe/Teach a lesson through Nearpod again on Mitosis and Meiosis, and following
this activity the students will do a Mitosis webquest activity.