The Many Rainbows of Teaching #AFEE 5697

Dec 6. 2018 

"Students don't care how much you know until they know how much you care."

- Mr. B

 Last day of school, well last day of school at Stillwater for me.  It was a busy and exciting day for multiple reasons. It was obviously my last day there and I had my technology lesson to try out in our Fish and Wildlife classes.  We also had a pet visit in Small Animals, and the most important thing of the day is that the babies were coming!  Working with trout in the classroom we were expecting close to 1000 eggs of Rainbow Trout to arrive sometime throughout the day.  It was a process working with Troutlodge, (which is based out of Washington) so the process of transportation was interesting.  The eggs came in the afternoon so let me explain some of the fun from earlier in the day.

In our Small Animal class first hour we had a pet visit from a student who Mr. B explained was completing an assignment from earlier in the semester, (not the best of students).  This was went well but Mr. B received an email later that there was poop in the hall that wasn't cleaned up.  This prompted our discussion on expectations and problems for his class in the future because of this event.  He expects his students to take responsibility for anything their animals do and they must clean up after them so he will have a discussion with the student about the incident and what might happen because of his ownership responsibilities. 

Food Chemistry third hour, oh boy did I get to see how class and school policy is enforced.  We had two students in the front have an issue with their phones out.  Mr. B stopped class to address this by taking away the phones; one student complied and gave up his phone.  The other student refused to hand in his phone, (which is multiple things against school policy) and this created one of those really awkward moment for the rest of the class who were so quiet during this to see this interaction happen in front of the room.  He moved on and I followed up with Mr. B to see what happens now and he explain the steps that are enforced for their school so that student's parents will be contacted about the situation and the next steps if it occurs again would be intervention by other school support systems.

Mr. B showing eggs to class

Students dispersing eggs in tank

Preparing eggs for introduction into tank


Now for the fun fish! They were delivered during the class I was going to teach in so I understood they were more important and time sensitive to get transferred so I took a backseat and got to the main chunk of my lesson after we got these friends into their new home.  Mr. B lead them through the process received from the company and the DNR to get everything to the right temperature and sanitary so the eggs have the best survival rate.  This was a unique experience because there aren't many schools that participate in this project with Minnesota Trout Unlimited.  The goal of this is to allow students to help grow and raise these trout and release them into the wild.  These eggs will hopefully grow and be released into Browns Creek (remember the first day? That's where these students went and did some sampling) so a really cool project that students can see occurring near their home.

300 new friends!

After all the eggs are situated I was able lead a quick Kahoot on game birds and waterfowl to kick off their next unit.  This helped Mr. B gauge their before knowledge and lets me take some of the results home.  We had our ending chat and any last advice for student teaching or first year teaching.  The main take away was to be yourself but pick your words carefully those first few years.  Being a non-tenured teacher in an elective courses if we make one mistake or upset the administration that is good enough of a reason to not have you come back for next year.  Your administration is very powerful, helpful, and scary those first years so be wise with them.

All said and done it was a great experience being at SPHS this fall and I look forward to transitioning to Medford Public Schools this spring where I can continue being maroon and gold!