I am so excited to go into another placement! I have had placements through Geographies of Urban Education and through Special Education, both of which I enjoyed and learned a lot from. Most of all, I’m excited to interact with students. Practicing active observation and participation in a classroom is so valuable to understanding the intricacies of a new educational area. While before I was entering a special education school for the first time, this semester I’ll be entering a multilingual program for the first time. I’m looking forward to seeing how a classroom bridges class content across different languages and grapples with different linguistic levels in one room. As always, there is a little bit of anxiety before the first visit. I hope that my host educator is welcoming to the idea of hands-on participation in the classroom, rather than strict observation– while observing has its benefits, I find participation more engaging and valuable in the short time we spend in the classroom. On that note, I am a little anxious about the little time we have. My last placement was 10 weeks for 3 hours a week, so the reduced time may lead me to approach my role differently- something I don’t think I’ll be able to settle on until at least the second classroom visit.
Alex, I wonder if in some ways the faster timeline in the placement this time around will mean that you get right into it faster. Hopefully your host educator will allow you to participate and interact, and hopefully you can get right down to business. One thing I'm wondering about, especially as someone for whom this is their first education internship placement, is what you learned in previous internship placements that you want to bring into this one. Are there any particular skills, either classroom-related or logistical or ways of thinking about the internship generally, that you want to bring into this one?