Day 8 (Oct 3 Tue)

I'm still feeling sick. Flu-ish. Probably a bug I caught over the weekend.. but certainly having a hard time in class because I can't speak properly (have to breathe and speak through my mouth at the same time) and I'm still having stuffy nose. I realized that quite a few of my students are having the same symptoms as me - runny nose, cough (though I think I haven't developed that - phew!) or an occassional sneeze. Who knows? They might have been the ones who *somehow* infected me! Hah! Oh well, I think I need to work on building up my resistance as a teacher.

Today's classes went well. I did all the 'Do Now's because Matt had mentioned to Karen that I was not involved enough with the students. She tasked me to start the day off with them by going over the 'Do Now' and the previous day homework. The one I did with 311 dragged too long. I think that I shouldn't have gone through almost every single question in their homework but should've instead asked if there was any question they had or were unsure of. I took up almost a full 40-minute block to do so and left only the other 40-minute block for Karen to do the new stuff. I worked on checking the time when I went over again later in the day for 310 and only took about 25-minutes. The "improvement" was possible because:

1. Most of the students had done their work and knew how to do most of the questions;
2. It helped the students concentrate better because I was not going through everything they already knew.
3. Karen had mentioned that I needn't spend so much time going into details every question but to choose smartly which I would foresee the students having difficulties in.
   

Karen says I'm doing well and is confident that I can take over her class any time. Perhaps, with more experience. =) I think I've so much more to learn - certainly glad of this opportunity to intern with her and at The Murphy. There's such a rich source of teachers and resources that I believe isn't as readily available as would be in other public schools. I do however, want to visit other schools that are charter schools, pilots schools and private schools. For that, I might have to arrange to visit those schools independent of my Harvard affliation on days that I'm not at The Murphy.