Bittersweet last day

Last Friday was my last day at my placement. They had a math field day which was exciting. Students were given different games to play that had to do with working together as well as different mathematical operations within those activities. I was stationed at the jump rope activity where each group had to decide together which three students would jump rope for twenty seconds each. Everyone had a role: three people jump roped, one person timed, and one person wrote all the data. After they wrote down all their data and how many number of jumps each person did in their twenty seconds, they had to add all of their jumps together to see what the total was.

It was interesting to see all the different levels of skill in jump roping. More students were actively willing to be one of the jump ropers, whereas others would let his or her peers take that role because they knew they would not be able to jump as much as the others. Afterwards, the teacher in charge of that station asked us, those who were supervising the children, if they had been working well together, what they did when they had disagreements between calculations or the number of jumps each person made, as well as if they were able to come to a conclusion as a group. The score was out of two points and the teachers at the end of the day were going to see how well their students did as a whole. It was also great because the students were not all in the same classrooms thus they got to know each other through doing all these activities together. It was also great because the students' parents were there helping out. It really was a blessing to get to meet the parents of the students I teach. They were genuinely so kind and went out of their way to speak to me and get to know me. One mother had actually attended Wellesley College and we bonded over how cold Massachusetts was compared to where we were both from, which was Washington and California. She also asked me about what to do when students are not willing to cooperate in the classroom because they feel like their class is too easy. I gave her an explanation as best as I could and told her everything is situational and depends on how everyone involved (parents, teacher, student) would like to deal with it.

Since my placement was in three different locations over the course of five weeks, I could not make as close of relationships as I had wanted. I was already expecting this going into my internship but I did get really close to the teachers at my first placement. I don't know if it's because they were the first school I was at, if it was because of the small close-knit community the teachers have, or because they were the youngest grade I taught, but they were definitely my favorite school. In all of the placements, everyone was so kind and welcoming and willing to help me out though. After each placement, I would say goodbye to all the teachers and the headmistresses. The first location actually told me to come back whenever I wanted whether it was to just talk or help out so for my last day of my internship, I went back to say goodbye. You can really tell that the school cares about nurturing their students and providing them with the necessary resources as well as incredibly competent and caring teachers. I loved my placement and wish that I could work somewhere like here again in America. It was such a wonderful opportunity for me and I already miss all the students and teachers!