Day 15 (1.18.24): Rain, Rain, Rain!

Hey all! It's me, Emily Hoekema

Today was officially our first rainy day here in Belize after being here for fifteen days. Luckily, it did not pour on us on the way to and from school. The rain was so refreshing and wonderful to see!

Today a few of us, including me, taught a lesson in our classrooms that was observed by Christy, our professor who is here with us on the trip. A couple of our lessons went really well, whereas a couple of other's did not go as well as we would have hoped. But that is ok because we are all still learning and growing as teachers! The lesson that I taught my second graders today was over subtraction with regrouping. During the lesson, I had the students go through a couple of different activities that gave them more practice with their subtraction. I had them partner up and work on a problem together for the first activity. And then for the second activity, we did a relay race where they had to go up to the board and solve as many problems as they could in five minutes. They seemed to enjoy this part of my lesson. It was great getting to see them have fun and also learn and work together. After being observed, I met with Christy to discuss how my lesson went. She had some great pointers and insight into my lesson. She also had some great recommendations for me that I could use next time I teach. Me and my classmates are all so lucky to have her as a professor and also as a person that we can come to when we have questions.

Something that I learned from today is that as students who are learning to become teachers, it is ok to mess up. We are not perfect at this and may never be, and that is ok. Something that I also took away from today is that God has everything in His hands. He has everything under control, not us. He meets us there in the storm, and something beautiful will come out of whatever storm we are in.

Your tired teacher,

Emily