This weekend I attended the Agriculture Cooperation Establishes Success (ACES) FFA conference. This was my first experience at ACES, and I was able to experience it through the lens of an advisor. It was such an awesome opportunity to spend the weekend with Greenwood and have some time to spend outside of the classroom with the students and my cooperating teachers. One of the highlights of the weekend was spending time with the other advisors and getting a feel for how to serve as an advisor during an FFA trip. I got to attend a NOCTI training session and learned about student assessment with NOCTI. After the training, Ms. Winklosky and Ms. Herr and myself went downstairs to watch the student workshops. It was so much fun to see the students in action, and be in a space where they can interact with other students.
The banquet that night was a great way to spend some time with my students and with the West Perry crew. I enjoyed watching the students at West Perry talk with the students at Greenwood and introduce themselves. We had a great time exchanging stories and interacting with each other's students through dinner. Following the meal was the embarrass your teacher event. My students volunteered me to go forward and we were challenged to ask each other questions without answering them. After that, teachers were called up again for the karaoke and KP was called up to sing. When Mr. Clark came back in they decided to swap KP for him. It was such a great time watching everyone sing and hearing the students go crazy for their advisors.After the dinner, we had the dance that night. It was so cool to spend some time outside of the classroom and enjoy a night with the students and other advisors. Our students really wanted us to jump in and dance with them, and we had a blast dancing in the conga line together! Just the energy of the students was so much fun, and really reminded me why I enjoy working with them. We ended the night with some group reflection with the state officers.
This weekend was my first night doing courtesy corps with Mr. Clark and Mr. Hines. We had a pretty chatty hallway and had to remind some students what curfew meant. The next morning we topped the weekend off with some breakfast and a fun placemat designing community service project. It was a great weekend and gave the students and ourselves some time outside of school.
Over the weekend, I had a few questions running through my head. How do advisors deal with discipline issues on a trip if they arise? How do you balance interacting with your students during fun events like this, but maintaining the authority of an advisor- especially as a young teacher? How do you discipline your students when needed, but balance that with being fun? How many trips should you undertake as a first year teacher?
Ryan, you always want to follow your school discipline procedures (so know them!)
ReplyDelete1st year teachers should make sure their own house is in order (ie their teaching/classroom) before being gone often!
Remember, if you are traveling with 14 students, you probably have over 70 at home not getting the same educational experience with a Sub!
Thanks for the questions, Ryan! It was fun to hear about your experience with this conference!
ReplyDeleteHow do advisors deal with discipline issues on a trip if they arise? Preempt as much as possible. Make sure expectations, consequences, and supports are outlined well in advance and communicated to parents, students, and administration. I had a permission form for students that outlined trip expectations beyond the normal school expectations. Let me know if you want a copy. From there, be crazy consistent. Crazy, because if your students know you're the craziest one in the room they will both try anything you ask them to and toe the line when it comes to discipline. Consistent, so no one doubts that you would actually follow through on the expectations you set.
How do you balance interacting with your students during fun events like this, but maintaining the authority of an advisor- especially as a young teacher? I think a big thing here is to maintain professionalism. You can be professional and still have fun (bust a move, crack a joke, etc). One of the cool opportunities of FFA is helping students see what it means to participate professionally, so finding ways to engage them in the fun, as agriculturalists, goes a long way.
How do you discipline your students when needed, but balance that with being fun? See "crazy" above. :-) I was a teacher of fun, not a fun teacher. I hope that my time in the classroom reflects helping students find the fun in learning, and generated enthusiasm around agriculture. When students understand your priorities and emphasis through your own consistency, students know what to expect and learn where the line is. As you build relationships with students, especially ones where the fun is more comfortable, they'll want to disappoint you less (not that any student really wants to disappoint you). I wish I had a better trick for establishing that rapport and those boundaries, but you already know the ground rules: be consistent, be fair, and be firm. Respect students in all your interactions (fun and not).
How many trips should you undertake as a first year teacher? Dr. Foster brings up a great point! It's hard to be gone ALL. THE. TIME. One of the things I did to combat this was hire an assistant advisor. She was a parent/community member who was hired hourly by the school to take students on trips. It was a great arrangement, because I was gone significantly less.
I asked another colleague about your "how many trips" question. She had some good food for thought to share as well:
ReplyDeleteMy general advice would be:
-Spend the first couple years honing your teaching skills. Your life and focus should be on the classroom and your students in the classroom.
-At the start of the year, have an honest conversation with your colleagues and administrators (if needed) about an appropriate number of days you’ll miss school, be gone on the weekends, etc. Once you have that number, stick to it and select trips of high priority (e.g., state conference). I remember teaching 4/5 days for like 6 weeks in a row in the spring (that’s just nuts!)
-A number will be different for everyone and every chapter, but I would make a point to NOT volunteer a team that wasn’t mine (for example, I foolishly “volunteered” to drive the second parli pro team my first two years. This was dumb because they had about 10 competitions in the fall and winter).
-Maybe no more than 3 school days/semester with no more than 1 overnight trip/semester.
-You also have to think about other non-ag reasons you’d miss school. I was asked to be a part of multiple multi-day p.d. in-service trainings that would eat up days.
Hope this helps! Let us know if you want to chat more!