My Digital Media class for the first 2 months has been very eye opening. Before school started I was thinking of something completely different than how the classes turned out. I am understanding more and more each day that an active classroom is what my students need. I am very visual in my teaching as this is new software for the students. I begin every class with a demonstration and move into guided practice with a partner. I ask the students to be intuitive and come up with their own answers. This is how I learn and this is how I have been teaching for the past 2 months.
Over the first three months most of the advice I get from teachers is that you need to be a friend first and then the teaching and classroom management will fall into place. The students need to know they can trust you and your classroom. This has been the biggest struggle for me to date. Every period, I have at least 2-3 kids that need an attitude adjustment. You call home, threaten with a call home and nothing seams to generate change. I have always been someone who gives a lot of trust to people, but this may be making it hard to manage the class. This is affecting the learning environment for my other students.