Life's Kitchen

AWESOME! I loved this experience.

Life's Kitchen provided me with such a new outlook on teaching. In the college scene we are in class for many different reasons (because we want to, because our parents are forcing us, because it's better than finding a job, because it's the next them to do, and so), but in Life's Kitchen the students are there because they want to be there! So when we arrived we understood they were ready to learn.

Now this does not mean that there weren't a few who were a little stand off-ish, because there were. But it does mean that they wanted to hear what we had to say. The few who were a little cautious about participating at the beginning slowly began to feel comfortable. I think this happened when Kristine and I would act out the skit or activity before they had to, as well as when Kristine would give them positive feedback.

The time truly flew by. I knew realized how fast an hour can disappear. So one area we could definitely work on is time management. When there's a lot to cover we need to make sure we stay on schedule. But overall it seemed as though we stayed on the topics that needed covered the most for the longest period of time, which I think helped the students out because we answered their questions right then and there instead of at the end. But to help stay on time in the future I would position myself to where I could see the clock. I sat with my back turned to the clock on the wall, so every time I wanted to check the time I had to turn my attention around. I didn't like to do that because I wanted to stay focused within the group and not alter my attention.

Overall, I think we did a nice job of creating a safe environment, and allowing knowledge to flow. If we go back to teach there I would revise our evaluation forms to a ranking scale instead of a write out. They didn't quite like writing anything down (due to spelling, grammar, etc), so I would change that. Also, I would change the way we did our personal contracts. I would maybe have them write a key word down instead of a sentence.

Challenge - Follow the time & have a time piece in front of me.