student teaching

     So I noticed that I never wrote about my student teaching at the beginning of this year.  In order to finish my elementary education degree I had to complete 4 months of student teaching.  I was placed in the school down the street, Sonoma Heights, in a 3rd grade classroom.  While I think I probably would have done a little better in a younger class, I struggled tremendously through the whole thing.  I would have to say it has probably been the most stressful 4 months of my life.  Thinking back, I don't know how I finished!  Actually, I do know how I finished. I had awesome people helping me through the whole thing, my amazing mom and wonderful husband! Plus others who probably have no idea how they helped.  Going into it I knew it would be a lot of work, but I had no idea what teaching was really like.  College doesn't really prepare you for the reality of it. 
    As you probably already figured out, I'm not going to be a teacher, its just not for me.  I can write lesson plans all day long, but actually get up in front of a room full of kids and trying to get them to do what you want is torture to me.  It didn't help that I had my teachers constantly there to judge and criticize what I was doing.  Most of the time the kids were pretty good, and I got to liking quite a few of them.  But I don't miss teaching that classroom at all. 
   Still today I'm kind of embarrased by the fact that I spent almost 5 years trying to get my teaching degree, and I have no plans on actually teaching any time soon.  It's kind of awkward for me when people ask if I'm trying to get a teaching job.  Luckily for me if I don't want to explain the real reason I can just say that there are no teaching jobs, and there really aren't!  I just wish that I could have experienced the real thing at the beginning so I could have chosen a different career before it was too late. 
   After student teaching, I worked on the farm with Kade cutting and baling hay for the summer.  It was a nice change from the classroom, but it didn't leave much time for anything else.  I was able to teach a little girl piano lessons for the summer and I realized how much fun it was.  So later in the summer I started trying to get the word out that I was teaching piano lessons.  Now I have 8 students and I love it!  But with only 8 students I still needed something else to do.  I had applied and was hired to work at a new preschool.  The hours were terrible and would not work with piano lessons, too. So I decided not to take it and bet on more students.  I'm so glad I did because I know I would not have liked it very much.  I was blessed when my bishop offered me a part time job in his office.  Now I work part time in the morning in an attorney's office and come home to do piano lessons in the afternoon.  It's working out great and I'm so grateful.