Martina Cahill, from The Hungry Teacher, and I met nearly four years ago… but I feel as if we’ve known each other for a life time! 
The first day we met, she stopped by the school so we could meet each other. My principal was like, “Hey! You’re getting a student teacher next year.” And my jaw dropped because this was the first I had heard of it. But a teacher does whatever their principal tells them to, so I introduced her to our class (I was looping up with them) and she sat with our sweet Stewart and listened to him read to her for like an hour. It was really only 5 minutes in all actuality. But Stewart was not an easy student and so when she survived 5 minutes, I knew she was a keeper.
Little did I know how life changing having her as a student teacher would be. First of all – I had only been in the classroom for 2 years before she came and taught with me. Ummmmm – do you know any 2nd year teacher that has their shit together? I’m sure there are some… but I was far from one of them. But having Martina in my classroom made me explain and justify every little thing we did. Why do I do word study like that? Welllllll…. {and into my hour long explanation I would go}. Working with Martina challenged me to think and explain more than I ever had as a teacher and I became a much stronger educator because of it.
Typical Tuesday
I am also one of the most unorganized teachers known to mankind. Piles on top of piles. Always. Martina changed this. She is uber organized and when she wasn’t sure what to do, she would start going through my piles, my binders, and our books, and organize the crud out of our classroom. It was magical. {ANY FUTURE STUDENT TEACHERS, TAKE NOTE!} And I don’t think I’ve ever felt so calm in the classroom {Acts of Service is totally my Love Language}.
Martina isn’t just amazing for her organizational skills though. She also is a bombdiggity teacher. Seriously. Just take a look at her blog, or Instagram, and you’ll know this in a heart beat. Her love for teaching is contagious… and I think my favorite thing about her is that she’s not afraid to laugh at herself, or her students, when something is really funny. I think that her ability to be human while teaching is one of the reasons students and I love her so dang much. She is never once in a bad mood {it’s impressive} and she loves and works harder than so many teachers. She’s one of the good ones.
So please take a second to stop by her blog and enter her amaaaazing giveaway! Seriously. It’s ridiculously bombdiggity and includes ALLLLLL of my favorite items!!
Thanks for stopping by and listening to me brag about one of my faves!
What experiences have you all had with co teachers and student teachers? Please share in the comments!