The Careers in Education class offered at AHS encourages students with aspirations of future jobs in that field. In preparation for their future endeavors, these students step into the shoes of teachers, not only shadowing but creating lesson plans and teaching their class. 

Students have been assigned classrooms to shadow throughout the month, watching and observing different teaching and learning styles. 

“I shadowed Mr. Mendo, and all of his students were talking. None of them were being quiet and I thought that was really cool because you don’t really see that in a lot of classes,” Tavyn Goodridge (12) said. 

Inspiration from different teachers helps motivate these learning students. 

“I’ve always wanted to be a teacher, but this class really showed me the behind the scenes,” Goodridge said. 

The encouragement of student inclusion from other teachers helps these students find the teaching style they want to incorporate. 

“When I shadowed Mr. Guerrero’s class, I just saw how he brought in his kids’ attention and made sure that they were engaged. He asked them about their personal lives, stuff outside of school, made sure that they had a friendship also in the classroom,” Karissa McCamey (12) said. 

From this perspective, having a relationship with students is important for both the student and teacher. 

“I think it helps a lot… having another person in that classroom to see how it really happened. It gave me a mindset of how I could run my classroom,” Mccamey said. 

After following other teachers, these students are now creating their own lessons to teach to their peers. This is to help practice and prepare them for a real classroom like setting. They are given the opportunity to create their lesson for a class period, where they act as a teacher. They go through the period beginning to end, taking the class along a lesson they created themselves. 

“I chose choir because I want to be a choir teacher,” Zephyr Serniotti (12), said. “I taught them how to read a musical staff, all the different components because it’s a whole thing, and it’s great. It’s an intro going into a different music class for them.” 

This lesson created by a student had been inspired by their own personal experiences in different classes. 

“I took the second quarter to observe the choir, and I taught mini lessons here and there, but a lot of what I put into my lesson was based on what I saw in class,” Serniotti said.