Sometimes co-teaching is being near the students that need you the most, while allowing the other teacher to lead the class...

Melissa arrived for our lesson #2 knowing that we would need to adjust our activities and exercises for Oaklawn's end-of-the-day all school meeting and ROARRS recess. The lesson was basically in three parts (picture writing, warmups, and excerpt reading). To fit the entire lesson in I had the students complete the picture writing and review of the 6 big questions before lunch. Students prepped their writer's notebooks to answer the 5Ws + H?s. They also glued their pictures right on their page in the notebook. Many questions came up about the two photos: "Is this Mrs. Kneeland when she was a baby?" and "Why is Mrs. Kneeland chewing on a cat's tail?"

When the students returned from lunch, we reviewed their journal questions and Melissa started right away with the body movements, facial movements and tongue twister warm ups. It was during the stack the bead back exercise that I began to notice the need to be near. Mrs. K. modeled how to stand and bend forward pretending to move or roll down, vertebra by vertebra or bead by bead, using the abs for control and lengthening the spine. She encouraged the class to move slowly until they could stretch or reach their hands to their toes or the floor. Mrs. K. then reminded students to move slowly bead by bead, focusing on each bead. Once the students reached the floor, they stayed in that position momentarily before rolling back up to a standing position. This exercise helped students focus on their body and breath. 

One of my students that receives adaptive PE lessons was struggling to perform the spinal roll and was getting frustrated. He kept trying until I encouraged him to move on to the next warm-up. I realized then that I would need to stay nearby to monitor his participation and frustration level during the active warm-up.  I watched the rest of the class as they maintained their focus and participation. After the warm-up, he seemed to settle in to the rest of the lesson. Sometimes being present is a gift for everyone to give.