How do you survive student teaching?

Currently, I do not have my certification or a degree in education. I'm finishing up my Master's Degree in Special Education. The master's program that I am in leads to certification after I complete all the requirements.One of these requirements is 12 - 15 weeks of student teaching. Student teaching is generally an unpaid voluntary, but necessary internship unless you can get hired as a teacher under a teacher shortage. With the economy and No Child Left Behind Laws; they have pretty much made it impossible to teach unless you have your full certification. I've worked as an assistant for almost 4 years with one district. I was hoping to be able to keep my job as an assistant and do the student teaching at the school that I work as an assistant; however, the superintendent of our school district does not allow this. She is a really stickler for the rules. It is hard to understand because the district would benefit along with me, but I guess the rules are the rules. The best I can do is take a leave of absence; however, that leave would be unpaid. Also, the only reason that the district allows me to take this leave is because my continued professional development and certification will benefit the district. It is one of those catch-22, where the rules don't exactly make sense but you have to play by the rules.

Oh! I see you are already in the field of education. You are majoring in it so you need an internship. Yeah, this is the same in India, too. I was imagining something else, like you have a full time job- a non-teaching one- and you have nothing to do with Education as a profession, but then due to some emergency you had to take up teaching.

Friend, thans so much for the encouragement and words of wisdom! Intelligence, I think is one of those things that we all possess. Perhaps, we do not perceive ourselves automatically as intelligent, but in truth we are very intelligent human beings! There is a favorite quote of mine from a Susan Wiggs book Winter's Lodge "In cooking like life we know more than we think we do." I think that is so true. I love working with children! I've spent almost four years working in special education, and cannot wait to get my certification to teach Special Education. I love watching the children learn, develop, grow, and mature. It is not always easy work, but the rewards can be so fulfilling. I will work hard on making a New Year's resolution to trust in God and have faith that it will all work out.