Elementary Matters

Annnnnd We're back!

2010-08-07T20:24:00.002-05:00

We had our back-to-school night Thursday and our first half-day of school yesterday. I don't feel ready to be back at work, but here I am, making desk assignments and trying to figure out what happened to summer.

I've noticed I have a surfeit of blond boys and small, dark-haired girls. They all look alike so far. Also, even with some low-ability special ed students, this looks like it will be a higher-ability class than I've had the past few years. They actually looked longingly at my bookshelves. I do have four exceptionally zippy boys, but that's nothing compared to the nine I had 2 years ago. That school year proved that I can live through anything.

My schedule is not for the faint-of-heart. I teach nonstop from 8:45 until 12:10. During this time I'll teach reading, writing, math, and language. Students will complete spelling assignments as morning work, leaving only science or social studies to be taught in the afternoon. I'll have to teach them during the last half-hour of the day. Lunch, recess, learning lab/Title 1/math centers, specials, and PE all come before I'll have instructional time again.

So, here's to a year good teaching, good students, and parents who won't go so far as to purchase/purloin tests for their students. I'm excited about the possibilities.

Wow--Where have I been?

2010-05-07T23:18:00.003-05:00

I don't even know where to begin. Let's see if I can recall some of the highlights of the past 5 weeks:

Staying a half hour later, while beneficial (got that math curriculum TAUGHT!), proved to be really taxing. I was simply too whopped to blog during that time.
State testing came and went. I am hopeful that my students will show progress. We worked hard all year, and had a really great, productive review courtesy of the state--they used grant money to give us practice books that were, in all ways, similar to the test. Same number of questions. Same SPIs. My students' test anxiety was nil--they literally had seen a version of the state test.
I thought my days would be less hectic after state testing, but I was so wrong! I've had to submit my writing portfolios to the principal twice since then (not just me, everyone). If you don't know from writing portfolios (too much RHONY), let me tell you that they are a time-consuming pain in the tooshie. Writing pieces have to be scored with a rubric (6 Traits) and meaningful comments should be made on each and every story. And we're still not done. We would have finished this week, except for one small thing:
We had a major flood in my state and have missed an entire week of school. In May! For weather!?! Unprecedented. My city is downstream from Nashville--we got all of their floodwater a day or two later, plus all of our own. The dams on the Cumberland River were wide open (or overtopped!) and we have had severe flooding. Forget the 100 year flood plain--we had a 500 year flood. I can't articulate how devastating this has been for our state--it's just plain stunning to see the Titans' stadium flooded and a portable classroom floating down the interstate on the television. My son's piano teacher was distraught to learn that the Steinway at the Schermerhorn concert hall in Nashville was ruined. She had actually attended a concert there the night before it flooded. So many people have lost everything and have no insurance. You can't get flood insurance unless you live in the 100 year flood zone. Those outside the zone are ineligible. Hopefully, FEMA will help them out.

So, we go back to work on Monday after a week off. We have only 10 and a half days of school left and a ton to do. It's going to be a hard two weeks.

Now I can worry

2010-03-21T23:07:00.005-05:00

I've read with sympathy and horror about school district woes across the country on the teacher boards I frequent. Some wrote of projections of 45 students in classrooms next year. All wrote of massive layoffs, going deep into their ranks--as deep as the 8th year of experience or more. So far, in my state, not as much as a peep. I seem to recall our governor being stressed about the budget, but promising education would not be affected.

My local newspaper today had a different story. Locally we're facing an 8.1 million dollar shortfall, due to incorrect enrollment predictions (down by 400 students), using part of the mandated 3% reserve to balance the budget previously, and the Lord only knows what other reasons. Additionally, they project that they'll have 7.9 million dollars in unfunded requests for the coming year's budget. They say they'll cut programs but try to leave classrooms alone.

I wonder which programs will get the axe. I'm hoping literacy coaches are the first to go--I don't think it's an effective use of funding to have a busybody running around the school, trying desperately to make herself relevant. Curriculum advisors are fairly useless, too, at least the special ed one I've met seems to be. The math, science, and reading/language arts ones do work hard--part of their job is overseeing the writing of our benchmark tests. Even if I can happily do without all of these folks, their salaries don't come close to being $16 million, so what else will get the axe? A new language series to replace our 6 year old one? I can live with that. Language doesn't change that much over 6 years. But after these, the cuts become harder to bear.

What I fear is that art and music classes will be eliminated. The daily PE classes at my school may have to go to 2-3 times per week. We don't have that much extra in our budget--years of no new property taxes have cut us close to the bone. Besides the effect this will have on these teachers, I worry about how it will affect students. We will truly become test-teachers when we eliminate art and music because these are the only classes where creativity is encouraged (or, alas, even allowed.)

I never had an art class in school. There wasn't one in elementary school, and I was never able to get in the one in junior high school. I had 2 music teachers in elementary school. One was a woman who would show up every now and then in our second grade class. She would begin each song by blowing in a pitch pipe and we would sing, reading the songs from a song book as we did. I remember we sang "A Froggy Went a Courtin'". I had another music teacher in fifth grade, a man. He hated rock 'n roll but loved jazz, and we were afraid of his short temper. I don't remember anything we sang. He came about once a month and terrified us.

Today, I can't sing a lick or draw very well and I wonder if I would be more musical or artistic if I had had a weekly art or music class. I like to draw, however poorly I do at it, but there's a lot about perspective that I never learned. I'm so incompetent at singing that I don't try it at all. :(

Okay, it's become a long post, but I'm worried that we're shortchanging our students. Heck, even before the rumors of budget cuts came, I was worried about our students. The joy of learning has been sucked out of so many classrooms as we concentrate on the damned test everyday, all year long. We begin preparing for it the very first day of school and don't stop until the day before the test. We begin preparing for the next year's test by pre-teaching content from the next grade level the week after the test is taken. There is no down time, no respite. We are a nation of testing teachers and our students are all test takers. Not scholars. Not excited learners. Test takers. It sucks.

Le Sigh

2010-03-06T15:22:00.004-06:00

I have my own teacher website. (I'm not going to link it here in the interest of privacy--I want to be able to rant and if you know who I am, I won't be able to.) Mostly my website is the same as others--lots of helpful links for parents and colleagues. I have uploaded some things I've made for reading (a brochure-type thing) that have proven wildly popular. I'm not over-exaggerating, either.

I get several emails each week about the brochures. They're simple things, really, just a brochure that has three panels on each side. It has five questions that I took from the "guide on the side" of the teacher's edition and spaces to write the answers to the questions. Some unknown genius teacher came up with the original format, but it's easy enough to copy (steal!) and implement on one's own time.

I'm happy to share. Teachers should share, especially if they have better ideas than mine. I did the first 4 units (20 stories from the basal, folks--20 stories!) and then intended to do the rest as I needed them. But now, since Rotney's family obtained a copy of the assessment book and I've decided to drop this series in favor of the previous one, I'm not doing any more of the brochures. Mostly, because I'm busy reinventing the wheel as I try to come up with activities without the benefit of a teacher's edition. Partly, because I'm still mad about the whole assessment book mess.

Now comes the part with all of the emails. Ever single email that I get thanks me for the first four units and wants to know where the other two are. Begging. Pleading. Driving me crazy. I finally stopped answering them. That made me feel guilty, so I finally put a notice up on the website that this is all there is or will be this year.

I feel so relieved that it's all over. And, folks, these brochures aren't difficult to do. It takes time, a laptop, and a basal teacher's edition (ask Rotney's family for that last one--I'm sure they can get one for you!)

Fridays

2010-03-05T22:16:00.003-06:00

Doesn't everyone love Fridays? We look forward to them all week long. We celebrate Wednesdays because we're now over the hump of the week, on the downward slope to the inevitable here-it-is-again Friday. Sometimes I worry that I've got it all wrong.

Maybe I should embrace Mondays, with their manic business as I try to prepare for the week. My students are always glad to see me on Mondays. I think they're victims of short-term memory loss, but it's nice to see their smiles on Monday mornings.

Or Tuesdays, the day of the hated computer lab and the crazy teacher because once Tuesday is over, I have a week before I have to face Tuesday again.

Or Wednesdays, because it's Art day. Art lasts 10 minutes longer than other specials and that 10 minutes is GOLDEN.

Or Thursdays. Wait--I have Cooperative Planning Teams on Thursdays. CPTs are the highly-staged mock-cooperative team drill we have to endure weekly. Instead of waiting until Thursdays, we cooperate all the time--passing in the hall, in the mornings, through email--why have these stiff meetings? Also, Thursdays are faculty meetings and IEP meetings. Often I don't get one minute of planning on Thursdays and I actually have to stay 50 minutes later. Thursdays suck.

I've got it. I'll celebrate everyday that's not Thursday! So, here's to the first not-Thursday of the rest of my life. I'm going to enjoy it!

Hodge Podge

2010-03-03T22:39:00.006-06:00

Having math twice a day is working out better than I had anticipated. My students are learning about perimeter and area--much easier concepts to grasp than (shudder) adding and subtracting fractions with unlike denominators. I taught and taught and taught that; I understand the "unlike" part--I intensely unlike anything to do with fractions now. Tomorrow we move on to probability. Hopefully this site, Math Live, will help. It has cartoons that explicitly introduce math concepts. I wish I had found it earlier this year, but it will help with the looming state test review.

There's not much going on. Rotney went home sick today; Moses went home sick yesterday. Both had stomach viruses. I'd be more excited about this, but my youngest felt fevered at bedtime and complained about a stomach ache--I may go in for a half day tomorrow and come home to spend the afternoon with him, if he wakes up sick or queasy.

There's a bit of a contretemps (I don't actually know how to say this word, but I know how to use it) about computer lab usage at work--2 teachers have signed up for the coveted end-of-the-day snowday make-up time for Monday-Thursday for the next month. Rather selfish, doncha know. If you knew one of them, you'd say rather typical. Some people. Of course, princiPal is out of town for the week, so it's going to fester for a while. Lovely.

Crunch Time!

2010-02-28T21:55:00.002-06:00

Tomorrow we begin our Plus-30-minutes days of punishment. (You know what I mean--we've had so many snow days that they've added 30 minutes to our days until after our state testing.) It has been decreed that these 30 extra minutes will be devoted to Math, and one of the specials teachers or educational assistants has been assigned to every class during that time. I'll have my usual SpEd aide--she's fantastic and easily wins the award (if we gave one) for being the hardest working person in our building.

What will I do with this bonus time? CATCH UP.

I'm so far behind our math curriculum map that it's shaming. Especially since I helped make the darned thing.

It's not like I didn't know it would be impossible to stay with the map. Our standards have increased in rigor, and just by adding up the lessons that had to be taught, I knew we were screwed. But my princiPal doesn't seem to understand. I sense this because she's asked me many, many times why we, as a grade level, are so far behind where the map says we should be. She always gets the same answer(it's not possible!), but she's not happy about it.

I say she should ask the district math curriculum coordinator. It's her fault that we're not able to maintain the pace--she made us trim days off of units to add more days for review before the state test. What a dummy. I still don't understand the reasoning--trimming the days off didn't change the fact that those lessons needed to be taught.

Anyway, it's crunch time. I'll probably dream in mathematical symbols.

Frustration Reared Its Ugly Head

2010-02-24T21:43:00.002-06:00

This is the first week we have a hope for a 5-day week in at least a month, and my students have forgotten that the purpose of school is to learn. They are at school to socialize. I've spent part of my precious instructional time in every subject correcting and admonishing students. They turn around. They leave their seats to wander. They talk. They pass notes. All of these behaviors while I'm teaching! Do they not know me at all????

So today they got the full tirade. For a full 10 minutes I lectured them on the purpose of school and their job as students. I spoke eloquently (and emphatically) about coming to school to learn versus coming to school to just be there. I told them that if they still can't simplify a fraction, the fault is theirs, not mine because I HAVE TAUGHT IT OVER AND OVER AND THEY HAVEN'T LEARNED IT BECAUSE YOU HAVE TO WANT TO LEARN AND PAYING ATTENTION IS WHAT PEOPLE WHO WANT TO LEARN DO. I also promised failing grades to students who weren't learning what had been taught because I'm doing my very best and I expect them to do their very best, too. I don't think I've ever been as frustrated with a group of students.

I hope this helps. They sure did sit up straight and start paying attention.

A Good Day

2010-02-17T23:02:00.002-06:00

I enjoyed today because it is one of the days I look forward to all year long. I'm idiotically happy whenever I get to teach students how to convert mixed numbers to improper fractions. I still remember how much fun I thought this was when I learned how to do it in junior high school. Yep, I didn't learn much of anything about fractions until junior high and until after seveth grade. My classmates and I were the victims of New Math.

I was okay with New Math for the first 2 years I had it. We did a LOT of set theory, and I do think it has made me a greater thinker than I would have been without it. Maybe I'm just smart and it hit me where I had a talent, but it made sense and wasn't at all painful. Then seventh grade came and HOLY HECK.

I've blocked out most of my seventh grade memories, but I'll always remember how desperate I felt. All of my teachers were secondary teachers--no more gentle souls tottering around in sensible shoes. My teachers were men (!) and aggressive young women's libbers. They were subject-area teachers and didn't seem to notice that seventh graders were 12 years old, not 17, and not ready to write essays. No one had taught us how to write essays and research papers and we were suddenly expected to--complete with footnotes, typewritten on my dad's old Remington, with ibids and ob sets. (Forgive me, Latin-teaching daughter. It's been more than 40 years. I'm sure I messed that up.) The entire experience was unnerving, but the math was horrendous.

We had to learn Math In Other Bases. If you can't wrap your head around why this was a problem, let me give you an example. In base 2, 1 + 1 equals 10. It made absolutely no sense to me, nor did base 5 (4 + 4 = 13. Really.) I couldn't have been more gobsmacked. I developed an aversion to math, limped through high school and graduated with 1.5 math credits. (If you wanted to get a diploma without doing much work, the 70s were a wonderful time! Even my dumb ole brother graduated. In fact, he graduated a year early by taking senior English at summer school after his junior year.)

Back to the math--why is it now my favorite subject to teach? I went back to college when I was 36 and had to take the required teacher math courses. Angst time! However, maybe 36 is the magic developmentally-ready-for-math-age, because I excelled. It all made sense, including the chapter on math in other bases. Emboldened by my success, I took even more math courses and found a favorite professor who cheered when I would solve problems in a creative way.

And, because I struggled so mightily with math when I was 12, now I have sympathy for my students. Some math (long divison, for example) is just hard. Buck up and learn to do it, and I'll be here to help you all that I can. But some math is so easy that it's fun to do, like converting mixed numbers to improper fractions. You multiply to the left and add to the right--we step to the left and slide to the right as we say it. At least I do. And today, everyone was riding along with me on my high, and everyone--every single one--was able to do it by the end of the lesson. Some won't have it tomorrow, but they'll pick it up again and feel happy that they've learned they can be competent about math.

Maybe tomorrow I'll tell about my colleague who told my Title 1 math students today that she's a better math teacher than I. ("It's not true!" Braided Boy said. "I never understand anything she's talking about and you explain things to us.") Or maybe I'll let it go and just consider the source.

Snow Days

2010-02-16T21:27:00.003-06:00

We've had 8 snow days, including the one yesterday that was supposed to be a make-up day for one of the other snow days. So, actually, we've had 7 snow days and one snow holiday. Three days are "forgiven" because our school days are thirty minutes longer than the state requires. (This actually adds up to way more than 3 days, but 3 days is all they'll give us. They have a "don't ask because we won't tell" policy about this. Of course, "they" is the powers that be.)

So we now have 4 days to make up. And TESTING is JUST AROUND THE CORNER. You can practically SEE IT COMING.

Really, we're all stressed. Our curriculum map is in tatters. I'm so behind in math that I doubt I'll ever catch up and heaven forbid that I don't teach each and every SPI to mastery because my butt is now on the line (see previous post where government screwed teachers by tying evaluations to test scores).

The solution? Not four Saturdays. Not extra days at the end of the year for students because that would be past the almighty TEST DATE. We're going to add 30 more minutes to each school day.

Yikes.

I like this idea and I don't like this idea. I'm afraid my class won't want to have an extra 30 minutes of structured math time (because that's what it has to be--I can show a video and take care of Social Studies, but I can't get them to where they need to be in math without a lot of time on task.)

It's going to mean more planning--dedicated lesson plans for those daily 30 minutes. It's going to require some additional resources. It's going to require that third Diet Mt. Dew. Be still, my caffeinated heart.

I have about 2 weeks to get ready. On your mark, get set, GO!

A Long Day

2010-02-12T21:48:00.004-06:00

My husband woke me at 5 o'clock to a dark and somewhat cool house. The power was off, and he was leaving for work. He knew there was no way on earth that I would ever wake up without my alarm clock. Unfortunately, 5 o'clock is about an hour too early. And I hadn't gotten much sleep--less than 5 hours, in fact.

I tried to read by candlelight, but that didn't work. (How did Lincoln--happy birthday, Abe!--do it?) Son and I ate pop-tarts and watched a saved Magic School Bus episode on my laptop, before I took him to school and went to work.

At 9:30, I got a Connect Ed call. His high school was still without power and students were being sent home. My husband also received the call, and took off work to go home. He didn't want him to be alone at home if there was no power. They both arrived home at nearly the same time and ten minutes later the power came back on. They had a great afternoon--son playing on his laptop, husband napping on his couch.

And I? I had to answer the question, "When is the field trip?" eighty-seven jillion times because today was the day of our field trip to the dentist's office. When I wasn't doing that, I was answering the question, "When can we pass out our valentines?" Fun, fun, fun!

Actually, I enjoyed the field trip, except for the part when Rotney told everyone that the pink capsules were made from blood so it would make their teeth look bloody. Yuck. Incredibly, some fourth graders will believe anything, if for no reason than the utter grossness of it. When the trip was finally over, they were all very excited to receive free toothbrushes and other dental products, so excited that some readily popped the toothbrush into their mouths to chew on them. I guess that didn't pay close enough attention to the toothbrushing demonstration. . .

Additionally, I gave them the free T-shirts I received last summer from the author of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series. Since everyone immediately donned them, I'm going to extrapolate that they liked them. I thought that since the movie is coming out this week end, they might appreciate them. :)

And the six students who brought valentines to give out made everyone happy. We're not supposed to have a valentines party; they're only allowed to give out cards. Happily, several of the cards had candy attached to them.

A fun time was had by all. :)

Back to School

2010-02-10T21:18:00.003-06:00

I guess we're going back to school tomorrow. There's still 3-plus inches of snow on the ground, but the city roads are clear. I guess the county roads are, too, since we didn't get the ConnectEd message canceling school.

It's tough to teach every other other day. Last week, we were in school Wednesday through Friday, having missed the previous three school days. My normally well-behaved class was absolutely bonkers for those three days of school. Too much time off and not enough time-on-task.

Monday came, and my class was back! Working. Not talking incessantly. Ready for the day. So, of course, we had an early release day. Totally pointless and a waste of instructional time.

And then we had two more snow days.

Tomorrow I'll be right back where I was a week ago, trying to corral an absolutely bonkers class.

Seriously, will this be taken into account when my test scores bomb because I wasn't able to teach how to add fractions with unlike denominators? I've been introducing fractions for the past 2 weeks and I've yet to get to lesson three!

I love snow days. I hate snow days.

More snow is predicted for next week.

Adventures in Pencil Integration

2010-02-10T14:42:00.002-06:00

From the blog sidebar: "The year is 1897 and Tom Johnson works for a small school district. This is the story of the journey to move into the twentieth century with paper and pencil integration initiatives.

Yes, this is entirely fictional and any relation to "real life" is entirely coincidental."

If you're a tech-savvy person who doesn't like working with people who are actually fearful of on-line grade books, this is the blog for you. The premise: slates are becoming passe'. Adventurous teachers are moving forward (with some trepidation) to using paper and pencils. Students are introduced to "plogs" (pencil-logs). Teachers fret over whether students are responsible enough to wisely use the technology--what if they start drawing???

Go to the beginning of the blog (around the first of the year) and enjoy this fine bit of satire. The author, John Spenser, also maintains Musings from a Not-So-Master Teacher. Both are good reads and regularly up-dated.

Snow Day Today and Tomorrow

2010-02-09T20:27:00.002-06:00

Thank goodness for the snow days--I'm sick with a cold--snotty, coughy, feverish, and achy--nice not to have to use a sick day today. I had to take a 3 hour nap this afternoon, and those just aren't allowed at school. :) However, I'm sad about the snow days, too.

We did go yesterday (Monday), and Sweetie Boy told me that this would be his last week at school. I'm so bummed! Sweetie Boy has made so much progress this year, proving that he's not unintelligent, just uneducated.

I wish him the best, and I'm sorry this week is hastening away with snow days. I'd like to enjoy the few remaining days with Sweetie Boy.

I don't think this post is as sensical as I would like. Let's blame the meds.

Pencil Problem seems Solved!

2010-02-07T22:05:00.003-06:00

I bought a bunch of pink pencils--bright, bright pink ones. I showed them to the class, and asked that no one else buy pink pencils like mine. I also told them that I could not afford to give them any more pencils. They are welcome to borrow a pencil for the day. I explained that "borrow" means to use for a while and then return to the lender in good condition. They evidently listened, because I still have all of the pencils. I do have to (usually) ask for their return at the end of the day, but I'm willing to do that. No one minds returning them, and I get an unsolicited "thank you" from most students.

This may be the best pencil idea I've ever had!

It's sad, the things that make teachers happy. ;)

I didn't watch the Superbowl

2010-02-07T21:56:00.003-06:00

The Superbowl was on, but the TV was behind me as I worked on my lesson plans at the kitchen table. Consequently, I didn't watch any of it. I worked for hours--rewriting the science test, making a study guide for each science lesson, and making a chart for math. I'm getting a cold and my eyes are itchy and blurry. After staring at my laptop screen all afternoon and evening, I must now be legally blind. I am typing this with my eyes closed, only opening them to check for squiggly red lines.

Thanks for listening to my whine. Here's your cheese. :)

It's Just Wrong When Friday is the Busiest Day of the Week!

2010-02-05T21:55:00.002-06:00

Friday's are normally a little hectic--it seems there's always at least 2 tests on Fridays. But there needn't be an IEP meeting with Rotney's family and an incident in the boys' restroom and 3 tests on Friday. That's just mean.

Just before lunch, Moses flew into the boys' restroom and forcefully slammed a boy into the sink. Boy was crying, Moses was saying, "It's okay. It was just an accident," in a manner that indicated he really thought it was okay he had nearly broken the sobbing boy's ribs because It Was Just An Accident. Arrgh.

This comment is about as welcome to my ears as "I was just kidding". It's always said after an unkind remark has been made. Saying "I was just kidding" doesn't make it better. Saying, "It was just an accident" doesn't make it better.

Moses is an Aspie, so it approaches being acceptable that he made the remark. I still held him responsible, though, even if I didn't punish him. I don't think he grokked my explanation of why it wasn't okay, but at least he heard it.

The meeting with Rotney's family went fairly well. I think one member of the family realizes that the other was in the wrong for acquiring a copy of the basal test book, and that Rotney has not been done any favors being taught to memorize everything and not think about anything. We've added more support services. They were appreciative, if not still a little demanding. Whatever. I don't want to put up with another knockdown, slap down meeting with them. Life's too short and we're on the downward turn of this school year.

My friend was released from the hospital today. She did have a mini-stroke, caused by a very small, inoperable aneurysm (that's a ridiculously hard word to spell!) in her brain. They will monitor it, checking every 6 months or so to see if it's increasing in size. It must be worrying--she must feel like a ticking bomb. She will be back at work on Monday; the doctors said she should return to her routine life as soon as possible. Keep your fingers crossed for her!

Best Friend Update

2010-02-04T22:06:00.002-06:00

They're still not certain why my friend had her episode yesterday. For now, they're calling it a mini stroke. She's still in the hospital and tests are still being done.

She's someone who totally gets me, and I need her to be there to interpret my actions to the ones who don't. :)

Gosh, I miss her!

My Best Friend

2010-02-03T22:19:00.004-06:00

I've written on here before about my best friend at work. She's the Special Ed teacher assigned to my inclusion class. We're both avid readers with similar tastes and we're always giving each other books (Okay--she gives me books; I lend her books. It works for us.) I'm her shoulder; she's mine.

Today she was taken from her home in an ambulance. She woke up, got dressed, and walked into the living room and started speaking gibberish to her daughter. Her daughter checked her pulse and blood pressure and both were sky high. My friend has no memory of this--she only remembers waking up in the hospital. She called me from the hospital, speaking with slurred speech and making little sense at times. At other times, she made sense, but the slurred speech was always there.

They think she's had a stroke, but they're not sure. She's been sent from our community hospital to a large teaching hospital about an hour away for more tests.

I'm so worried about her. She's 61 years old. She wanted to teach another year or two before she retired. She may not have that option anymore.

I get to work tomorrow!

2010-02-02T21:57:00.004-06:00

Finally, after seven days (in case you've lost count--2 sick leave days, 3 snow days, and a weekend) I get to be a teacher again. The roads are clear, the parking lots and school driveways (incredibly, that kept us out today) are clear, and everyone is sick of being at home.

I've worn out the internets the past few days. One of the teacher boards I frequent had a post by a teacher that made me laugh. Maybe everyone who says we need to overhaul education has come across a teacher who expresses herself this way:

I used to spiratically jump on here and participate but haven't in a while.

Is anyone else picturing this teacher on a mini-trampoline, jumping and doing three-sixties as she participates? Clearly she meant "sporadically". It's frightening to think that to her ear "spiratically" sounded the same.

Maybe she's a closet pirate freak.

Maybe she does jump on a trampoline.

Or maybe she's one of those teachers who took the Praxis test half a dozen times, finally passing on her last possible attempt.

Those teachers are out there. They think they can teach primary grades because "First grade is so easy!"

They make me hang my head in shame.

The Truth and Nothing But the Truth

2010-02-02T21:55:00.000-06:00

I hate grading papers.

Hate it.

Thanks for listening.

Robert Jordan

2010-02-01T23:41:00.003-06:00

I've been reading his series of 12 books steadily since Christmas, and I've yet to finish the fifth one. I feel like a reading failure since I normally take 2 or 3 days to finish most books.

However, most books aren't thousand-pagers. The fonts are small, too.

The main plot line has now split into three separate plots; it's dense and confusing reading. I frequently have to check the glossary to remember who someone is and how to say a particular proper noun (name, place, or thing).

In the fifth book, one Very Important Character hasn't been mentioned at all. I guess he'll get page space in book 6.

Accidentally reading the first 30 or so pages of the sixth book and learning of a key character's death has made me attuned to any nuance of foreshadowing about this character. I'm probably reading too much into most of it.

I'm enjoying the read, but it will be the end of March before I finish this series. I'm just not used to anything taking that long to read.

And it's seriously going to encroach on my rereading of the Dresden Files series, prepping for the next book release in April. I've got about a dozen of those to read, too.

My eyes hurt, but I'm captivated by the thought of being an Aes Sedai, so I'll plug along.

It's been a long time

2010-02-01T14:29:00.002-06:00

Today marks the sixth consecutive day I have been out of school. I was out on sick leave on Wednesday and Thursday (my mother had cataract surgery). We had a snow day on Friday and another snow day today. I hope we go to school tomorrow because I won't remember my students names if I stay out much longer.

I need a checklist

2010-01-31T22:34:00.004-06:00

The worst part of my job has to be the requirement to do things that I don't see the need for. Over the past few weeks, it has been decided by the princiPal and her pal, Wormtongue, that we all need to include in our plans:

Embedded writing in all subject areas.
Evidence that we're spotlighting the Trait of the Month in a writing activity.
A lesson spotlighting the math problem-solving strategy of the month.
A lesson or station addressing the reading strategy of the month.
A "Rigor and Relevance" lesson.

All of these need to be highlighted so that the cursory inspection by the princiPal will show her that we've jumped through another hoop.

And hoop-jumping is exactly what it all is. Planning and doing are two different things. Writing it in my plans doesn't mean I intend to do it. What I intend to do is teach the standards in a manner that I decide will enable my students to learn.

I hate being micromanaged.

Absolutely hate it.

Let's See

2010-01-27T22:41:00.003-06:00

I could write about the problems my class is having with one BAD student in another class during their joint PE time, but I just don't want to go there.

I could write about my problem with Rotney's family this week but, happily, it was resolved amicably, and I've already been there many times.

I could write about my students who collectively think I own a pencil factory, but there's no point in going there because complaining about it won't solve the problem. (Buying a pencil factory will.)

Oh, I know! I'll recommend my three favorite educator blogs--the ones that make me laugh, the ones that fill me with admiration, the ones that make me think! Here goes:

Look At My Happy Rainbow written by kindergarten teacher, Matthew Halpern, both makes me laugh and fills me with admiration. His posts are insightful observations about his students. Mr. Halpern seems to be everything that all teachers try to be--caring, compassionate, and totally on top of what he's doing. And what's not to like about reading about kindergartners?

Michael Smith's Principal Page: The Blog is another favorite. I envy his "voice" and writing style. Previous topics include the declaration that any educator who can't microwave popcorn without burning it and stinking up the school is incompetent and therefore should be fired. I tend to agree with that! His light and funny style is very readable. He's actually a superintendent now (perhaps even still a principal) in a small school district in Illinois (or maybe Indiana--I always confuse them).

Confessions of an Untenured Teacher by Sarah, who teaches language to students with hearing loss, is another good read. It has short-but-sweet observations about school and life.

Okay, fatigue has hit. (That reminds me--I need to write "fatigue" on the board and see if my students can pronounce it. Fun for me and educational for them! Yes, we'll also discuss meaning. Sheesh.)

Have a great rest-of-the week. We're supposed to have a significant snowfall on Friday! The last time that was predicted, we got a half-inch. . .

Moses

2010-01-23T05:56:00.003-06:00

This is from our math book, an illustration of a geometric pattern. The simplistic description of the pattern was: "Take away bottom row of triangles". That's not very mathematical, so I wondered aloud if I could find an equation to represent the formula. "Let's see," I said, "You start with 15 triangles, then you have 10, and finally you have 6.'

Moses, waving his arm wildly, interjects, "That's not 6 triangles, there, Mrs. Matters. There's 9 triangles."

"Nine, Moses? I count only 6."

"You didn't count the white ones, Mrs. Matters."

Rotisserate?

2010-01-23T05:38:00.002-06:00

One of my SpEd kids scored an 85 today on a math chapter test, which is a major achievement. Fred is quiet and thoughtful. Most of the time I think he's not paying attention, but then he surprises me with the correct answer. He has difficulty with reading, but not understanding--I need to remember that.

Today's test was on motion geometry--transformations, geometric patterns, and tessellations. We had done a tessellation activity earlier in the week. After the test, we did a more specific exploration. Students were given tag board and instructed to make a scalene triangle, trace it onto the pink and yellow sheets of paper I had provided, cut out the triangles, and see if they will tessellate. (And the activity was so messy--scraps of paper everywhere!) Fred was working with a group at the table and I overheard his instructions as I walked by: "You have to make a triangle and see if it will rotisserate." While it's a laughable error, it makes sense. You do have to spin the shapes around as you fit them together to see if you can find a tessellating pattern. But where did my Fred, who lives in the projects, ever hear the word "rotisserie"?

Feeling Rather Desperate

2010-01-16T21:53:00.002-06:00

My state has succumbed to the Race to the Top initiative. In order to qualify for a federal grant that we may or may not be selected for, the governor called a special session of our state legislature to upend teacher tenure and our evaluation process. Value-added assessment scores will now be used for up to 50% of each teacher's now annual evaluation. And damned if he didn't want it to be 51%--enough to fire a teacher. Here's the letter I wrote to my state senator and representative* (personal info hidden or reworded):

Dear Representative ###### and Senator ######,
I am writing to encourage you to support fair reform of our state’s tenure laws. As a teacher in a Title 1 school in the ###### School System, I have seen some teachers who need to retire or be fired, and support any change to tenure laws that would enable the judicious removal of them. However, I believe Gov. ######’s proposal to tie tenure to the value-added assessment system is unfair for several reasons.

First, let me state that I have great value-added scores. My position is not endangered by the use of value-added scores to evaluate me, and I achieved these scores while teaching in an inclusion classroom where approximately 50% of my students qualify for free/reduced price lunches. Why am I speaking out? Because, to me, Gov. ######’s plan is highly flawed. The most prominent flaw of his plan is to make testing high-stakes for teachers, but not for students. A teacher is then at the mercy of her students’ performances, however capricious these performances may or may not be, but nothing will happen to a student who willfully decides to fail a test. If the state wants to judge teachers by value-added scores, then please help level the playing field. Please insist that student accountability also become a feature of our state’s testing policies.

Secondly, value-added scores are tied to state tests, given to third through eighth graders. How will teachers who teach in untested areas be affected? How will the state determine accountability for kindergarten, first, and second grade teachers? How about high school Latin teachers? Or teachers of European history? Or physical education teachers of any grade level? Please correct me if I’m wrong, but I haven’t found any discussion of assessing teachers except for those who teach in grades and subjects that administer the state test. Adding assessment to the primary grades is a staggeringly bad idea—to put five, six, and seven year olds through the stress of taking a state-mandated test would be developmentally inappropriate. Adding tests to Latin I classes or health classes would be cost-prohibitive. So, how will these teachers be assessed? Will the assessment be as high-stakes as the one that will be used to judge third through eighth grade teachers? Please ask these questions of Gov. ######.

Finally, where on earth will our state find teachers to fill our classrooms if we fire beginning teachers because of poor value-added scores? Teaching is an extremely taxing profession. I will readily admit that my first five years in the classroom were spent becoming a competent teacher, often at the expense of my home and family. Even now, in my thirteenth year of teaching, I spend hours and hours out of the classroom preparing lessons, grading papers, and researching new teaching and management methods. It was even more difficult when I was a new teacher and learning the curriculum for six different subject areas. Thankfully, I had time to work out the kinks of my pedagogy, and quickly became a very competent teacher. Are we going to kick today’s new teachers to the curb, or give them time to develop the skills needed to be a quality teacher? It would behoove our state more to direct money to a quality support system for new teachers than to fire a first year teacher for her poor test scores. Let’s try to do this instead of throwing the baby out with the bath water, or the rate of incoming teachers will never meet the loss of teachers to attrition.

Thank you so much for the time you’ve spent reading this. I encourage you to ask some hard questions and refuse to let a vote be railroaded through in an effort to grab a multi-million dollar carrot. Please encourage your colleagues to do the same.

Respectfully,
Elementary Matters

I received no reply from the state senator but did receive this reply from my state representative:

Dear Ms. Matters,

You ask some very good questions and so far, the administration has not been able to give us specifics, for various reasons...mostly they are "protecting the integrity and secrecy of our state's application for funds."

We will continue to press for information and I greatly appreciate your thoughts on the matter.

Keep up the great work.

#####

I did all that I could, and greatly emphasize with our union's president who wrote:

"I know in my heart I have failed Xxxxxx’s Teachers. Not only have I failed Xxxxxx’s Teachers but also I feel as if I have brought a pox on our members. I am concluding the most anguished week of my life during this special legislative session. Before this week, the worst event in my life was waiting by my mother’s bedside to see if her stroke would kill or paralyze her. I know many of you are angry, mad and frustrated and I want you to know that I am as well."

Before I read his letter, I hated the man. I felt he had let us down. But now I understand that he was put between a rock and a hard place and had to agree to abide by whatever happened because the governor had all the votes he needed.

I had naively believed that when Obama was elected to office that the hated and despised NCLB crap would end. I didn't know Obama was driving a U-Haul full of his own crap into the White House. I have no one left that I care to vote for, and I've voted in every election since I was 18 years old (except Reagan's first election--not registered and had a new baby). I don't think I'll make it seven more years until retirement. Between PITA parents and now PITA governors and presidents, I think I'd be happier asking, "Would you like fries with that?"

*I also wrote to the governor about 2 weeks before this (on Christmas day, if memory doesn't fail me), and I never heard back from him, either.

Recap of Last Week

2010-01-10T14:37:00.003-06:00

We returned to school on Monday, Jan. 4 for staff development. Like all days devoted to staff development, it was fairly boring. Half of our morning was spent was spent in the library, where there was no heat to be found. None. We were all sitting there, wearing coats and gloves. (Ever try to pretend to take notes wearing woolen gloves? Not so easy.) During our first break, I pointed out to the princiPal that I had heat in my classroom, trying to subtly suggest a change of venue. It flew right over her head. Undaunted, I now went with the direct approach: "You know, princiPal, I have heat and plenty of room for everyone in my classroom". Ah-ha. She got it. Everyone moved to my room for the remaining hour and we cranked up the heat to 80 (a violation of system's 74 degree policy). It's so much more fun to be bored when you're warm!

Tuesday, Jan. 5--School resumed and totally ruined my birthday. ;) It happens every year (or near enough), so I'm used to it. After hugs and "What'd you get for Christmas?" queries all around, we jumped right back into the curriculum. Things went surprisingly well--everyone was on task and eager to learn.

About 10 o'clock, one of my sweetie girls came up to me with a $100 bill. "Is this real?" she asked. Yep, by golly it was! When I asked her where she had gotten, she said a girl on the bus had given it to her. I thought, "WTF!" but I said, "What on Earth!" I called the Lead Teacher (P.E. coach who handles discipline) and his exact words were "Hoo Boy!" I sent Sweetie Girl off to see him after reassuring her that she was not in trouble. Turns out a girl from another class had taken the hundred and a $10 bill from her mother's wallet and given them away while on the bus. (My husband said that the girl who only got ten dollars was really ripped off. ;)) The money was held in the office until the mother could retrieve it. We speculate that she was trying to make friends. Thank goodness for the honesty of my student--or was it really naivety?

Wednesday--My class walked in chatting away and stayed chatty for the rest of the day. Why? There was snow in the forecast, and that was all that their little brains could focus on for the rest of the day. We get snow rarely enough around here, and the forecast was for from 2-4 inches. Visions of snowballs danced in their heads!

Even though not a flake had fallen yet, all of the surrounding school systems decided to cancel school for the next day by Wednesday evening. Not mine. I think they like to wake us up with an automated phone call at 5:30 A.M.--at least that's what they did on Thursday morning. >:(

So, the snow came on Thursday--the entire half-inch of it. We were closed because the streets were slippery with snow that had stuck immediately. As the temperature fell that afternoon, the roads re-froze and, wonder of wonders, for the first time ever, school was cancelled the day before instead of the morning of! Seems lots of parents grumbled about having to find day care at the last minute, and my school system is nothing if not reactive to parental complaints.

So, to recap: I was off for Christmas break for 2 weeks (16 days), came back for 1 staff development day and 2 school days, and then enjoyed a 4-day weekend. I won't remember how to get through an entire week next week. I think several naps will be required!

An End and a Beginning

2009-12-31T23:41:00.002-06:00

The great thing about the end of one semester and the beginning of a new one, separated by a 2 week break, is that you can change things that haven't worked and try new ideas. Some things I'm changing:

Social Studies and Science interactive notebooks. The pace of our curriculum guide doesn't allow for extra days to be spent on topics. I felt I was overburdening my students to get a reflective piece for the left side of their notebook. Much better to just have them turn their work in and receive immediate feedback.
Reading time. I'm still puzzling this one over. I need to find a way to do more whole group reading and also spend more targeted time on reteaching in small groups. What I'm doing is working, but just in an okay, formulaic sort of way.
Free time for students. They have recess at the end of the day, but I dislike it. It should be about learning social skills and not about fighting for computer time. I'm considering instituting a board game day (Fridays, I'm thinking) where everyone must play a board game. I'll encourage students to bring in board games, too.
I need to reward effort. Maybe with lunch with me (yuck--I need my time at lunch.) Maybe with public praise--a look who gave extra effort! kind of thing. Need to think this out.

That's it for tonight. I hope your year has been blessed and that next year is your best ever!

The Holidays

2009-12-23T23:36:00.002-06:00

I hope my students are having a merry Christmas. Some, I'm sure will get everything desired. I worry about the ones who won't. For the first time in my teaching career, more than half of my class qualifies for the free/reduced price lunch program. One student has a new baby sibling and an out-of-work mom. Others have many siblings and only one parent. These kids ache with want--for a Nintendo DS, let alone an X-Box or Wii. I've heard this year of kids who "used to have one of those, but we had to sell/hock it".

So, to all of my students (but especially those who want), Merry Christmas. May all of your dreams be fulfilled. To my non-Christian student, I hope you're having a blast in Key West. Don't forget my shell!

We're Winners!

2009-12-20T20:00:00.002-06:00

School's out; our final day was Friday. We always end semesters with a half day, and it's become a tradition at our school to let our students have a dodge ball tournament on half days. It's easy enough to do with just 2 grade levels at our school and it helps burn up the time!

My classes have, before this year, never won even one game in the tournament. The coach picked the teams and the rest of the students had to watch as the "lucky 12" competed. It sucked big time for the unchosen few.

This year, coach left the team picking to the teachers. I couldn't bring myself to exclude anyone, so I made sure that everyone had an opportunity to play. I rotated players in and out after each game--everyone got to play at least 3 games. My students were elated. Perhaps because they were so happy, they played unbelievably well. We actually won the tournament and are now the reigning 4th grade champs! Their joy was boundless. We ended up by celebrating with a whole class game, boys against the girls.

So, yay team! We've got bragging rights about something, even if it's not making the best benchmark scores!

Christmas wishes

2009-12-17T22:32:00.002-06:00

I've been asking my students what they want for Christmas--I even invented a fictitious 10 year old male relative when my boys asked me, "Why are you asking? Are you going to get it for us?" To the majority of my students, I'm wealthy. They've expressed that I should bring snacks to school for them everyday. Dream on, I tell them.

Anyway, I've been asking about Christmas. I want to get to know them better and I thought this might be a way to do so. Yesterday, as we were waiting for the bus bell to ring, I asked Spunky Girl what she wanted for Christmas. "A metal detector, a game, . . ." she began. "Wait a sec," I interjected. "You want a metal detector?" Her reply absolutely floored me.

"Well, yeah, DUH."

Like it was the most natural thing on earth for a 9 year old girl to want.

Laughing, I asked Spunky Girl why she wanted a metal detector. "So I can find all of the stuff my brother has buried in the yard," she said.

Just when it was getting interesting, the bus bell rang and Spunky Girl and the rest of my class surged out of the building to the waiting buses. I think this is the only time this year I've hated to hear that bell. :)

Benchmarks

2009-12-08T22:19:00.003-06:00

It's benchmark testing week for our district. Since benchmark scores are scrutinized even more than our state assessment because the data is readily available and making teachers feel bad about their scores is something Central Office seems to live for, it's a stressful week for teachers and students. I taught math twice today, during the sparse instructional time I had available, trying to cover the last 2 standards I hadn't yet taught (spent toooooo much time trying to get them proficient at multi-digit multiplication and finally gave up (for now) on teaching division by 2-digit divisors.) So today we took a picture walk through the plane geometry chapter and learned about common factors and multiples. My kids are mathed-out, but that's okay. They won't see anymore math until Friday. Tomorrow, I'll science them out and Thursday I'll social studies them to death.

All of this seems to be working: their reading benchmark scores were actually pretty good. I'm cautiously optimistic about this week. Stress "cautiously". I've been burned before!

Yet Another Parent-Teacher Conference

2009-12-04T23:23:00.002-06:00

I attended a parent-teacher conference this morning. The parent expressed the agony of her heart as she watched her child, gifted with high ability, squander his opportunities for good grades by failing to turn in assignments. The student's grades were of the 100, 0, 0, 100, 0, 0, 0 variety. The teacher agreed, lamenting the fact that this student seemed unfazed by the lowering of grades as each missing assignment was recorded. The teacher stated that she had allowed the grade reach an F to see if this would provide a wake-up call to the student. The mother thanked her and assured her that the F, plus removal of the student's computer and phone privileges, had seemed to have a positive effect. It was a good meeting--neither party was angry or abusive of the other. Both parties had the student's best interests in mind. The teacher expressed a genuine regard for the student. The mother left the meeting armed with some information (assignment dates) to help her keep her child on track. I wish all parent meetings went so well, but I can't be the parent at all of them as I was at this one.

My son, my bright and funny and warm and so gifted with ability that he takes my breath away son, has been not doing his English homework. He has so much ability, but he's a little ADD and a little careless and totally accustomed to having someone (a teacher with a generous late policy) bail him out of sticky grade situations. His teacher does not accept late work. My son has become the Titanic to her iceberg of grade policy, but I think this is fair and something I want for my son. I want him to learn that work has a value, even if he doesn't want to do it because "it's boring". I, a teacher, want him to understand how onerous it is to have to grade late work and that he should respect his teacher enough to not burden her with that job. I don't think we're there yet, but as the restrictions he's under lengthen in time and severity, perhaps he's finally getting the idea. But maybe not.

His teacher has relented a bit and graded 2 late assignments and a late paper. My son's grade is now a low C, but with upcoming tests he should be able to make a low B. An A for the semester is possible if he aces the final. The mother half of my soul is feeling relieved; the teacher half is worried that this reprieve will, once again, send my son the message that there's always a safety net there, waiting for him.

A Thought

2009-12-02T22:24:00.002-06:00

We are an assessment-driven district (to say the least) and last week, on the 2 days we were in attendance, common assessments were given. The common assessments were reassessing skills that our students, as a grade level, had failed to demonstrate mastery of on our last benchmark--in less academic language, they bombed these standards.

So, reteaching began. Thanks to my newly-reconstructed reading program, my students have had opportunities to finally learn just how the heck to answer these types of questions (cause and effect, fact and opinion, inferring, and drawing conclusions). What with my renewed efforts to fit in the teaching of these skills in order to give a specific quiz on the weekly skill, they greatly improved their scores. In fact, my inclusion class had the highest average score on the common assessment.

And to whom do I owe thanks for my newly-reconstructed reading program? That's right--Rotney's Educational Administrator. By her misbegotten effort to ensure that Rotney scored A's on the reading tests (i.e., obtaining the test book and teaching him the answers) I was forced to get creative. My class is benefiting. I'm working harder, but enjoying the results. So, thanks EA! I owe you one!

One more teeny post

2009-11-30T21:52:00.002-06:00

NaBloWriMo ends today. This is my 30th post, so I made my goal to post 30 times in 30 days. It would have been better to blog daily, but November is a month filled with no-school days and sometimes the well ran dry. As I continue this blog, I'm going to try to write more about the joys of teaching instead of bellyaching about things out of my control. I'm going to be positive, positive I tell you! At least, I'm going to try.

A Good Monday (and that's rather surprising)

2009-11-30T21:23:00.003-06:00

I'm not a big fan of Mondays. I hate having my weekend end. It's so hard for me to get up, get the boy up, and pull it all together to get out of the house in a timely manner. But I do, week after week, because preparing for a sub is worse than facing any Monday! However, I rather enjoyed today.

It was November walk-about day--nice timing, princiPal--waiting to the last day of the month! (I guess it snuck up on her.) My princiPal, academic coach, fellow 4th grade teacher, and I visited 3 classrooms during our reading block. As much as I hate the game of trying to decide which quadrant each teacher was teaching in (if you don't understand "quadrant" then, please, go and kiss your princiPal tomorrow for not rushing headlong into the whole Rigor and Relevance rigamarole the way our district has)--long parenthetical pause there!--as I was saying, as much as I hate determining the quadrant, that's how much I love observing fellow teachers. I always learn something or find something that provokes admiration or horrorification. Today I admired the way one teacher was using a picture book to enhance student knowledge of hurricanes and tornadoes. She did a bang up job and landed in quadrant D! (Um, that's good, in fact, the best quadrant, for all that it sounds like an admirable bra cup size.) The other 2 teachers weren't quite up to a D level, but they weren't bad. Except one had a handmade division chart on the wall. She had labeled "divisor" and "dividend" incorrectly! (Shock! Gasp! Oooh!) Not good. And in a school where math practices are suddenly under intense scrutiny because of lousy scores, extremely NOT GOOD.

Okay, back to the day. I did a good job with the science lesson. Students were active and engaged and excited to learn about static electricity. Then my math lesson went even better. I wish I taught everything as well as I taught that lesson. I had energy (don't know from where!) and enthusiasm and perfect examples and they learned, finally, how to do a simple division problem. They finally saw the value of the Teacher-Approved Handy Dandy Division Device and used it! (You don't know about Teacher-Approved Handy Dandy Division Devices? Cut an index card to make two almost-squares. Give one almost-square to each student. Keep one for yourself and model using it. When beginning the division problem, cover up all of the dividend except the greatest digit with the T-A HDDD. Look at that first digit. Can you get a group of the divisor from that digit? How many groups of 3 can you get from 8? Using the T-A HDDD helps students keep their problem lined up and makes certain they put digit in the right place in the quotient. Try it--it works!)

Okay, that was my terrific day. Got to be nosy in others' classrooms-check! Got to teach a good science lesson-check! Got to teach a fantastic math lesson-check! Enjoyed myself and my students-check! Check! Check!

All days should be so good.

Not my favorites!

2009-11-28T23:23:00.003-06:00

Everyone does a list of favorites. I've decided to be different.

Least Favorites:

Book: The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne--I would rather be beaten with it than ever read it again.
Movie: Sorcerer. My husband and I saw this when we were dating (1977). Trucks, mountainous terrain, and nitroglycerin. I kept hoping everything would blow up.
Food: fish or liver, take your pick. Both make me want to hurl.
Color: Aqua, the predominant color of my childhood, in the 60s. Everything in the kitchen was aqua, even our counter top. Yuck, yuck, yuck.
Thing to do: Clean. I'm defeated by a mess. Overwhelmed doesn't begin to describe how I feel about my house.
Gift: Anything from a particular sister-in-law. We draw names and the number of times she's gotten my name is uncanny. She has a knack for slights and insults, even through the guise of a gift.
Genre: For books, romance. For movies, horror flicks.
Dessert: Pumpkin pie. It just tastes bad and no amount of whipped cream can save it.
Candy: Licorice--so vile it's hard to believe it's a candy.
Soda: Root beer or Dr. Pepper. They taste the same to me. Bad.
Magazine: Consumer Reports. Geez, how boring can you get?
Thing about myself: My weight. Or my big feet.
Favorite child: I'm not that mean. I don't have a favorite, either. I love them all.

Happy Thanksgiving!

2009-11-26T20:45:00.004-06:00

I've only cooked one Thanksgiving turkey and that was more than 25 years ago. For every other Thanksgiving since I've been married, we've gone to my in-laws to enjoy the day with them. To my children, this IS Thanksgiving--playing with cousins, eating the bountiful meal cooked by their mammaw, and playing with cousins some more. Even though the cousins' ages range from 14 to 29, they all still play together. Today they had us in stitches as we watched a covey of them play Curses. Hilarious!

So today, I'm thankful for the 19 family members and 1 boyfriend (not mine--husband definitely wouldn't approve--the boyfriend was my niece's!) I spent today with. I'm thankful for my nearly 73 year-old mother-in-law who can't imagine not hosting Thanksgiving (and Christmas and Easter) dinners at her home. I'm thankful my mom is here, because I don't think she will be for many more years. Mostly, I'm thankful that my husband (53 years old today!), kids, and I celebrated another holiday together. It's a rum old world and I treasure every moment I enjoy with my family.

Finished!

2009-11-25T22:45:00.002-06:00

I've finished reading First Lord's Fury by Jim Butcher. I greatly enjoyed it and am now saddened because it's over. Of course, the fact that I read it in about 15 hours means that my eyes hurt and I need to reread it to answer some questions about some of the stuff that happened.

That's okay--I'm a great rereader. There wasn't a lot of money in my family when I was growing up, and the few books I owned I read and reread to pieces. I enjoy a book nearly as much during a rereading as when I first read it--the experience isn't at all spoiled because I know the outcome. In fact, I find that I really enjoy knowing what is to come; I'm able to see the author lay out the groundwork for character and plot development.

When it comes to reading Jim Butcher's books, rereading is a joy and a necessity. His books are always page-turners. In fact, I stopped today and marveled at how he was able to make me want the book to shift the scene back to the previous one while simultaneously not wanting the present scene to end. I didn't know if I should slow down and savor or speed up and satisfy my curiosity. That, friends, is a good book!

Today

2009-11-24T22:30:00.002-06:00

I've been working on math ideas for my princiPal. This isn't at her behest; it's because our lousy scores have to change and I know she expects me to be helpful. I've been interneting, looking for ideas to improve elementary math instruction. I ordered Knowing and Teaching Elementary Mathematics by Liping Ma and received it today. A cursory look makes me think I'll never get the other 4th grade teachers to want to read it--they are all non-readers and there ain't no pictures. That boggles my mind--how can you not be a reader if you're a teacher? I'm excited about this book. It looks at the differences between US and Chinese math instruction and focuses on depth of understanding by the teachers as the reason for the disparity in scores between our 2 countries. I'll try to blog later about how it goes.

As I continue to blog over the next few days, it likely will be more about family and less about school because it's Thanksgiving break. I'm beyond happy that I'll get to see all of my children on Thursday. It has become a too-rare occurrance.

Monday's post

2009-11-24T22:15:00.003-06:00

Moses came bounding into my classroom on Monday morning. "Mrs. Matters! Mrs. Matters! Mrs. Matters!" he said, "I fell ten feet and landed on my back yesterday!"

"Oh, Moses! Were you hurt? Did it knock the wind out of you?"

"Yeah, it did, but what I really want to know is why did it take so long to fall? I mean, I know it didn't take very long but it seemed to take forever! I just fell and fell and fell! Why did it feel like it took a long time?"

"I don't know, Moses. I'll have to think about that one."

Three hours later. . .

"Mrs. Matters! Mrs. Matters! Mrs. Matters! Did you think about it? About why it took so long to fall?"

See why I like him so much? Never dull, always excited. He fell ten feet, knocked his breath out, and he's wondering why it felt like it took so long. That's Moses. And I actually did think about it. I told him about my car wreck last spring. It, too, felt like it took forever. I think that happens when we're in danger--our brain speeds up and the world feels like it has slowed down. I explained this to Moses (and the rest of the class) and Moses was so excited about the idea of having a "speeded-up brain".

Moses and a speeded-up brain. That would be interesting!

Sunday's post

2009-11-24T22:04:00.003-06:00

We went to Son's piano performance on Sunday. In some ways it sucked big time--crowded, parents had to sit in the balcony, and some carols were played many times by different groups. A little boring.

The premise of the performance was unique--duets on multiple pianos played simultaneously. It was terrific when it worked--it sounded like one big, rich piano. When it didn't work (when students weren't playing at the same pace), it sounded like a bunch of cats were loose in a piano store. Son's group played Pachebel's Canon in D Major flawlessly. There were some other great performances--the Christmas bells one that my older daughter sings "Ding! Fries are done! Ding! Fries are done!" every holiday season was my favorite piece.

The only thing that really bothered me was the decision by the teachers to play at the end of the concert. C'mon, folks. We're parents and grandparents and siblings of the kids performing. We don't need to hear you showing off playing 2 pieces that added an additional 15 minutes to what was already a long concert. I was beyond ready to go by the end.

Saturday's Post

2009-11-24T21:50:00.002-06:00

If I'd taken the time to post on Saturday, I would have written about:

driving my son to his rehearsal and stopping by our favorite deli, the only place I can reliably get to in the Big City. We made rehearsal with time to spare and then enjoyed a Reuben (me) and a grilled cheese with bacon sandwich (son). This almost qualifies as BIG NEWS since it's the first time in ages Son has eaten anything besides chicken fingers/nuggets/lumps. Maybe someday he'll try ketchup.
feeling proud that I actually washed, dried, and folded 3 loads of laundry. I knew I wouldn't have time on Sunday.
ordering another book from Amazon. That makes 18 so far this month: one for son, one for school, let's see, um, 16 for pleasure. But, hey--that will be weeks of reading pleasure. I'm good until about the end of January. :)

Finally, Friday!

2009-11-20T23:19:00.002-06:00

Today marked the first week since fall break where I've taught for 5 consecutive days. It was exhausting. I guess, in the interest of full disclosure, that I should admit that I left 30 minutes early to take my son to a rehearsal for a piano performance.

The rehearsal is in the big city, about an hour away from here. In order to be sure to get there on time for the 4:40 rehearsal, we left at 3:05. We were going along at a fine pace until we hit the big city's Friday afternoon rush hour traffic--egads, how do people (my daughters!) stand to live and drive there every freakin' day? The last 6 miles took 40 minutes. My stupid GPS must be stuck to "scenic route" or something because we were traversing back roads and byways to get there. Finally got to the campus and couldn't find the music building. A kindly safety worker led us there and we ran into the building only 10 minutes late. Sigh.

The scheduled 30 minute lesson lasted less than 20 minutes. Son was on stage with his duet partner for, oh, about 8 minutes.

Crap.

We left, quickly snagged in the same rush hour traffic (it was just 8 minutes later!), and got home about 90 minutes later.

Let's see--100 minutes there, 8 minutes for the lesson, 90 minutes back.

It just doesn't add up.

And we get to do it again tomorrow.

On Thursday, I pissed off a few colleagues

2009-11-20T22:39:00.003-06:00

Last week, we received our teacher-effect scores (see post) and I was yippee-skippy about my effectiveness as a teacher. This week, we met (in the always dreaded after school faculty meeting) to discuss our sucky-poor teacher-effect scores as a grade level. The average gain for 4th grade math was negative 7 point zero. That's a little more than 10 points below my average gain for math. A score of 0.0 means that a teacher (or school, if that's what you're looking at), on average, brought students forward one grade level. It's the expected gain. Positive scores show more than a year's gain. Negative scores must mean you walk by and suck brain cells out of the kids. My score meant I brought my students forward more than one grade level. Given all of that, why did I have to sit at this meeting to be chastened with the others? It's not my fault that we're floundering.

The tone of the meeting was ugly--we were shown sucky data and then repeatedly asked, "How can you explain this? What do you believe is the reason for these poor test scores? What are you going to do differently because whatever you are doing isn't working." I finally asked, "What do you want us to say? Do you want me to admit to kicking back, drinking coffee, as my kids ran amok? Let me say--I don't know what everyone else's score is, but my score was a positive number. I know what I'm doing--I know how to teach math." Surprisingly (sarcasm, okay?), no one patted me on the back for my great scores. I was shot a few hate-filled looks from the teachers who must be responsible (and who have negative scores, natch) but not a word was said. Oh, well. Maybe they'll all come to observe me teaching math. And I'll be voted teacher of the new millenium. But I'm not betting it.

(This meeting could have been a positive experience if a let's-all-roll-up-our-sleeves-and-brainstorm-teaching-ideas attitude had been adopted. Instead, it was all about "what are you doing wrong?" It was demeaning. I told my princiPal that a few more meetings like that will drive everyone to cheat on the test. She, pal though she is, was. not. amused. At. all.)

It happened on Wednesday

2009-11-20T22:19:00.003-06:00

One of my students wet herself--thoroughly. Puddle-on-the-floor wet. Guess who told her she had to wait until after the science test to use the restroom? Yeppers-'twas me.

To be fair to myself, I'd like the world to know that we had just passed the restroom on our way back to the classroom and some students went at that time. It's a frequent occurrence that we pass the restroom and students (see the restroom, have sudden urge to pee) ask to go and I always say yes. Always. Why didn't she ask then? And, if she had to go so badly, why wasn't she doing the pee-pee dance when she asked? Why, oh why?

Thankfully, because God takes care of children and idiot-teachers, no one noticed. When we went to lunch, she remained seated--that's when I noticed her dilemma. After the line left the room, I got her to the nurse's office, unseen by anyone. Mom was at work (an hour away) and so the bookkeeper went to the dollar store and got her a new outfit. It all worked out.

She'll get to use the restroom whenever she asks for the rest of the year--my husband and I decided she's got a "golden ticket" to go. Pun intentional.

And I still feel so bad about it.

Moses

2009-11-16T18:29:00.002-06:00

Moses is one of my favorite students, perhaps even on the short list of all time favorites. He's smart and enthusiastic and eager and totally out-of-control all day long. He never remembers to raise his hand (until asked numerous times) and he shouts out off-the-wall questions. All. Day. Long.

I knew that today would be one of his more interesting days when he entered the classroom with a Puff the Magic Dragon picture book. He was singing along with it, loudly and enthusiastically. The other students immediately, in unison, swiveled their heads toward me with widened eyes and open mouths. Written on all of their faces was the mute plea, "Please, save us!" I laughed and then they laughed. And Moses finally stopped singing after being told to stop half-a-dozen times.

He was the most irrepressible he's ever been. All. Day. Long. But he was (as he always is) so danged cheerful about life, that it's impossible to dislike him or be angry with him. So, I just laugh and enjoy and, sometimes, tell him to put a fist in it (meaning put your fist up to your mouth so you'll stop talking.) One of my co-workers has a student who keeps trying to put her eye out with a pencil. I can live with Moses and enjoy a unique perspective on the world: you can be happy if you choose to be, even when you've suffered a year of loss and change (Moses has) that has rocked your world. IF you choose to, you can forget the pain and look for the happier things in life (Hey, teacher, look at the neat fuzzy seeds I found on the way to school!) He has a special place in my heart.

Yet Another Sunday Spent Working

2009-11-15T22:24:00.002-06:00

There's a load of clean laundry waiting for me in the dryer, but I've just finished my lesson plans, and I'm taking a breather for a few minutes. Lesson plans have taken quite a bit of my time today; I'll still use the old basal this week and that necessitates creating quite a few things on my own. A vocabulary chart to introduce this week's words, a center activity involving a written response, a detailed example page of the written response (a friendly letter). All of this takes time and I'd rather be reading than working on reading, but I'd always rather be reading. There are 17 notebooks awaiting grading, but that will have to wait until tomorrow. I'm knackered.

Darn, it's past midnight

2009-11-15T00:40:00.003-06:00

I'll just pretend I'm in another time zone. . .

My mom's home from the hospital. She had a calcified stent (one of the old ones) that was removed by an inventive use of a balloon angioplasty and replaced with a new stent. She's tired, but doing well.

I've been a bad girl today--ordered 13 books from Amazon. Once upon a time, I read mostly mysteries but now my tastes run to fantasy. My favorite fantasy author is Jim Butcher, and I'm currently rereading his Aleran Chronicles because the sixth and final book will be released on Nov. 24. Oh, that's another book I have on order. Today I ordered the first nine books of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series. Later, when talking with my son (the one in grad school), he mentioned a book series he's reading (A Song of Ice and Fire), so I ordered that too. Damn Amazon--it's just too easy!

My house is full of books, despite the fact that I gave over a hundred to the local library about a year ago. That was a mere tip of the iceberg. My 2 six-foot bookshelves in my bedroom are double-stacked and double-faced. I have stacks of books in my living room and my kitchen. I usually keep a book on the toilet tank. I cannot not read something bound every day. (An awkward sentence, but I like it.)

Anyway, I hope I like the new books. I've read a lot of crappy fantasy in the past year--I do not like Ann McCaffrey's Pern books much and I gave them a fair chance (borrowed from grad student son's shelves.) I tried a British youth series, The Dark is Rising--bah! Lots of potential but it managed to be just plain boring. I've read all of Rachel Caine's Weather Warden series but it's gotten so darned convoluted that I don't think I'll read the next one. Oh, who am I kidding. I'm a book addict and I'm sure I'll buy it just because I have all of the rest.

The Catch-Up Post

2009-11-13T22:30:00.002-06:00

My favorite EA sent my princiPal a handwritten letter of complaint yesterday. She's upset that I've changed basal reading series (doesn't have the test book for this one!) and said that I wouldn't let Rotney take a copy of the book home. So NOT TRUE. My princiPal called and left a message that Rotney was, indeed, allowed to take the book home and that I would be teaching frequently from this basal. The EA never returned the call or the second call made today.

I wonder what the point of the letter was. Did she think that I'd be in some sort of trouble for switching series? Did she think I wouldn't advise my princiPal that I was doing this? One reason my princiPal is my Pal is because I've always kept her from being surprised by anything I've ever done. Confession is good for the soul and good for keeping your princiPal happy--every goof or misstep I've ever made, she's heard it from me first. And there have been several over the dozen-plus years we've worked together. Additionally, she, by my request, vets my emails for me when I'm dealing with a difficult parent. No sense in going out on a limb on my own.

Stay tuned. Will Rotney finally return to Nirvana School where students are handed A's and B's? Will the EA shoot me in the parking lot? Will I be sued for harming his self-esteem? Any and all of these outcomes is possible on next week's episode of I'm Tired of Rotney's EA. Stay tuned!

Another Sub, Another Three-Day Week

2009-11-13T22:22:00.002-06:00

My mother, who visited the cardiac cath lab last week and received a stent, had to go back today for another visit. She had angina pains on Monday and Tuesday and that's just not supposed to happen again so soon. So, another sub day for me, and Mom and I were off to the hospital at 6:15 today. After check in and all that entails, she went off to the lab at 8:45 and stayed in there for nearly 4 hours. That's a long time--last time she was in and out in 2 hours. They found a calcium blockage in a artery and had to work hard (but carefully, they assured me) to remove it.

Was it there last week and they just missed it or is it possible to get a blockage in less than a week? If I ever see the doctor I'll ask. And now I have Cookie, her dachsund, dogging my every step again. She's always on the hunt for food. I'm always eating. It works for her but I'll never understand why that dog doesn't weigh 50 lbs.

Teacher Effectiveness

2009-11-13T22:02:00.005-06:00

I teach in one of the few states in our glorious union that rates teacher-effectiveness based on our students' test scores. Yep--scary and a good reason not to like Obama and his minion Arne Duncan, which actually makes me sad because I liked Obama so much last year. I had foolishly thought anyone besides Dubya would see the ridiculousness of NCLB, but it seems that ain't so. And now Obama wants to pay teachers based on their students test scores? Seems mighty unfair to me, but my scores are an argument in favor of this--darn it all.

I have referenced it before, but let me state it again--last year was the most difficult year of my teaching career. If I had to do it again, I would resign. I had huge behavior problems and half of my class was special ed-inclusion, which means it really wasn't an inclusion class--it was a modified CDC (Comprehensive Development Class, I think it means--typically a CDC class has MR and severely autistic students. An overstatement to call it a CDC, but it FELT that way. Everyone was so low!) Imagine my surprise when I signed for and received my white envelope.

Getting your Teacher Effect scores is a big thing--someone from downtown comes and distributes the envelopes. Teachers rip them open and study the results with furrowed brows, but no one shares with anyone else. It's PRIVATE with all caps. I'm dying to know how one of my co-workers did, but to ask would be a huge faux pas--darn it. My scores were good. Above average gains in science--I don't understand this because I hate to teach science. A positive score (indicating more than a year's growth) in mathematics. A year's growth in reading. Finally, a below average score in social studies, but that doesn't matter because it doesn't count toward NCLB. It hurts, because I love teaching social studies, but it doesn't matter. Now, the big question--how did that group of knuckleheads I had last year achieve this?

Some things are impossible to grok.

Stupid Science Book

2009-11-10T21:42:00.004-06:00

We have a new science book this year and it sucks for air. The publisher guaranteed that it would be fully aligned with our state standards and, by cutting out all extraneous material, they've done it. However, since the uncut material wasn't edited to account for the excisions, the text is choppy and leaves out information that would be helpful in understanding just what the hell the book is talking about. Additionally, money woes for the district means they bought a stripped down experiment kit (no doubt thinking teachers could purchase the missing items with their personal money) and the least helpful workbook (thin, thin, thin--nothing but test practice and nothing for specific lessons.) Finally, can you imagine my joy today when I discovered that the test for our current chapter had items on it that aren't found in chapter 6? WTH! I had to write yet another test, then write 4 pages (one per lesson) of study guides for the chapter. I'm so sick and tired of writing tests. And study guides. (thanks, EA!) I did try to construct study guides that were less "fill in the blank" and more "Be able to define:". I'm tired of giving the game away just to satisfy Rotney's EA.

On a mean and personal note, I have to admit that when I switched to the old reading series today, I really enjoyed the surprised expression on Rotney's face. Poor kid--I bet he spent all of our three-day weekend memorizing questions for the wrong test. Oopsy!

No school today

2009-11-09T22:06:00.002-06:00

We were out of school today for Veteran's Day. Yeah, I know--Veteran's Day is on the 11th, but I guess my district prizes 3-day weekends. Of the 16 weekdays since Fall Break, I've been out of my classroom for training or personal leave or a holiday 6 and a half days. No wonder I can't come up with something to write about today. Stay tuned--Rotney's EA or Billy the Bully are sure to provide fodder in the coming days. Or, heaven forbid, something else will come up--that's the spirit!

About me and mine

2009-11-08T11:01:00.006-06:00

I graduated from high school in 1975. I was the first in my immediate family to go to college and the first to graduate, even though the matriculation was spread out over 20 or more years. Life, especially having my family, intervened. Also, my major (biology) was fairly poorly chosen. I hated dissections and the smell of formaldehyde. I'm not a great memorizer of scientific names. Chemistry is not a subject for which I have an affinity, and it's required for biology majors. After 3 1/2 years of screwing around, aiming for a "Gentleman's C" in all courses (how liberated I was!), I happily left for marriage and kids. But when I allowed myself to think about it, I felt like a failure.

So, with three children happily in school, I re-enrolled and changed my major to elementary ed. A good fit and the shortest track I could find to graduation. I did glance at psychology as I took 2 core classes there--I think I would have excelled there, but the financial strain I was putting on my family made me take the more immediate track to a pay check. In what would have been my final year, I became pregnant with my fourth child--quite a surprise, but he's been a blessing, so I'll not argue with God over that decision. So, finally--graduation, student teaching (a horrible experience--saving for another day), and employment. I was 40 when I began teaching fifth grade at my school. I had already lived a lifetime of experiences.

My own kids had prepared me poorly for teaching. They're all very bright and gave me an inflated sense of how good I was at teaching. I worked with my older daughter for a week on her addition facts--bingo! She was good to go. That's really the only thing I had to help her with, and the other kids seemed to learn by osmosis--they learned every concept the first time around. I did keep tons of books in the house and made frequent trips to the library with them. They're all readers and all, by any measure, successful. The oldest three are out in the world and I so miss them! Here's what they've chosen to do with their lives:

Older daughter (and oldest of all) is BSN/RN, working as a charge nurse in a regional cancer center. She's witty and wonderful and beautiful. I think she'd be a perfect nurse to have because of her cheerful attitude and deftness. I love watching her put away groceries or load a dishwasher--poetry in motion! The Cheaper by the Dozen parents would have studied her! She and her new husband make quite a pair.
Younger daughter is my DETERMINED child. She was a National Merit Scholar, valedictorian, and actually made money going to college because she had quite a bit of excess scholarship money. She's a Latin teacher, living with her husband in the same city as her older sister. She completed a half-marathon yesterday in less than 2 hours. She, too, is witty and wonderful and beautiful but she's also the opposite of her older sister. She's fair; the other is dark. She's short; her sister is tall. She's shy; the other is outgoing. Just these 2, born 19 months apart, taught me that all kids are different and that comparisons were impossible.
My older son, my former baby, is a graduate student at a very nice university in another state. He, too, was a valedictorian. He's a very talented mathematician but he loves literature. He's studying English Lit, emphasis on Medieval Literature, and he hopes to be a university professor. And, considering the 5-year program he's in is paying him to go to school, he should be able to achieve his dream. The most amazing thing about all of this is that he had a serious language delay disorder when he was small because of repeated ear infections. He literally didn't talk much at all until he was 5 (and had had 3 years of speech therapy.) I've dealt with language-impaired children in my classroom, and I have to say they are the most difficult children to teach. Language is everything in a classroom. A child who is not processing language can't learn. My aspiring professor was able to overcome his language delay and excel.
That brings up the baby--now 14 and in high school. He's the brightest of a very bright bunch--he taught himself how to read before the age of two. Literally. I was changing a diaper when he was 17 months old and he asked if "stop" is spelled s-t-o-p. He would read newspaper headlines as we walked by. He used to amaze the check-out girls at Wal-Mart by reading their name tags to them. He's always been very gregarious and would walk up to just anybody at the store and start a conversation. After begin chastised repeatedly for talking to strangers, he then began conversations with them by saying, "Hi, my name is _________ and this is my friend, Mom. What's your name?" His reasoning--if he knew the stranger's name, then the stranger was no longer a stranger. He, like his brother and father, excels at mathematics. He's not so good at turning in schoolwork and that is maddening and tiring for his father and me. Dang-it, his brother and sisters turned their work in. Sometimes I feel too old for the "did you do your homework" crap, but it must be done.

Well, that's my kids. I didn't raise them alone; my husband has been here with me, a true parenting partner. He's the one my kids get the intellect and math ability from. I often wonder what I gave my kids--I think I'll be content for making them readers and lovers of words and learning.

Supernanny

2009-11-07T20:01:00.006-06:00

Does anyone else out there love Supernanny as much as I do? I wonder if she does classroom visits--some days I could use her.

I really could have used her last year with my zoo of a classroom--twelve behavior problems. About three of those were hard-core, well, jerks comes to mind. The other nine were followers of the three, but would have been a handful in anyone's class without the influence of three others. Talk about a long year.

By fourth grade, the parents of my hardcore jerks have already heard about their precious child's issues since kindergarten. They know that little Willful is doing what he's always done (whatever the hell strikes his fancy) and they are beyond caring. It's my problem. One meeting with a parent produced a hug for me (!) but did not stop mom from continually selling her son's behavior meds every time the prescription was renewed. (Of course, the drug-selling was not discussed. It was the cow in the room that everyone pretended not to notice. We did ask that she send the meds to school so that the nurse could give her son the meds and she promised to do so. Promises are so easy, aren't they? Are you surprised that she didn't fulfill her promise? Not I--I've been played too many times.)

This year, I have about three behavior problems. Skippy isn't on the list--his behaviors are his out-of-control actions when he doesn't have his meds, but thankfully he does have them most of the time. And he doesn't hurt anyone when he's not medicated--he's just incapable of working or sitting still.

One of the three boys is socially clueless--insults others and then is so sad that he doesn't have friends. Well, duh. I've been coaching him on appropriate/inappropriate things to say and he's doing better.

Rotney, crazy EA aside, is also a behavior problem. He's a tattle-tale and will interrupt instruction to tell me (and the class) that someone did some minor thing. Constantly, as in multiple times an hour. I've tried the "Don't worry about it--that's why I get the big bucks" speech. I've tried ignoring him, but that's difficult since every tattle is preceeded by a long "Oooohhh" as in "Oooohhh, Mrs. Matters, Sprout is sticking his tongue out at Sweetie." I'm now at the point where I say, "And that's your business? Why is that your business? How is Sprout's action harming you?" Still doesn't do any good.

My third behavior problem is subtle. He's the one who has been bullying (sorry--must be PC--he has been exhibiting "bullying behaviors") to several students in my class. I thought I had this kid pegged--he's lazy as all get out, asks when recess is multiple times a day, and is the first one to always ask, "Do we have to write the sentences?" (Yes, because you asked and didn't read the directions.) I've met mom and I know she won't believe that he would do such a thing, so I've been gathering evidence. I wrote an account of what he was doing to bully Skippy. The other day, he was bullying (exhibiting bullying behaviors to) another classmate, accusing him of wearing a bra (What?!). I made him write an account of what he said and sign and date it. I told him that the next time he exhibits bullying behaviors (is a bully) I will call mom in for a conference and show this to her and let his explain his actions to her. (He also lost recess--the one thing he enjoys about school.) He visibly blanched, so maybe this behavior will end. Maybe.

I have one more kid who might be considered a behavior problem in someone else's class, but I enjoy the heck out of him. All of the goals on his education plan are of the "Will sit down and shut-up" variety. He doesn't realize that there are others around him who are trying to learn too. He will yell to me "I'm having trouble with number 9," and be really confused why that's a bad thing. I think I like him because he's had a rough year at home, but he's unfailingly happy about everything. And I do mean everything. New fact learned--happy! New paper--happy! New friend--happy! Find an unusual seed pod on the way to school--indescribable joy lights up his face. Just thinking about his joy makes me happy--how can that be a bad thing?

Burning with Resentment

2009-11-06T21:46:00.002-06:00

I'm still playing games with Rotney's EA (Educational Administrator-my fancy title for his crazy relative who is the family member in charge of his education.) He again achieved a high score on this week's reading test. Next week, I'm switching to the old basal (I kept a class set when we changed adoptions)--let's see the EA come up with a copy of that assessment! Lest you think I'm just an ol' meanie, it's not that I don't want Rotney to pass. If he passed a reading test on his ability, I would be the happiest person in the building. I just don't want him to pass because he has been taught the answers but not the skills. And this knowing he can pass because EA is teaching him the answers situation has made Rotney a worse student, not a better one. He comes in with the reading workbook pages memorized and flies through them. He won't slow down to process what he's doing--he just regurgitates answers. It's maddening.

I've also decided to give a weekly reading quiz. It will have 2 short reading passages, and each passage will have 5 questions. The quizzes will test understanding of our weekly skill--next week it's discriminating between fact and opinion. This will enable me to assess Rotney (and my other students) in a non-biased way. It will also prevent skewing of grades because having that category in my gradebook and not using it is making the weekly tests more than the 40% of the total grade that they should be.

What this all means is more work for me. It also means abandoning the worksheets and centers I created specifically for our current basal and trying to reinvent the wheel in order to teach the old basal. So, yeah, I'm burning with resentment. EA has increased my workload and if I ever find the person who gave her the reading assessment book, I'm going to jerk that person bald. At the very least, I'm going to try to get her certificate.

2009-11-05T20:31:00.004-06:00

My mom's home--tired but doing well. That means her dachshund, Cookie, who peed, pooped, and vomited on my carpet this morning (some surprises are hard to wake up to!), is back home as well. Bad Cookie!

Evidently, my class thinks having a sub is a license to forget all of the behaviors I've worked so hard to extinguish this year, particularly talking nonstop and getting out of their seats to visit whenever the heck they want to. Three people had to go into my classroom yesterday to tell them to shut up. The lead teacher blamed it on the sub, who doesn't have enough presence in the classroom to get them to stop. That may be, but I still expect them to act like my students whether I'm there or not. They really let me down. And, maddeningly, they couldn't understand today's effect (loss of recess) was due to yesterday's cause (misbehavior).

Is it just my students or do all students forget the classroom procedures we've had all year after one day with a sub? Every single day we've been together, my students have kept their math and language arts assignments so that we can check them together the next day. And even though my sub notes state this, the subs still take up the work and my class tries for days afterward to turn it in instead of keeping it to check together the next day. Why? What is so hard about understanding this?

Okay, that's all for today. Progress reports go home tomorrow, so I must grade and grade tonight. I wish teaching was a 9 to 5 gig because I'm tired of working for 1-2 hours at home, daily.

Another day out of class

2009-11-04T09:47:00.002-06:00

At this moment, my mother is in the hospital cath lab, having another stent put in one of her heart's arteries. I'm in the hospital waiting room, fairly amazed that free wi-fi is available here. Back to mom--she's had 5 bypasses and now I think she's up to 5 stents--possibly more, almost certainly not less. In case you haven't realized the fact of it, my mom is proof that getting older sucks.

2009-11-03T22:17:00.003-06:00

I teach at a really small school--2 grade levels (4th and 5th) and 9 classrooms. When I started here as a brand-new teacher 13 years ago, we had 16 fifth grade classrooms. While there are quite a few staff members still here, only two teachers have been here longer than I. I'm not particularly close to either of them, but we get along okay. I'm closer to 3 of the fourth grade teachers, but my closest pal is my special ed co-teacher. Her schedule has changed this year, so she's only with me during math, and we miss each other so much! Besides being a great supporter of what I do in the classroom, she's my reading buddy. And laughing buddy. And understanding buddy. Everyone should have a co-teacher as wonderful as mine. The days are long without her.

I've always had a touch of Asperger's when it comes to dealing with people. I have a quick temper I inherited from my father (Thanks, Dad!), and I seem to be cluelessly insensitive. Sometimes, I've had to keep a Post-it on my desk, cautioning me that "Sarcasm is not a tool to be used here". Some people here really don't get me but thankfully my princiPal does. Which is why I went to her last spring to clarify something that had come up at our grade level meeting.

When the data from our second quarter benchmarks was made available, we found that the fourth grade (my grade) had done poorly in math. We had 4 (yes, FOUR) meetings where we were asked "How can you explain these scores?" Uh, dunno. We taught it; they didn't get it. We retaught it; they still didn't get it. At one of these meetings, the academic coach stated, "Your scores were the lowest of the district. You were at the bottom." Quite shocking, especially for me. I'm supposed to be a great teacher of math. At least my value-added scores say so.

I spoke about it with my co-teacher. I talked it over with my fellow fourth grade teachers. We all felt like, um, losers! So, finally, I went to my princiPal, who is as much my friend as she is my boss, and reminded her about what had been said (she was at the meeting) and asked her if we had truly been at the bottom. She didn't remember that comment, but said that we had been below average. It was a good discussion--she calmed me and made me feel less negative about the scrutiny we had endured over the scores.

Read on--the point is coming! A few weeks later, benchmarks rolled around again. I wanted to do a quick review of similes and metaphors on the morning of the Language Arts benchmark. I wasn't sure how kosher this was (I couldn't do it directly before the state assessment), so I asked the academic coach about it. She said it was up to my conscience and professional opinion. Well, I said, I don't want to be criticized again for having really low scores, so I guess I will give a quick review. And, hey, my inflection was light-hearted. In the whatever-do-you-mean discussion that followed, it came out that we fourth grade teachers had all felt bad about the criticism we had received and that I had felt so upset that I had gone to the princiPal following the coach's remark that we were the "lowest". She denied ever saying it and lit into me about stabbing her in the back. She said, "Your actions were not the actions of a friend. A friend would have never done what you did." She was irrational and nothing I said soothed her.

So, well, she's not my friend anymore. I don't understand her reaction. Was it me? Was it her? I know she's always wanted praise and recognition from inside and outside the building. I guess I underestimated how much her self-esteem depended on being perceived as "perfect". I will say hello as she passes me in the hall, but I'm rather an unbending type. The friendship is over.

Another Successful Day

2009-11-02T16:47:00.003-06:00

Suprisingly, this day--a MONDAY--turned out to be a good one. This morning, I quickly constructed a math test to assess multiplication of 2- through 4-digit factors by a 1-digit factor. Amazingly, they did well on this test! I had 8 100's, 4 B's, 3 D's, and 3 F's. Okay, so I'm not so happy about the bottom 6, but the top 12 rocked! Two of the 100's belonged to students who go to Title 1 Math--I'm so proud of them!

After the test, we did 2 math lessons which is what one does when one is a chapter behind the pacing guide. One might think that I could keep up with the pacing guide, since I was one of 2 fourth grade teachers PAID to make it for our district (21 elementary schools), but it turns out that I can't. An overloaded pacing guide is what one gets when one tries to cram 10 months of math into 8 and a half months of instruction, so I sincerely doubt anyone can. And, please don't tell anyone outside of my building that I helped make it--I already get enough ribbing about it from my colleagues, who are sometimes mean to me! ;)

I love November--we get so many days off that it's the month besides May that I enjoy the most. Students are off tomorrow for election day; we have a staff development day. (I don't know what we're electing--not senator nor governor nor congressman--guess I'll show up at the voting precinct and find out tomorrow.) We're off next Monday for Veterans' Day and we get the 25th-27th off for Thanksgiving. Yay, November!

NaBloWriMo

2009-11-01T22:32:00.000-06:00

Look for daily posts throughout November--I'll be participating in National Blog Writing Month.

Another Sunday

2009-11-01T11:49:00.004-06:00

Sometimes I think I enjoy Sundays less than any other day of the week because I have so much to do. It's laundry day and lesson plan day and get-some-grading-done day. It's definitely not Funday or Lazy Sunday or anything I would prefer it to be. And I think that's mostly because I have acquired a negative attitude about my job.

Last year, I was surprised to learn that workman's comp only covered injuries incurred during the school day--not before 8:00 or after 3:30, unless one is attending a school event (meeting, open house, etc.). Hmmph. Since I think this is unfair--a district-level decision designed to protect their pocketbooks but not their employees--I've changed my work habits. So even though I will get to school early (between 7:00 and 7:30), I will no longer stay late to work in my classroom. If it doesn't get done at school, it must be done at home so this is really not working so well for me. So this is one factor affecting my attitude.

The other, larger factor is the loss of autonomy I've experienced in the past 3-4 years. For example, I don't have any say-so in how or when I teach reading. I have to have "literacy stations"--no different from the centers I did years ago. Centers didn't work then and they don't work now to make students better readers. Reading makes better readers, but I've had my hand slapped too many times for having my students just read self-selected text instead of doing a center with a product and I've given up. When your princiPal asks you to stop being the "toxic member of the staff", it makes you realize you're tilting at windmills to think that complaining is to going to change the new district vision. The curriculum for all subjects has been mapped and everything must be taught (covered is more like it) before the state assessment. This means that everything has to be taught at a breakneck pace, especially since we have new, more rigorous standards. There is no time to expand or enhance the learning through projects or other activities. It's become all pencil and paper.

I need to give myself a pep talk and quit longing for yesterday. I need to find a way to work the system to be the best teacher I can while teaching in a way that's alien to me. I've been trying to do this, but today it's hard. Tomorrow I'll be back in "sheep mode" and I'll get it done.

Bullying

2009-11-01T00:26:00.003-05:00

I was out of class 2 days last week for bullying prevention program training. It was time well-spent, and I can't wait for us to go school-wide with this program. It's probably because I'm newly aware of bullying that I noticed that Skippy is being bullied by his classmates. All of them. One student is leading the bullying effort--he has influenced the others to not stand beside Skippy in line and to say something impolite whenever Skippy walks by. I learned about all of this on Friday after the bullying leader (let's call him Billy the Bully) had been dismissed for the afternoon. I told my class that I was ashamed that they would treat someone the way they had been treating Skippy. I gave the whole "How would you feel?" lecture. Amazingly, they showed remorse. At least, my girls did. They went over to Skippy to tell him that they were his friends and sat down with him during inside recess (it was raining) to play a game with him. Skippy was radiant. I definitely have to have a talk with Billy the Bully on Monday but maybe, just maybe, my class will be kinder to Skippy from now on.

Skippy is very bright and (you may recall) sometimes not medicated. When he's not medicated, he spins around the room, out of control, and does annoy everyone. Even when he is medicated, he takes things from his classmates, but I've always sensed this was a self-esteem-building trick for him--he wants to believe someone is his friend and jumps all the way to "this is my friend and he will share things with me." It's sad that his inconsistent medication makes his classmates wary of him because he CRAVES friendship--companionship, really. He has only his mother--no father or siblings. She's ill (or perhaps strung out on something--it was hard to tell). So really, he's alone at school and alone at home. Just imagine.

Keep Your Fingers Crossed!

2009-10-31T00:16:00.002-05:00

I've felt that my content area instruction has been my strongest area this year. Thanks to new text adoptions for social studies (last year) and science (this year), I have tons of resources and readable texts. I make graphic organizers (composed while looking at the tests) that we complete as we listen to the audio CDs (is that redundant?) of each lesson. I frequently pause the CDs as we discuss the new information and connect it to previous lessons. I mean, really, I'm doing a bang-up job. And that's why it's been so discouraging that my students, by-and-large, are consistently failing the tests.

Today, though, my class crossed the Rubicon of testing success and actually studied for this test. Nearly half of the class scored an A or B; only 3 students failed. Is this success attributable to the low grades that went home on last week's report cards? Probably so, but also I think it was because after weeks of hearing me say, "Be sure to study your notebook. Your notes are a great study guide for the test," it has finally sunk in. Whatever the reason, I was as happy as I can be while grading the tests. They made me feel successful. I really needed this before I went in front of everyone at the awards assembly and gave my lone honor roll student his award. Sigh.

Accidentally, A Good Lesson

2009-10-29T22:30:00.003-05:00

There's a great teacher in our district who has made a Power Point for everything imaginable relating to the curriculum he teaches. I thank the stars everyday that he teaches my grade and has put all of his creations on our sharing server. He has made Power Points that are oh-so-handy for benchmark reviews, and, incredibly, a Power Point for each and every lesson in the Science and Social Studies books. I don't always use them, but they're a nice tool to have in my teacher toolbelt. There is one set of his Power Points that I have used daily for the past 3 years and that's the set he made to review our weekly reading vocabulary and skill/strategy.

Typically, I've used these Power Points to introduce the new vocabulary set each Monday, and then I run through it everyday to do a quick vocabulary review. However, this week I was out on Monday and Tuesday for training (probably more about that later). If I'm out, my laptop is with me, so my sub couldn't use the weekly Power Point. If you're a teacher, you know how it is when you've been out--you wonder how well your sub did at teaching and so you do a thorough job when you get back of reviewing what was taught (or not) while you were out.

That's what I was doing yesterday when I found out, quite by accident, that maybe there's a better way to use these Power Points. My students had been working with the vocabulary words for 2 days. On this, the first run-through with the Power Point, I found that I was able to really take them to a higher level of thinking by asking them to predict what the picture would be. They knew the definitions, but I was asking them to apply the definition and brainstorm what would be a good picture to illustrate each definition. I was gobsmacked at how well this worked for them. For the word "vain", they came up with ideas that clearly illustrated they knew what the word meant--predictions like "a woman putting on make-up", "a TV star", and "a model". Then they laughed aloud when the picture was shown--a silly, girly peacock who was holding a mirror in her hand. Next week, I'm going to introduce the words on Monday without the Power Point and then use it on Tuesday and see if it works again. If nothing else, it will shake me out of the rut I seem to have fallen in with my vocabulary instruction. I think anything that becomes a routine becomes forgettable (and yawnable).

And, so it goes. Being away from my class helped me learn something useful. Life's like sometimes. :)

Two things are going on

2009-10-26T20:20:00.002-05:00

Thing 1: I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop. Last week, I again replaced questions on the reading test with questions from another source (the previous basal, which had the same story). Rotney made a 70. My favorite part of this (gotta get some joy from the extra work) was his written response to one question, which bore absolutely no relationship to the question asked, but did answer the question I discarded. Can you say, "Gotcha!"? I sent home his report card, with a modified 70 (D) in place of the 65 (F) he had actually earned. I don't think I'm going to get thanked for my trouble since he didn't make the honor roll (also, he made some C's so he wasn't going to make it anyway). I've emailed the EA to send her the social studies study guides and my long-range plans, but haven't heard a peep in response. Today my princiPal told me to cc the emails to her, so that the EA knows she's in the loop on what I'm doing. And, so I wait. Anxiously.

Truthfully, thinking about Rotney and grades, this is my lowest ability class ever--only one child made the honor roll, and I did everything I could to increase their grades. I dropped the lowest test score, gave them some softball grade opportunities that they disregarded, and prayed that they would get their acts together. It didn't work and it wasn't even close. Sigh. If I hadn't done what I could to remedy the poor scores, lots of students would have gone home with D's and F's. As it was, lots did go home with C's and D's. And I've heard not a peep from the parents. Wake up, folks! You can make a difference in your child's achievement.

Thing 2: I haven't been at school much lately. I was out on professional leave on Thursday, I took a half-day of sick leave Friday, and I had more professional leave today and will have it tomorrow. I hate being out of my class so much! I hate writing sub plans! I hate being sick with a cough and not sleeping much and not being able to take a couple of days ( or even 1 whole day) off to recover. And, now I'm off to write yet another set of sub plans. . .

The Other Conference

2009-10-11T16:16:00.005-05:00

Ten minutes after the conference with the crazy EA, I had a wonderful conference with the father of a boy in my class. Dad has had custody for less than 2 years and no contact with the kids before that. When my student, a real sweetie, lived with mom he missed 90 days of his 2nd grade year and nearly all of his first grade year. He's not unintelligent but he is behind. He had 4 C's and 2 F's on the progress report I printed for the conference. I showed these grades to dad and waited, tensed and hunched, for a verbal assault directed at me begin.

I was so wrong. Dad turned to son and congratulated him for his effort. He said that he sees son is still having some trouble areas, but that those 4 C's showed his effort. He thanked his son for trying so hard to do his best. It was all that I could do not to sob (but I did wipe a tear from my eye.) Dad spoke to me about his own growing up--his father died when he was 8; his mother was useless and he's been on his own since he was 14. He said he had made some bad choices in his life but that he was going to be there for his son and younger daughter because no one had ever been there for him.

His son is one of the hardest workers in my class. His home life isn't perfect--his dad works nights and his dad's aunt takes care of him. Evidently there's a lot of people at this home but none are able to provide educational support because none can read much at all. So my sweetie tries to get all of his work completed at school where he can get help if he needs it.

It strikes me how different this is from Rotney's situation. Rotney has more people helping him than he can probably count, all determined to educate him. But he doesn't participate much in the process--just rushes through his work because he'll have to redo it at home anyway. Rotney's not trying to please anyone because it's not his fault when he doesn't succeed. According to his family, it's mine for not caring (code for not greasing the skids enough for him to slide onto the AB honor roll.) By contrast, Sweetie Son tries to achieve because he knows how much it pleases his dad. He also feels a great deal of personal satisfaction when he does well on an assignment--Looky, Ms. Matters, I made an A!

I would give my paycheck back to have a classroom full of parents who care as much as Sweetie Son's dad. And I definitely don't get enough to deal with the ones like Rotney's EA.

It's been a long 2 weeks

2009-10-10T23:02:00.007-05:00

I've been getting an ever-increasing amount of pressure from Rotney's educational administrator. (What else do you call a non-custodial family member who is in charge of his education?) As you (my fictitious reader) may recall, she's very unhappy that he's not making A's and B's. During the week when I met with her three times, she had three different family members with her. Presumably, their purpose was to tell me (repeatedly and ad nauseum) how important Rotney's education was to them. Well, they actually mean it's supremely important to them that Rotney make the honor roll--they couldn't care less that he actually acquire some skills along the way. This was proven two weeks ago when the EA actually did something that totally BLEW MY MIND.

We use a reading basal in our district and two weeks ago we had a fairly difficult selection to read. Our skill was inferring and most of my literal-minded students struggled mightily with the weekly test. Not Rotney. He completed the test in five minutes, refused to go back and check his answers when I suggested he do so, and made the highest grade in the class--a whopping 95%! He averages D's and F's on these reading tests so, to put it mildly, I was intrigued. I called him over and asked him if he had ever seen a copy of this test before, and he admitted that he had. Further questioning revealed that his EA had somehow gotten copies of the reading tests and was teaching him the answers. Even the written response portions of the test were nearly identical to the suggested answers in the test book.

After consultation with the lead teacher (acting assistant principal), the principal, and the district elementary education curriculum supervisor, it was decided to not enter a grade for this test. It's cheating, but not by his own instigation. Although it wasn't discussed, we must have all felt the way I did--I'm not calling crazy, intense EA to accuse her of cheating--so we let it go at that.

We took a week out of our basal instruction for benchmark testing. The tests showed that Rotney's grades are pretty much in-line with his benchmark results--if anything, the grades are higher.

This past week, I decided to not give the test from my kit, but instead wrote a new test. On Monday, I asked Rotney if he was studying this week's reading test again and he happily told me "yes". I then told Rotney that he would be taking a different test that week, not the one that his aunt had. I might as well have lit a fuse on a nuclear bomb. (yeah, I know that nuclear bombs don't have fuses, but the phrase works for me. Thank you, anyway.)

A series of emails between me and the EA, each of us not daring to poke the hornets' nest about the reading test, began on Tuesday. Finally, on Thursday, she directly asked about what I had told Rotney on Monday and denied being capable of obtaining an assessment book. (HOW did she know it's called an assessment book?) I sent her a very polite reply about what Rotney had said and invited her to a conference. BOOM!

I, nearly immediately, received an extremely vituperative email. It was quite difficult to read because of the plethora of grammatical errors, but the gist was that I was against Rotney and always had been. And that she would be bringing her family to the conference.

So, I lawyered-up in the way that teachers lawyer-up. I had my Special Ed co-teacher there, as well as the lead teacher, principal, and the district elementary ed curriculum supervisor. This last member of the rally-around-and-support-me-crew totally took the wind out of the EA's sails. Well, not totally--she did state that she was happy the district person was there, because she had been advised to take the matter to her next, but she was definitely surprised to see her. She spent the next 40 minutes taking shots at me, my co-teacher, the lead teacher--it was like an arcade shooting gallery. Except I was able to refute what she said and even able to produce an email to Rotney's tutor that she said I refused to answer. Hah! Take that!

Nothing was resolved at the meeting. District person offered a transfer back to the school that had modified his grades to A's and B's last year, but transportation isn't available. They requested he be moved but the other inclusion class is full up, and sending him to another classroom isn't an attractive option. So I am still yet his teacher and stuck with the worst EA ever. Oh. Joy.

Catching Up

2009-09-20T16:14:00.003-05:00

I've been busy--grading and planning and seeing my daughter married (yesterday), so I've not kept my resolution to make timely posts to this blog. Sorry.

What's going on in my school life? Let's see--still enjoying working with Ms. Rabbit, Ms. Kitten, and Ms. Ducky. There actually is a fifth 4th grade teacher--let's call her Ms. Ewe. (As in "Ewe didn't say that" because she tends to unconsciously push my buttons. And you can emphasize any of those words as you say it, (i.e. Ewe didn't say that!, Ewe didn't say that!, Ewe didn't say that!, or Ewe didn't say that!) and I've pretty much felt that about her sometime or other.) Ms. Ewe just moved to our grade level, and her classroom is still on the 5th grade hall; consequently, I usually only see her for our grade level meetings. One example of what she's said to push my buttons: We were at a meeting together with our principal. We three were the first to arrive for the meeting, and Mrs. Ewe turned to me and said, "I was really happy to hear you screaming at your kids at the restroom yesterday. Everyone tells me I scream too much--it's nice to know that you do, too." What? I will honestly say that I have gotten loud (and, regrettably, angry) with my class before, but I hadn't done it the day before. I had said, "Come on, guys. Hurry it up!" or something similar. I know this because it's what I always say. What on earth is there to scream about at the restroom? This is quite different from Ms. Ewe's style--she does scream, in fact she begins with screams and "Shut up!" is one of the things she screams. Anyone who has ever been in elementary school knows that "shut up" is the elementary school equivalent of dropping the "F-bomb"--kids gasp to hear anyone say it. And, you know what--it's just not respectful to students to tell them that, not when there are 500 euphemisms you could use instead. How about "Quiet, everyone." or even "Shut your mouths, please."

Anyway, after she said that, IN FRONT OF OUR PRINCIPAL, I said, "I don't believe I did that. I don't know what you're talking about." I thought this was a better option than, "You're an idiot. You do not accuse a teacher of doing such a thing in front of her boss. I will pay you back some day, some how." And now she's on my list.

Have you ever had to mediate between to students who don't like each other and make each others' lives miserable? It seems to be a constant theme in fourth grade. One of the things I tell these students is this: "I'm just asking you to leave each other alone. You don't have to be best friends or like each other, but you do have to respect each other. If you can't be friends, just agree to not be enemies. You will not like everyone you meet in life, but you don't have to let them know it."

Ms. Ewe is on my "I Don't Like You, but I Will be Polite to You" list. Unfortunately, or perhaps NATURALLY, there are several people I work with that have made my list. I'll save the complete list for another rainy Sunday, but suffice it to say, there are several. However, I'm happy to say that my "I Like You and Enjoy Working with You" list is longer. I think I'll end this here, on the only positive note I've found, and go make that meatloaf we're having for dinner. Bon Appetite!

Nine-Nine-Oh-Nine

2009-09-09T23:08:00.002-05:00

I couldn't let this date go by without making a post--I've ever been draw to dates, even though there is no significance except for the neat-o numbers. So, here's to 9-9-09--I surely won't live to see the next one!

School is, well, disappointingly not shaping up the way I had hoped. I had a horrendous class last year. This year, they're not horrendous, but they are apathetic and disengaged. I can't get the attention of more than a handful at a time, and I am a good teacher. Really. But they just sit there, waiting for the next worksheet, and then they want to be told what to write and how to spell all of the words. (NOTE: I do use the provided workbooks, but not for everything. However, my class doesn't seem to care about doing other fun things. They just want opportunities to goof off and brainless work. No doubt that they've had plenty of the latter--what did they do last year?)

Another, continual frustration is the constant humming and soft-voiced singing that goes on. It's torture to me--please, make the noise stop! It begins so softly that I don't notice yet. As it continues, I soon find myself reacting subliminally. I tense up and get snappish--that's when I figure out that that darned humming is going on again!

So, I've got hummers, apathetic students, and a few behavior problems. I moved some desks today, but it seems that I'm back where I was last year--too many problems among the students (talkers, trash-talkers, gossipers, etc.) and not enough "good" students to tamp down the proclivities of the others. Like the Bridges of Konigsberg, it becomes a puzzle with no solution.

Colleagues

2009-09-01T22:55:00.005-05:00

I work with a great team--I love working with Ms. Rabbit, Ms. Kitten, and Ms. Ducky. We work together well and genuinely care about each other. And we're all happy that Ms. Squirrel is now has left our team to be the computer lab teacher. Unfortunately, we have to attend this lab--for our students' sakes as much as any other reason--and now we know why our grade level scores were always negatively affected by Ms. Squirrel. Geesh and Louise! Today she had our students type the following: "Today, I learned how to copy and paste. I, also, learned how to save my Journal." What's with the commas surrounding the "also"? And the capital J on journal? Did I miss some grammar rules back in the 70s (when grammar wasn't taught)? My aide and I were rushing from computer to computer because:

Our kids can't type.
They get frustrated to the point of tears because THEY CAN'T TYPE.
She slows down for no student!

So I had to type the above sentences 10 times (no lie--okay, not much of one), and I wondered about them each time. I should have edited as I typed, but I was afraid a student would point out that I had left the commas out, and I didn't want to go there. Not my job.

The Meeting

2009-08-31T23:07:00.003-05:00

Oh, boy. She's going to be one of "those" parents. You know the kind--every graded paper kept in a folder so they can be scrutinized for mistakes. Every single thing I do as a routine is questioned, including not having a set math test day "like the other school did". I think we're all wishing they'd never left the other school--maybe they'll go back. One of the adults at the meeting agreed with us that Rotney was done no favor by getting to retake tests (with "help") because he hasn't learned any skills that way. The other adult just wants him to continue to be on the honor roll because, as she says, "These F's are hurting his self-esteem." Sorry, I don't modify grades to B's. I will help Rotney pass, but please remember that D's and C's are also passing grades. The meeting was tense, but without the other adult's support (her own mother, BTW), there wasn't a whole lot she could do but keep a pickle-sour look on her face.

Ooooh! Big News! Skippy had his meds today! Talk about a difference--he was actually able to sit and work and didn't eat anything off the floor all day! I hope he stays on them--our kids' meds are quite often "lost" because mom sells them.

Others in my class

2009-08-30T12:25:00.005-05:00

It's early in the school year, but so far you (my fictitious reader) have only read about two of my challenging students. I do have students who are not challenging. Some snapshots of them, complete with anonymous names:

Sweet Guy--cried on the first day of school because he was afraid of fourth grade. He's usually happy-go-lucky and an avid student. I like him alot, more for his attitude than his scholarliness. Happy kids are a blessing to be around.
Sweet Girl--hugs me a lot, always when I'm least expecting it. She means well, though, so I try not to jump to the ceiling when she comes up from behind. I'm the sort who never wants anyone to touch my back.
Big Girl--I was afraid Big Girl and I wouldn't get along. She came to me with the reputation of being a hallway roamer--leaving to use the restroom and never coming back. She also has a reputation as a behavior problem. She is very low and I think leaving the classroom was a respite for her. I'll only let her leave the room with an aide or the Special Ed teacher, and we're working individually with her as much as possible. She's actually quite a sweet child, just hindered greatly by her first grade skills.
My Acolyte--follows me around the room. I look to my left and there he is. Shy, nervous, and always over-thinking his conversations with me, he desperately wants my approval. I need to figure out a way to let him know he's OKAY with me without giving him permission to hang on me all day long. Tricky situation.
Best Buds--one of them is new to our state; the other is an outgoing boy I asked to be his friend on the first day of school. Now they're inseparable, but both are good kids--do their work and mind their own business--so it's not a problem. You'd never know they've only known each other for three weeks.
Princess--perfect hair, lovely girl. Unfortunately, a no-gapper. Do you have these--low performance because of low IQ and, therefore, not Special Ed? Bless her heart, she tries.
Wise Guy--don't let the name fool you--he is very wise but has Asperger's so everything comes with a little twist. If I forget to dot an i, he notices and kindly points it out, every single time. He could be a big pain, but he's so sincere in everything he says and does that I just enjoy him.

Well, that's enough for now. I am enjoying getting to know my students; behavior wise, we're not quite the class I want yet, but we're getting there.

Progress Reports

2009-08-28T22:57:00.006-05:00

It's the end of the first third of our quarter and progress reports went home today. I'm now waiting for a bombardment of parent queries about low grades (What can s/he do to make it up? Um, if s/he would just do his/her assignments and turn them in, that would do the trick.) I don't do extra credit; I do give credit for work turned in. It's that simple, but this year's group is one of the worst I've ever had as far as turning in assignments go. When I speak to them, singly or as a group, I get blank stares and a "What's the big deal?" attitude.

Parents can be a help or a hindrance when it comes to learning. One of my students (let's call him Rotney) has a parent who is determined that he make all A's or A's and B's. He's not quite that caliber (putting it mildly), so this parent wants us to offer him retests, after she sees what he has missed and then teaches him the correct answers. And, yes, I mean the exact answers. (Lesson learned--no more marking the correct answer as I grade our standardized-format reading tests!) I've got news for her--tests are staying at school until after he is retested unless an equivalent form of the test is available. I only have equivalent forms available in math, and I'm not about to start creating my own reading and social studies assessments. Rotney knows he doesn't have to try, so rushes through his work so that he doesn't miss a moment of socializing. He's the Hedda Hopper of my classroom--always reporting what others are doing wrong yet, at the same time, doing plenty of wrong things himself. So, in a nutshell--behavior problem, pushy parent, 2 meetings scheduled about him next week--could life be any more perfect? :(

Skippy

2009-08-26T18:18:00.005-05:00

I've worked with the same Special Ed teacher for the past 6 years. We work really well together and share memories and laughs about some of our special kids from the past. We have our own list of "best" students--you know--those kids who benchmark the wrong behaviors: "Best Cheater", "Best Fighter", "Best Whiner". Until this year, the child who was, hands down, the "Best Example of Off-the-Charts ADHD" was George, even though he was only with us for a month. He would literally spin on his head in his seat and had absolutely no attention span. Poor George--he had a terrible homelife and the fact that he couldn't function because his ADHD was so severe didn't faze his mom--no support from her at all. Finally, his father found out where he was living (in appalling conditions--mom was more stressed about her boyfriend leaving than worried about George's needs) and took him back to his home (a place far away).

Well, I think I have finally found a new benchmark for "Best Example of Off-the-Charts ADHD". Let's call him "Skippy". Skippy is brilliant--high test scores even though most instruction takes place when he's out of his seat because he's never actually in his seat. I've said, "Skippy, SIT DOWN" so often that I probably say it in my sleep. Today was one of his really bad days--he was constantly looking for a reason to be out of his seat and I was constantly redirecting him and trying to get him to complete a simple reading worksheet. Finally, when he dismantled his pencil sharpener and tried to insert the very sharp blade into the plastic casing (to stick straight out, like a scalpel), I had had enough and sent him to the office. It was 10:00. He had driven me to distraction in an hour and forty minutes. He has already been written up once for threatening to cut the throat of a classmate (3 days ago), so I had to send him for making something weapon-like. Truthfully, I can handle the typical ADHD behaviors, but being ADHD does not make you threaten others or put your hands around a clasmate's throat to choke. And that's what I'm dealing with everyday with him.

So, after a record-breaking year of behavior issues (12 behavior problems last year. TWELVE.), this year I've got Skippy. And another handful of ADHD kids, but Skippy is the newly crowned "Best". It's going to be an interesting year.

Negative Brownie Points

2009-08-25T21:34:00.003-05:00

First, a little background: We have a new computer class this year. Because the teacher who has this classroom is renowned for her inability to teach, we classroom teachers have to stay with our classes to assist her. Yeah, I'm not wild about this--I would instead appreciate the planning time, but I would stay with my class (even if I weren't forced to) rather than leave them with her. She yells and goes too fast and makes nonsensical statements as asides--you just gotta see it to believe it.

After today's experience, I had to say something to Boss, so I sent her this email:
"A positive comment:
The half hour I spend in the computer lab every week makes me appreciate all of the half hours that I don’t. "

She didn't find it to be a positive comment. But, I swear, it was the most positive comment I could find! (Somewhere I need to mention that I saw Julie and Julia and commented to Boss that I needed to be more like Julia Child--she was unflappable and never let setbacks get her down. I told Boss that I was going to work on being more positive. See--my email was a JOKE.) Boss wasn't upset with me (probably), but perhaps tired of acknowledging that that particular teacher is a thorn in our collective behinds. We did have a small chuckle about it, but I felt bad that I had let my negativity out. Gotta push that cork in tighter and put on a sunny face. Yeah, right.

Mondays

2009-08-24T18:29:00.002-05:00

Mondays are hard enough, but I just wish the god of Mondays had cut me some slack today. I had 2 concerned parents before school began, a concerned parent who popped in at 9:00, and 2 voluminous parent emails after school. All different concerned parents. All the same problem--why is my child failing (choose one or more) math, social studies, all classes.

I am a parent of 4 children. When any of my children failed, I never once--not even for a teensy moment--supposed it was the teacher's fault. My students' helicopter parents don't see how it could be anyone's fault but the teacher's (mine, in case this is unclear.) One parent (really custodian, but not really--just acting for the custodian--opening up the whole FERPA can of worms!) wants me to allow her darling to retake tests until As or Bs are achieved. Yeah--like that's going to happen. But it seems it did happen at another school in our district that this darling attended. Um, getting multiple chances to pass a test does not make your child an A/B honor roll student. It makes your child lucky or the best bubbler-in-er or something, but it does not mean that your child's grades match his/her ability level and that's what grades should do, shouldn't they? Doggone it.

And, just for the record--if a child has made it to 4th grade and there is not an accountability system set up by you the parent to check your child's daily work, then that is not the teacher's fault, either. You know your child. If s/he has made a habit in the past of having missing assignments, then why do you suppose that I have lost them? Why don't you set up a system so that your child has a place for his/her work and knows that you will check to see that it is completed? Oh, you're too busy you say? Well, try dealing with 20 other children, all with their own unique needs that are just as important as your darling's. Just try it. I'd like to see that. Not so easy, is it?

I don't think I have anyone reading these posts, but if you are and are horrified by my attitude, I wish I could say I'm sorry. But I can't. The god of Mondays has won this week.

Back to School

2009-08-23T14:30:00.003-05:00

I hate the first two weeks of school--thank goodness it's over and I'm good-to-go until the last two weeks of school (hate those, too!). I intended to post sooner than this, but it's been a very hectic time for me. My roster has settled down and the remaining class is fairly balanced: 12 boys and 9 girls. Of course, some of those boys are really like having 2 boys, since they never sit down or do any work so my class is really more like 17 boys and 9 girls. :) Still, not as bad as last year's group. I do wonder what they do at our sister-school (k-3), because it seems like not a whole lot of teaching has been going on.

Really--shouldn't 4th graders be able to get out a pencil when directed to do so? Or have their "pen in hand, ready to check" their paper? When I say these things, I get blank looks. So I've been explicitly teaching everything imaginable and trying so hard not to be sarcastic about it. I have succeeded at that but sarcasm is one of my great character flaws, and I constantly strive to be less brusque and more, umm--human? Anyway, less of what my natural tendency is. I am a good teacher, my students come to appreciate me (even love me), but I can be a little too no-nonsense (but that's not always a bad thing).

One constant daily frustration is our Social Studies notebooks. A few of my students are doing a wonderful job--notebooks lovingly decorated and well-maintained. Others--well, explicitly showing and telling and using my doc camera to really show and tell has had no effect on them. Their notebooks are irreparably screwed up--papers glued in just any-old-where, incomplete, and just plain wrong in so many ways. Oh--the angst! And I've tried so hard! I gave up on talking them through taking notes--even when I write them on the doc camera as they watch, they can't keep up. Even with looooooooong pauses. After spending 3 days on Lesson 1 (and our curriculum map says "1 day" for that lesson), I knew I had to make some changes. Now, I provide a notetaking frame. It's basically cloze sentences, written with one eye on continuity (history is a story) and the other eye on the chapter test (so that it is also the study guide my 6 students with IEPs need.) I spent a couple of hours writing these for the next 2 chapters. Here's an example:

Chapter 1 Lesson 3
The Rise of ___________________
1. The ___________
• The Mayan ____________________ developed about
_____________ years ago and lasted until about the year
_____________.
• The Maya were extremely successful _______________ and
eventually produced a _______________ _of food.
• Because they had a _________________ of food, some Maya
began to ______________________.
• As a result of the Mayan study of the movements of the
____________, ______________, and _______________, the Maya
developed a highly accurate ________________.
2. The _________________ and the __________________
• The ______________ civilization developed in about the year
_______________.
• The Aztecs settled in the Valley of ________________ where
they built the great city of _________________________.
• The Aztecs got more ______________ for _______________ by
creating floating _________________, carving terraces in
___________________, and developing __________________
systems.
• The Aztecs extended their borders to reach from the
______________ to the _______________ oceans by conquering
other peoples in the _________________ of Mexico.
• At the same time as the ______________ ruled central Mexico,
the _______________ Empire rose in South America.
• The Incas built thousands of miles of ____________ to link all
parts of the empire to their capital at ________________.

I don't just give them this notetaking frame--we read and work together on it. They locate the lesson title, section names, etc. in the text, then we read the first cloze statement (they are sequential) and listen to the cd recording of the text to hear the answer. Hands shoot up, the answer is found in the text, and everyone records it. Or, so I thought. I don't record it for them. Not even on the example on display on the doc camera--heck, I've done everything but that. But, incredibly, quite a few want me to do that, too. Um, no. The answer is in your text. Find it.

Oh, and next time I make a batch of these frames, I'll replace the bullet point with A. B. C. listings--they just can't handle those bullet points.

Score!

2009-07-22T14:45:00.000-05:00

I've been a fan of Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson series since the first book (Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief) was published. I started subscribing to his blog on my reader this summer and learned that he was giving away class sets of T-shirts. The T-shirts (and his offer) are described here.

Today was the first day we were allowed to go to school, so I went and dropped off a ton of stuff I had purchased this summer--composition books, 48 boxes of crayons, etc. When I entered my classroom, I saw a large box with the Penguin publishing logo on it. It was a box of 30 T-shirts! Yippee!!--I feel like I won the lottery. Rick's a former classroom teacher, so he knows how much this will be appreciated. It definitely made my day!

2009-06-21T16:16:00.000-05:00

We're changing science series this year, and Tennessee has adopted new, more rigorous standards for Language Arts, Mathematics, and Science. Necessarily, I've spent a lot of time looking at the new series and searching for ways I need to adapt to be ready for the coming school year. One thing I've found is ISNs--Interactive Student Notebooks--and I will be using ISNs for Science and Social Studies.

What is an ISN? Well, the best answer is perhaps found here, at Mr. Saunders' site. The interactivity comes from the products students produce related to the daily notes they take. It will be more work for me, because I don't think I can create notes very well "on the fly", but I think it may provide my students, especially my inclusion students, with the support they need to succeed. I still have some questions about grading (some worksheets will be necessary, I think) and I worry that I won't be doing enough to turn the learning over to them--I'm a great one for jumping in and telling the answer. But, I'm going to tuck in my chin, buy 100 composition notebooks, and figure this out as I go along.

Other helpful sites I've found regarding ISNs are:

an interactive notebook wikispace
a discussions at ProTeacher here, here, and here
Mrs. Heaton's blog, where she writes extensively and uses lots of pictures to show everyone her ideas on ISNs