Trials and Tribulations

A bit of a shaky first full week. In part, it is communication stuff. What I think a lot of teachers don't fully appreciate is that the special ed teachers in their class feel, at least I do, a bit like the students, you have to get used to a whole new teacher. While it is a co-teaching model, the classroom is still theirs. Their rules, their set up of expectations and routines, and I admit, I am a little tentative in new situations, actually a lot tentative. The week ended very positively with both of my colleagues, so I expect that since we're working through the kinks, the coming week will be better than the last one.

Partial Misfire

Since this is a blog about teaching, it will have to have some entries about successes, but also some gaffes. One of my co-teachers on Thursday asked me to teach Friday's math. I said great until I looked at the lesson and said, "shit." It is place value/base ten lesson that uses manipulatives--every ten bits can be exchanged for one skinny, and ten skinnies can be exchanged for one flat. Math is easier with visuals but I think this one has too many moving parts. I prepared the night before, and gathered most of the manipulatives in the morning, but I got busy gathering something else when I came back early from lunch, forgetting my priority which was to get more of the bits from the other 5th grade teacher. So, I wasn't ready, and that was inexcusable. Joanie also indicated that she didn't think I nailed the underlying meaning of the lesson. We didn't get to talk about it at the end of the day so we'll see what she has to say tomorrow. It is not the first impression I wanted to leave with my first math lesson in the class. Thankfully, the day before her answer was "great" when I asked her about my input in a writing lesson we taught in response to their note-taking in the President's address to them, but still.

Another Day of Infamy

Our school did today something we do very well, acknowledge national events. I'm sure many schools did a remembrance for September 11, but we also do them for Veteran's and Memorial Day, too. We couldn't do an outdoor get together because it was rainy. We usually gather around the circle outside of the school. We raise and lower the flag to half staff, which is actually a flag that has the names of all those who were killed. It's on a very vary visable wall all year, except it flies outside the school for the day. There's usually the pledge of allegiance, Claudia our ELL and classically trained singer sings "God Bless America" or one of the other athems, poems, and finally, Taps. Didn't do all of that today since we were inside, but it was moving, the whole school crowded in the auditorium, the aisles, in the doorways, and Taps was especially moving, made me tear up. I shared with one of my classes a button I made the night before the first anniversary, to remember a friend's cousin's husband who died that day. I told them I wear the button with his name on it every year all day, then put it carefully away. Hard to believe that it's eight years down the road. Still very much a part of what we are as a country now, not very far from our collective minds. Maybe that's more a thing here in the New York area than other parts of the country, though. I can still smell the smoke from that Sunday afterwards, after it blew north. It was the smell of wood, undectable smells and fuel. So many of our kids in school were'nt even born yet, and even our fifth graders might have only been three or so. But, we adults remember that terrible day, still so horrible after all these years, and we won't ever forget, or be the same, not should we.

Surprise strategy

I was co-teaching a lesson today in relation to yesterday's the Presidential speech. My co-teacher used the word destiny as one of the Pres' quotes was that "we all make our own destiny." I thought thay most kids probably didn't know what the word means, so I said, give a thumbs up if you're not sure what that word means. I turned out to be a great strategy since the kids can "save face" since it's not like their whole arm is raised for everyone to see. I'd seen one of my colleagues last year use the thumbs up strategy, but in the opposite form, give a thumbs up if you agree, or know about----, but not when they don't know something. It was after 2:30 when we did this lesson, and while my legs didn't hurt today as much as they did last night, they still hurt, the classroom was hot and I was tired, so where I pulled this strategy from is news to me.

Opening Day

Oh, my aching legs! If I could cut them off below the knee I might. My heels weren't that high and they were nice and wide, but I will wear flats for the next few days until my legs get used to being back at work.

It was a good first day. I really missed and like these kids in the two classes. At noon, most of the school watched a live broadcast of the Pres. Obama's speech to school children. One of my colleages, told the class that in 40 years of teaching, this is the first president to do so. There was some political backlash nationally since last week over it, some of a particular political mind set didn't want their kids "indoctrinated" in his beliefs. The socialist, and worse label has been tagged on him since before he was elected. In a nutshell, what he said was to listen to and respect your parents/caretakers and teachers, and respect yourself enough to stay in school and do they best you can, so that you can help solve the world's problems when you're older. Commie-pinko rhetoric if I've ever heard it. :) You know, the other side needs to stop it's hating, and to stop thinking like Fox Network robots..

All in all a really good day. I have some planning to do for tomorrow but we're still in rules/ropes mode so not a lot. Good thing, mostly all I'm up to is my tv, my sofa and a couple of aspirins. Still, it's great to be back.

Labor Day

Monday morning, the last day of summer vacation. It was a good long period to unwind and recharge, but I'm ready to go. As for Labor Day, here are some thoughts. It is so wonderful having a job to love. Back in my social work days, I was so unhappy that on weekends, I'd start to get that gnawing in my stomach on Sunday mornings, not even Sunday nights, at the thought of going back. Imagine, after being spoiled now with nine weeks off, I can't wait (almost) to get back? It's hard leaving the apartment so early, having constant stimulation for 6 hours, feet aching by the end of the day, but it beats, by far, what I used to do. Seventeen years in that other field, and I only got pleasure from it the first four or so. I enjoyed working with the young kids at the residential treatment center, and even with some of the old people in the nursing homes where I began my social work career. Then, that feeling ended, and I couldn't feel a connection with the people I treated. I guess that's the beginning of burnout. That's the key to enjoying teaching. Not every child will endear themselves to you, and there are some that are hard to like, but you've got to enjoy for the most part where you spend your day and who you spent your day with, whether they are kid or adult.

I've learned from my checkered employment history, that work is not just 6 or 8 or 10 hours a day. If you hate it, it consumes you. If you love it, you're alive.

But, since many working people have this day off, shouldn't they call it, "No Labor Day?" Just asking...

Conspicuous consumer blog redux

So, I am on-line now via a high-speed connection, one of a list of things I planned to do with my new salary. As it turns out, doing it with a bundled cable and phone service, I am actually saving money per month. I didn't notice the real differance of high speed until I downloaded some songs last night. A song used to cost about 8-10 minutes, now, about 10 seconds, and photos are significantly sharper.

While the high-speed guy was here for 6 hours yesterday, I did some work for school (this is a teacher blog, afterall). I figured out a way to combine the star chart idea with the metacognitive, rubric idea. I glued a star chart on the outside of a manilla folder for each of my students. I will also glue in a check-list for the first goal of being prepared for learning that we will discuss the first week. Inside, I will keep their completed rubrics so we can check their progress. I also made out a very, very skeleton schedule as to how I will divide the day between the two fifth grades, but I know that it will be revised many times before we have a good routine.

Another Auld Lang Syne

A nod to one of my favorite (and misunderstood) singer/songwriters, Dan Fogelberg for the title of this post, from his song, "Same Old Lang Syne." September 1st has always felt like new year's day to me, even more so since I became a teacher. Hating summer and hot weather, September 1, although it can still be hot for a few more weeks, gets me closer to that beautiful 6 week period from mid-September to end of October with the cool weather and changing leaves. As a teacher, it means that we're heading back to school, and even though I've never gotten used to leaving home before 7:30 in the morning, I can't beat how it feels to be with a group of kids.

Today was a perfect September 1. The weather no higher than 70 degrees, high sun, deep blue sky. Oh, the pleasure of putting on a light, hooded jacket! I did a little shopping, hoped to buy something or two new to wear, but I settled on just a pair of shoes, Then to Kensico Dam park to review a book of strategies for inclusion classroom students that I read last year. Looked like I highlighted good points last year, since they made a lot of sense to what I tried during the school year.

Tomorrow is the district-wide gathering to hear a welcome by the superintendant, the new Board of Ed president, and introductions of newly hired faculty, as well as the usually rousing speech by the head of the teacher's union, then back to our own schools and the agenda there. I can't believe it's starting again. I could have made better use of the two months off, but I accomplished some things. Re-charging the chief among them.