Belly Flop in The Pool of Shame

I’m just going to say it.


I’m afraid… but it needs to be said. Dare I say, it DESERVES to be said.

I…

I llloo…

I loooovvvvv

ILoveMyClass!

There! I said it. (Please, please, puh-leeeeeez don’t let that jinx me.)

They are just so sweet and wonderful and I actually look forward to seeing their smiling little mugs every morning.

Why am I so enamored by them? Just yesterday, as I stood in front of my classroom door giving them directions (which they actually listened to!!), I watched one of my students from last year wander by us. He was completely tangled up in his jacket with one arm stuck straight up, his hood over his face (because the jacket was on backwards), and the other arm stuck in the zipper. Although he was putting up a pretty good fight, the jacket was clearly winning.

Maybe the jacket had some trick up its sleeve? (ha!)

Or possibly it was just some hood, taking advantage of the poor boy. (Somebody STOP me!)

And I looked at my new class and loved them even more.

So why ya swimmin’ in the Pool of Shame, Edna?

Well, old habits die hard. Is that a good excuse?

Last year we could give no leeway, no second chances, no flexibility at all when it came to behavior or else we suffered the consequences. So when I caught one of my boys whispering to his neighbor during my math lesson yesterday, I did not hesitate to nail him with a consequence, which he humbly accepted.

As we were leaving for recess, his neighbor came to me and said:

I know George shouldn’t have been talking to me but he was just telling me that you’re the smartest teacher he’s ever had.

And then she walked away, leaving me to drown in my giant pool of shame.

help!

I’m Baack! (I hope…)

So here I sit, avoiding doing all the work I have on my growing to-do list for school (which starts in about a week) by posting a bit on The Bits.

Where was I?

In short, I was busy just trying to survive the most difficult school year I've ever had and doing so without finding the funny in it. The last thing I wanted to do when I got home was revisit my school day online.

BUT, it's a new year and a fresh start and I am rejuvenated and fired up again! (Did I use enough "ands"? I've got a quota to meet, ya know.)

Nothing gets a girl fired up more than some good old public education controversy.

Anybody heard about the LA Times releasing LA Unified School District teachers' ratings based on their students' progress on California state testing?

I got myself all caught up in reading all the responses to the article. The only conclusion I've reached thus far is that rating teachers is a complicated and messy business! I certainly have more questions than answers.

Take the class we (my teaching partners and I) just finished teaching (PLEASE!). In my opinion, they made very little progress last year. We spent far more time putting out fires all day long than we did teaching standards and that drama lasted all year long. We fought the same behavior battles day after day and tried millions of intervention techniques, but with little success. However our students, who came to us quite low, did comparatively well on the state test. They tied for first place in the district in math and tied for second in language arts!

Clearly, we did more teaching of standards than we thought, however that does not mean that we really had a significant impact on those students in the areas that they really needed help. It felt good to see that they had done well on the state test, don't get me wrong, but at the end of the day, we were unable to effect any change in their social behavior which may impede them more than anything else in the future.

Sure, at the time of the test, they could do multi-digit multiplication but if they're doing it while punching another kid in the face does it really help them become successful adults?

I'm not fishing for compliments here. We all understand the value and limitations of standardized testing. What I really would like to hear is…

What constitutes an effective teacher and a successful school year to you?

Snapshot

Summing up my class in 10 words or less:

Sammy: A puzzle!

           Wait…

           50 pieces!?!

          That's TOO much work.

Sign of the Be Verb

As I may have mentioned before, we leveled our students this year in an attempt to lessen the achievement gap in each subject. Our largest group is the Intensive group and they are also the ones who have the farthest to go to meet fourth grade benchmarks.

They also have some of the best little personalities on the planet!

All week, my unbelievably awesome student teacher has been working with them on identifying the Be verb in their textbooks and using it properly when speaking and writing. They started off today by going on a Be verb hunt in a story they read. In small groups, they read the story and kept a log of the ones they found.

In the Intensive group we also have two blind students. Most of the time, they work without the assistance of a full-time aide and are the Rock Stars of the World, but they just happened to have one checking in on them today and she was working with them on the verb hunt.

With a big grin on her face and snickering under her breath, she asked me to come and see the work they were doing. I wandered over there and she asked young Kyle to give me an example of what he'd found. (For my long-time readers, Kyle is this kid, a visually impaired firecracker!)

Big grin on his face, pride and self-confidence brimming over, Kyle announced that he had found "was" in the story and that "was" is a beaver!

"It's what?" I asked.

"A beaver!" he repeated proudly.

Oh dear… we have some enunciating to do.