First Day of March!
maybe it's the freshness of the month...maybe because it's thursday....maybe because it's not raining...maybe because i was pissed at them yesterday...or maybe, just maybe, it's because the activity that i designed was a good one. whatever the reason, i finally had a successful day with my strategic class.
all i wanted to do when i woke up this morning was stay home. it wasn't even that i was so tired--but the first thing out of my mouth was "is it friday yet?" i will admit, i did take a tylenol pm because i was so stressed last night that i couldn't sleep, so most likely that made me a little groggy this morning. all of that being said, though, i did not want to teach today. but of course i dragged my butt up and went along on my merry way to school, without any real lesson plans for the day other than for my 7th grade class.
i started brainstorming on the way to school about what i could do with my strategic class where they wouldn't have to be quiet and listen to me, because i knew they weren't going to be quiet to listen to me. i decided to try "stations"--where there are different activities set up around the room in various locations and students rotate in groups to each station. the ironic thing is, i designed the whole thing in 15 minutes and then on the fly. normally i type all of my worksheets and materials, but today i hand wrote them all. normally i have things more clearly planned, but not today--today was sort of fly by the seat of my pants. the beautiful thing was, it didn't matter. it all worked out okay. my kids totally got into the stations and were really successful, and i didn't have to talk for an entire hour, except to individual students and groups, mostly to tell them that they were doing a good job. i designed a really simple set of activities because i wanted them to get the hang of the system, rather than being focused on the content and having difficult work to do. In general, I was just really surprised and proud of them for focusing and getting their work finished. i think that all of my speculations above are related to why they were successful--but regardless, it was so great. it just set me up for a good day in general, although i didn't have a lot of stuff planned for my other kids. someone came in to do some presentations, which was nice,a nd the 7th graders did well, too.
i'll say more this weekend.
all i wanted to do when i woke up this morning was stay home. it wasn't even that i was so tired--but the first thing out of my mouth was "is it friday yet?" i will admit, i did take a tylenol pm because i was so stressed last night that i couldn't sleep, so most likely that made me a little groggy this morning. all of that being said, though, i did not want to teach today. but of course i dragged my butt up and went along on my merry way to school, without any real lesson plans for the day other than for my 7th grade class.
i started brainstorming on the way to school about what i could do with my strategic class where they wouldn't have to be quiet and listen to me, because i knew they weren't going to be quiet to listen to me. i decided to try "stations"--where there are different activities set up around the room in various locations and students rotate in groups to each station. the ironic thing is, i designed the whole thing in 15 minutes and then on the fly. normally i type all of my worksheets and materials, but today i hand wrote them all. normally i have things more clearly planned, but not today--today was sort of fly by the seat of my pants. the beautiful thing was, it didn't matter. it all worked out okay. my kids totally got into the stations and were really successful, and i didn't have to talk for an entire hour, except to individual students and groups, mostly to tell them that they were doing a good job. i designed a really simple set of activities because i wanted them to get the hang of the system, rather than being focused on the content and having difficult work to do. In general, I was just really surprised and proud of them for focusing and getting their work finished. i think that all of my speculations above are related to why they were successful--but regardless, it was so great. it just set me up for a good day in general, although i didn't have a lot of stuff planned for my other kids. someone came in to do some presentations, which was nice,a nd the 7th graders did well, too.
i'll say more this weekend.
posted by Allyson B. at
3:03 PM
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