my strategic class

if you've been reading my blog for awhile, you'll remember that i had a period 1/2 class that just got really difficult. it was called my strategic class. i have the same thing this year--new kids obviously, but the same kids for a double period who have low scores.

but it's sooo different. i don't know if i'm different or they're different, i can't tell. so far the class is small--i have 25 kids in here--and it would be amazing if i could keep it that way. they are enthusiastically participating--i had all but 4 kids participate today. i know all of their names already, too. it took me so long last year to learn names, it was horrible. they are quiet and patient.

okay, i KNOW it will change, but i feel like by setting up the expectations that i'm setting up, it can't change that much. they can't be that bad, because i'm being pretty strict. how bad can they get if they have to follow the rules.

we had this funny presentation--well, not funny exactly but kind of odd--but i have decided i really like it and i'm using the tools already, which is very unique for a professional development section. you can go to http://iunderstand.com and click on the button on the left which says "click here for one of our training seminars." it will show you a video which is the beginning of his seminar. honestly, it was really helpful. obviously you don't actually do anything that seems that fake in the classroom--but his thing is that effective teachers have a plan, and we know that there are kids who will act out, so we have to have a plan for working with them. it's silly to NOT have a plan--so why not have a good one, and practice it a little bit. as sort of weird and cheesy as he was, i learned a lot and i think it's legitimate.

so yeah. keep your fingers crossed for me that my strategic class will keep this up!! because it's awesome!!

Reporting In

my first day went well! i talked too much but i think that might be inevitable. my kids were cute and overall pretty cooperative. i don't want to believe this, but i'm worried that my after lunch ELD class might turn out to be more like my strategic class last year. my strategic class this morning was pretty great. on the other hand, you never know who you'll get in class. i just have this memory of already being sort of overwhelmed by them even on the first day of school. they were really quiet, etc. the group today was different. but my ELD class was very quiet. i am worried about that. i'll think of things to draw them out, though. i think i can do it. ELD, by the way, is English Language Development. i think it's the lingo that has replaced ESL (English as a Second Language). basically, when you enroll your student in school at whatever age, you fill out a home language survey. if it says that a language other than English is primarily spoken in the home, then they will pull your kid to take the CELDT. (CA English Language Development Test). if your kid gets a certain score or below on the CELDT, then they get put into ELD classes that replace the regular english/language arts class. there are different levels, but my kids are in the highest level before you graduated out of ELD.

i should go and get myself ready for the rest of the week. (didn't ever think you'd hear me say that, eh? well, i've got the whole week planned out!)

school starts on monday

i just thought to myself, "stop planning for the first day and relax. you have everything in place. it will go well." i thought this as i was glancing at my policies and procedures document, which is 6 pages long.

i have photocopies made for monday and tuesday. i do need to kind of 'rehearse' the lessons/information in my mind. soemtimes you can know what you want to convey, but it doesn't end up coming out right when you say it, cause you didn't actually plan *how* you were going to convey it.

i am going to take photos of my classroom and post them up here because it looks SOOOOO nice. i am very excited. i have all of these cool things planned for the first week of school, teaching my kids about brain growth/malleable intelligence, teaching them about the essential understandings and essential questions for the course, creating a definition of "expectation" and what it means to have epectations instead of rules, and generating their ideas for how to respect each other, me, the classroom, technology, and the school. fun!!

i just hope it goes well. wish me luck..... i'll keep you posted. :-)

big decision...i think

last night when i made a decision that i think was rapidly approaching, but i was in denial. i decided to teach this year following the textbook. not exclusively, but close. a lot of people invent their own stuff all year so that's what i did last year, too. unfortunately, it wasn't very good stuff--my students did horribly on their state tests in English. it was pretty upsetting and definitely eye-opening. i realized that my curriculum was not thorough or rigorous enough. the fact that my students tested so low also tells me that they didn't learn what they need in order to be successful in 9th grade English, which isn't fair to them.

basically, i didn't really know what i was doing last year, and as hard as i worked, i wasn't working very "smart." last year would have been a really great year to follow the curriculum, but for some reason i shyed away from that. don't ask me why. i know that this year will be better in my classroom for many reasons, but i also want my life to be less stressful. one way to do that is to use a pre-written curriculum. then what i am doing is critically assessing that curriculum and preparing the best way to teach it. i don't have to think up *how* to teach the 8th grade English standards out of the blue. i can use my creativity in designing projects, keeping my classroom running smoothly, engaging my kids with the stuff that's already written.

i feel like a sell-out, like i have to defend myself for some reason, but that is totally irrational. it's like i have this idea that GOOD teachers make up everything on their own, or know how to do everything right away. the truth is, truly GOOD teachers teach their students what they need to know, hold their students to high expectations whether or not the curriculum is truly fascinating, and use the very best resources they have. my school expects me to follow the curriculum, and while there is wiggle room, i know that i'm better off doing that. i think they're going to come down even harder this year since scores dropped across the board, and especially in 8th grade English.

i should go and get planning. today is the first day i can get into my classroom but i'm going to get some breakfast before i enter the land of school!!

"the dream"

before school started *last* year, i had a dream about the first day of school. jesse and his mom (both teachers) told me that it is natural--everyone has a "first day of school" dream, every summer. based on that idea, i figured i would have one this summer. oddly enough, i had it very close to the beginning of the summer. among other things, it involved me teaching at a high school instead of middle school. i felt lucky, like i'd gotten the annual dream over with early and i wouldn't have to endure another one before school ended. jesse cautioned that it was too early for it to be the authentic annual "first day of school" dream and i would likely have another.

when i woke up this morning, i realized that he was right. i had a very strange dream that felt like it lasted all night, probably because it spanned the ENTIRE school day, about 7:30 am all the way to 4:30 pm. i started out as an 8th grade teacher (normal) but there was another teacher in the classroom. i don't think that it was my classroom, and it was arranged sort of oddly. i was writing on a chalkboard, instead of a whiteboard, and then i realized that i was writing in chalk on a whiteboard instead of using dry erase markers. (i vastly prefer the dry erase to chalk!) i wasn't prepared for the class, didn't have any activities to fill, the kids weren't listening, and i was already having to quiet them down. on the first day of school they are generally really good. my classes didn't develop any big behavior issues last year until 2-3 weeks after school began.

so i got through this class and then the dream jumped to after school. this part is a little bit murky, but the gist of it is that i was in some kind of after school professional development for 4th grade teachers and all of a sudden i was a 4th grade teacher. i remember off-handedly thinking to myself that the 4th grade standards are a little bit different and i was dissapointed that i had done so much work on the 8th grade standards and then i wasn't going to be using them. then i went to another professional development session after the 4th grade episode, and it turned out that i was a 2nd grade teacher.

there you have it. anxiety central. let's just say that it majorly inspired me to spend today preparing for the first two weeks of school, which i haven't done prep for as i need to. (i want to start out the week with all of my photocopies made for the the entire week and the agenda for every day planned.)

the time is drawing near

well, in my second post of the summer, i must tell you that it has been an AMAZING summer. i think that i have seen most of the people who read my blog this summer and most of you would attest to the fact that i have been relaxed and that i have a positive outlook on school. it was lovely traveling all over the country to spend important time with family and friends. now i miss everybody who lives so far away!

i am definitely getting excited about going back to school but also a bit nervous. my collaborative partner and friend (lia) and i are doing a lot of preparation together to be ready for the coming year. however, as hard as i try, i feel like i don't *quite* have a grasp on what is going to happen the first week of school. last year, and i might have posted about this, i meticulously planned the first day of school. afterwards, i realized that i had no idea what i was doing for the rest of the week. oops!! this year, i plan to have the entire FIRST WEEK meticulously planned. it's hard, though, because there is a lot to do, but it is all little things like learning procedures in the classroom. during the first two or three weeks of school, there are a lot of changes that go on in the class--students are transferred in and out of my class, and so i will have to say the same things over and over again every day for a week. i think that's okay, though--kids (and most people) have to hear something several times before it has the potential to really be implanted in their brains.

in an effort to avoid some of the problems that i had last year, i have written out a bazillion procedures for how the classroom will run. they run the gamut of topics, but some of them are going to the bathroom (passes), moving around the classroom, sharpening pencils, what to do when you're absent, what to do when you're tardy, coming into the classroom, doing the warm up, leaving the classroom, working in pairs, what to do if you don't have a pencil (they're going to have to give me a shoe this year), cell phone rules, dress code, food & drink, gum, etc etc. that's actually a pretty good list. i found that last year since i didn't plan how to deal with all of those things, that stuff ended up taking up a disproportionate about of my time during class and outside of class. the idea is that in a classroom with good systems, you get to do more teaching and the classroom will run itself more.

right now i need to get to work preparing for the second unit, which will be a narrative writing unit. i think that we tentatively agreed that the question we will ask to prompt the narrative will be "have you ever had to make a difficult decision? what was it about, and what decision did you end up making?"
i don't know exactly what it will be, but something along those lines.