CSA

community supported agriculture, that is. we have selected full belly farms in Guinda, CA (near Davis).
we only got one CSA box so far but i am really, really into it. in our first week we got: 2 bunches of bok choy, 2 big leeks, 2 heads of cauliflower, 2 oranges (random), a celery root, a bunch of arugala, and a bag of mixed salad greens. all fresh, picked the day before, and trucked from not really that far away in California. (try buying produce only from your california, or whatever your state is, at the grocery store...it is very limiting. i love that the CSA box basically tells me by inclusion what is in season locally). every meal we've eaten at home and the one that we cooked on our camping trip included veggies from the CSA. leek and potato soup, celery root bisque (added a leek to that), roasted cauliflower, sauteed bok choy (eaten with scrambled eggs). on thursday we're having a curry with the other cauliflower head, and we made an awesome salad on our camping trip with the mixed greens and arugala. yum!!!

i am so into the whole thing and at $17 per week, it's not ridiculously expensive considering everything is local and i think i'm already eating healthier. last thursday i didn't particularly feel like cooking but i couldn't come up with anything i wanted to eat out. we came home, i remembered we had a TON of bok choy (which in my opinion needed to be eaten) so i sauteed it and made eggs with some leftover mushrooms. a little hoisin sauce and, voila!!! so tasty!!!

thank you for all of your sweet birthday wishes!!!!

Work & Holidays

we return to school in two days, after being off for two weeks. i have a lot coming up this spring, and this year, both personally and professionally. i'm happy with the challenges of my job but i really want to do a better job of rising to meet them--often i feel like i'm on the edge of drowning instead of staying well above the surface.

i have a new coach i'm working with, and that is very helpful. we are doing collaboration and planning together, something i've been craving for awhile now. having someone who has even more teaching experience than i do is so amazing. and it's nice having a non-TFA person to work with. while i like and respect a lot about TFA, some distance and alternative perspective is also helpful.

so today i want to talk to you about reading. we have SSR (sustained silent reading) for 20 minutes every day after lunch. this time varies in different classrooms. in my class this year (and my first year), most kids read silently after spending some time settling down, and i usually read also. i find that the best way to get them to calm down and read silently is just to sit on my stool at the front of the classroom and read also. it's remarkable. a lot of my kids don't read, and while i kick myself for it, i often just leave them alone and let them rest. they are not allowed to bother kids who are reading, though. i consider it pleasure reading time and i don't hold them accountable for what they read during SSR. that's a place where i've fallen short, not taking advantage of the opportunity to get them working more on their reading, but that's how it is.

in other classrooms, there is talking. in a lot of classrooms students read the newspaper. other teachers get books on CD. in some classrooms it's just a chaotic time when kids often get sent out. in my classroom last year, i had the kids listen to books on CD or MP3 because it was the only way to get them silent.

so i bring up reading and SSR to tell you about the all-school read. this is something my school has done several times now, and we're starting a new book called "Becoming Naomi León" in january. it's a pretty good book. i just read it over vacation. it's about a girl named naomi who lives with her brother and her great-grandmother in a trailer park in san diego. she's happy. her mom, who hasn't seen them in 7 years, shows up out of the blue and tries to take naomi away. mom says it's because she has a girl bond with naomi but really it's because mom's new boyfriend has a younger daughter and naomi is supposed to babysit for the girl. mom doesn't want to take naomi's younger brother because he has some physical disabilities and behaves a little bit strangely.

great-grandmother wisely assumes that when mom goes to court to get her kids, the judge will grant mom the right to take the kids because judges pretty much always give kids to their moms. grandma hatches a scheme to help naomi and her brother keep living with her instead of going into this manipulative, abusive situation with a mom whose alcohol rehab didn't stick and has begun drinking again. the plan includes going to oaxaca city, mexico to find naomi and owen's father and get a letter of support for the kids to stay with great grandmother. along the way, naomi "becomes" herself--instead of the shy, quiet girl that she was, she blossoms and becomes louder and outwardly stronger as a result of the trip and finding her father.

overall, it's a little bit of a feel-good book but i do think that it has some themes and experiences that our kids will like and relate to--IF we give them the tools to do it. after reading the book, i decided to look up several things that i was curious about and that i thought would interest my students. i found a bunch of photos and information related to the book that i think kids will like, and i decided to put together a little guide for other teachers to use at school with before, during, and after reading activities. it's fun doing this, especially since it's not for test prep or anything like that--it's just to get kids into a book. i'm hoping that my ideas will be helpful to others and that the kids will get into the book. so....i'm off to finish my work!