Dinosaurs

A quick story that happened on Friday:

We have this behavior management system at school called PBS (Positive Behavior Support) that centers around recognizing students who are doing the right thing rather than focusing on the students who are misbehaving. I am not completely bought into it, but it seems to work for most of my kids. Part of the system is that we reward students with “Cubs Cash” that they can trade in for prizes, special privileges, etc.  On Friday’s I have a Cub’s Cash store that students can “buy” from with Cub’s Cash.  Well one of my students, A, had apparently been saving his Cubs Cash (80 tickets!) and wanted to buy two toy dinosaurs.

To give you a little background on A, he is one of my sweetest, most eager, yet academically lowest students. He is a refugee from Thailand. His mom left A’s older brother and dad in Thailand to bring  A and his little brother here. They came here with absolutely nothing. Mom understands no English and now that their transition aid is running out, it is clear that they are barely making ends meet. To make matters worse, I recently learned that A had Malaria when he was about 5 years old. The medical care they had in Thailand through the clinic was very poor and he had it on and off for a year. Mom told us that she had to completely re-train A to eat, walk, go to the restroom, everything. We suspect that he has some developmental delays and language acquisition issues as a result of his Malaria left untreated for so long.  

Anyway, I told him that he could only buy one thing, which has always been the store rule. Instead of buying one of the dinosaurs he just kind of walked away with his head down. I wasn’t really paying attention, but when I caught up with what had happened I asked him why he didn’t just buy one dinosaur.  He told me (in a lot less words…he has very little English) that he was saving so he and his little brother could play together. I am not even kidding you; it took everything that I had not to burst into tears.  (And yes, I let him buy both dinosaurs). 

Most kids his age would never have even considered buying something for a sibling. To make the story even more special, I had a few students in the room who witnessed it. Another student, S, asked me why I let him get two things. When I explained to her and the students that were there what it meant to be a refugee, and that A doesn't have toys at home like most kids; they just nodded their heads and moved on. 

Times like these are the reason that I really like working with my population of students. They have so much more empathy and understanding of each other’s challenges than other kids their age (I am sure more than I did myself).  It is hard to explain, but they really just “get it.” There are some things you can try to teach, but I don’t think I could ever teach the type of empathy, support, and compassion that my students have for each other. It truly is amazing.

Intimidated

1 real week down and I am still loving my 3rd graders. Things are settling down and I am about finished with teaching routines and procedures. I am excited to get to teaching actual content, but I am also admittedly terrified. One of the biggest changes I have observed from switching grade levels is that the achievement gap is so much bigger.

I thought the gap was big with my first graders. I really did. 3rd grade is a whole new ball game. The reality is that some of my 3rd graders are below the level of my first graders from last year. I can compare my first graders from student teaching in a high-performing school to my 3rd graders, and the middle-low of my first grade class would outperform all, but a handful of my 3rd graders. It is scary.

We did a lot of diagnostic testing this week and I have identified our two biggest obstacles for this upcoming year...writing and math. I identified these target areas earlier this week, but I did not grade the diagnostic tests until today. The actual scores made the challenge we have ahead of us so much more real.

The chart below is a crop of my writing and math tracker. The top bold score is where TFA expects my students to be at this point in the year. This benchmark assumes that my students will need to make 1.6 years of growth to be on grade level. The second row is my class average.

I know writing does not look that much lower, but students are expected to average a 5 out of 6 points by the end of the year. As I was grading their diagnostic tests, I did not have a student get a score of more than 4 in ANY of the 7 rubric categories. Many of my students cannot form a complete sentence. 

The math diagnostic speaks for itself. The math diagnostic we give is based on the second grade standards. Our kids are going to have to make extraordinary gains to be on grade level. Our pacing guide has us teaching pretty much all of the 2nd grade prerequisite skills in the next 2 weeks. My roommate/ partner teacher (convenient, right?) has similar data in her classroom and we are working together to decide if we should extend our first unit to ensure mastery or move on so we have a chance of teaching the big 3rd grade skills to mastery. It is quite the balancing act.

Right now I am intimidated by my data. Not discouraged, but intimidated. Right now my most pressing challenge is how to present this data to my students and families in a way that will inspire hard work and best effort. The gap, of course, is the reason I joined TFA. I wanted to understand it. I wanted to be a part of the solution. I guess you get what you wish for. 

And finally, in an effort to "lighten the mood" I got a friend request from one of my summer school students this week. I am sure you would be shocked when I tell you that I politely declined her request with, "I would be happy to be your FB friend when you graduate from high school."

Learning and Implementing School Wide PBS

This year my school has mandated that we move to a school wide PBS (positive behavior support) system. I really like the concept behind PBS, but admittedly I do have some reservations. There is a lot that goes into PBS and it has been challenging to implement a system that I am not yet fully trained on. So far I have introduced our school wide expectations (Be responsible, Be respectful, and Give your best effort), school-wide procedures and reward system. I am seeing good results with my students, and would probably see better results if I could remember to keep blue tickets with me.

Here is how I introduced the system to my students:

I started the discussion by talking about why we have rules and expectations (We have rules and expectations so everyone at our school can do their best learning). Then we did a group brainstorm about rules and expectations the students already knew. 

I then told the students that this year at our school there were three words, called expectations, that would help up us all do our best learning. Everyone, including teachers, will be working this year to meet these expectations. 

I introduced the the words responsible, respectful,and best effort. Then I gave a simple, kid friendly definition of each of them. I put up a synonymous word or phrase to help students remember the difference between the words (see below). 

Next we did a sort of procedures that would help make sure we are being responsible, respectful, and giving our best effort everywhere in the school. I modeled with classroom rules and then the students were broken up into groups to do sorts for the other areas of the school (bus, playground, cafeteria, restroom, arrival/ dismissal). 

After students presented their sorts to the class, I put the sorts up on a bulletin board under our key words (expectations). 

To end the lesson I had the students create a tri-fold and give an example of how they can show each expectation. 

Throughout this upcoming week I will be doing a series of character building activities and read alouds. At some point in each activity we will come back to our key expectations and talk about how our we (or the characters in our books) are/ are not demonstrating our expectations. I am looking forward to some great discussion with my students!

The good, the bad, and the ugly

Ignore the awful cliche in the title, but I am too tired to be original. As I move farther from January I am trying to stay committed to my new year's resolutions (1. Make my bed every day, 2. Find a balance between work and the rest of my life, 3. become a more active blogger) which means forcing myself to blog in my unmade bed.

So here it goes:

The Good:
I have created a block-by-block behavior tracker that is working really well with some of my students. It gives them a fresh start at each block and both an immediate and weekly goal to work towards. It did not work well with my lower students, but has given some extra motivation to two of my bright, but difficult students.  It is available for download here: Weekly Behavior Chart.

The Bad:
Tomorrow during what will likely be a very intense parent-teacher conference I have to explain to a very traditional Muslim family what "the finger" means and why we can't give it in school. This is to the same family that came in distraught that their daughter had written that she "loved" a boy in her journal.

The Ugly:
My students made my sub cry on Friday. They misbehaved to the point that a 30 year veteran teacher and regular sub in our building was so upset that my principal had to come down to speak to my students on Friday afternoon. Today we wrote apology notes "I am sorry I _______. Next time I will do ______" instead of going to recess.

We also had a behavior meeting in which we discussed our rules for the 100 millionth time and created a consequence bubble map of consequences that can happen as a result of bad choices. Did it work? Maybe for 10 minutes! I am trying to stay optimistic and give my best every day, but the reality is that the conduct in my classroom (including my own) is not where I want it to be. My classroom environment is not conducive to the academic and social-emotional gains that I came into this year expecting to make. The reality is that I don't know what else to do other keep a mild chaos from turning into a down right destructive environment. I have done my best to apply what I learned in school, from TFA, from COMP training, and what I have read in my classroom management books. Right now I am looking into purchasing materials from the Love and Logic Institute which was recommended to me by my MTLD. Hopefully you will see and update about the wonderful results I am seeing!

The thing I should be mad about, but honestly find really funny.

Last week at lunch one of my students was sent to the office for "pleasuring" himself with a corn dog. The office didn't find it nearly as funny as I did.

"We need talented and committed people"

I had the opportunity to see Wendy Kopp speak at Vanderbilt tonight. I typically do not do much on weeknights, but I am really glad that I made the choice to go. Hearing Kopp speak really helped to reaffirm my choice to join TFA and to find my role in the larger education movement.

I have spent much of this year feeling incredibly frustrated. As someone who typically does well in her endeavors, it was/ is increasingly frustrating to put ALL of my time and effort into something and STILL only see mediocre results. My anxiety and feelings of not being good enough have been heightened by seeing and hearing things my TFA colleagues are doing in their classrooms. I, and I know many of my fellow CMs, feel a lot of pressure to be extraordinary teachers. We are pushed to be the best. We are pushed to do whatever it takes for our students. This is a great thing and a huge personal burden. Over the past six months I have been overcome with the feeling that I am not good enough--that I do not have what it takes.

Tonight Kopp acknowledged something so realistic (and probably common sense to most of the non 1st year CMs in the audience) that has even in a few short hours helped reaffirm my choice to be a classroom teacher. Kopp told the audience that she knows that not everyone will be a teaching super star. She told us that yes, we need superstars, but we also need just as many talented and committed people to the cause.  Her belief is that if we can put extraordinary leaders into a position in which they have access to teams of committed and talented teachers/administrators we can begin to make systemic change. This is a belief I support. It is also a comfort. While I am going to keep striving to be great at my profession, I felt a release in the pressure to be great. I know I am committed. I know that I am a capable teacher. I believe that my capability will refine a talent for teaching.

Kopp also said something in the Q & A session that resonated with me. She talked about the 2 year TFA commitment and the goal that TFA alumni find their niche in the larger education movement. She spoke of how alumni take their TFA experience and make a critical decision about what is best for them in the movement and their personal lives. This is an experience that without a doubt changes you. I cannot imaging anyone coming out of this program affected in some way.

Up until recently, I had not really considered my role as an alumni of the program. I intended to stay a classroom teacher for at least 5-10 years after my commitment. As of lately I am not so sure. I plan to teach for at least 4 years, but I have already started to think of other roles that I might be able to play in the education movement. For me it is almost like the difference between my experience as a Peer Leader vs. a Peer Leader Captain. I enjoyed being a PL and was a decent PL, but I was far from extraordinary. I was a much better PLC than PL. As a PLC I had more of an opportunity to effect programming, curriculum and resources in our program. I feel similarly about being a classroom teacher. I really enjoy the planning aspect of teaching. I like creating and modifying resources (as my Pintrist and blog clearly illustrate) and I feel like I have been a valuable asset to my grade-level team. I also feel really connected to higher education and have a lot of ideas on how to enhance teacher education programs. These are areas that I want to pursue. It is a long way off, but never too early to start thinking about!

I will take "D" for Differentiation for 1000 Please

This past week was probably the best overall week I have had so far. While far from perfect, I was really able to put in place some differentiation strategies for my students. Gone are the days of whole-group hell and in are the days of independent, partner, cooperative, and skill groups!

My students adjusted really well to the changes and really showed me that they are more capable of independent learning than I have been giving them credit for. While I have not given the majority of my assessments for this past week (thanks to a snow day), I am confident that I will have data that is at or above this past quarter's data. We shall see.

Break Down of the week:
Low point- being called into the principals office after Monday's surprise observation and told that I was "not awful."

High Point- Being observed by the director of my TFA region and receiving both positive and constructive feedback with more to come.

My goal for this upcoming week is to build routines that will continue to give my students opportunity for peer-scaffolded and independent practice. I also am hoping to get back into the habit of posting more resources and units on my blog. I get so much from teaching blogs and I want to do my best to contribute to this community as well.

My first "snow day"!

It's all about the data: Semester Review

My first semester as a teacher ended right before winter break. Since I took the majority of winter break for relaxation, family, friends, and a very good football game, I am just now getting to really look at and analyze my data! The nerd in me REALLY loves looking at data so this is a fun post for me.

First up, my running record levels. Running Record Reading levels rule pretty much everything at my school (DIBELS and DEA coming in 2nd and 3rd respectively) so running records are always the first thing I look at. I use my running record levels to determine my guided reading groups, student partnering, seating and beginning next week my word study instruction. Here is a look at the reading growth my students have made:

Running Records Growth

TFA Benchmark Goals

I am proud of the progress my class has made, but there is definitely room to grow. I have a few all-star students who have grown over 10 levels so far and several students who are on pace to make at least a year's worth of growth. What worries me is that I have a few students who have shown little or no growth. 

My other major concern is that only 7 of my students (less than half of my class) are reading above the first grade benchmark for this time of year. This means that despite growth being made, they are still reading below a first grade level. One of my driving goals for this year is that my students will make 1.5 years of progress (or grow 15+ levels) so that they are adequately prepared for second grade. This is seeming like a long shot for many of my students which is really frustrating. 

Once I had the data I realized a few things. While I am proud of my progress (especially considering the amount of time during the first semester I had to spend on classroom management and routines), I have a lot of work to do if I am going to meet my Big Goals. The teaching methods I have been using need to be revamped.

I am spending to much time teaching to "the middle." The middle is typically a safe place to teach to, but if you look closely at my data you will see that my students are divided into "high" and "low" groups. The low group consists of students who are all under a level 5 reading level. Students are actually supposed to enter first grade on a level five so these are students who have not yet mastered kindergarten reading skills. When I teach to the middle I alienate these students or find myself asking them the lower-order questions so they can feel successful. My higher students are not being challenged enough and often answer questions so fast that they students who need to think about it cannot get a chance ("wait time" is difficult in a first grade classroom b/c inevitably someone will whisper of shout out the answer). 

With this divide in mind I have decided to revamp my schedule so that I am spending more time working with small groups of students who are working on specific skills. I have dedicated my math block every Wednesday to be an intervention hour. I will have my students playing math enrichment games, using an online program called https://www.xtramath.org/, and meeting with me in small groups. My table will be a combination of math re-teaching and hopefully also time to address some reading skills my students need. I am also going to try to work with some of the third and fourth grade teachers to have a few student volunteers in my classroom to help my students with AR testing and even tutoring a few students.

I am also going to divide my word study instruction into two ability level groups. As I was doing report cards I realized that my low group (the below 5s) did not pass a single spelling test this entire quarter so I am going to go back and re-teach some of these skills as well as do some vowel sound remediation with them. My higher group will start word study independently while I teach the low group. The word study routine is something these students have mastered so I think they will be able to handle it without the lesson first and then the two groups will switch. I built in a 3 minute transition time so that I can check the high group's work in between sessions. During this same time I have one student who will be going to a kindergarten classroom to get additional reading support and one student I have developed an independent word study lesson for.

This student is so high that even when among my other high readers she is not being challenged. So starting this week she will be going to a second grade classroom in the morning for reading and then during word study I have her set up on http://www.spellingcity.com/ with her own differentiated word list based on the Words Their Way spelling inventory. I have created a checklist so she can study independently and on Friday I can give her an online quiz. 

Click here for a copy of the differentiated spelling checklist. 

So begins a new 9 weeks. I am trying a LOT of new things. Right now my only concern is if I can handle the preparation and time involved with setting up so many new systems and procedures. It is a new year and for me it is really a "now or never" type of thing so ready or not, here I come!

If you met me 1 year ago

If you met me 1 year ago, I would talk your ear off about teaching.

If you met me 1 year ago, I would smile when I talked about our students.

If you met me 1 year ago, I could tell you about how I wanted to implement a reading workshop and a writing workshop.

If you met me 1 year ago, you meet a well-rounded person.

If you met me 1 year ago, you would meet someone who was tired, but not exhausted.

If you met me 1 year ago, you would be meeting a person who believed in herself.

If you met me today, I would want to hear about something, ANYTHING, other than teaching.

If you met me today, I would sigh when I talked about my students

If you met me today, I would tell you that I don't understand balanced math, balanced literacy, or Reggie Routman Writing.

If you met me today, you would meet someone who does nothing but work.

If you met me today, you would meet someone who is no longer sure of herself.

If you met me today, you would meet someone who is working tirelessly to get better.

If you met me today, you would meet someone who is frustrated by a lack of progress.

If you met me today, you would meet a perfectionist who is no where close to perfect.

If you knew me 1 year ago and met me again today, you would not recognize me.



Sorry to be depressing. It has been a long couple of weeks. I have been putting off posting on here (and sending out my monthly, well let's be honest bi/tri monthly, update to family and friends) until I could be a little bit more positive. I'm trying to be more positive. I am really trying to be more positive, but let's face it--optimism has never been one of my strengths. I can say optimistic things, but in my head (and most likely out loud) they are sarcastic. I am a realist, and the reality is that I am not happy. I just don't know what to do about it. It seems like the harder I try, the more frustrated I become. I wake up every morning and think about how many hours it will be before I get to go back to bed. I cuss my students out under my breath at least five times a day and I am currently at the top of the school's gossip list for crying during an evaluation meeting and half of the day on Friday. Things have to get better. That is not optimism. That is reality.

I have been challenged by my MTLD to write down at least 2 positive things that happen each day. So I am going to try it.  My new label, "life on the sunny side" should have a daily update about good things happening in my classroom. So here it goes...

(1) Today we made it through everything we had planned. I even had time for a pencil raid, recess, AND a word game!

(2) Based on my suggestion, our literacy coach helped us truly integrate science and language arts in our plans next week. This means that I will actually get to teach some science. We have millipedes, pill bugs, and terrariums to build!

Bring it on 2nd 9 weeks. Bring it on.

For the majority of my life I have been a student. Now, I am a teacher. I live and breathe by the school-year calender. In all honesty, I do not think in calendar years... I think in school years. I can tell you what grade I was in when things happened, but the year? Give me a second to figure out what grade I was in and then I can tell you the year. I do not have New Year's resolutions in January like the rest of the world. I have them in August.

As with most New Year's Resolutions, my school-years resolutions usually fade away. The ambitious goals I had are gone. The goals of how to improve my life, my health, and my education are gone. They are replaced by day to day routines, the monotony of every day life.

My teaching goals are a lot like my school year resolutions. The excitement and enthusiasm I had is now gone. It has been replaced by a daily routine--a cycle of going to school, bringing work home from school to do, eating and sleeping. My routine for the past 9 weeks was exhausting. It was not at all sustainable. This routine caused me to question myself and my career more than a few times.

Towards the end of my first nine weeks I made a bargain with myself. I will give teaching 4 years of my life, putting everything I can into it. It took my 4 years to become a teacher and I should give it at least that much time before leaving the field. After 4 years I will re-assess. My roommates and I joke that we need to find careers that you can leave work behind at 5 o'clock and not worry about it again until 9am the next morning. We joke because we know that we are not the type of people who would be happy in a career that we could just "turn off" when the work day is over. We could make teaching that kind of career, but we would not be the best teachers. We care too much about our students. We hate the work, but love it at the same time. The reality is I do not know what else I would do.

So if I am not ready to give it up, I have to get better. I have to find more of a balance in my life. I have to find it now, not later. The great thing about school year resolutions is that the school year is broken into pieces. My life used to be measured in quarters, not it is measured in 9 week cycles. My goals for the next nine weeks are...

- Find a balance in my life.
- Regain my passion for teaching. I want to enjoy spending time with my students. I want to have funny stories to tell. I want to enjoy waking up and going to school again.
- Help my students grow at least 2 reading levels. So many of my students did not show growth in the first 9 weeks. This is unacceptable. We all need to improve.

I can't say that tomorrow will bring the enthusiasm that comes with the first day of school, but I am using it as a fresh start. I need a fresh start. I can't wait until next August rolls around. Late-October will have to do. I have had a week to prepare for tomorrow and even though there are plenty of things I would like to have accomplished over fall break, I am as ready as I will ever be. Bring it on 2nd 9 weeks. Bring it on.

Reading Growth

My running records are finished! Let me say that one more time in celebration...my running records are finished!

As excited as I am to be finished I have mixed feelings about my results. Here is the break down...

Running Record Data

X-axis: Students
Y-Axis: Running record level
Blue series: entry level
Red Series: growth, current level

7 students showed no progress
7 students showed expected progress (1-2 levels)
6 students showed significant progress (3+ levels)

I am working really hard to get past the fact that my students have not made the growth I hoped for. My big goal translated into running record language is that all of my students will reach a level 18 by the end of the year. I honestly am starting to doubt that this can happen, but it is too early to give up on my students. I need to create a plan.

I only started looking at my data today, but I am already trying to think of ways to improve.

My lowest students (0-3's) need decoding skills. I need to incorporate more work with blending and segmenting to help them better decode words. I also need to reinforce practicing word work and sight words.

My middle students (4-8s) have mastered basic decoding skills, but need to be more careful readers and make sure that the words they are reading make sense when you look at the text. We also need to continue to build fluency. Some of theses students REALLY need to practice being aware of what they read. Students need to be more detailed in their comprehension answers.

My high students (10-12s) are on the right track. I need to really build higher order comprehension skills, retelling skills, and help them "chunk" larger words.

So what am I going to do about it:
I think that a more consistent guided reading routine will be really helpful. We have only had 2 full weeks of guided reading and I think that having a consistent routine (and my new guided reading groups based on new levels) will spark a lot of growth.


I really want to create more interactive centers for my word work center... I have been mostly doing worksheets at the center and many of the students that I really need to reach with these skills are those who do not have the independent skills and/ or attention to complete them on their own. Hopefully more interesting centers will allow for more genuine practice. The question now turns to what...

I also really want to build more lessons on decoding into my whole group instruction. This is really difficult because my students are on such different levels that When I teach to the middle I have half of my students that either have no idea what I am talking about or get the answers so fast no one has a chance to catch up.

Better use my parents/ family resources: I do not think I am fully keeping in contact with my parents. I think that some of my parents are more of a resource than I have been utilizing. I need to create more individualized reading homework and work with parents to make sure it is done and done well.

Incorporate more student response activities: I have been doing too much teaching whole group. I really need to create time for more independent work so that I can pull small groups of students for intervention. I really would like to get to the point where I pull 1-2 skill groups each day beyond guided reading.

Create a more print rich environment. My students really have taken ownership of the print I put up in the classroom. It is amazing how much I see them look and talk about it. I would like to slowly add in more print for my students. My first step is moving and beginning my word wall, but I would also like to put up our daily schedule, introduce a birthday chart, and add our related arts to the calendar.

My mind is going a million miles a minute and I really need to reign myself in. The more concrete actions I can get done, the better. I want my students to grow as learners more than anything in the world, but I also have to become more aware of what I can manage and prioritize what will help me get the closest to my big goal. I have been getting caught up in all of the little things which I really don't think is the most beneficial for me or for my students.

I will do my best to be better about updating my blog in the progress. Hopefully the reflection will help me grow as much as it did when I was student teaching :)

"Miss Prinzo, I'm learning. yeah?"

I started guided reading last week and I am really enjoying the time I spend with my students. I have some huge challenges ahead of me trying to get my students up to grade-level and guided reading is one of the few times I can provide differentiation and individualized instruction. One of the biggest challenges with my Read reading group (my non-readers) is getting them to understand how letter sounds are blended together to make words. We have been reviewing our district's sound cards each day and I realized last week how dependent my students were on the picture. Many of my lowest students were not even looking at the letters to make the sound. On the suggestion of one of my teammates I covered up the pictures. Today the red group went picture-less. This was a HUGE moment that I had been building excitement about all last week. My students really did a great job. After getting her first sound card (students get to hold the card when they get the sound right) one of my students' goes...

"Miss Prinzo, I'm learning. Yeah?"

After I confirmed that we were infact learning, she told EVERYBODY that that they were learning.

"We're learning. Yeah! You learning! We learning."

Her excitement was contagious... the red group left guided reading with huge smiles because they were learning! Here is to investment being student generated!

I'm a first year teacher...failure comes with the position!

I  am going to cheat a little bit on blogging and pretend a discussion board post from class i s really a blog post. Discussion board post or not, it pretty much describes my life right now.

I am a first year teacher in my first quarter of teaching. Failure comes with the position!

In all seriousness,as a new teacher I have experienced more failure than success. I could give you hundreds of instances of when I have made the wrong decision, turned in something late, said the wrong thing, set the wrong tone, or taught an impossible-to-understand lesson. What I am slowly realizing is that failure comes with the territory of being a first year teacher. It is really easy to become defeated by each of my little failures. It is really easy to absorb this negative energy. It effects me and it effects my students. What I have realized is that it is not the failures that matter, it is my response to them. How do I fix the problem? How can I re-teach a lost lesson? How can I prevent mistakes from happening again? I am trying to use failure as a learning tool, but it is one of those things that is easier said than done!

Falling forward...inspiration from my grad school professor:

3 WEEKS!?!?!? Classroom Management in the real world.

I have been a real-life teacher for three weeks now! Three weeks! Things have been crazy. I spend most days in a sleep-school-eat-work at home-sleep-school-eat-work at home routine. There is usually a lot more school and work at home than sleeping and eating, but things are slowing down.

Do I love it? Yes

Do I hate it? Yes

Do I want to be doing anything else? absolutely not.

I definitely had a rough start to my school year. I quickly became aware of what veteran teachers call the "honeymoon" phase and have been dealing with a lot of management and discipline problems. During my student teaching, I thought I had developed pretty good classroom management skills, but there is nothing like doing it when you are on your own. Week 2 was really rough, especially the day after we had a substitute ( my team had a mandatory professional development day to attend). Monday of Week 3 was absolutely miserable, but the rest of the week has slowly gotten better.

What were my major problems:
-- Bathroom Breaks--we had three days in week 2 that our bathroom break after lunch took over half an hour. (This doesn't include the day I had a student throw-up all over the bathroom). This was teacher-torture for me. I slowly made some improvements to increase our time. We started sitting in the hallway, I banned the students from the sinks (we use hand sanitizer), figured out which students cannot go into the bathroom together, and I now wear a clock to the bathroom...just call me Flavor-Flav. I mark with a whiteboard marker on the clock how long it should take us to go to the restroom and I told my students that if we could get to 10 minutes we could have an extra recess (and it would be well worth it). My clock also makes a handy dry-erase board to record student behavior and do review problems on.

--TALKING! My students are little chatter boxes which, when talking with some of the other EL teachers, seems to be common among EL students. So I got rid of my tables and we now have rows. I have have also gotten a LOT stricter and BMC like crazy when I am trying to get my students to listen. This is definitely a work in process.

 I also put a lot of effort into our noise level system and used a suggestion from my MTLD to talk about listening with our whole bodies. This helps students to realize that talking is not only disrespectful, but hurts the speaker's feeling.

Our 7 minutes of lost recess on Friday also seemed to help (all of my students except two talked for 7 straight minutes while at the bathroom on Thursday so on Friday they sat and watched other children play at recess for 7 minutes to know what it felt like for me to wait 7 minutes). I am normally not a fan of taking away recess (and I still gave them the same amount of time to play), but it really seemed to help at our future bathroom breaks.

I also do group drinks at the end which for some reason takes less time then each student doing it on their own after they get out of the restroom. Like I said, it is a work in progress, but I am working on it.

--Bullying: I have a bully in my classroom. Surprisingly, it is a girl and she NEVER does anything in front of me, but enough students have told on her/ I have heard enough things when my back is turned to realize something is wrong. This has thrown me for a loop and I have started to re-think my "work it out yourself" strategy I have been telling my students. I have a new game plan for Tuesday and hopefully it will create some positive results.

--Pushing/ physical touch: A lot of my students push and hit. It is becoming quite a problem. I really think that the root of the problem is an inability to verbally communicate their feelings. This is something I really need to work on with my students. I have talked to the guidance counselor about addressing it in guidance class (my students go once a week as a special) and I am going to try this Peace Maker Activity from First Grade Parade to emphasize how we can be nice to each other and how we work out our problems.

I also noticed that a lot of our pushing occurs in line so I moved my line up fish (fish taped onto the floor with student numbers) farther apart. My line now stretches and zig zags all of the way across the room, but my students now will no longer be as close to each other. I made this change on Friday before I left for the weekend so we will see what happens!

My teaching is getting better, my management is getting better...or I am getting more tolerant. Hopefully things will continue to change for the better. I signed up for two different observations from TFA over the next month and will probably have my teacher environmental evaluation next week. I signed up as extra self-motivation and hopefully my students will be on their very BEST behavior!

My Classroom Management Inspirations. All he needs is a dry-erase marker.

"Teacher sings his way to classroom lead"

Check out this news story on a fellow CM making change :)

http://www.wsmv.com/video?autoStart=true&topVideoCatNo=default&clipId=6209040#.Tl8i32xO49w.facebook

My First Full Day

Today was my first full day and I have to say it was LONG! My students have a late lunch and related arts the last period of the day. This equals a ridiculously long day for me! I am really going to have to put some management in place because I will have to check folders and stuff them while keeping the students engaged. I will also have to make sure to print and set out everything I need for the entire day each morning--making sure I have easy access to it. Right now I am using my kidney table as home base, but that's definitely not going to work when we start small group activities.

I am pretty tired so here are a few highs, lows, and points of interest for today:

Highs:

Many of my students are very kind and responsible for their classmates without me teaching it. I have had zero instances of pushing or line cutting and it is very clear that many of my students watch out for each other. I have one student (one I can guarantee I will be writing a lot about) that many of my girls take care of.

We voted on our class "team" name today. It was a close race, but the peanut butter fish, the electric fish, and the fish with big tales could not stand up against the "Rainbow Fish."

Lows:
Did I mention today was LONG??

On a more serious note...One of the forms we are asked to collect from each child is an application for free and reduced lunch. It is also the form that our school turns in to receive our Title1 funding. I got about 10 forms back today. Of the 10 families returning forms only ONE of my families has a household income of more than $1000 (and all 10 families have one working adult). To put this in perspective... I make  about $34,000 as a new teacher. My first paycheck will be more than most of my families will make in a year. This realization was a huge reality check for me. I knew my students would be low income, but I had no idea that it would be this low.

To make me feel even worse almost all of my students brought in school supplies. The first grade general supply list (which I had absolutely no part in making...) costs about $20-30. For a lot of my families this equates to 5% of their income. I actually feel guilty about taking their supplies. One idea I had was to use any of the extra materials to make a take-home summer kit for my students. This would not only relieve my guilt about much of the unused supplies, but also be a small step in eliminating the notorious "summer slide."

Point of interest:
We had a new student join our class today. He happens to have the same first name as another student...and the same last initial. To make this even more fun...I have a really hard time pronouncing my new student's last name!

Extreme Classroom Makeover

I am back! It has been a LONG couple of weeks. We had TFA orientation,  MNPS new teacher orientation, a 2 day staff retreat, 4 PD days leading up to school AND classroom set-up!

I have been working non-stop. Over the past few weeks I have been been following a sleep-work-eat-work schedule with very little free time. Now that school has officially started, I am trying really hard to find a balance and get back into a routine---one that includes time away from school! I have a trip planned back to Akron next weekend, and even though the drive is going to suck I am so excited to get a way and talk about something that is not school or work!

I hope I don't sound like a complainer, because I really do love my job so far. My co-workers have been extremely supportive and I feel VERY welcome at my school. And...the hard work really does pay off. I inherited one of the least student-friendly environments possible, but my portable is starting to look and feel like a classroom! I have gotten a lot of compliments from staff members on my classroom which has really helped validate the work that has been put into it.

Here is a picture of my classroom as it currently stands (functional, but not finished) and below that is a link to the transformation process.

and the transformation: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.1990449207394.2100739.1428270161&l=9142d892b7&type=1

Thursday was my first day of school and it went REALLY well. My students are adorable. I am still working through some language issues and really need to take some time next week to talk to students one on one. I think after next week I will have a better idea of what strengths and challenges we will have....now I just have to do some planning to make next week happen!

Different Directions

It is decision making time. I have been getting ideas, strategies, "rules" and suggestions from so many people and from so many settings that I spent most of this week extremely overwhelmed. Instead of getting a  better picture of my first few weeks teaching from all of this support, my first few weeks were becoming less defined.

Today has kind of been a turning point for me. I have stopped listening to "must do's" that everyone seems to have and began to take them as opinions on what a classroom should look like. I need to regain my OWN view of a classroom first and then I can incorporate some of the very helpful suggestions I have been given. I also created a series of lists (I am a big list maker) to help organize myself. I have the following lists: Ask Emily (my team leader), to buy, to make, bulletin boards, centers, and teacher to do. Everything fits on a list and even though I have not started a single thing on my list, I FEEL SO MUCH BETTER!

I also received the keys to my classroom portable (aka trailer) today and even though there are some things I am definitely not thrilled about (post coming), I have a better idea of how I can set up my classrooms and classroom processes. Again, a huge step to making me feel better about the next few weeks!

The moral of the story: stay true to yourself and ideas, but be open to making changes and modifications based on the feedback of others.

Institute Debrief

Well, I am finally back from Institute and a long weekend of moving and driving. I am semi-settled into my new house (until the POD with all of my furniture and boxes gets to Nashville) and we have started Round 0 orientation.


Institute is over and with so much driving time I have had time to think of some key take aways. The thing about the majority of TFAers (myself included) is that we are very critical--especially of ourselves.We see a problem and we want to fix it. My Institute experience is no exception. The reality is that I failed my students. We did not meet our goal as a class and the majority of my students did not meet their individual growth goals.

So my question is..What went wrong? The answer...a lot of things! Most of these things have been written about in previous posts as I was going through them, but the major things that I believe I need to change for next year so that my new class does not have mediocre growth are:

- Spend more time on investment...There is a huge jump in our data after the three week mark. I felt the difference in relationships with my students and the numbers proved it. Once I started learning about my students and having some fun with them, they started achieving. The other side of investment is helping the students to understand that what they are doing in the classroom, that the goals we have for them, are important to their current and future success.

- Build strong routines and procedures...I really want a classroom that functions independently. My students are more than capable of doing many of the things I did for them this summer and, as a result, I lost a lot of time for individualized and small group instruction.

- Give students more opportunity to experience and engage with material. I felt like I was talking all of the time and the reality is that while I was talking very few students were learning.
- Differentiate more...I saw so much growth during AIT and I need to make sure that small group and individualized instruction has a strong place in my classroom.

- Find what works for me as a teacher...All of these things above, and so much more, are things that I knew going into this experience, but knowing and doing are two very different things. I lost sight of who I was as an educator and what I could give to my students. As we moved further into weeks 3 and 4 I became more comfortable with my teaching style and how my style impacted my students.

These are all things I am working on building into my classroom vision and plan that we are working on during Round Zero. I am confident that my new students will benefit from my mistakes over the summer because I refuse to let my classroom and my students go in a direction that I am not comfortable with again. I am in the process of making changes and I will never let my classroom be a place where the teacher's mistakes hinder student progress.

So there is the bad and what will come of it. Here are some of the good things that have helped rekindle my teaching "fire"....

- all of my students eligible for promotion (including special project #1) who met the attendance requirement met their goals for promoted! Together the first grade team using a collaborative AIT model promoted 8 students to first grade. There are so many statistics to support the urgency for students to achieve promotion in the early grades and we helped make it happen for 8 students!

- All of my students showed growth in both math and reading. Even though it was not the growth we wanted our students still learned SOMETHING over the summer.

- As a teacher I learned about how to use data to drive my classroom and my students. Assessments are so much more purposeful and meaningful to me now than they ever were before.

- I am leaving Institute with a strong network of support and many resources to explore.


I am leaving Institute on "The Brain Train." I have been motivated to learn more, to do more, and achieve more. Not only have I put faces to the Achievement Gap, but I have a better understanding of my role in helping my students get to "Destination Success." I made an impact on my students and they have made an incredible impact on me.

Tomorrow is...

...THE LAST DAY OF INSTITUTE!

What an experience this has been! Tomorrow is an early morning to what is going to be an emotional day so I am going to leave it at this has been a life-changing experience and I am sad to leave my students when I still feel like there is so much progress that can be made, but PUMPED for my return to Nashville and my own classroom!

Night!

A Different Side of the Delta

Look at these pictures. These pictures show the familiar landscapes that I see out my window during the commute to and from school each day. This is the Delta I came to Mississippi expecting to find. 

This, however, is not the Delta that my students know. I cannot tell you how shocked I was to find out that only 5 of my 19 students have ever been on a farm. My students are surrounded by farm land, drive past it everyday, yet they have never set foot on a farm. To me this shows the unbelievable limits poverty can place on opportunities. The reality is that the experience my students, most of which come from low income backgrounds, is more similar to that of what you would expect inner city students to face. While there are some major differences, the strength of religion and respect and the  being a major difference, I am realizing that my Delta students are faced with so many of the same challenges that inner-city students face. There have been several small things to build towards this realization, but a conversation with my roommate who teaches secondary literature really pushed me to start thinking about the similarities. She had a conversation today about pressure with her students today and it shed light on drug, gang, and familial issues that forced me think about the similarities and differences more seriously.

I really wish I had spent some time at the beginning of this experience seeing the towns that my students call home. I feel like it would have helped ground me and also help me pull from experiences prior to TFA to better serve my students. 

In the end it really comes down to the achievement gap. We came here to help close the gap. We came here because the gap is every bit, if not more, real for my QES students as it will be for my students in Nashville and in urban populations nation-wide. We came here to give students opportunities and while 5 weeks cannot change everything, it can change something.