August 2009
12 posts
Love
I LOVE the kids I teach and feel so excited about going back on Monday. That’s how I know I made the right career decision.
Last week was full of frustration, but I’m so ready to start the week off on a good note this week! I will be proactive :)
Frustration
I like to know expectations so I know how to meet/exceed them. My teaching program, being in its first year, is very challenging. I keep getting more and more work piled on and today I completely lost it. I have two final papers due tomorrow for my summer classes, TODAY they sent us an email that we need to read 150 pages by tomorrow, I’ve been writing lesson plans like crazy, daily...
“The principal’s office is only for blood and weapons.”
– Classroom Management Seminar (via getyourlearnon)
Our motto is “The office is a serious place for serious business.”
In other words, if a kid is sleeping in class deal with it yourself by either asking “What’s wrong?” or being more entertaining.
(via girloffscript)
...
My Kids!
I was so excited and nervous to meet my kids. Somehow being in a classroom with them was much less nerve wracking than I had imagined. I’m trying to hang on every word that my co-teacher for the year says. She has such a powerful management style that I want to learn so much from her!
Within the first five minutes of school starting the cutest little boy told me that he was not supposed to...
First Day!
My first day of school was this week. This is the start of big things people. Big things!
The Blueberry Story
As reblogged from girloffscript:
“If I ran my business the way you people operate your schools, I wouldn’t be in business very long!”
I stood before an auditorium filled with outraged teachers who were becoming angrier by the minute. My speech had entirely consumed their precious 90 minutes of inservice. Their initial icy glares had turned to restless agitation. You could cut the hostility with...
One more thing...
I recently learned that an old college friend had been trying for 16 months to get pregnant before it happened. I wanted to use this moment as a reminder that we never know what battles people are fighting in their personal lives. So many of our relationships are only surface deep, or are now long distance, that I want to remember to love and respect people at all times.
As I go into my classroom...
Facial Expressions
I’ve been learning a lot in my classes about how language styles can be misconstrued along ethnic lines. (Example, some ethnicities like implied direction and some are prone to very explicit instructions to yield the same results.) I just read this great (short) article on facial expressions and how they too can be misconstrued among Eastern and Western cultures.
“By tracking the...
White House Pushes Education Reform →
First Week in the Classroom
Last week was my first week in the classroom. I had no idea how much work goes into creating a learning environment before the kids even come to school. My school is structured very differently than the one I grew up in. There isn’t a “homeroom” for sixth graders they just get divided up when they get to class on the first day…seemingly unstructured? They also don’t...
Have I been living in a cave?
How has something so cool been going on in education for so long without me knowing about it? I’m talking about the Harlem Children’s Zone which is so out-of-the box and innovative…paying kids who have been in survival mode for so long for consistent attendance? Having a lottery to make getting into this school a privilege? Going to school on Saturdays? A short summer break? Talk...