Tomorrow I go where most novice teachers shouldn't boldly go on their own...my first field trip. I heard through the grape vine that the upper grade students were heading to the Museum of Science and Industry to partake in some lectures. I was looking for something to take my students on this fall and looked forward in my book to find that space and technology were two topics that wouldn't come into our plans until the end of the year (if we were lucky). I couldn't do that to my kids! I even heard from my three third graders that they didn't even get to study space last year as second graders! How sad! Since Daniel is in such a space kick I figured I should probably take advantage of the vast amount of knowledge I have gained in the last few months (since the end of July) about our solar system and space in general, ask permission (from the teacher who coordinated the trip as well as my principal), skip ten chapters and then go back after I'm done.
So now, here I am, the night before my field trip and I'm a nervous wreck. See, one of the things I brought in with me when I first interviewed at this school was my itinerary from a field trip my mentor teacher had me organize under her supervision...a five class, 125 (roughly) student, two day, three location trip around historical Glen Ellyn. Yeah, I was really proud of that accomplishment...and still am. But I had help. A guide. A previous itinerary upon which to lean on in the event my plans went awry. I mean, really, what if my kids misbehave? What if I lose one? What if we don't make it back to the bus in time? What if I kill my kids? I am hoping they are on their best behavior but this hasn't been an easy bunch so why would they make it easy on me? I mean, I only have four of their parents coming to play referee and to see if I am either A) under paid, I mean, some of the issues I have had so far this year are unbelievable or B) a complete liar, how can I say there have been problems with immaculately behaved cherubs? And so here I am - with 18 students and four parent chaperones thinking - I should be able to do this.
I'm going over pictures of the places within the MSI I have taken Daniel to. I'm mapping out the best places to go and best times (based on the time we get there and the time we have to leave). My head hurts...
If I post again it won't be until Sunday. I will hopefully have recovered by then. Stay tuned...
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Saturday, October 8, 2011
My Inheritance
As you may recall, I got this job fairly last minute due to a teacher from last year informing the school she was not coming back this fall. So here I am in her old classroom, making it my own. It feels good, you know, having something that's mine. I've decorated it the way I wanted to, moved the furniture around just so, and inherited a whole lot of stuff from teachers manuals to junk.
Inheritance is a weird thing. Some stuff you get "willed" or left to you is extremely useful. And other stuff you wonder about...you don't wonder necessarily why they left it, just how they could have left it in the state it is in.
My leveled readers for example...I have six boxes of them (I teach both 2nd and 3rd grade language arts after all). Sam was kind enough to put the books together one afternoon so that I have (hopefully) five books per lesson per set. But we didn't organize them further than that. What did I do? Yesterday was catch up day so I had my third graders and one second grader help me organize the book. What I heard from them was, "How could anyone leave such a mess?" and "I will never complain about my teachers having to get ready for our classes!" The good news is we got all that organized. Now I have to deal with my classroom library!
During this three day weekend I took the opportunity to take home a lot of things which need to be cleaned up and that I can do here at home. I brought home transparencies that need to be organized, papers that need to be graded, CDs and DVDs that need to be listened to or viewed in order to see how useful they will be to my future lessons and posters that need to be written.
So what did I do last night while watching a movie with Daniel and Sam? Organized the third grade transparancies in a binder...I'm missing some pages but hopefully they are the ones I found somewhere else and already started using. On to the second grade batch, to grading, and to planning for this week and the next...But first, breakfast with my two loves, a friend's birthday party this afternoon, and dinner with great friends we haven't seen in a while later this evening.
Despite the crazy, I would chalk this up to a win. Life is good my friends...even for the novice teacher.
Inheritance is a weird thing. Some stuff you get "willed" or left to you is extremely useful. And other stuff you wonder about...you don't wonder necessarily why they left it, just how they could have left it in the state it is in.
My leveled readers for example...I have six boxes of them (I teach both 2nd and 3rd grade language arts after all). Sam was kind enough to put the books together one afternoon so that I have (hopefully) five books per lesson per set. But we didn't organize them further than that. What did I do? Yesterday was catch up day so I had my third graders and one second grader help me organize the book. What I heard from them was, "How could anyone leave such a mess?" and "I will never complain about my teachers having to get ready for our classes!" The good news is we got all that organized. Now I have to deal with my classroom library!
During this three day weekend I took the opportunity to take home a lot of things which need to be cleaned up and that I can do here at home. I brought home transparencies that need to be organized, papers that need to be graded, CDs and DVDs that need to be listened to or viewed in order to see how useful they will be to my future lessons and posters that need to be written.
So what did I do last night while watching a movie with Daniel and Sam? Organized the third grade transparancies in a binder...I'm missing some pages but hopefully they are the ones I found somewhere else and already started using. On to the second grade batch, to grading, and to planning for this week and the next...But first, breakfast with my two loves, a friend's birthday party this afternoon, and dinner with great friends we haven't seen in a while later this evening.
Despite the crazy, I would chalk this up to a win. Life is good my friends...even for the novice teacher.
Thursday, October 6, 2011
Fun in Science
Our first chapter in science was called ALL ABOUT PLANTS. It talked about woodlands, prairies, marshes, deserts, what plants lived there, how plants have adapted to their environments and what kind of things plants do to survive. One of the experiments was placing stalks of celery in water to see if it needed roots to absorb water. I had a mason jar, the celery, and as a tip from my MIL I also had food coloring. We chose red.
The kids drew their predictions for what would happen. On the first day I was just putting the celery in the jar without any water. Just as they thought, the celery wilted.
I put water in on day 2 (like the experiment said to do) and added the selected red food coloring. I had them predict what would happen. They were right. The celery turned red (in the leaves and some parts of the ribs).
The kids enjoyed seeing the celery turn red so we kept it going. Then they asked if we could put other food coloring in. I thought, sure. Why not? Well, this is why - after ten days of a successful celery stalk changing color we added blue food coloring to turn the fresh water purple...and over the weekend the celery melted into the water so I had to toss it out.
I can only hope our experiments with space, seasons, gravity and the phases of the moon go better. Much better. At least the kids were able to work on some scientific processes!
The kids drew their predictions for what would happen. On the first day I was just putting the celery in the jar without any water. Just as they thought, the celery wilted.
I put water in on day 2 (like the experiment said to do) and added the selected red food coloring. I had them predict what would happen. They were right. The celery turned red (in the leaves and some parts of the ribs).
The kids enjoyed seeing the celery turn red so we kept it going. Then they asked if we could put other food coloring in. I thought, sure. Why not? Well, this is why - after ten days of a successful celery stalk changing color we added blue food coloring to turn the fresh water purple...and over the weekend the celery melted into the water so I had to toss it out.
I can only hope our experiments with space, seasons, gravity and the phases of the moon go better. Much better. At least the kids were able to work on some scientific processes!
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
The Paper Trail...
I'm sure you are wondering why I haven't posted anything lately. The truth of the matter is that I am swamped by a two inch thick pile of papers that are just waiting to be graded! That's what I get for giving my kids brain warm-ups in the morning and in the afternoon! A friend told me that giving them something to do in the morning establishes a routine while getting the kids ready for the day or the afternoon. I can't agree more PLUS it's really awesome when they get something, you know, that proverbial light bulb...but the paperwork...UGH! Even with a quick plus, check or minus, I'm already behind by a week! Don't get me wrong, when Friday rolls around the kids have a heap of stuff to take home in their folders!
Which leads me to wonder when I became the teacher who uses paper (and a LOT of it) to get her kids to do stuff?!?!? I'm not that teacher am I? I'm the fun one. The one who does fun (while still learning) activities. Music plays during group project time so the kids sway to the beat as they put together posters or puzzles. We're out of our seats. We're talking with a partner or two and sharing ideas. We're brainstorming...I mean, the kids have about a zillion things on their "What kids need to know in 2nd grade" lists, it's not like they are coloring all the time, they are, indeed, learning something or twenty...still, the paper trail is driving me nuts!
Speaking of paper trail...Have I mentioned I do after care? Well, three days a week I watch anywhere from 15-30+ children ranging in ages from 2-10 years old...and the first few weeks were chaos. Seriously. I was completely outnumbered - and I still am. And frankly my room is not safe for kids under 6! I have games with a gazillion parts to them! But alas here is where the whole paper thing comes into play. I have found that a successful (read: less messy) Mrs. Bell's room with a five minute clean-up merely requires 100 pieces of paper with photocopies of favorite things...HITS: anything Disney princess or animals; MISSES: Sesame Street characters. Who knew? So I have the coloring station with three buckets of crayons (supplied by me and any kids who decided they didn't care to get their crayons back last year); the play with Legos and Jenga blocks station; room on my carpet for a read-aloud or to play games; an area to do homework (study hall is for an hour and only for 4th grade and up); a snack station; and on Mondays I don't even have to do this in my classroom! I simply have the boys pick a movie one week, the girls another, and life goes on.
So off I go to bed so that I can wake up in the morning and grade papers...because by golly those Friday folders will have mail in them so help me!!!
Which leads me to wonder when I became the teacher who uses paper (and a LOT of it) to get her kids to do stuff?!?!? I'm not that teacher am I? I'm the fun one. The one who does fun (while still learning) activities. Music plays during group project time so the kids sway to the beat as they put together posters or puzzles. We're out of our seats. We're talking with a partner or two and sharing ideas. We're brainstorming...I mean, the kids have about a zillion things on their "What kids need to know in 2nd grade" lists, it's not like they are coloring all the time, they are, indeed, learning something or twenty...still, the paper trail is driving me nuts!
Speaking of paper trail...Have I mentioned I do after care? Well, three days a week I watch anywhere from 15-30+ children ranging in ages from 2-10 years old...and the first few weeks were chaos. Seriously. I was completely outnumbered - and I still am. And frankly my room is not safe for kids under 6! I have games with a gazillion parts to them! But alas here is where the whole paper thing comes into play. I have found that a successful (read: less messy) Mrs. Bell's room with a five minute clean-up merely requires 100 pieces of paper with photocopies of favorite things...HITS: anything Disney princess or animals; MISSES: Sesame Street characters. Who knew? So I have the coloring station with three buckets of crayons (supplied by me and any kids who decided they didn't care to get their crayons back last year); the play with Legos and Jenga blocks station; room on my carpet for a read-aloud or to play games; an area to do homework (study hall is for an hour and only for 4th grade and up); a snack station; and on Mondays I don't even have to do this in my classroom! I simply have the boys pick a movie one week, the girls another, and life goes on.
So off I go to bed so that I can wake up in the morning and grade papers...because by golly those Friday folders will have mail in them so help me!!!
Friday, September 23, 2011
End of the week
Yesterday I kept hearing the words, "Tomorrow is Friday!" passed on from teacher to teacher. Ordinarily I would brush it off but this week I really am thrilled the Friday is upon us and it's not just because Sam is coming home tonight! (Though that is a plus for sure!)
The commercial, which is 60 seconds long, was supposed to take one day of filming. Now I know that one day meant one whole day. I was prepared to lose one whole day of instruction. But every day this week one, two, or all the kids in my class were pulled out and we lost valuable instruction time!
What!? A teacher wants to teach her kids something? Um, YES! So you can imagine my dismay at having to send an e-mail out to the parents saying, "Um, sorry, but due to the filming of this commercial we may or may not be chosen for, our math test has been postponed...til next WEDNESDAY!" I felt like the biggest flake in America - and there was nothing I could do about it!
Thankfully I was able to get through week 2 of our reading text book - including the vocabulary for the week - for both my second graders and their third grade counter parts. I got some math in when I could but there was no way the kids would be prepared to pass the test today and by Wednesday I started drawing arrows in my lesson plan book so that I could do the science lessons I had planned for Monday and Tuesday down to Wednesday and Thursday...and even today - like that's going to happen - we have an assembly during my science and social studies blocks today! Speaking of which, I didn't even start using the social studies text book and would feel bad about that if we weren't working on our classroom citizenship (or lack there of) on a daily basis!
I hope this post isn't sounding too negative. In fact, I hope that so much that instead of ending with my rant of how much work we didn't get accomplished I will instead end with the good that happened this week:
In the midst of it all we had a (pretty) successful fire drill. No tears from my kids and, I'm pretty sure, no talking either!
We led the school in prayers and the pledge all week without major incident.
Kids are starting to sit quietly while waiting for their friends to finish warm-ups instead of shouting out, "Mrs. Bell! I'm finished! What should I do now?"
We managed to take all the recess I had built into the schedule (and then some)
I finished almost all the grading I had to do this week so my kids' Friday Folders will be full of wonderful things they can share with their parents!
THE END
The commercial, which is 60 seconds long, was supposed to take one day of filming. Now I know that one day meant one whole day. I was prepared to lose one whole day of instruction. But every day this week one, two, or all the kids in my class were pulled out and we lost valuable instruction time!
What!? A teacher wants to teach her kids something? Um, YES! So you can imagine my dismay at having to send an e-mail out to the parents saying, "Um, sorry, but due to the filming of this commercial we may or may not be chosen for, our math test has been postponed...til next WEDNESDAY!" I felt like the biggest flake in America - and there was nothing I could do about it!
Thankfully I was able to get through week 2 of our reading text book - including the vocabulary for the week - for both my second graders and their third grade counter parts. I got some math in when I could but there was no way the kids would be prepared to pass the test today and by Wednesday I started drawing arrows in my lesson plan book so that I could do the science lessons I had planned for Monday and Tuesday down to Wednesday and Thursday...and even today - like that's going to happen - we have an assembly during my science and social studies blocks today! Speaking of which, I didn't even start using the social studies text book and would feel bad about that if we weren't working on our classroom citizenship (or lack there of) on a daily basis!
I hope this post isn't sounding too negative. In fact, I hope that so much that instead of ending with my rant of how much work we didn't get accomplished I will instead end with the good that happened this week:
In the midst of it all we had a (pretty) successful fire drill. No tears from my kids and, I'm pretty sure, no talking either!
We led the school in prayers and the pledge all week without major incident.
Kids are starting to sit quietly while waiting for their friends to finish warm-ups instead of shouting out, "Mrs. Bell! I'm finished! What should I do now?"
We managed to take all the recess I had built into the schedule (and then some)
I finished almost all the grading I had to do this week so my kids' Friday Folders will be full of wonderful things they can share with their parents!
THE END
Monday, September 19, 2011
We better win the $25K!!!
Mercedes Benz is offering 5 $25K grants to not for profit organizations who create a 60 second spot and submit it to them by the end of the month. This would be an amazing amount of money to come back to our school and could buy each classroom technology that will bring us to the tail end of last century...
Whose kids did the higher ups choose? My adorable 14...well, if their parents sign release forms, of course. So I had three kids whose folks did not sign release forms because of misunderstandings...and one kid who didn't go with the rest of the ten and then felt all day like he wasn't included (despite dressing for the occasion) because his English abilities weren't on par with the rest (there are no speaking roles).
I ended up teaching the kids I had things that I'll get to this week with their classmates - or not - but still on level with what we're doing in class all week. I even modeled and guided them through their math homework packets for the week in an attempt to make sure that at least they pass the test on Friday!
I planned for the whole week's worth of instruction in all content areas - this week being a key week for math because we have an end of chapter test on Friday...and do I see my kids all day? Oh no...and they will also be gone tomorrow! ARGH! On top of all this I got an e-mail today from my principal saying that I will have the 5th-8th grade kids tomorrow (along with the now two(?) kids whose parents didn't sign release forms AND my own third graders...It will feel like a one room school house!
I know, I'm complaining now...but if we win this I really will just have to grin and say, "I knew my kids could do it!"
Whose kids did the higher ups choose? My adorable 14...well, if their parents sign release forms, of course. So I had three kids whose folks did not sign release forms because of misunderstandings...and one kid who didn't go with the rest of the ten and then felt all day like he wasn't included (despite dressing for the occasion) because his English abilities weren't on par with the rest (there are no speaking roles).
I ended up teaching the kids I had things that I'll get to this week with their classmates - or not - but still on level with what we're doing in class all week. I even modeled and guided them through their math homework packets for the week in an attempt to make sure that at least they pass the test on Friday!
I planned for the whole week's worth of instruction in all content areas - this week being a key week for math because we have an end of chapter test on Friday...and do I see my kids all day? Oh no...and they will also be gone tomorrow! ARGH! On top of all this I got an e-mail today from my principal saying that I will have the 5th-8th grade kids tomorrow (along with the now two(?) kids whose parents didn't sign release forms AND my own third graders...It will feel like a one room school house!
I know, I'm complaining now...but if we win this I really will just have to grin and say, "I knew my kids could do it!"
Saturday, September 17, 2011
Enrichment
Hola, mi nombre es la Sra. Bell y yo no hablo español muy bien...
So why the heck did a woman come into my classroom inquiring about what I plan on teaching during the Spanish enrichment class that my principal signed me on to do once a week for an hour?
Oh, I never mentioned that? Don't get me wrong. I took four years of Spanish in high school and was in the Spanish Honor Society for my abilities to speak and write in Spanish. But I don't speak it fluently. AT. ALL! I know the basics: the alphabet, how to count, conjugation, colors, basic verbs and nouns, etc. The lady spoke Spanish to me (fluently) and I could understand her; but could I answer her entirely in Spanish? Absolutely not!
So what am I doing on a Saturday night? I'm looking up songs in Spanish. Reading about how to teach kids from Kindergarten through 3rd grade Spanish in a fun way that isn't just paper and pencil. Researching books I can go and borrow from the library. Figuring out whether or not I should speak Spanish fluently or teach in English in the same way I learned (only with more songs). Because there is one thing that I got out of talking with the lady who knocked on my door and that is that if I don't do what I'm doing right now I am totally screwed!
So why the heck did a woman come into my classroom inquiring about what I plan on teaching during the Spanish enrichment class that my principal signed me on to do once a week for an hour?
Oh, I never mentioned that? Don't get me wrong. I took four years of Spanish in high school and was in the Spanish Honor Society for my abilities to speak and write in Spanish. But I don't speak it fluently. AT. ALL! I know the basics: the alphabet, how to count, conjugation, colors, basic verbs and nouns, etc. The lady spoke Spanish to me (fluently) and I could understand her; but could I answer her entirely in Spanish? Absolutely not!
So what am I doing on a Saturday night? I'm looking up songs in Spanish. Reading about how to teach kids from Kindergarten through 3rd grade Spanish in a fun way that isn't just paper and pencil. Researching books I can go and borrow from the library. Figuring out whether or not I should speak Spanish fluently or teach in English in the same way I learned (only with more songs). Because there is one thing that I got out of talking with the lady who knocked on my door and that is that if I don't do what I'm doing right now I am totally screwed!
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