Beautiful Moments

Today we had an advisory "field trip," where we split into our advisory groups and had 3 and a half hours to complete a really long scavenger hunt that required us to run all over town finding different places and taking pictures (for example, we had to find a statue that I had never known was there, and take a picture of everyone in height order, and we also had to take a picture with a dog and find out its name).  I was with a 9th grade advisory group with two other teachers, since I don't have my own, and the only student I knew was one of the 9th grade kids in Mr. B's special ed class.  The group was super excited, and everyone was running around screaming and cheering each other on.  I am really surprised no one got hit by a car, but there were so many beautiful moments of problem solving and teamwork that I never would have expected from a silly scavenger hunt.

We finished in an hour and a half (first place!!) and bought the kids pizza.  We had run so far that RC, (the sweet, short little boy from Mr. B's class), could barely walk and was in a lot of pain (he goes to an OT for some kind of leg problem).  RC is the kind of kid that at any other school would probably be a target for being teased, but these kids were so concerned about him.  One bought him a water with his own money, another actually carried him all the way back to the school!

Every Wednesday we have a staff meeting after the students leave.  We always start by writing "merit referrals" (the opposite of disciplinary write ups) for students, and sharing them with everyone.  Two teachers wrote merits for JT, for being uncharacteristically focused in class and calmly helping explain something to a frustrated classmate.  I felt like a proud mom...I almost cried!

Meet my students!

My job description, when I was offered this job, was extremely vague and no one ever really specified exactly what my role was supposed to be.  As I've been trying to figure out my place in the school over the past five weeks, I've realized that I have gotten really protective over "my" thirteen students, and that my role has become a cross between teacher, advisor, and mother-figure.  I feel a responsibility not only to teach them, but to constantly advocate for them and make sure they know how to advocate for themselves--and to feed them cookies!  Yesterday I brought in a box of rainbow cookies that my aunt had given me to share with them, and they were so excited that I had other kids coming into the classroom asking if they could have (I guess it was better than my usual oreos).   

Since I have such a small group of students that are actually "mine," I thought I'd introduce you to each of them, so when I talk about them in my posts everything makes a little more sense.  I won't do all 13 tonight, but here's a start:

I've mentioned JT already, my ADHD friend who’s awesome at math when he will just focus!!  He’s decided that he wants to go to Pratt when he graduates, and he recently got onto the basketball team (which is hysterical in itself, because he’s only about 5’3”), so luckily I have two huge motivating factors with him.  It’s gotten to the point where all I have to do is give him “the look” and he’ll say “I know, I know, I have to focus or I won’t get into Pratt and I’ll get kicked off the basketball team.”  

James is by far my lowest-level student, and this is probably mostly because he is absent on average 3 or 4 days a week.  I went through his grades with him yesterday, which were almost all below 50 (many below 20), and had a long talk with him about the importance of attendance.  He’s a sweet kid who is willing to take any help you can give him, but it’s hard to catch him up when he has missed entire units in more than one class!  Unrelated, I found out he calls himself "chippy" because he is missing half of one of his front teeth.

Most teachers at my school dread having Amy in their class, and not because Amy is a tough student—but because her mother is incredibly overbearing and calls constantly to tell us that her daughter has to become an attorney.  Amy has been staying in my classroom during lunch almost every day to make up tests and quizzes, and kind of lingers around to talk with me when she’s done.  I realized yesterday that she is the Latina version of my middle sister: smart but ditzy enough that it sometimes affects her grades, and constantly surrounded by boys.  One of the 9th graders was hitting on her in the hallway last week, and as she walked away she said "you wouldn't be able to handle me."

Arnelle—the girl who used to come in really angry and refuse to do any work until the day that I had a one-on-one meeting with her and somehow got through to her—is now one of my hardest working students!  She not only tries really hard and gets all of her work done, but when she finishes early she gets up and starts washing down my chalkboard.  She also has a habit of stealing my stamp and my stickers and covering herself in them.  Today I overheard her tell another of my students that her boyfriend “broke up with her to get with the girl he cheated on her with,” and she was really blah all day.  I asked her if I let her hang onto the stamp for the period if she’d cheer up, and it actually worked J

Anyway, 9:45 is pretty much teacher bedtime.  Next time I'll introduce you to a few more!  

My First Write-Up

Yesterday I wrote up my first ever disciplinary referral (referral for a school-wide detention, which goes on their record).  It was for Jay, surprise surprise.  Although he wasn’t acting much different than any other day, I realized I had to show him that I actually would write him up.  He was completely ignoring every direction I gave whether I asked him or told him to do something.  Everything had to be an argument or have an explanation.  The worst part was that James—who is absent four out of five days of every week and is extremely behind—was actually there yesterday and was so distracted by Jay that he got nothing done.  Jay also made fun of Carolyn’s belly, which is starting to show (she’s now about 4 months pregnant), which was the final straw.  I used my best teacher stare and teacher voice, told him I was no longer going to tolerate his behavior, and walked over to my desk and wrote his name down on a random piece of paper.  So, in those last 5 minutes, he was an angel, but I wrote him up anyway.  When he found out he had a detention (and who gave it to him), he walked into my French club meeting screaming, and I calmly told him we’d talk about it tomorrow. 

I was dreading seeing him today, but he was actually better today.  Not perfect, but an improvement!  The Global Studies (Mr. M) teacher and I have teamed up to create a daily behavior tracker that he has to have every one of his teachers sign every day, and he has to bring it to us at the end of every day.  It’s pretty hysterical because it’s tailored specifically to him.  The categories include, “stays in his seat,”  “does not talk to himself or others while the teacher is teaching,”  “does not argue or give excuses when given a reminder or consequence,”  “takes notes and does work” etc.  We’re going to introduce it to him tomorrow, and he’s going to hate it, but Mr. M and I are already getting a kick out of it. 

French club, by the way, was magnifique! One of the 9^th graders, whose chosen French name is André, was apparently a fantastic French student in middle school and was so sad to find out our high school doesn’t offer French.  I swear, the kid is actually just as good, if not better, at speaking French than I am.  We had a lot of fun, and it was so interactive and high energy that I’m starting to think I’ll go back to school to get my French certification after my Special Ed. master’s is finished!

Something in the Water

During 7th period today, as the full-time substitute (Ms. L, who I love, she's going to end up being one of my best friends) walked into my class exactly when I needed her.  I looked at her in desperation, as I was trying to review the rules of adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing integers, and said, "Ms. L, did you know I taught a kindergarten class here?"  In that class, I have 8 students, and their desks are arranged in a U-shape.  In the center of the U, four boys in a row were sound asleep at their desks.  For some reason today, no matter how many times I woke them up and threatened detention, they fell right back to sleep.

Ms. L, who is a tiny little thing (less than 5 feet tall), sneaks up to them with a history text book and slams it on the ground.  Two confused boys slowly lifted their heads, looked at her sleepily, and went back to sleep.  JT looked at me and said, "Ms. C, how about if we all get 100s on our Math tests tomorrow, we can sleep for the entire 7th period?"  and then he too went back to sleep.  I remembered that phrase "pick your battles," which I've been reminding myself of a lot lately, and reviewed with Carolyn, who was so near tears by the thought of adding negative numbers that she kept muttering, "Math just isn't fair!"

8th period, which is one of my prep periods, I saw the principal in the hallway and she asked how my day had gone.  I mentioned my sleepy children, and she said today was a particularly sleepy day in most of the classrooms she saw--some days the cafeteria food just really slows them down.  I walked past Mr. V's global studies class and did a double take, and noticed JT in the front row--passed out on top of his notebooks with his mouth wide open while Mr. V pretended not to notice.  I couldn't stop laughing for the rest of the day...at least I knew not to take it personally!

Tomorrow after school is my first French Club meeting!

Last Week's Quote of the Week: "Ms. C, if I were to win an award right now, like a VMA or something, the first thing I'd do would be to thank Ms. C for all her help in Math." -JT


**Note: A good friend of mine reminded me to make sure I changed the names of all of my students.  I went back to look and realized that I had been using one real name, so I went through my old posts and gave him a new name.  In case you were wondering, "JT" is the formerly mentioned, self-proclaimed, "math pimp."

Reflecting.

I'm sort of just writing this post to figure out some of my thoughts right now, so I have a feeling this entry may be kind of boring and not make much sense.  I've been weighing the pros and cons of my specific teaching position (as the resource room teacher who co-teaches two math classes), and I definitely have it easy in many ways. I have a "case-load" of 13 students.  My second period class is 5 students, and they are angels.  My seventh period class is 8 students, and as individuals they are all wonderful (except for one, I hate to say it, but he's just a nasty kid.  He has good moments, but they are few and far between).  When they get together as a group, they can be a nightmare.  For some, it's because the work is way too hard, and for some it's because it's way too easy...I can't seem to find a balance between remediation and challenging them!  What is good about the resource room class is that I can sort of do what I want with it...so one day I'll teach art history lessons that relate to their global class, and another day I'll do writing strategies and another I will have them all practicing math.  The problem is that it's hard for me to track how they are doing because they are not graded in my class (which also results in many of them not taking this seriously), and I don't really know what the end of the year result is supposed to be for them!  

I know it's only week three, but I'm starting to feel like even on my really good days that I'm not making a big difference with them yet.  Our ultimate goal is to help them pass all of their classes, and especially the Regents' Exams they are taking at the end of the year (passing at my school is a 70, not a 65).  I'm thinking I'm going to have to somehow restructure my class (already! ugh!) so that I can track each student's progress in every class.  Or should I just figure out with each student which subjects they need the most help with and track their grades in that?  So much to think about, I don't even know where to start...

Pink Pens and Projectors

Today was a fantastic day.  The 10th graders had a quiz on multiplying and dividing polynomials, and grading them was really rewarding...most of my students got As (one even got 105), and the two that didn't do well at all just made really silly mistakes (something I have to work on them with).

I had "one on one" meetings with my students today, which actually went amazingly.  Had a great talk with this one girl who always comes in looking really angry and sits and writes her name all over her notebook with her multi-colored sharpies while I'm talking.  I've never seen her smile that much...I'm hoping that means I got through to her!  Another girl told me that resource room was a lot different this year: "kids are not out of control crazy and they don't curse at you and we actually do work instead of just hang out."

During the dreaded 7th period, my supervisor was observing, and we worked on changing out "rules" into "norms" (taking the rules they came up with the first day like no sleeping and no cursing and making them positive like learn actively and use appropriate language).  They got into that about 10 times more than I thought they would--I pretty much expected them to refuse to do it.  When my supervisor left, they wouldn't stop talking about how she winked at JT as she left, and when they found out she was my boss JT tried to run after her to make sure she would "give me a good grade."

Other great things that happened, that I would not have understood the importance of two weeks ago...

• The copy machine finally works!!! 
• I found the pink pen that I like to use to comment on student work...I thought I lost it!
• We got a screen and a projector in our room (pretty old school compared to the SmartBoards that every other classroom has, but better than nothing!)  Just in time for me to be able to do a lesson on analyzing photography tomorrow...I've been finding it surprisingly easy to incorporate art into my lessons.  

Pop Quiz

Every once in a while, I give my students a pop quiz: "How do you spell and pronounce my last name?"  Even after repeating it every day for a week, I get blank stares from most of them!  I used to refuse to let students call me Ms. C--I thought it was disrespectful considering my last name is only 5 letters and if they tried they could learn it easily.  I quickly realized the importance of the phrase "pick your battles."  Most students at this school refer to their teachers as "Miss" or "Mister," so I'm lucky when they actually try and end up calling me "Ms. K."

Overall, my first week went pretty well.  My colleagues are amazing.  Most are new teachers, I'd say everyone, even the principal, is under 40 (most under 30), and we all get along wonderfully already and everyone is really supportive.  Some of my students are absolutely hysterical.  On Friday all they could talk about was the hurricane...one student asked if we were "going to die."  At the end of the day I saw one of my students, JT, who I have in both resource room and in Algebra, slowly swagger past my room using an umbrella about half his height as a cane.  I had been incessantly praising him for his awesome math skills all week (I noticed it got him to actually stay awake during class), and when I stepped into the hallway he said, "Miss! I'm a pimp...that knows math!"

What I learned that day: Never underestimate the power of praising a high school student and....STICKERS.  Yes, they are 15, but they love stickers and stamps.  It's hysterical.  JT, who gets distracted really easily and will at random intervals during the class either fall asleep or stand up and disrupt the whole class by cracking jokes, tells me he is going to "shoot for 3 stickers a day" on the positive actions sticker chart.  Allison steals the stamper off my desk whenever I'm not looking and next thing I know she's covered in smiley faces and A+s.

I spent several hours on Sunday calling the parents of all my students.  I was a little anxious about it, but I had some great conversations (and some really funny ones, and some awkward ones that made me realize I need to learn Spanish).  Today most of them told me they were surprised I called home, so at least now they know how easily it can be done!

My ongoing challenges for the year:  

1.  "Differentiating."  Basically, although most of my students in resource room are 10th grade (only one is 9th), they are all at completely different levels in each subject, and in subjects like math and science they are learning completely different things (those who failed biology last year are taking it again, others are taking chemistry, and one isn't taking science at all because he is at a fourth grade reading level and needs all the English classes he can get).  It's really difficult to find ways to simultaneously challenge the ones, like JT, who are really high functioning, and others, like Cristy, who forgot their multiplication tables!  I feel like I need to be a magician...

2. Every teacher has that one student....out of all of my students, I only have one that blatantly disrespects me.  Jay interrupts me every other sentence to try to derail my thought process, makes inappropriate comments under his breath, and very easily gets the whole class off task.  Today, while I was talking, he took a wooden hairbrush and banged it repeatedly on his desk. When I told him to stop: "No Miss, it's okay, I'm just cleaning it out" (as little bits of hair fly everywhere).

My principal was in to observe this mess of a class, and to my surprise she left a note in my mailbox saying she was happy to see my "lovely demeanor in front of the class", and the students "respond really well to me."  A lot of times I have other teachers tell me I'm not tough enough (though I do break out the teacher voice when it is necessary), so I was glad to hear directly from the principal that my teaching style isn't in fact that terrible.

Crazy Wednesdays

Mr. B (the 9th grade Special Ed teacher, who is also a first year teacher) and I decided to dedicate each day to a different subject in Resource Room.  Math Mondays, English Tuesdays, History Thursdays, Science Fridays.  Wednesdays are shortened periods (30 minutes instead of 56) because the students have half days, and teachers stay the rest of the day for professional development. I thought having short classes would make the day go by so quick...but it's chaos!! 


This pretty much sums it up:


"Miss, I can tell you're having a bad day."
"No I'm not, what makes you think that?"
"Your hair is a mess."

5 seconds later, I attempted to take a pen off of a desk and walk away, not realizing it was the pen I had attached by a string to the bathroom sign out sheet.  Needless to say, I gave my kids some good laughs today.

On a not-so-funny note...the social/emotional counselor told me today that one of my students is 3 months pregnant.  She wanted all of her teachers to know so that she wouldn't get in trouble for leaving to go to the bathroom a lot.  She's a really silly girl who seriously wants to be a mortician when she grows up.  I don't even know what to think right now.