http://www.theycallmeteacher.com/
“I had been pretty thick-skinned so far this year but at that moment, I melted.” This blog is from a teacher in her first year, working 5th grade, in the Bronx. This blog stuck to me because of it's foresight. One specific post from this blog (http://edwize.org/first-cry-of-the-year) discusses the teacher's first cry of the year. I know that all of us will experience a moment of collapse and meltdown in our first couple of years in teaching. This teacher's story of running into a wall of emotion, and then picking herself back up is one that must be heard by us preserves teachers. Not just for the sake of learning to handle situations like this, but also to feel less alone when this situation arises. What gets me the most when reflecting back on this blog, is how fellow teachers help and hinder this 5th grade teacher. The rest of the blog has posts that offer great stories and pointers throughout this teacher's first year. Experiences brought to life through detailed recollections and honest revelations helped me to connect with this teacher on a personal level.
Saturday, November 29, 2008
Monday, November 17, 2008
...and I keep learning...
"Now that you are nearing the end of your first quarter of your internship, what has been your biggest surprise about being in the classroom and working with students?"
- Starting with just being in the classroom, I would say the most surprising thing I have noticed overall would be the intensity of which the teacher and the students work at It is a rare sight to see my CT just kicking back and not doing or thinking about anything. She constantly grades papers, organizes her desk, talks to students about late HW or gives them positive feedback, teaching a lesson, discussing future projects with the other 6th grade teacher... the list goes on. Having quite a few family members as teachers, I knew the job was not easy but I didn't have a grasp on the constant physical and mental activity that a teacher subjects themselves to on a daily bases. Remarkable.
Students as well as teachers are put through the ringer in 6th grade. Some hang with the amount of work being, appropriately, placed in their laps, but some don't. I was definitely surprised at the intensity level the students and the teacher endure.
- My biggest surprise in regards to actually working with the students has been their overall capability to perform in the classroom academically. I had my expectations set at a good level going into the school year, but those expectations have definitely raised since I have seen what these 6th graders are capable of doing. Their are a lot of things, individually and as a group, that surprised me, but the fact that as a class these students develop sophisticated insights into math problems, and reading analysis, and their writing, social studies vocabulary words, and many other things. Though they have so much more to learn in this world, it is true to say that they have a great jump on gaining a diverse and plentiful amount of knowledge.
Monday, November 10, 2008
Personal Narrative
The writing unit I am teaching in my classroom is focused on personal narratives. They have been learning what a personal narrative is, how to brainstorm ideas for their personal narrative paragraph, and how to plan a rough draft using a graphic organizer. We still have revising, editing and publishing left to do. Once they are done with their publishing we will engage in a sharing session that will be focused on receiving positive feedback and allowing others students to better know each other. The lesson I will focus on for this post is the lesson I taught which introduced the students to personal narratives.
1) Short term learning target:
Given the word two different genres of text students will find the differences and similarities between the two forms using a Venn diagram.
Given the genre “personal narrative,” students will help create a definition of the word by reporting their findings.
(2) Evidence:
I knew the students were successful through a Venn diagram comparing a personal narrative and an expository text, and through a class wide creation of a definition for "personal narrative." Some of the realizations that students made in the Venn diagram were that personal narratives describe an "experience," "what happened to the narrator really happened," "the (personal narrative) was emotional," and "it is first person." These are actual statements from the students that they noted in their Venn diagrams. This told me that a large majority of the students were grasping elements of a personal narrative. When we were done with this activity we closed by creating a student led definition of "personal narrative."
In groups they came up with ideas and shared; this is what they came up with:
· Usually true
· Meant to entertain
· Sort of like a personal biography, journal, diary
· First person
· An event from your life
· Tells the feelings
3) Reteach:
If I were to reteach for those who do not understand fully, I would bring in additional texts that would only be focused on personal narratives. Comparing two types of texts is a good idea, but it can lead to confusion if students begin to mentally combine the elements of the two types of texts. I feel that immersing the students in personal narratives that are at their reading level would solidify their understanding of what a personal narrative should sound and feel like.
(4) Extend:
I think that students who have successfully met my expectations would benefit even further by finding personal narrative examples in the world outside of school. I would look for three examples that students would find and bring into the class. The examples would have to differ from each other (for example, I would not want three emails as example, maybe an email, a letter, and a news paper clipping). I would also have them justify how their personal narrative examples come to be labeled a personal narrative.
1) Short term learning target:
Given the word two different genres of text students will find the differences and similarities between the two forms using a Venn diagram.
Given the genre “personal narrative,” students will help create a definition of the word by reporting their findings.
(2) Evidence:
I knew the students were successful through a Venn diagram comparing a personal narrative and an expository text, and through a class wide creation of a definition for "personal narrative." Some of the realizations that students made in the Venn diagram were that personal narratives describe an "experience," "what happened to the narrator really happened," "the (personal narrative) was emotional," and "it is first person." These are actual statements from the students that they noted in their Venn diagrams. This told me that a large majority of the students were grasping elements of a personal narrative. When we were done with this activity we closed by creating a student led definition of "personal narrative."
In groups they came up with ideas and shared; this is what they came up with:
· Usually true
· Meant to entertain
· Sort of like a personal biography, journal, diary
· First person
· An event from your life
· Tells the feelings
3) Reteach:
If I were to reteach for those who do not understand fully, I would bring in additional texts that would only be focused on personal narratives. Comparing two types of texts is a good idea, but it can lead to confusion if students begin to mentally combine the elements of the two types of texts. I feel that immersing the students in personal narratives that are at their reading level would solidify their understanding of what a personal narrative should sound and feel like.
(4) Extend:
I think that students who have successfully met my expectations would benefit even further by finding personal narrative examples in the world outside of school. I would look for three examples that students would find and bring into the class. The examples would have to differ from each other (for example, I would not want three emails as example, maybe an email, a letter, and a news paper clipping). I would also have them justify how their personal narrative examples come to be labeled a personal narrative.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
The group setup
This is the portable that I am in. They are super nice for portables I must admit.
This is what my class looks like with the desks in groups. Presently this is the setup.Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Class Pictures and my feelings on before & after class desk arrangement
For most the year the class desk setup has been in the rows you see in the pictures below. I felt for sixth graders this was an entrance into a more mature world. Rows of desks feel more grownup in comparison to groups of desks that often are found at the lower grade levels. The rows of desks offered individuality to the students because they were not having to share space with others. They had their desk that they could establish as their own with a creatively designed name tag and an organisation of their own accord on the inside of their desks. The rows of desks had their shortcomings: group work was cumbersome due to the arrangement, community building might have benefited slightly more with groups, and moving through the desks became an obstacle of sorts. Then one day, change came.
I came into the classroom last week and saw little poddlets of desks scattered about the room. My CT had grouped the desks. My initial reaction was, "Wow there is a lot of room." The space that was created for movement was amazing. From a teaching perspective, when I did my read-aloud, I was able to quickly move from group to group to hear what the students were discussing. This was very contradictory to the struggle of having to hurdle rows to get to student conversation. I also noticed an increase in management power. During my lesson I was able to quickly and quietly move to where some students were talking and place a, "please be quiet while I am teaching" hand on one of their desks. This would have been much more obvious of an issue to the rest of the class if I had to either say something out loud or run through the rows (which I wouldn't) to put the hand down on their desk. The negative that I noticed about this setup, so far, is that students are more likely to talk, or pass notes, or create distractions for a larger group of students easier.
I could go on and on about the benefits and negatives concerning both these setups, but I would love to hear your preference, opinion, or even suggestions. I will try and get a picture of the new arrangement. Also, what is your opinion on starting out with rows and then moving into groups, with this grade level?
I came into the classroom last week and saw little poddlets of desks scattered about the room. My CT had grouped the desks. My initial reaction was, "Wow there is a lot of room." The space that was created for movement was amazing. From a teaching perspective, when I did my read-aloud, I was able to quickly move from group to group to hear what the students were discussing. This was very contradictory to the struggle of having to hurdle rows to get to student conversation. I also noticed an increase in management power. During my lesson I was able to quickly and quietly move to where some students were talking and place a, "please be quiet while I am teaching" hand on one of their desks. This would have been much more obvious of an issue to the rest of the class if I had to either say something out loud or run through the rows (which I wouldn't) to put the hand down on their desk. The negative that I noticed about this setup, so far, is that students are more likely to talk, or pass notes, or create distractions for a larger group of students easier.
I could go on and on about the benefits and negatives concerning both these setups, but I would love to hear your preference, opinion, or even suggestions. I will try and get a picture of the new arrangement. Also, what is your opinion on starting out with rows and then moving into groups, with this grade level?
For all those that must jump through hoops.
Hoops upon Hoops
by Dr. Ookus
Hoops upon hoops hang from the sky,
dipping down… into many lives.
Some folks ignore them
Some folks deplore them
Some folks just sit down and cry.
The hoops come in sizes of small, medium and large
They get pushed out of the way, pulled down, or hit by cars
But they are always there; those hoops upon hoops, so eventually the folks will have to care
As all hope is lost
As some curl in fear
One man stands up and wipes away his tears.
He stares through the middle of a medium sized hoop, with green, glistening sparkles and solid white loops.
He takes a deep breath and bends at the knees, then leaps through the air; through the hoop, and back on his feet.
He yells at the others still curled in fear, “Jump through them! Jump through them!”
Because that’s the only way to make hoops disappear.
* (I wrote this poem to represent us college folks, and honor the creative use of words that Dr. Seuss lived by. No comments are expecte, this was just for fun.)
by Dr. Ookus
Hoops upon hoops hang from the sky,
dipping down… into many lives.
Some folks ignore them
Some folks deplore them
Some folks just sit down and cry.
The hoops come in sizes of small, medium and large
They get pushed out of the way, pulled down, or hit by cars
But they are always there; those hoops upon hoops, so eventually the folks will have to care
As all hope is lost
As some curl in fear
One man stands up and wipes away his tears.
He stares through the middle of a medium sized hoop, with green, glistening sparkles and solid white loops.
He takes a deep breath and bends at the knees, then leaps through the air; through the hoop, and back on his feet.
He yells at the others still curled in fear, “Jump through them! Jump through them!”
Because that’s the only way to make hoops disappear.
* (I wrote this poem to represent us college folks, and honor the creative use of words that Dr. Seuss lived by. No comments are expecte, this was just for fun.)
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Deflated convictions
Before I entered the classroom and met my CT for the first time, I was sure they were going to be rigorously stringent on the rules of the classroom. I thought I would go into the class, listen to the teacher tell the students what was what and who was who when it came to the rules, and then I would leave scared of breaking any of the rules my self. I mean come on, they are rowdy 6th graders...right? That was not the case. My CT was adamant about having the students brainstorm together, discuss together, and agree together on the ways in which they expected THEMSELVES to behave. I was pleased to say the least. I did not go home cowardly that day. I went home understanding that in the real world we make choices every day as to how we should properly act, why shouldn't students make those same choices in the classroom, and pin them on the wall as theirs to abide by.
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