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April 28 Lots going on....new baby, new job, new home!Alright! Things have been uber-busy for me. I had two pregnant friends back home, but as of this morning....one of the babies was born! Both baby and mom are doing well, she had to be induced so it was very anticipated. I just wish I were there to meet the new little girl. I will get to meet her in June when I go home to stay for good.
I have enjoyed my two years of teaching and learning and having my eyes opened to a different way of life, however, I miss my mommy, and my daddy, and my brother and everyone else that means a lot to me. It's time to go home.
My job hunt has not been easy. I spend approxiamately 3-7 hours a day on the internet searching school districts and job finders to see if anything new is open. At this point there are 378 school districts on my list and there are somewhere around 30 that I have not added to my list yet. Yeah, just a few to look through. Needless to say, I have not checked them all yet. There are some jobs open, and a few in a district that I would really love to work in, it is a growing area and only about 20 minutes from all the people I want to be around, so I could buy a house even!
So, that is why I have been so gosh darn busy lately...plus the fact I am working on packing also:). Ahh yes, and the other friend who is pregnant is having twins and is due in June.
Hope all is well,
Enjoy the weekend! February 17 Apparently, I suck.I got my observation write up back yesterday from the principal. Based on the paper, I totally suck as a teacher and should completely revise my way of teaching. My students in small group are just working on rhyming, which the activity I was doing was never mentioned, although it is a strategy I have been told to use. The four activities I told the rest of the class not in small groups to work on should be on a checklist to focus students (these are second graders, and I am a second year teacher - this expectation is a bit ridiculous). Many of my students were off-task and unengaged - 2 were reading (one of the assignments was to silent read for 15 minutes), several were looking around the room (one of the assignments was to write silly sentences with the word wall words, and another was to use the spelling words to create rhymes, could they possibly be looking at those words?), 5 were writing (one of the assignments was to work on a fairy tale writing of their own, could they maybe be writing this?!) and 4 were just unengaged (were they sleeping? how were they unengaged, cause the other 7 or 8 mentioned already were actually working.) And did you know that silly sentences, or sentences in general, don't really help students understand the meaning of a word? Really, cause I thought that if a person can use a word in a logical sentence they knew what the word meant. Interesting. Plus, silly sentences give students a chance to use the elements of a good sentence and make it funny. It is an activity that has been used in many K-2 classes for many years. My mom remembers both me and my brother doing those for homework, and he and I are ten years apart!
I had a couple other people look at the review just to be sure I was not blowing it out of proportion, and they could not believe the things she said about me. And the lack of information on what I was actually doing. Oh yeah, and under strengths, she put: Ms. S has a melodious reading voice. Really. I read to second graders on a daily basis, do you think I would read to them in a monotone voice? Especially since I am teaching them to be good readers? Yeah. So I suck and the only strength I have is that I can read aloud well. Go me.
Just to make the observation review even better, there were numerous spelling and grammar errors all through the typed form. She had already signed off on it, omitting the date. The sticky she put on the front of the review said for me to review and come in to discuss. Think she meant for me to review and correct her errors? I would just love to take my highlighter and green marking pen to that paper and return it to her saying, I'll sign this when it looks good. My dad said to just leave it because when it goes in my file, it will just make her look like the idiot. He's right. If I sign it at all, I do have that option, as I'm told, along with putting a rebuttal note in my file. I may take that option if my meeting with her does not go well. I think I just need the weekend to calm down and think of the best strategy to handle this without losing my cool.
Have a great weekend and enjoy the President's Day if you happen to get it off! February 11 Qualified teachersI wrote this post to a person who left a message on another site about teacher's reading stories about different ways of life. Here is the site post and the comment the person left, and then my reply, which I chose not to leave on the person's site, I felt it was a little rude and not asked for, so I kept it here.
Original post:
Parent-isms: A couple of Massachusetts parents filed a lawsuit against their children’s school district for “violating their parental rights.” The parents claim that the school is using “propaganda” to “brainwash” their children against their parents’ religious beliefs. Evidently, one couple felt “violated” when their 5 year-old son came home from kindergarten with a book featuring a gay family. The other couple felt violated when their child’s second grade teacher read King and King (fairytale about two princes who fall in love) to the class. Hello, parents! If it’s that big a deal to you, take your kids out of public schools. The public school system has a responsibility to teach diversity and acceptance of different people from different backgrounds. As John Davis, lawyer for the school district explained, "The parents do have rights ... but they don't have the right to dictate to the public school system what their children can be exposed to in the way of ideas.” If you want your kid to be a bigot, keep him at home.
Comment
I agree with you somewhat on the parent-ism. What two consenting people yada, yada, yada. Agree with all of it. I have to ask, were the parents aware they were discussing gays and gay families in school? Did they know that the books were being sent home? I ask because everything else is discussed to death ad naseum in the school why not this. They can teach about alternative life styles, but not about God. I am not a God freak, or Jesus born again. I don't think think I'm even very religious. Just whats fair is fair. Besides most of the teachers I know would have a hard time explaining why Dick and Jane have two dads or two moms. My concern is not that it is in the classroom but are the teachers qualified to teach it.
My reply that I did not post on the person's site:
Hey there, I say your comments on Jenn's space about the diversity education stuff. I teach second grade in NC in a small town. I personally love teaching about things the students don't know much about, like during the Christmas season, we do a unit called Christmas Around the World. Each teacher chooses a country and the classes rotate throughout a week between the rooms to learn from each teacher. I chose to teach about Isreal. Last year when I taught about it, a parent who came into my room saw that we were learning about Hanukkah, and she actually asked me what country that holiday originated from. I was a little shocked, especially since this person was an educator. I do agree that parents should be informed of what is being taught, but teachers do have a duty to teach about different cultures and ways of life. We also have to be sensitive to the fact that some students may have a home situation like the ones we are teaching about. Especially families where there is more than one home due to divorce or a split, or whatever the case may be. I even have some kids who are being raised by their grandfather's girlfriend. I wish we could talk about everything we do in the curriculum, but most parents don't care and most people in the government don't care as long as students make the scores they need to make. I do also make a point to talk about Jesus when cultural issues arise that involve Christianity. I also make sure other religions are represented when appropriate. I am not any more qualified than any Average Joe on the street to teach about different home situations, I personally came from a typical nuclear family with wonderful parents, who were happy to have me learn about different ways of life, so it is hard for me to understand all of the ignorance and intolerance we have in this world. I don't feel like I am qualified to teach the heavy subjects, but I do feel obligated to at least expose the students to a few different things that their parents may not, and possibly help make a more tolerant new generation. Sorry if you didn't want my two cents, but I just wanted to give it. Cape HatterasIt turns out that I live in the state with the largest lighthouse in the US. Considering I am moving back to Michigan in June, I am trying to see as much of my state as possible. So, when my neighbors said they were going to Manteo for a photo shoot, and they were going to stay in Cape Hatteras for the night, and get up to see the lighthouse in the sunrise. Bonus: if I helped her with the kids while he was doing the shoot, then they would give me a free trip besides food. So really I just had to pay for what I ate. I thought it was a great deal. It really did turn out pretty well, fights were minimal, and once I got the point across to him that sometimes his teasing goes a little too far and bothers me, it was all good. I did really want to do more walking around and looking around and stuff like that, but they are not really into that, and since they have two little kids, I didn't really want to push it. I got some awesome pictures though! And I have been to one more new place in my state. Definitely cool.
February 01 Snow DayToday was my first snow day in the south. Very interesting indeed. We started out with a 2 hour delay, which I found out about around 5pm, pretty early in my opinion. Then I woke up around 7ish and it was clear out, just a little cloudy. So I was considering taking a picture and emailing my yankee friends and family that my 2 hour delay was a false alarm. Then about 7:30 my neighbor calls me and tells me to look outside. I do and it is really starting to come down! Yay! Snow! But school was still not called off, so I decided I had better take a shower so that I could get to work around 9:30 if I still had to go. Then my neighbor calls back around 8:00 and tells me they just saw that school was definitely closed. So I decided to take my time getting ready, and I surely did. All I did most of the morning was take pictures of the snow, and videos of the snow, it was very exciting to me. I haven't seen any snow at all this winter, even when I went to Michigan for the holidays, so I had definitely been missing seeing the white stuff. So I got my fix, didn't have to scrape the car or shovel, it was pretty nice. Sadly, it was not good packing snow and since it started raining a couple hours after it started to snow, I didn't go out and build anything, not even a snow ball.
But ya know, I got enough pictures to make a really good scrapbook page:)!
Hope your day was as relaxing as mine! January 22 A Little Wine to RelaxNot that today was a tough day, but it was definitely a tiring day. I had a teacher workday on Friday and then again today. I got tons and tons done, but I am super duper tired.
We have had a thing going on since about the tenth day of school. Our second grade was overloaded, and so after the tenth day, which is official count day for us, we were able to hire a fifth teacher. She was hired some time in October and has been working since mid/late October. Well, she still does not have a classroom. Yeah. It is as sucky as it sounds. She now has a temporary classroom until things progress in the building process for her to be able to move into the room that will eventually be hers. So today she moved into her temp room and that meant that we could get the extra desks out of our rooms and move the rooms around to be more spacious. And I am loving it. I will miss the four students that are out of my room now, but I am so glad to have my room back to the way I want it. I have a round table for doing small groups, and I had to have it right close to the door so that it could be in the room and there was room for all of the student desks. Now I get to have the round table away from the door and near my Pooh Corner (my student friendly reading area - complete with pillows and Winnie the Pooh carpet), which enables me to keep a better eye on the room and what all of my students are doing.
This is so great that I was just bursting with excitement and dancing around my room. I love it!
However, after such a long and productive day, I just need to relax, sit back, watch some tv and have a glass of wine to help me unwind a bit. It seems to be working well, and I am sure that I will have a great night of sleep!
Have a great day tomorrow and a wonderful working week! January 17 Eating rightHave you ever looked at what you eat and realized that the reason your pants don't fit right is that you don't eat right? Yeah, I've been doing that. My mom recently went to a Health and Wellness class and learned a lot of things that she was doing wrong and is passing some information on to me. For example, did you know that high fructose corn syrup, or corn syrup in general, is really really bad for you? And there are several products on the market now that are corn syrup free. I recently tried whole wheat pasta, and it's not half bad, and if you look carefully you can find sauces that are corn syrup free.
My mom also told me that most people should eat 5-6 meals a day. Three balanced meals and two or three snacks. But not only do you need to eat this often, but you need to drink about 16 ounces of water with each meal, including snacks. That means one average sized water bottle with each meal! Wow, that is a lot of water. I tried it this weekend, and it really does seem to help. It makes you feel fuller and therefore you eat less, which is always good, and my pants are fitting a little bit better...which makes me feel good!
The only problem that I have is that it is very hard for me to keep up with this while I am at school. I mean, I have an assistant who can watch my class if I need to use the bathroom, but when do I have time to have a snack and drink that much water? I just don't is the answer. And to keep the water cold?! Yeah, I am about a mile away from the teacher's lounge with a fridge and I am definitely not buying a mini-fridge just for water, too expensive. So it comes down to the fact that I will need to just not have a morning snack, eat an afternoon snack during my planning time at 1:40 and then eat dinner around 5/6 at night and then have a snack again before 8:00. And drink 16 ounces of water with breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner and snack. Let's add that up: 16 + 16 = 32 + 16 = 48 + 16 = 64 + 16 = 80 ounces of water in a day...minimum! Wow, and I thought that if I was getting 32 I was doing pretty well.
I have also downsized on the types of drinks I have. For example, I used to keep juice in the house for breakfast, because I refuse to drink water for breakfast. So now I just have milk for breakfast and water all the other times and sometimes a little milk in the middle, just cause I love it. No pop (soda) and no juice, no sweet tea (sadly) and no nothin' else. Maybe a little wine here and there.
Next week I plan to implement an exercise strategy..meaning I don't exercise now and I need to start. I got one of those cool balance balls for Christmas, if only I could get up the energy to finish pumping it up! The pump it came with is worth beans...so it means I can only stand to put so much air in it at once. I also am going to count housework as exercise, so I am going to make a cleaning schedule, which I hate cleaning, but if I put on the right music I dance the whole time it's not so bad and it can become fun. Unless I get distracted too often:).
Anybody else trying to get in shape? Or change their eating patterns? Any suggestions? Or encouragement? Good luck to all of us who want to be healthy!
Smile and have a great day:). January 14 Kid MoviesYa know, I am realy glad that I am an elementary teacher, especially a 2nd grade teacher. It allows me to do childish things like watch movies called, "Ice Princess," and to color with colored pencils that have erasers, and to read kids books. I really do love that fact. Ahh yes, I also watched "Elf," "The Cat in the Hat," "The Polar Express," "The Best Christmas Pageant Ever," and "Because of Winn-Dixie" this week. Kid movies just make you feel good.
I was over at my neighbors' house the other day, and inevitably, I was playing with their two year old. He got a dump truck for his birthday a couple of months ago which is big enough for him to ride in, so he asked me to push him in it. I did for a few minutes, but got tired of it and sat down. He asked me to do it again and I grabbed it with one hand and just kind of rolled him in a circle. He said to me, "No, use two hands." I told him I didn't want to right now, maybe later. He went over to his dad, who had not heard our little conversation, and asked, "Daddy, you have two hands?" His dad replied, "Yes, I have two hands, see?" To which his son replied, "You push me with two hands, Daddy." Smart little kid. He knows how to work the system.
This week I have been working my butt off because my students really did not do well on their mid year assessments for reading, and so I decided that what I was told to do is not working, so now I am going to do it my way. I mentioned this to our Reading Coach, who checks our lesson plans and kind of keeps an eye on us, just so she would know to not expect seeing the activities from the text implemented too much in my room. Her reply was, "You're the teacher, you know what works for your students." Along with a look that said, 'I hate that book too.' I love when people agree with me and see things my way! January 06 Happy New Year!Today is: National Cuddle Up Day! Find someone or something to cuddle up with...even if it is 68 out!
It has been quite a crazy week...even though it was a short one. Basically, all my sick kids are back, after having 12 out in one day before Christmas break, and things are in a bit of a whirlwind while we all get into the swing of things again. I finally got my car back on Tuesday:). It was gone for almost a month after the transmission died on December 6th. It was quite an ordeal and rough not having a car, and made my mom really feel that I need to move back home. Which is the plan, but mothers like to say things because they just like to. I got to have a lovely party with my Michigan friends over break and it was wonderful and people actually played my Reindeer Games without too much griping. I loved being able to see everyone and their growing bellies (really only two growing bellies of my soon to be mom friends). I can't wait to see the three new babies from these two new moms! And I know the dads are excited too! This year I was able to ring in the new year with my oldie but goodie friends from Michigan, although I had to miss the Pickle Drop in Mount Olive, which was sad, cause who doesn't like free pickles and hot chocolate to go along with watching something as exciting as a 7 foot pickle dropping at like 7pm?! Yeah, it was sad. However, I did get two kisses at midnight (on the cheeck that is)! I am having a great day, cuddling up in my pj's and getting ready for a shower so that I can go to Target to pick up a few things and then do some work around the house, maybe clean up Christmas decorations, maybe just do school work, who knows! Have a great Cuddle Up Day December 05 Perfect AngelsI have wonderful students. I really do. I'm not just saying that because they are cute (although they are) and I'm not just saying that because other teachers think so. I truly know in my heart that I have wonderful, intelligent, capable students. However (you knew that was coming), they just can never shut their mouths. For example: We had library today. We go there, they turn in their books, I ask them to sit down and wait quielty until the librarian begins to read to them. Yeah, right, they can sit quietly. So they make little chatter until the librarian reads, to which about three shout-outs happen (normal - even though I give several warnings constantly, and even follow through with my behavior program). So then they are dismissed table by table to check out books. They were so talkative, I had to get up from helping students with keeping in their reading levels (so they get 'just right' books, not too easy, not too hard), and go tell the offenders that they needed to heed this warning of keeping their voices low or else they would get a check (my behavior system - parents get a calendar of how they behave daily). Needless to say, they just could not do it. They could not just get books and use whisper voices, they could not just sit at their tables for 5 minutes and read, and they could not stand up and line up quietly. Now, I am not a stickler, I let them use low voices to talk, and I have no problem with them visiting when they are not working. Yet I do have a problem when second graders just don't follow directions. I realize they are 7 and 8 years old, however, they know that they get rewarded when they do good things and they get punishments when they do not follow directions. They work towards a party as a group and towards a prize as an individual.
Also, we had a lockdown drill last week. We did a practice, and we basically had to scare the pants off of them to let them know the gravity of the situation. My assistant and I were discussing with them the fact that if they made a single noise, they could have gotten someone in our room hurt or killed. And yet, when the actual drill came up, there were talkers! How much more talkative can you get?!
Don't get me wrong, I love them, they are wonderful, and they look up to me (so I try to be positive and a good role model) yet they just can't learn how to behave in the way they need to. Hopefully they will get the idea soon and learn that life has rules, and when we follow them, good things happen to us. Maybe. December 03 Decorating!It is time to decorate! I have done my outdoor illumination and then today I am going to get a tree to decorate! I still have to get an angel as my one from last year is on my tree in my classroom. I have tried Michael's and Target, and neither had a good angel for my tree topper. So I still have to try Wal-Mart (or as some people say, "Wally World").
I just wanted to share my outdoor illumination with ya'll, so here you go!
November 21 Happy ThanksgivingHappy Thanksgiving!
I hope that everyone enjoys the holiday and gets to spend it with someone they love.
I am lucky that I will get to fly home to see my family and friends for almost 5 whole days! Sweet! I do have to come back to NC very very late on Sunday night, but hey, they are worth it. And like always, when the kids at school have not seen me for days, they will give me tons of hugs and be happy to see me. Maybe I'll even make them a Power Point of my trip since I know they would love it. And what better way to teach social studies?!
Have a good one! November 19 Cleaning DayIt is almost Thanksgiving, which means it is time to clean up so that things can get ready for Christmas! Today I am working on picking up my various messes. Luckily, although I am untidy, I have kept it to a few general areas, which means it is easy to fix. Good for me. I am currently working on the back room which is really my office, but I have trouble referring to it as my office, and tend to just say the back room. So I am cleaning the back room. Then I will move on to the living room, which is a bunch of small piles, most of which needs to go into the back room, hence the reason I am cleaning the back room first:). Then I need to clean off the kitchen counter, which serves as a pile station for mail mostly. Next, on to the kitchen table, it has all of the mail that I tried to get off of the counter, but sadly, there is just a lot of mail that I have trouble getting rid of.
Has anyone picked up on the fact that I am a packrat? Yeah, I am. A pretty bad one too. While picking up the back room I had to tell myself to think if I had ever or would ever use the thing in question of throwing out. Good thing I am capable of reasoning, cause there was a lot of junk that needed to go. I do still have some stuff to sort through, but that is just life - for me anyway:).
I am totally excited about getting decorated for Christmas! I love the decorations, the candles (well, I always have candles, but Christmas seems to allow for more), the smells, the colors, everything! And of course I can't wait to get my bonus so that I can shop for a few more decorations, that I don't really need but want, and be able to put up more stuff that celebrates this fun time of year.
I do however, have one issue with this time of year. There is a huge debate on whether to say Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays. I personally feel that either way is acceptable. When we say Happy Holidays, we are including Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, Christmas, New Year's, Channukah, Kwaanza, and any other holiday celebrated this time of year. What's wrong with that? Pretty much nothing. However, many people who live in my general vacinity feel that saying Happy Holidays is to say that Christmas is somehow diminished in relevance. If you wanna say Merry Christmas, that's fine, do what you want, however, don't forget that other people celebrate other things this time of year. Be smart, be thoughtful, be kind. If you are Christian, as most people around here are, and someone says Happy Holidays to you, don't get mad, just think - Oh yeah, they mean New Year's and Christmas and Christmas Eve. Just be polite and if you choose to say Merry Christmas in return, then do so. And if you feel offended by someone saying Merry Christmas, ignore it or reply with Happy Holidays. All of the arguing kind of ruins the spirit of the season, which is supposed to be have fun and be happy. So if you hear someone say Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays, be kind and reply any way you so choose!
Happy Holidays:). November 18 Gone a long time!I have not posted for a long time, I realize, however, I didn't have much to talk about! Lots going on, but not much to say about all of it. I currently have laryngitis so I feel the need to communicate, however it is rather annoying to both myself and the person with whom I am communicating to talk. Needless to say, my students found my voice rather amusing. One of them said, "Ms. S. you sound like a little old woman." Thanks, honey, love you too.
I did take Thursday off to rest my voice, and a darn good thing too! I went into school because I had not planned on taking the day off until just when I was getting ready in the morning, so I had no good sub plans and needed to write them up. So as I enter the building I am told to not even bother going to sign in, just to start rounding up kids in the hallway as we were under tornado watch. Sweet! So here I am, with very little voice, barely above a whisper, and trying to gather a bunch of kids and tell them to sit against the wall and assume the tornado position. You all know the one, crouch down on your knees and put your hands behind your neck. Yeah, real comfortable. Luckily they let us just have the kids sit with their backs against the wall after a few minutes, because so many of them were uncomfortable. They let students go about 30 minutes after school should have started. Then I went to the office and told the assistant principal that there was no reason for me to try to be here, and upon hearing me, she said, yeah, go home. So I signed in and out and left. Now, the very good thing about me having left considering I had no voice, is that just before my students were to go to lunch, there was another tornado watch. Yeah fun! This one lasted about 30 minutes also, from what I am told. And after that, there was pretty much no point in keeping any of the students engaged because they were just gone! My assistant said that she was to the point of giving them marbles (incentive - they work towards a party) if they were even quiet for just a couple minutes. So yeah, I can't imagine my voice even trying to recoop in that environment.
So then I return to work on Friday, and there is a nice huge cockroach laying on its back on the floor and apparently still a little bit alive as it was kicking its legs. Sweet! So I had a student go ask another teacher if she had spray, and the student came back with air freshener, which I guess was better than nothing. All I had was window cleaner. I commenced to spraying the dickens out of the rascal, had a student bring me the trashcan while I bunched up several paper towels and threw the little nasty bugger in the trash. Gross. Yeah, only the grosser thing is that later that night, I found a huge, I mean as long as my finger, cockroach walking across the side of my tub. Let me tell you, there are few things more surprising than walking in your bathroom, expecting to find it just the way you left it, and a nasty roach is crawling around. I screamed. Then got some spray from under my sink in the kitchen (which was actual ant and roach spray - has come in handy for many spiders and such) and sprayed that nasty thing into the tub, and kept on spraying until it stopped moving. And I left it there until the morning when I could handle picking it up out of the tub. So guess where I think that darn thing came from. Yep, from school. I have a cart that I carry my books and such in because it is better for my back (I'm a workaholic at times). So the cart had stayed in my classroom for a few days, and from what I was told, the exterminator came on Thursday while I was gone, and my cart was present. I feel that the roach hid out in my cart and came home with me on Friday. Gross. So now I have to have my place sprayed as you never know if the thing laid eggs or not. So that has to be taken care of.
I am also working on my quilt, and am almost halfway finished with it. It is looking pretty good too. And considering I started it about 2 years ago, it is about time that I get it finished. I would like to get it finished before the school year is done. That would be nice.
Ahh yes, and I have to clean my apartment, not only because of the bug, but because I am leaving on Wednesday to go back to Michigan for Thanksgiving, and then when I come back it will be time to get all of the Christmas decorations out and start looking for a tree and all of that wonderful stuff. I am actually getting very excited about that!
Enjoy the weekend! October 19 Mini VacationI am off to the mountains for a mini vacation with my neighbors. I am so very excited. We are leaving after school tomorrow, and it will be wonderful! I went with them last fall, and it was a super experience. He is a photographer, so he likes to get up early to get some cool shots with the morning light, and so that makes it so that I get some cool shots too! I love it. I hate getting up early, but I love that I get a chance to do something that so few people do. I can't imagine how dull my life would be if I had never moved down to NC and had the great experiences I have had. I will have some really awesome stories to tell my kids one day. Speaking of which, I need to start taking some pics of unusual things and places that I go so that I can remember them and tell people about them. I love having cool things I have done to talk about:).
Have a great weekend, and I will put some awesome mountains in the autumn pics up when I get back! October 16 It's Coooooolllllllld!Oh my goodness is it cold today! I had forgotten to do laundry this weekend, and when I remembered it was too late to have the time to take care of it before I went to bed. Therefore, I had no clean dress pants and had to wear a dress today. Okay fine, but it was freezing today! I could see my breath, and didn't expect it. It would not have been so bad, since it did warm up, however, the district has not yet decided to turn on the heat in our building. Apparently, they don't want to turn it on until November 1st. Okay, that's nice that they want to save money, however, these poor kids are sitting in their heavy coats, gloves and hats just to keep warm IN CLASS! How are the supposed to learn and focus when they are too worried about keeping warm? One parent called central office and told them that if she were to keep her house with no heat in temperatures like it was today, she would be turned over to social services. So maybe that will help and they will turn our heat on. I can't believe that with little second graders they would be so mean. Any kid should have a right to be warm at school, however, it is cold and some of my kids are skin and bones, maybe weighing 50-60 pounds (some are bigger, yes) and they just can't keep warm in this weather without a little heat.
I just have trouble believing that places that are supposed to be focused on learning can be so counterproductive...and by the administration!
I hope you all stayed warmer than I did today:). October 14 School ViolenceThere has been a lot on the news and on people's blogs about school violence. I know about school violence, I went to an 'inner city' school in middle school and high school. We were located right behind the biggest hospital in the county, sometimes we had people go to that hospital after fights because they were hurt so badly. However, that was a rare occurance. I also was a senior in high school when Columbine took place. It was scary. Some people wanted to stay home from school on a day that a hit list was supposed to be fulfilled. Or the day a bomb threat was supposed to be fulfilled. However, most of us felt that if we did so, we would not only be saying, "I don't care enough about my loved ones to be here with them and stand up with them," but that we would be supporting the person(s) who made those threats.
I'm not saying that I was not scared, I was. I was terrified. A little white girl who knew nothing personally of violence, lived in a wonderful home where my parents had 2.5 kids, a white picket fence and a wonderful marriage. I didn't understand these things. However, I did understand that if you let the violent people win, they simply continue with their plight. They feel they were justified in their actions, and see that you agree when you let them go on their merry way.
I believe that schools need to have an officer present. I feel safer when I know I can lock my classroom without having to go outside of my room to do it. I also feel safer knowing I don't have to step inside the building on my campus that is strictly for 5th-8th grades unless I want to. I love that I teach second grade and that they love me and want me to love them. When do kids lose that feeling of wanting to be loved? Oh yeah, they don't. It's just not cool for your 6th grade or higher teacher to tell you, "I love you and I'm proud of you." Why is that uncool? Why is that worse than coming to school and beating the snot out of someone who called your momma fat, and then everyone on campus is afraid of you and so leaves you alone? And if an officer were on campus and had the authority to cuff you and haul you off, would such a student risk the behavior mentioned above?
Sadly, I don't feel very safe at my school. I had a student last year who's mother was known to have shot at a school bus and threatened a teacher (not at our school, but at a prior school her children went to). I didn't find that out until I had already met the mother and deduced that she was clinically ill from one conversation. How do you think it felt to know that I had to keep my clasroom door locked because I was afraid of this mother? It was awful! I hated to be scared of a woman I barely knew for reasons unknown to me. Plus, this poor little girl needed to be loved, so badly, yet at times I second guessed myself because the girl was a liar. She might go home on a day I was upset with her for doing something wrong (such as stealing, which she was guilty of) and tell her mother I falsely accused her. When would her mother do then? Should I fear for my life?
However, if we had an officer on campus, I would feel like I could bring these issues to the person's attention and they could deal with the issue, or at least bring me peace of mind knowing that they are aware of who to look for and what behaviors she is capable of. And considering we have almost 900 students on campus and close to 100 staff members, don't you think we have a right to want a little protection? I certainly do. October 10 Silly KidsI have some pretty funny kids. For example, they just expect you to know what they want and when they want it, even though they never seem to know what you want and when you want it, even when you tell them. Like today, one of my little angels came up to me with a huge grin on his face - you know the kind, the one where you basically think "What have you done now?" Well, he comes up to me with this grin, and pretty much acts like I know why he's there. I of course have no clue. So I ask, "What?" Bigger grin. So I ask again, "What's going on, C?"
And he says, you wanted to see me. I give him a clueless look while I search my brain to think of whether or not I did call him over (which is possible) and why I would have done so. He then elaborates that there was a sticky note in his reading folder that said for him to see me about his reading log and filling in all of the boxes. I finally figured out that what he was talking about was from three weeks ago and that he had just finally gotten the clue to come see me about it. Strange, when I want something from him, he does it in his own slow time. Yet when he wants something from me, I had better know what it is!  Such is the life of working with little kids....but you know I love it!
October 08 To Do ListHere is a list I found on another blog (I'm sorry, I can't remember which one!) and I thought it was very interesting. All of the ones I have done, I have put in yellow text, and the ones that I would like to do are in green text. It is very interesting some of the things I have done that I never thought about, and then the things that I would like to do! 01. Bought everyone in the bar a drink
September 30 Birthday!Yesterday was my birthday, and it was a great one! First of all, I flew back to Michigan on Thursday night so that I could spend this birthday with my family and friends. So I had yesterday off from school, got to go shopping (Victoria's Secret, with my two coupons - got a new bra, free panties and some more body spray:)!), and got a new candle because my mom had coupons at Yankee Candle. And both of my parents took the day off, so we had lunch together. So that was awesome. Then I got to go on a date, and I ended up staying the night, but I was a good girl, nothing naughty happened. And then I went to breakfast this morning with a bunch of friends. Yahoo for me! It was great. And my date got me a birthday gift - A Light in the Attic, by none other than Shel Silverstein - my favorite author! Which he did not even know, it was just a lucky guess. And he gave me 50 hugs, because when he asked what I might want, I said a hug, and he was like, sweet, I can afford that! But then later in the conversation I said something to the effect of, "Did I say one hug, 'cause I meant 50." So he actually gave me 50 Hershey's hugs, how sweet is that?! Yeah, he's great.
So, today I get to have lunch with my brother, and parents, and then cake with them, and most likely my grandparents too. And then dinner with my friends and hanging out afterward and then tomorrow has not yet been planned, but I fly out to go back to NC around 2:00 pm. So, a very busy weekend, but definitely worth it:)!
I hope everyone out there is having a great day and enjoying the weekend:)! |
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