When the Classroom Feels Crazy and the Teacher Feels Crazy...

Just when I thought student teaching at Bales couldn't get any crazier, it did. Monday was, by far, the hardest day of student teaching yet. Going to school on Monday, I was not in a very good mood and teaching when you do not feel very happy is tough. As I mentioned in my last post, I am now sharing a classroom with Mrs. Bjorklund. We did not really get to organize much since she left early on that Friday which means that the classroom was total chaos on Monday. Plus, I finally took over the homeroom on Monday and the kids normally just socialize during that time. However, I really want to do other things with them during homeroom, but is going to be a bit of a process to get them to adjust to how I think homeroom should run. Needless to say, homeroom on Monday did not go according to plan.

Since homeroom was a bit of a disaster, this then carried over into first hour. It is difficult to expect the students not act crazy when the classroom feels crazy and the teacher feels crazy. However,  I still had things I needed to teach and stuff we needed to accomplish, but it was next to impossible to get anything done. Basically, by the end of the first hour I was beyond frustrated and in a completely awful mood. Thankfully, I was able to go have a nice cry in Jodi's office and she helped a lot. During the afternoon class, it started out really rough and I yelled at them; I really am not much of a yeller, but I had absolutely zero patience and did not know what else to do. Thankfully, Jodi came a little bit into class and helped me straighten things out. We had a talk with them (including me apologizing for being a in a bad mood and yelling at them/being part of the problem) and I genuinely believe they felt bad.

I was telling Katie about my day after school and she said something that made me feel a bit better. I was telling her how I knew part of the students' bad behavior was my fault and part of it was their fault. She told me that it takes some teachers years to realize that their attitude and behavior can be part of the problem with the students. It seemed really natural to me to realize that since I was in a bad mood, I was affecting the students. It always makes me feel better when I seem to be doing and realizing things that teachers who are far more experienced cannot seem to grasp.

The next day things were much better. However, it is a little bit frustrating that they seemed to lose a lot of their personality after getting in trouble. Another teacher told me that she often finds you can let them behave inappropriately and keep the personality or you can get them to behave but lose personality. Jodi seems to think that their personality will come back with a little bit of time and I think I agree with her. By the end of the week, they were still behaving well (with the exception of Thursday when they had a sub, but more on that in a minute) and we were able to have a bit of fun too.

On Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday I spent nearly all of my time that I was not teaching in the main office helping to prepare for the state audit of ELD (English Language Development). There are a lot of different requirements for students who have not tested proficient in English and there is a ton of paperwork that goes along with it. So, I went through a lot of student files checking to make sure they had their paperwork completed and in the correct folder. It was a pretty tedious and boring project, but, again I was glad I could help. The state visited on Thursday when I was gone and we will not know if we passed or failed until later.

On Thursday, I went to training for Language! (or LangBang as we have nicknamed it), which is a core replacement program. We are soon going to be implementing this in our school for our ELD, special ed, and fall far below (failing the state test) students who need really need extra help with reading, writing, and language. The program actually seems pretty good and could be really effective for these students. It not really something I think I would like teaching because it is sooooo scripted, but if it helps my students, then I am for it.

As I mentioned above, my students had a sub on Thursday since I was gone (Mrs. Bjorkland too). I was worried about leaving them because I knew they probably were not going to behave well for the sub and there were some things I really wanted to teach on Thursday that the sub would not be able to do. Honestly, it is much easier to just teach than prepare for a sub; I feel like I lost a whole day of important instruction. The sub did leave a bad report and on Friday I had to have another discussion with my students. I am worried they are going to start hating me, but they know that their behavior for the sub was truly unacceptable.

There are only two more weeks until the end of the quarter, beginning of fall break, and my much anticipated (week long) return to Cornell. Also, this is my last week living with Katie; I am going to move on Saturday to stay with Julia (a 1st and 2nd ELD teacher at my school) for the rest of my time. She lives in Phoenix so it will be nice to live a bit closer to things like Target and Starbucks.

Egg Propaganda and The Twilight Zone

This was probably the most exhausting week of student teaching thus far. First, the week felt slightly off since we did not really have school last week and getting back into the swing of things was difficult. On Monday, I started taking over the afternoon class, which I am pretty happy about. I believe I have mentioned a few times how much of a struggle time is and having more time with the students is definitely a good thing. However, behavior is a real problem in the afternoon. When I get them, they have just come from recess, lunch, and specials, meaning they are pretty wound up. Plus, they are not really accustomed to having me in the afternoon and are struggling a bit to remember our expectations are the same for both the morning and afternoon classes.

On Thursday, we took all of the junior high girls to an assembly at the high school called "Tomorrow's Winners." They started this program last year and basically it is all about empowering young girls to become future leaders. I was pretty excited about this because Jodi told me that they were really good last year and the girls really liked them. Plus, this sort of thing is something I am really passionate about would like to be a part of something similar in the future. However, with all of this build up, I was severely disappointed. The first 3/4ths of it was fine; it could have been better, but it was tolerable. However, the last presenter made me want to dig my eyes out with spoons (to borrow a phrase from Jodi). She was the owner of Hickman's Eggs and it, quite literally, was 45 minutes of egg propaganda mixed with support of the Republican party/ideals. The only thing remotely empowering was the fact that company was started by women; I am guessing that this lady has donated money to the organization that hosts Tomorrow's Winners because I do not know why else she would be allowed to present. Plus, Jodi told me that she presented last year as well, meaning my 8th grade girls have heard this lady, not once, but twice.

Friday was, by accident, my first day of teaching all of the classes. The day started with Mrs. Bjorklund moving all of her stuff into our (Jodi and me) classroom. Why would three teachers be sharing a classroom? Well, to make a long story short, Options (the behavior kids that are not in a normal classroom) needed an extra classroom. Since Jodi and I only teach part of the day, it made sense for Mrs. Bjorklund to move in with us and the 8th grade math teacher to move into Mrs. Bjorklund's old classroom. Then, the Options kids get the old math teacher's room. Needless to say, this whole process is pretty frustrating and stressful for everyone involved; I am just glad that Jodi and I did not have to move. She has been teaching 25 years meaning she has a lot of stuff in her classroom.

So, Jodi and I taught our morning class as usual and Mrs. Bjorklund's second class comes in after that. She was feeling pretty stressed with the move and just intended to show them a movie for the day. Jodi offered that I could help her since I was available and I will be teaching this kids eventually anyway. Therefore, we just decided I would teach all the morning classes the same thing I did for my own class. About ten minutes into class number two, Jodi comes back and says she needs to talk to both of us for a minute. As it turns out, Mrs. Bjorklund's son has been puking at pre-school and she needs to go pick him up. Now, I am not just helping with the morning classes, but I am teaching all the classes all day. Wow. I thought I would have a little more notice and more of a plan before I was teaching all day by myself, but you know, it honestly could have gone much worse than it did.

All of the morning classes watched an episode of The Twilight Zone called “Talking Tina.” We stopped the video every few minutes and let the students write predictions about what they thought would happen next in the show. The students were very engaged and really seemed to enjoy it, despite how incredibly creepy the doll is in the show. In the afternoon, all of the classes took their vocabulary test.  In the class I normally teach, my students then worked in groups of four writing a paragraph describing a cheeseburger. They were told to describe it as if it was the best burger they ever had; someone else is going to read them and decide which one is best. The winners will receive ding dongs on Monday. In the other two classes, we stared working on adjectives and went over the "helpful hints" handout that we have for each part of speech. Then, they wrote five adjectives describing themselves and the rest of the class guessed who it was.  Thankfully, I had already taught my class about adjectives earlier in the week and did the same activity with them, so I did not have to do anything new.

There were definitely behavior problems, but nothing that got too out of control. I also struggled because I only knew a few names in each class, which makes it hard to teach at this point in the year. Overall, I would say it was pretty successful for my first day and without much notice. However, at the end of the day, I was completely exhausted. I was already wiped from the rest of the week and this just took everything I had left. I completely crashed at home after school and basically laid around the house all of Friday night.

Oh, I know I mentioned in my last post that I was going to be going to the high school for a day for observation, but the plans fell through. Hopefully, I will get to go there soon and meet some of the high school students and teachers.

On Saturday, Fred (our principal) had a gathering at his house for all of the teachers and anyone they wanted to bring. I went with Katie and we had a really good time. There was a lot of great food and it was fun socializing outside of school with my co-workers. It is still weird to be on the "teacher" side of things, but I am adjusting. Today, Katie and I went to see Easy A. I definitely recommend it- it was so good. I had really high expectations for it and it exceeded them.

On another note, only three weeks until fall break and I will be back at Cornell for one week. I am really missing my friends and life at Cornell right now. I am learning a lot while being out here, but I am really not ready to give up my college kid life just yet. Looking forward to getting back to "normal" for a little while and not thinking about teaching. I think it will be just what I need to give me the energy for the rest (and most difficult part) of my student teaching.

Are you sure you don't want a jacket?

Last Monday we did not have school; I honestly forgot that most places get national holidays off! It was beautiful having a three day weekend, especially knowing that all the Cornellians were in class. However, I would rather have a block break than national holidays. Anyway, Katie and I went on a little shopping excursion for the day, most importantly to Ikea. I have a small obsession with Ikea/furniture stores in general, so even though we did not need to buy anything, we spent a long amount of time just wandering. It was really nice to have the day to do whatever we wanted and not worry about school.

As I mentioned in my last post, the junior high students went on a trip to Sky-Y Camp in Prescott, AZ from Tuesday to Thursday. Overall, it was a really successful event and I am glad I went! However, there were definitely some issues, mostly dealing with organization. There was not really a clear lead teacher for the trip which meant that communication failed at certain points. For example, the drive to Prescott was supposed to take us about 2 hours. Unfortunately, we went to the wrong camp at first and doubled our drive time. Surprisingly, the girls on our bus were really well behaved (even without a bathroom break!) and did not complain too much. The teachers seemed to be a bit more annoyed than the students did.

When we finally arrived at camp, we ate lunch, unpacked, and then started our activities. Mr. Forni, a fourth grade teacher that went to help chaperone, and I were in charge of a group of 15 students. Our first activity involved a few different team building things that were designed to help the kids to communicate properly. A few were effective and a few were not. The teachers were instructed to not help the students at all sot hey could really "self-discover." This was really frustrating for me because I have done a lot of these kinds of activities before and I could see where they were not being effective. However, I kept my mouth shut as I was instructed. It was really great in the end when they were successful on the see-saw. Essentially, there was a large square see-saw that the entire team had to stand on and make it balance. The trick was that when one person got on the edges could not touch the ground or else they had to start over. They did a really great job at this event and I was very proud of them!

On Wednesday, we had two really physical events and two team building events. The physical events were the high ropes course and the rock wall. I am quite proud because I completed both high ropes courses and climbed the 50 foot rock wall (I do not have pictures from the rock wall)! Plus, it was really great seeing the kids over come their fears and complete the courses. These two things were definitely a highlight of the whole trip.

Climbing the pole

Mr. Forni and me about to embark on our high ropes journey.

Going across the lily pads; this was definitely the hardest part!

High ropes course 1 (a little lower than the above pictures)

Jodi overcoming her fear of heights and totally killing the ropes course!

Beautiful view in Prescott.

That night we had a campfire, some skits, and s'mores. All of the day time activities were really fun, but staying over night with a bunch of junior high students is not necessarily my favorite thing. Thankfully, my girls actually wanted to go to sleep at night, however, it was really strange being responsible for them at night. I was the one who was actually supposed to know what was going on and where they were supposed to be at what times. I still have not totally adjusted to being an "authority figure" and this was a new level of that. Plus, there were a lot of woods around the camp and a few girls in my cabin that were definitely attempting to meet up with their boyfriends in the woods. I think we avoided any late night meetings, but, as Jodi says, we will find out in June if this true or not. I felt a bit like a mother a few times because girls would ask me if they could go shower and I also had a few girls leave without jackets. I felt just like my mother as I said, "Are are you sure you don't want a jacket? It is going to get cold." Speaking of weather, that was also a really great part of camp. It is still really hot in Buckeye (getting better but not fall weather), but since Prescott is farther north and in the mountains, it was much cooler there. It was really great being able to wear jeans and a hoody without dying and sweating profusely.

We drove back to school Thursday (without getting lost) and, thankfully, we let the kids go early and we got to leave early too. We were all completely exhausted and it was pointless to stay at school anyway. Friday was a bit of superfluous day to a certain extent; everyone was pretty checked out and there was no point in teaching any content on that day. However, did have to take a district benchmark writing test. The test was supposed to be taken on Wednesday, but we were obviously gone and took it on Friday instead. Basically, the students are given a writing prompt and must write (including a pre-write, draft, and final copy) in one sitting. This test is given a few times throughout the year to help measure their growth. However, the truly silly thing about this test is that the first one (the one we just completed) is a narrative. They do not write a narrative at any other point making it impossible to measure to their growth. When each prompt is a different genre how are we supposed to compare them? Not to mention the fact that this test is required by the district, but the district does absolutely nothing with the data. In fact, they never even see the completed tests.

This week I am picking up the afternoon class (started today, but I will save that for next weeks post) and will be visiting the high school all day on Friday. Hopefully it will be a good week!

DIBELS and a Fifth Grade Guido

I spent a lot of time this week doing extra work that others teachers did not have time to complete. A I spent a large amount of time working DIBELS tests. DIBELS (Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills) is a reading test that is taken three times a year to measure students' growth in grades K-6. Even though I am working with 8th grade, I found myself grading numerous DIBELS tests simply because I am an extra pair of hands and other teachers did not have time to grade them. After grading, I also alphabetized and made sure that we had all the tests for all of the students. Even though this was a pretty tedious job, I am glad I could help because it would have taken a lot more time if I had not been there.

I often find myself wondering how teachers can ever get all of their work done; there is always so much to do! I feel like they need to hire someone to do just the extra stuff that teachers do not really have time for, but need to get done anyway. Of course, with budget cuts and everything, this will never ever happen.

On Friday afternoon, I was volunteered to watch a fifth grade classroom because the teacher needed to work on ILLPs (Individual Language Learning Plan). An ILLP is basically like an IEP for students who are learning English. I was told to take each class to the library, they would read, and that would be it. However, it was not nearly that easy.  The students were awful: they would not listen and just kept talking throughout most of the class. Again, it reaffirmed my choice in being a secondary major. A fun bit of side information: there is a fifth grader who is a total guido. He has hair kind of like Pauly D's and was wearing an Ed Hardy style shirt. Seeing him almost made the whole afternoon worth it.

As far teaching this week, there is nothing too eventful to report. Jodi was actually here all week; I think a curriculum developer had an apoplexy (vocab word!) somewhere when they realized they did not send her to any training all week. Since she was here, she did about half of the teaching, which was fine. That will probably be her last week to get any significant amount of teaching because in two weeks I will be taking over full time.

Next Tuesday (no school Monday!), the 7th and 8th graders are going on a trip to Sky-Y, which is a leadership camp in northern AZ. This is not just a day trip though; we leave Tuesday afternoon and do not return until Thursday at 3pm. This means that I will be sleeping in cabins with junior high girls for two nights. I am kind of excited for the leadership activities, but the sleeping situation does not sound nearly as thrilling. At the very least I will have some good stories to blog about.