At our school, the morning announcements are shown on television. Various students anchor the broadcast, reading the important events of the day to students and staff, leading us in the Pledge of Allegiance, and directing us to observe the state mandated minute of silence. From time to time, they will have a guest, for example the principal, the IB Coordinator, or a student involved in some activity. They do a nice job, but it can be a little dry, and last year I noticed that not many of my homeroom students were paying attention. Of course I put a quick stop to any talking or whispering, but it's impossible to force someone to focus on something, and who wants a fight like that first thing in the morning, anyway?
My response was to start calling the announcements "my favorite show" as in, Yay! It's time for my favorite show! or Hey! Pay attention! You're totally missing my favorite show! Of course they rolled their eyes at me, but I didn't stop when it was over. Wow! Did you hear that! The boys basketball team won! AND, they have practice this afternoon! Gosh I love that show! Don't you? Soon, the kids started watching the announcements just so they could make fun of my favorite show. It was excellent!
I started that routine again today with my new students. Obviously, they don't know me yet, and as soon as the announcements were over, one of them turned to me with concern. "So what's your second favorite show?" he asked.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Getting to Know You
One of the goals of the first day of school is always to get to know the students in some way. Over the years I have planned many different activities to help everyone feel a little more at home in our class. A tried and true method is to have each student share one thing about themselves as I take roll, but some kids don't enjoy being put on the spot like that-- I was one of those kids myself, and I still kind of hate having to share personal stuff in a meeting or class.
So with that in mind I devised an alternate approach. Rather than have the student tell me something, I told them I would guess a few things about them that they could either confirm or correct. I was like Professor Marvel in The Wizard of Oz. Spying a new binder and matching pencil pouch, I would confidently declare, Your favorite color is purple! The tall kids usually got, You play basketball! And, playing the odds, many kids heard, Your favorite subject is math! or Your favorite song this summer was California Gurls! Amazing!
Soon I branched out a bit in my predictions.
Me: You have an annoying... hamster!
Student: Close.
Me: Brother?
Student: Yes!
Me: When you grow up you want to be a professional... accountant!
Student: Football player.
Me: Are you sure?
Of course I was wrong as often as I was right, but then the kids just laughed at how ridiculous it would be if pizza was their favorite food instead of sushi, or if they had gone to the beach instead of NYC on vacation, and when the day was through, we ended up learning a lot about each other.
So with that in mind I devised an alternate approach. Rather than have the student tell me something, I told them I would guess a few things about them that they could either confirm or correct. I was like Professor Marvel in The Wizard of Oz. Spying a new binder and matching pencil pouch, I would confidently declare, Your favorite color is purple! The tall kids usually got, You play basketball! And, playing the odds, many kids heard, Your favorite subject is math! or Your favorite song this summer was California Gurls! Amazing!
Soon I branched out a bit in my predictions.
Me: You have an annoying... hamster!
Student: Close.
Me: Brother?
Student: Yes!
Me: When you grow up you want to be a professional... accountant!
Student: Football player.
Me: Are you sure?
Of course I was wrong as often as I was right, but then the kids just laughed at how ridiculous it would be if pizza was their favorite food instead of sushi, or if they had gone to the beach instead of NYC on vacation, and when the day was through, we ended up learning a lot about each other.
Monday, September 6, 2010
Annual Insomnia
I can never sleep the night before school starts. No matter how well prepared I feel for the next day, my rest is restless at best, and I always wake in the middle of the night, my mind spinning anxiously, my heart beating along. I can already tell that this year will not be an exception.
In an email from college, my nephew asked if I was ready to go back. No, but I'm ready to be back.It's the transition that does me in. My only consolation is that I know I'll sleep well tomorrow night.
In an email from college, my nephew asked if I was ready to go back. No, but I'm ready to be back.It's the transition that does me in. My only consolation is that I know I'll sleep well tomorrow night.
Sunday, September 5, 2010
The Neighbors WIll Hear
One thing about the place where I live is that there's not a lot of open window weather; usually it's either too hot or too cold. I'm sure the building has something to do with it-- constructed in the mid-80s, the jigsaw design of the units offers the illusion of privacy, but the trade-off may have been that there was not a lot of attention paid to cross-breezes and natural ventilation in these townhouse-style condos.
Tonight is one of those rare times when we and many of our fellow residents have thrown open our windows and doors to welcome the first burst of cool, fresh, pre-autumn air. As I sat on my stoop grilling a couple of chops for our dinner, I could hear the sounds of my neighbors float through the courtyard. A child practiced piano; a couple chatted as they did the dishes; a commercial promised convenience and service; a dad announced that bedtime was coming.
Privacy? Oh, that was totally out the window, but the undeniable sense of belonging to a community completely made up for it.
Tonight is one of those rare times when we and many of our fellow residents have thrown open our windows and doors to welcome the first burst of cool, fresh, pre-autumn air. As I sat on my stoop grilling a couple of chops for our dinner, I could hear the sounds of my neighbors float through the courtyard. A child practiced piano; a couple chatted as they did the dishes; a commercial promised convenience and service; a dad announced that bedtime was coming.
Privacy? Oh, that was totally out the window, but the undeniable sense of belonging to a community completely made up for it.
Saturday, September 4, 2010
PIPs
At the open house the other night, I saw a former student who is now in eighth grade. She had been tapped to serve as one of our school's "Ambassadors," eighth graders who welcome guests and guide them through the building when they visit.
This particular kid had been an avid reader when she was in my class, and so I asked her if she'd had a chance to read the third book in The Hunger Games trilogy. She told me that she hadn't even read the second book, yet, so before the night was over, she ducked into my room and grabbed the book from my class library. The next day, I found it on my desk with a note-- Loved it! Can't wait for the next one! I know she'll be by before school starts on Tuesday morning to borrow that next book, and that kind of stuff always makes me smile, because I like being part of a community of readers and writers, and I love helping kids get their hands on books they want to read.
Last week we heard through the grapevine that our school system is implementing a policy that forbids teachers from having non-school-issued furnishings in their classrooms. Couches, rockers, bean bags, pillows, and their like will have to be removed. Such a rule bothers me, because beyond making me get rid of the ways I have personalized the room for my students, it smacks of other changes to come. How long will it be before teachers are not allowed to have any books that aren't issued by the school system in their rooms, either?
This particular kid had been an avid reader when she was in my class, and so I asked her if she'd had a chance to read the third book in The Hunger Games trilogy. She told me that she hadn't even read the second book, yet, so before the night was over, she ducked into my room and grabbed the book from my class library. The next day, I found it on my desk with a note-- Loved it! Can't wait for the next one! I know she'll be by before school starts on Tuesday morning to borrow that next book, and that kind of stuff always makes me smile, because I like being part of a community of readers and writers, and I love helping kids get their hands on books they want to read.
Last week we heard through the grapevine that our school system is implementing a policy that forbids teachers from having non-school-issued furnishings in their classrooms. Couches, rockers, bean bags, pillows, and their like will have to be removed. Such a rule bothers me, because beyond making me get rid of the ways I have personalized the room for my students, it smacks of other changes to come. How long will it be before teachers are not allowed to have any books that aren't issued by the school system in their rooms, either?
Friday, September 3, 2010
Oppositional
... and a couple of last marathon meetings (with fire alarm tests included) to end the week. It wears you down, that it does. I tried to make the best of the situation this morning by searching for the best metaphorical description of the alarm sound, "cicada from hell" was my favorite, and then by counting the earsplitting bursts in an attempt to find some pattern to the maddening din.
Of course I was hanging on the talking points of every presenter, too. Don't worry, friends, I did not miss a single word of that 2 1/2 hour meeting. I'll prove it: At about two hours in the principal went through a list of thirteen procedural items that were deemed so important that we had to initial a staff roster to verify that we had been there for her presentation. (Way more on the procedural trends later-- I'm just not ready to write about them, yet. It's that bad.) When she got to the part where we weren't allowed to use our smart phones to access any social networking sites during the contract day, I flipped my iPhone on and punched the facebook app, something I have never done at school before.
Had I not been distracted by an alarm or some other nonsense, I might have even posted an update: Missing: Two hundred and fifty work hours, value at least five thousand dollars. If found, please return to the students of our school system.
Of course I was hanging on the talking points of every presenter, too. Don't worry, friends, I did not miss a single word of that 2 1/2 hour meeting. I'll prove it: At about two hours in the principal went through a list of thirteen procedural items that were deemed so important that we had to initial a staff roster to verify that we had been there for her presentation. (Way more on the procedural trends later-- I'm just not ready to write about them, yet. It's that bad.) When she got to the part where we weren't allowed to use our smart phones to access any social networking sites during the contract day, I flipped my iPhone on and punched the facebook app, something I have never done at school before.
Had I not been distracted by an alarm or some other nonsense, I might have even posted an update: Missing: Two hundred and fifty work hours, value at least five thousand dollars. If found, please return to the students of our school system.
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Good Night Bad Day
In his latest piece for The New Yorker, David Sedaris makes the observation that when certain misfortunes befall you (in his case complications regarding air travel) it seems like a national tragedy that everyone should know about, and "only when it happens to someone else do you realize what a dull story it is." That's good advice coming from a master storyteller.
I'm going to risk it anyway and take a few paragraphs to describe how awful our day at school was today. We are still in preservice, working in our classrooms and meeting with colleagues to prepare for the students' first day next Tuesday. As I've mentioned before, our school is at the end of a year-long update which has entailed all sorts of outrageous inconvenience for every staff member in the building for what is, in my opinion, very little improvement. The project was supposed to be finished as of last Monday, but like the vast majority of renovations, the contract ran over.
The punch list is extensive: the a/c has been sporadic, which we have dealt with; yesterday the power went on and off at least half a dozen times, which was kind of a nuisance, especially if anyone was trying to work on the computer, but today, today was the day when they were testing the new fire alarm system, ALL DAY.
What does that mean, you wonder? It means flashing strobe lights and ear splitting alarms at unpredictable intervals five or six times an hour from 9 to 3. The lunch break only made it worse; just when you felt like you were recovering from the traumatic ordeal, it started again without warning. I'm not exaggerating when I say that the experience could have been modified and used as torture. Physically and psychologically it was so draining that I honestly can't believe they allowed the testing to go on in an occupied building. We should have left, but there's too much to be done to get ready for the kids.
And bless their hearts, it was the kids who came to my rescue tonight. We had our open house for sixth graders from 6:30-7:30, and when I left school at 4, returning to that building was the last thing I wanted to do. I had to, though, and it was still with a bit of a headache that I dragged myself into the theater at 6:25, but there must be something magical about eleven year old energy-- by the time I waved good bye to the last family, and for the first time since June, I had my teacher groove on, and I felt completely revived and excited about the new school year.
I'm going to risk it anyway and take a few paragraphs to describe how awful our day at school was today. We are still in preservice, working in our classrooms and meeting with colleagues to prepare for the students' first day next Tuesday. As I've mentioned before, our school is at the end of a year-long update which has entailed all sorts of outrageous inconvenience for every staff member in the building for what is, in my opinion, very little improvement. The project was supposed to be finished as of last Monday, but like the vast majority of renovations, the contract ran over.
The punch list is extensive: the a/c has been sporadic, which we have dealt with; yesterday the power went on and off at least half a dozen times, which was kind of a nuisance, especially if anyone was trying to work on the computer, but today, today was the day when they were testing the new fire alarm system, ALL DAY.
What does that mean, you wonder? It means flashing strobe lights and ear splitting alarms at unpredictable intervals five or six times an hour from 9 to 3. The lunch break only made it worse; just when you felt like you were recovering from the traumatic ordeal, it started again without warning. I'm not exaggerating when I say that the experience could have been modified and used as torture. Physically and psychologically it was so draining that I honestly can't believe they allowed the testing to go on in an occupied building. We should have left, but there's too much to be done to get ready for the kids.
And bless their hearts, it was the kids who came to my rescue tonight. We had our open house for sixth graders from 6:30-7:30, and when I left school at 4, returning to that building was the last thing I wanted to do. I had to, though, and it was still with a bit of a headache that I dragged myself into the theater at 6:25, but there must be something magical about eleven year old energy-- by the time I waved good bye to the last family, and for the first time since June, I had my teacher groove on, and I felt completely revived and excited about the new school year.
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