Last Blog

For my last blog I wanted to share this with you all. This was sent to me in an e-mail and do not know the author:

The dinner guests were sitting around the table discussing life.

One man, a CEO, decided to explain the problem with education.
He argued,'What's a kid going to learn from someone who decided his best option in life was to become a teacher?'

He reminded the other dinner guests what they say about teachers: 'Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach.
'

To stress his point he said to another guest; 'You're a teacher, Mary. Be honest.
What do you make?'

Mary, who had a reputation for honesty and frankness replied, 'You want to know what I make? (She paused for a second, then began...)

'Well, I make kids work harder than they ever thought they could.


I make a C+ feel like the Congressional Medal of Honor.


I make kids sit through 40 minutes of class time when their parents can't make them sit for 5 without an I Pod, Game Cube or movie rental.


You want to know what I make?' (She paused again and looked at each and every person at the table.
)

I make kids wonder.


I make them question.


I make them apologize and mean it.


I make them have respect and take responsibility for their actions.


I teach them to write and then I make them write. Keyboarding isn't everything.


I make them read, read, read.


I make them show all their work in math. They use their God-given brain, not the man-made calculator.


I make my students from other countries learn everything they need to know in English, while preserving their unique cultural identity.


I make my classroom a place where all my students feel safe.


I make my students stand, placing their hand over their heart to say the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag, One Nation Under God, because we live in the United States of America.


Finally, I make them understand that if they use the gifts they were given, work hard, and follow their hearts, they can succeed in life.


(Mary paused one last time and then continued.
)

'Then, when people try to judge me by what I make, with me knowing money isn't everything, I can hold my head up high and pay no attention because they are ignorant... You want to know what I make?

I MAKE A DIFFERENCE. What do you make Mr.
CEO?'

Time is flying by

I cannot believe that I have been teaching for almost 1/2 the year! It has just flown by! So much has happened and changed in a few months! I wish that time would slow down, so I could enjoy it more. I feel I always running around and working on something. It is funny that this time last year, I was so bored, and now there are not enough hours in the day. Now that I am getting older, I have a feeling that a lot of things are going to start happening and going by so fast, I wont know what hit me. I cannot wait to see what the future has in store for me!

Gingerbread houses!

So, I waited last minute to hot glue the graham crackers onto my milk cartons! We are making these things tomorrow! I ran out of hot glue, and still have 8 more to make! My hand is killing me. I have to wait until tomorrow to make the rest of the houses. I learned to lessons! 1. It takes a lot of hot glue to make a gingerbread house. 2. Next year, I am not making them!

Diversity and the Holidays

With all of the holidays coming up, it is very important for teachers to be sensitive and aware of them. I believe it is important to discuss not only Christmas, but also Hanukkah and Kwanzaa. The students I teach are a very diverse group. It  has been fun to set up days where parents come in and discuss their different traditions and beliefs. Not only is it fun, but very educational. Students need to be aware of the diversity of others. I am also trying to create traditions to do with my students every year. We are making ginger bread houses so far. Are their any traditions that you do in your classroom that you would like to share?

Test

I have started to make my own quizzes and test. Every time I have used a language arts test from the book my students completely bomb it. The directions are confusing and some of the answers are hard for me to figure out. I do not understand this. There was even a question on one test that had nothing to do with the concept it was supposed to be measuring. Do you think it is better to make your own test or use test from the books. I think it is good to use both. I actually use some questions from the book test, when creating my own test. I just make them more kid friendly.

Pay Day

I just found out that we get paid on December 17th this month. I have mixed feelings about this. It is great because I will have extra cash to go shopping with for Christmas and after Christmas specials. But it also makes me nervous. I have been putting a lot of money into savings, so I can pay back my loan for my masters. However, I really like to shop when I am bored. Which I will be over the break, because I am ahead with my lesson plans. I am very scared I am going to get comfortable thinking. "What is five more dollars, I have plenty of money now." Which might keep happening over and over. Then I will be broke and I will not have enough money in my checking to last until the end of January. Please keep your fingers crossed that I will have self control over the Holidays! :)

First Teacher Evaluation

I had my first teacher evaluation last week. The moment I saw the principal walk in with all of her stuff, my stomach fell to the floor. It was actually a wonderful lesson to have observed! I was teaching about how the holiday, Thanksgiving, began. Not the first dinner, but the woman who kept writing letters to different Presidents to make Thanksgiving made an actual holiday. We also discussed how the President gets to pardon a turkey and watched a video of President Obama doing this. The students loved this lesson and were very engaged. I got a wonderful review and feel much better about the idea of having an evaluation! 

Doctorate

I have been thinking about not stopping after I get my masters degree. I am very unsure though. I do not want to spend more on my education, than I will make. I also do not know what schools are good and if there are any online schools. The only way  I would make good money with my Doctorate would be to teach college. I do not know if that is something I would want to do. I love teaching elementary, but I am not sure I would get paid correctly doing that with a Doctorate. Does anyone have any advice? Or maybe some of you are thinking the same thing?

Students and Sex

I remember when I was in elementary school, and even the early part of middle school, all I wanted to do was play Barbies, American Girl Dolls, of N64. I did not get my first kiss until I was 16 years old or take a sip of wine until I was 21. Sex was the last thing on my mind. Nowadays, it MUCH different. Kids are having sex very early! They are talking about it and thinking about it in elementary school, and I can only imagine middle and high school. Some are even doing it at age 10 and younger. First of all, I find that very gross! Second, I find it extremely sad! Where are the parents? How is this happening? Why are kids so eager to do that, instead of having a childhood. Is it the music? YES. Is it the movies? YES. How about the t.v. or even commercials! YES! YES! YES! Everything has sexual humor and as for music, it is just about sex. This is sad! Wake up America!!!!

Teaching Math

I found this great article at
http://www.edarticle.com/special-education/parenting-tips-for-special-needs-kids-with-math-disabilities.html.
It is a list of tips for parents with special needs kids and how they can help their student get better at math. The article explains that math is very poorly taught in elementary schools, because elementary teachers have math anxiety. Now, I am one of those teachers and would be a poor math teacher! However; my teammates that do teach math are amazing, so that part of the article upsets me. I see their point, but in general everyone that I know that teaches elementary school math is amazing. What is upsetting is how hard they have raised the mathematical standards in fifth grade. I feel that there is a big jump, ( I speak from a GA teacher's point-of-view), from 3rd and 4th grade to 5th grade. The math skills they are asked to learn are very high analytic problems, and they are not there yet. They get so lost and frustrated with having to think that outside of the box that they shut down. Maybe I am wrong, but it seems that content is much harder these days than it was when I was little. However, the standards have been raised, so I guess they have to be. 

Christmas in Schools?

Should we celebrate Christmas in schools? So many schools are turning away from this idea and banning the celebration of this holiday, to be fair to all faiths. I do not agree with this. America was founded on Christian beliefs, but we are slowly getting rid of all things Christian in society! It is unbelievable to me. I do not see what is wrong. We are supposed to teach about different cultures, but we can't teach about our own? I try to celebrate an array of different holidays in my classroom, and love to have parents of students with a different culture than my own, come and speak. What do you think? Should we take Christianity out of schools? 

what is a mobie

A few people asked me to further explain my mobi post.A mobi hooks up to your computer and then will project on a screen. It can act as a key board. So I can walk around the room and access the internet, powerpoints, or other things I want to work with. Also, I can write on it. So for example, I can pull a scratch piece of paper and write word problems on the screen and then my students can write the answers on the mobi. I use it a lot for spelling and handwriting. Here is a link to a site that explains much better than I can!!
http://www.einstruction.com/products/interactive_teaching/mobi/index.html

Mobi and microphones

Our county bought Mobi's for every classroom in the district. We also all got a microphone system that works through our ceilings. They are amazing! The microphone has changed my whole style of teaching. It is very easy to get the students attention, because they can even hear me whisper! However, you do have to remember to turn it off when having a private conversation. The mobi's have been great! I know longer have to write on the dry erase board. I in fact, barely do! It does a take a little while to get used to writing on the mobi. At first it looks like how you sign your name on the pen pads at stores. Has anyone ever used one and have a lesson they would like to share? I use mine mainly with teaching hand writing and PowerPoints. I would love some new ideas!!

Parent's today

I am really tired of my students trying to friend me on facebook.  I do not understand why an 11 year old needs a facebook account. It makes me so sad that so many students are allowed on computers without adult supervision or blocks. However, parents don't care anymore. I feel like when I grew up my mom and friends mom's were always checking up on us or doing things with us, but these kids have hardly any interaction with their parents. Parents today are so caught up in their own lives that they lose sight of their kids. This breaks my heart. What changed? What happened that caused such a shift in parenting style? I have a few ideas of my own, but would love others input.What are your thoughts?

Cruise.

Since I finally got a teaching job, I decided to buy a new car. It is a brand spaken new Chevrolet Cruise. It is a 2011 model. Cranberry red! It is so nice to have a car with new technology! It just goes to show you how much technology is changing our world! I can press a button in my house and turn my car on! From the navigation to the speed gage, it is completely high tech! I feel  like batman lol. Now I am just waiting for the days that we get smart houses that will cook and clean for you!

Kitten

Last night I went to Chick-Fil-A with my mom. As we were going to the drive through a stray kitten ran past our car. As the animal lover I am, I was determined to rescue that kitten. So, we got out of the car, in the freezing cold, and begin to try and coax the cat out of the sharp bushes. We used chicken, which the kitten loved! However, every time it went to grab the chicken, we went to grab her. She was way to fast for us. We stayed out there for an hour!A man brought us blankets, which was nice. However, we did not get the kitten. It was very hard to drive away, listening to the crying kitten. We went back yesterday, but she was nowhere in sight. I am still pretty bummed about it. Hopefully someone will get her, and she will find a good home. It always breaks my heart to see animals in trouble!

Elections

I was very happy with how quickly I was able to vote this year. I was in and out in ten minutes. I was really surprised because I did not get a chance to early vote. I went Tuesday at 5:30pm. I figured everyone would be there at that time! There was a fair share of folks; however, not as many as I thought. The people running the vote did a wonderful job and we were in and out. Although I was happy to not have to wait in line (because I have 0 patients with that kind of stuff), it still made me sad that so many people did not care! It is such a wonderful right that we have as Americans! So many people fought for this, yet we take it for advantage! We take a lot of things for advantage. For example, I always have two or three kiddos who eat in my classroom during lunch. They study, work on homework, or get tutored. I love it because during the 10 minutes I let them enjoy lunch and chat they have the most interesting conversations! Really deep and important conversations sometimes. It is like having a kid version of talk radio in my room. Anyway, one of my students was complaining because they did not like what they were eating at lunch. Another student simply looked at him and said, "You better eat it, people in Africa would do anything for that hamburger! What a waste." He then looked at me and said, "I wish there was a way we could send that hamburger there." Man.... what a cool kid! I wish we could have too. 

Veteran's Day

I am in charge of organizing Veteran's Day this year. I am getting nervous about it. I have a few things planned out, but it is a big to do at my school, and since this is my first year, I am nervous that it will not be as good as normal. I have it worked out so that the fifth graders run the entire show, with some help :). We will have breakfast, an assembly, and a veteran's walk through the school. Poems will be read and songs will be sung. We have made a slideshow and it looks like it will be a success. I tend to over analyze things, as us teachers do. Can anyone else think of something that would be special or know of a video that is powerful? I would love ideas! Thanks :)

Writing Assessments

I had a discussion with one of my fellow teachers about the writing assessments we do in Georgia. We have to pre-test and post-test a writing sample and then do six other writing assessments throughout the year. We were talking about rather or not Kindergarten should have to do these. As of now, they do. They have to write one sentence and then draw a picture of what they wrote. We both have mixed feelings about this. Yes, at the end of the year they should be able to do this, but at the beginning of the year they cannot even write their name. So, how can you assess a blank sheet of paper or fake writing? You will get great results, but the students in her class get very stressed out and upset about this process. Does anyone else's school district do this? If so, what do you think?

Good Morning

Do you ever wake up thirty minutes early and can not go back to sleep? I hate that! You look at the clock and get so excited you can sleep a little longer, but then lay there thinking that the alarm will go off at any moment. I really think that is the worse, and it makes me start my day off on a bad note. I have done that every day this week! I am not sure if it is stress because I have so much to do this week or bad karma! But since it happened again today, I thought I would be proactive and blog. I have a question for everyone. Do you have a fall break? We do not. Our first break is for Thanksgiving and we get one week off. In some ways I like this, because I get a lot accomplished and a lot of sleep, but then again a few days off in the middle of the first part of school to catch up on sleep and paper work would be amazing! Does anyone have any feelings on this? Which would you rather have? Or is it one of those things that could go either way. They do say, "the grass is always greener on the other side." I think I just like the idea of sleeping....especially right now. Everyone have a great day at school and Happy Thursday!

Proof-reading

After re-reading my previous post, I found it funny that I made so many mechanical mistakes! I teach writing and language arts!!!! I am always talking about how important it is to RE-READ and correct your mistakes! My students get sick of me talking about it. However, I did not follow my own advice. I did my work in a hurry and posted it without proof-reading. Let's take a moment and reflect..... how many things do you preach to your students, but do not follow. Part of our job is to be a role model, yet I would not want my students to read my last few posts.

Cyber Bulling

Cyber bullying keeps getting worse and worse. Facebook is a wonderful example of this. I am a grow woman and only have friends on facebook that are adults, but I still see cyber bullying on this site! I would think people would know better. For example, one person (who was "de-friended"), wrote very disrespectful and rude comments about a neighbor of ours (who is the mother of someone we grew up with) on her news feed. Knowing that this person, her kids, and friends would read it. She got mad because this woman asked her dad to stop cutting her grass. So she bullied her on facebook and called her horrible words! This same person, will then turn around and talk about how awful bullying is and she was bullied when she was a young girl! Do people think it is not bullying, because it is done online and not to their face? My point is, is that cyber bullying is not only something that children do, but adults as well. I do not understand this. Everyone can read what you write, does that not just make the bullier look bad? I stopped being her friend because of this, does she not think that others will do the same? Cyber bullying needs to stop and it does not look like children have great role models to look to for this!

Halloween

I spent the day buying decorations for my classroom. The school I work at goes all out and it is a lot of fun! We do a parade and a wax museum. I am going to dress up as the Statue of Liberty! I will try to post pictures, if I can figure out how to do that. Anyway, I went shopping with my dad and spent a good bit of money on decorations and treats for my students. We started talking about how sad it is that teachers can only clam $250 on school supplies. I guess they do that because if we could actually use how much we spend on them it would be 1/2 of our pay checks. It still blows my mind that teachers get paid so little, and actors get paid so much. We are the back bone of this country.... maybe I should dress up as dollar tree and see if I get donations lol.

First Year

Hello,
 I am still unsure what exactly we are supposed to blog about. But I do have something to say after my day to day. I hope that this is what we are supposed to do. This is my first year teaching and today was my first day that a student told me that they hated me. I know that they were just angry at their own actions, but it really hurt my heart. I always thought that I had a pretty tough backbone, but this really bothered me all day. You get so attached to your students, and then one of them can crush your day with those words. I hope that I can learn to not take  it personally!