Sometimes, You Close the Door and Cry.

Sometimes, love hurts. And on days like today, it hurts a lot. 

One of my students is a bit of a late bloomer. She's been struggling since the beginning of the year, and I've been working with her individually every single day for the past three months to help her be a more successful academically. After all of the time, effort and data collection (that's always the hardest part, really...keeping track of everything I do), I had finally completed all the requirements to have her referred for extra pull-out support. I left work Tuesday on a high, excited that my little girl would finally be getting the support she needs. 

That was three days ago. Today, I got a phone call in the middle of class to let me know that my little girl, the one I'd been working with for so long, the one  I'd had to keep and report so much data on, the one I'd FINALLY gotten referred after all of the backflips and handstands I had to do to make it happen...that little girl was gone. 

Just like that. She left. 

It was all I could do to hold it together until I took them to music class. I was beyond distraught. So much time, so much energy, so much work, and now she's moved to another district. That means not only is she no longer in my class, but because she's not in the district anymore, they may not have or request access to her records. So her new teacher may just have to start from square one. Also, I don't think they have bilingual schools in her new district, so she'll be even more behind because of the language change. 

It's times like these where I wonder what it's like to work in a district where this kind of stuff doesn't happen constantly. A district where the class list you get in May stays exactly the same til the following May and kids' phone numbers always work and their addresses stay the same all year. I bet it's nice...

I held it together as long as I could, and then I just had to shut my door for a while. 

To those who know what it's like to work so hard for so long and have it all fall through your fingers in a day...stay strong. You are not alone. 

Flexibility

Teaching comes in many forms, and for me, that means coaching in addition to my regular classroom time. I have a co-coach that works with me at group practice, and he's been gone for the past two weeks. It's been tough without him, but I'm managing.

Last year, we tried holding workshops where we'd take the large group, split it into two parts, and work with the kids separately. I tried doing it myself last week and it ended up being difficult to manage and less than successful. Determined to make it work, I adjusted my strategy today and made practice more interactive and engaging for everyone, and the team members who were excused early actually seemed sorry to leave! Better still, we were able to finish in less time than usual.

I was talking with my mom about how I was feeling quite efficient and productive after practice and how it was a big improvement on last week. She replied, ”You're really good at reflecting and adjusting.”

A high compliment for a teacher! After all, isn't that what we do every minute? We gauge how well our students are understanding and responding to what we are teaching them and we adapt accordingly. We reteach, demonstrate in greater detail, stop and do some jumping jacks, shift gears, simplify or increase challenge, add scaffolds and support. We are constantly taking the pulse of our class and making adjustments accordingly. To do it well is to do our best.

Thanks, Mom.

Let Them Lead

I have to blog this because I laughed out loud as I was reading it.

I'm working on my Capstone and I'm studying conferring, and I'm reading this book No Better Way to Teach Writing, which is about how a group of Australian teachers. After listening to Donald Graves and reading one of his books, they decided to implement Writers' Workshop, which they called "The Conference Approach." One teacher highlights her struggle to let the child lead during a conference, allowing him to teach himself rather than just telling him what to do:

"Wait," I said. "Where is that part in the story?"
Irritated, he looked, then said, "I haven't wrote that yet."
"Well, where would you write it so the reader knows your story is about a car race?"
He picked up his pencil and wrote the sentence--at the end! Into my impatient mind flashed the uncharitable thought, 'No, dimwit, write it at the beginning.' But I managed to stay silent...When he finished, I asked him to read it back.
...he said..."That sentence doesn't make sense there."

Isn't it amazing what can happen when we allow children to take the lead in conferences? Providing lean prompts, asking good questions, directing children to notice and consider pertinent aspects of their own writing...because she let him figure out for himself that it didn't make sense, this student learned a skill that he could use in subsequent pieces, all on his own. He learned the importance of telling the reader what his story is about, and how to use an arrow to insert information that is missing from the beginning or middle of a piece.

Holding back our own ideas and letting children lead in conferences...so difficult, but so powerful.

Sometimes, Listening is Teaching

As I'm diving deep into the heart of conferring, I'm learning so much about how to listen to kids when I converse with them about the work that they are doing. Every so often, particularly with students who don't demand quite as much of my attention, I'll ask a simple question and the child will freeze. I am then hit once again with the painful realization that they think that the purpose of teacher questioning is to inform them that they did something wrong. What a horrible message to receive.

I had this experience just yesterday with one of my little ones. He was writing a story about playing in the park with his family. I was watching him, just observing and writing down everything I noticed him doing as a writer. When he erased part of a word and changed it, I asked him "Why did you do that?" 

He froze.

He stared at me, with a cross between mild wide-eyed shock and frowning confusion. He seemed to be thinking, "What did I do wrong?" and "What do I say?" Since kids erase for a number of different reasons, I was genuinely curious about his thought process. And in fact, he hadn't done anything wrong. He'd done something very right. I just wanted to know what it was.

Debating how thaw out this frozen moment in the conversation, I rephrased my question. I said, "I noticed that you wrote that word, and then you went back and changed it. I just want to know what you're thinking. Can you tell me what you were thinking?" He then informed me that he was thinking, "...that it was the same as this word (he pointed to a word in the previous sentence). And I already said that." He changed "and we played the played" to "and we played the game", which made perfect sense. I then complimented him for independently going back and rereading his work to make sure it said what he wanted it to say, and I told him how smart that was and that good writers always do that. By the end of our conference, he was smiling and happily writing again. We didn't have time to get to a teaching point, but I didn't care...that was enough.

Sometimes our teaching point is as simple as:

I'm not listening to correct you, I'm listening because I care what you think.

Hugs.

I have the greatest kids in the world. I really do.

After two weeks of vacation, it was hard getting up before sunrise and driving to work again. It's always a bit of a rough transition getting back into the swing of things. But it's times like that when I remember that I love my job, and that's why I do it.

I love that nearly every day, someone draws me a picture. I love that half of the pictures say "I love you" or have hearts somewhere on them. I love that my kids jump up and down and squeal and wave every time they see me, even if the last time they saw me was literally 2 minutes ago. I love how when I take them to science or music or gym, they stop and hug me goodbye, even though they know I'll be back to pick them up in an hour.

As I was walking my students to the buses after school, one of them bounced off toward his bus (I was going to say walked, but this one, if he were a cartoon character, would be Tigger). Then he suddenly stopped right before he reached the door. He turned around and said "Bye, Ms. M!" then ran toward me, arms outstretched in a goodbye hug. I smiled to myself as we hugged and he turned around and ran back to get on the bus.

We don't get paid much, and politically, this is a rough time to be a teacher. But when I see their sweet faces first thing in the morning and bask in their random hugs throughout the day, it really is worth it. I love my job.

Happy New Year!

Image: dream designs / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Possibilities.

That's what I love about each new year--it is absolutely bursting with possibilities. All of the amazing things that you can do for yourself, for others, with others. Your hopes, your dreams, your goals. Amazing things that you don't even know will happen, are going to happen to you this year. There is nothing to be discouraged about, no disappointment, no failure. The past is gone. Things are made new. 

This is my first post in a few weeks, so I know that the year isn't as new today as it was 10 days ago. But even better: since the first day of the year, I've been complimented, hugged, smiled at, loved. And I have had the opportunity to compliment, hug, smile at and love others. I've moved closer to accomplishing my goals and dreams. I've shared exciting news and celebrated great moments with others. 

And this year has just begun. 

I know it's a bit cliche, but I am re-training my brain to see the possibilities in my classroom. To look at my children and simultaneously see both where they are and where they can be. To look at a child who is struggling, and think, "You are such a smart kid." And then, of course, to tell them. 

And beyond that, to see the possibilities in myself. It gets a bit overwhelming at times to learn so much in so little time--we have weekly professional development, which in addition to my own personal development, is a lot of information to take in. Sometimes trying to remember and master everything at once feels really overwhelming. But I have to look at myself, look at my teaching, and see possibilities. I'm growing as a teacher. My students and I are learning together every day. Like I used to say my first year of teaching (and can now say with more confidence and less stress), a year from now, I will be infinitely better at my job. And I can't wait to see the results. 

What possibilities do you see/hope this year holds for you? 

Listen up!

The classroom rule that is most frequently broken is number 5: raise your hand to speak. My kids get really excited about whatever it is that they have to say, and they blurt out, or talk to a friend, or otherwise interrupt the speaker, whether it's me or a classmate.

Today, I nearly broke this rule myself...and am so glad I didn't. Sometimes my students make connections to something someone else said, and then they get off topic when we don't really have time for extraneous comments. It was the end of writing time, and I was sharing with everyone how one of my students had zoomed in on a small moment by not telling about his whole trip to his cousin's house, but instead just about the part where he was looking at videos on Youtube. Another little boy raised his hand and started talking about these movies he saw. It was time to line up, so I was about to interrupt him and tell him to save his movie story for later, but I decided to let him finish. And what a finish it was.

He said, "I did the same thing too. I saw a whole bunch of movies on Saturday, but I only decided to write about the wolf movie, because that was one little moment."

Holy crap.

I have the smartest kids ever. And to think...I almost missed out on this genius little comment because it sounded irrelevant at first.

I will think twice about interrupting my students in the future.

In the words of Ruth Ayres:

Just listen.
Just listen..
Just listen.