I Did It!

Two years and 43 units later, I am on the brink of receiving my credential in elementary education. I have been teaching with an intern certificate, which allowed me to teach as credentialed staff in my own classroom with full salary and benefits. The only requirement was to be enrolled in and successfully complete this program. Once I take two finals, I will be done. My credential will be upgraded to a standard credential, highly qualified. It feels great to have accomplished this. I am going back to school as a middle aged mother of 5, and juggling it all was hard. I did not have a housewife cooking and cleaning for me. So, yes, I think I deserve to be proud of myself. And thankfully my family is doing just fine. They don't seem the worse for wear. If anything, I think I just gave them a great object lesson in doing hard things and not giving up. My husband has always given 200% to help us all, so he didn't have much more to offer. Even so, he squeaked out a little extra, we got more take out, and the house wasn't as clean. Priorities. I learned some things about myself along the way. I was smarter than I thought. I'm going into my finals with a 4.0. I also learned how to use all kinds of technology. I'm still not a crafty creative type of person, but that doesn't mean I don't have good ideas to implement in the classroom to create interesting lessons and keep kids engaged. My classroom isn't Pinterest worthy, but I still take education very seriously and get results with my students. I learned that I am a little competitive. I did not have to learn that I am sensitive. Like all strengths, the flip side can be a weakness. As I go into my third year of teaching, which will hopefully be in a new school and grade level, I will take the lessons I learned with me.

ELL

In my two years teaching public school, I have not had the ELL (English language learners) class. Last year, I had three students who tested out after one year. Both years, I have had several students who are learning English. Almost all of my students are bilingual. This is something I need to keep in mind. Their vocabularies are limited. I like to read aloud to my students, and I will often stop and define new words. We also study vocabulary, which is tied to our weekly readings, in a variety of ways. Each week, we start by defining our words and making a gesture. We focus on 4 words a week. On day 2, they draw a picture of the word. Later in the week, we do word work and use the words in sentences. My language learners are often slower learners, which is totally understandable. They are learning a new language! Because of this, they can get overwhelmed and discouraged. Sometimes I modify their assignments and allow an oral, pictorial, or spoken response instead of a written response. I also demonstrate and show directions, rather than just telling them what I need them to do. It is exciting to see these students grasp both the language and our difficult standards. They know I'm proud of them.

The IEP

Today's topic is the IEP, or individual education plan. Federal law requires schools to meet the needs of all students in the least restrictive environment. In other words, if at all possible, students will be educated in a regular classroom with the added support outlined in their IEP. I have had quite a bit of experience with students who have IEPs. Last year, all the students in my grade level with IEPs were in my class. This was done in order to utilize limited resources for push in support. I also attended IEP meetings and referred others for testing. This year, I do not have any students who have IEPs. I have referred two students for evaluation, however. One was emotionally disturbed. After trying some interventions, his grades went way up. Now he cannot qualify for services because his emotional issues are not affecting his academics. This is a common hurdle. Another student was referred, but after talking to his mom about my concerns, she refused to allow testing. She did not agree with my assessment that he might have a learning disability. She is convinced he is lazy. I will still try some strategies and alert the teacher he will have next year to my concerns. Hopefully his mom will come around if he does need extra help. Last year, I had wonderful relationship with our Sped. teacher. She planned with me and gave me some great new teacher advice. She was a mentor to me. I appreciate having a bit of an easier class this year, but I miss working with her.

Lining Up

Now that I am finishing my second year in the classroom, it is time to reevaluate how everything is working with classroom management. One thing I have learned is that students get comfortable with routines and sometimes need a new incentive in order to perform the desired behavior. Each class is also unique with different strengths and weaknesses. Last year, I used a line up song in order to provide a positive way to line up and review expectations. This year, my students are not responding as well to the song. Many kids are talking instead of singing. Lining up after recess is becoming more and more of a problem. It is time for some new strategies. We now have a mystery walker who can earn a point for the whole class by lining up well. I am also adding a fun new incentive for the class: a guitar jar. I play the guitar, but I have not brought it into the classroom yet. I am going to give students a point in the jar every time they line up well. After 10 points, I will bring in my guitar and play some songs for them. After one day of having a mystery walker, I saw improvement in most of my students. I am excited to see how the guitar jar works. Last year, my students were very excited about me bringing it in. I think this might mix things up just enough to get them excited a about having a straight line.

Emotional Disturbance

Many students suffer from emotional disturbance. A negative experience during infancy can have a detrimental effect on emotional development. Even students who have strong academic abilities often struggle emotionally. As a teacher, I need to make sure the basic needs of my students are met. These include a sense of safety and love. I do my best to set a positive tone in the classroom. Each student is greeted with a smile and a handshake every day. Students who show signs of emotional disturbance are referred for testing. During the referral process, other teachers share strategies. I had a student show huge progress after starting the year with severe struggles. He finally settled down after I put him next to a boy who was a role model. Sitting next to girls didn't help at all. Each student has different needs. Teachers need to keep trying. I know that reaching each child on a psychological level is a very important part of my job. It may be necessary before the child can learn. It will certainly unlock much more confidence and success academically.

Positive Classroom Management

I love this topic. It is heavily related to the previous post about student engagement. If students are engaged, discipline problems are much less likely to pop up. Students often misbehave because they are bored or because they don't understand the lesson. In first grade, it is all classroom management all the time. Positive management is definitely my style. It is amazing how quickly students shape up when the good students start getting attention. Why not give attention to the good students and ignore the bad behavior? Of course I can't ignore all the bad behavior, but positivity helps. This week I tried something new called "mystery student". I told them that I would be picking mystery students throughout the day. If they did what they were supposed to do, the whole class would get a point. Points earn fun time for the students. It worked like a charm. As soon as I would mention that I picked a mystery student, they would all get super studious. It was a great week. Thanks for the idea, Dana!

Student Engagement

Student engagement is the meat and potatoes of teaching. If students are not engaged, they are not going to learn. The days of passive listening are over. We are a multitasking society. Students must learn while doing. An added benefit of an engaged class is that everyone is having a good time. A positive atmosphere goes a long way. Of course, there are many ways to engage students. Some strategies will not be everyone's favorite. Writing, for example, is hard for many first graders, especially the struggling readers. They still need to practice the skill, but we make sure to do many other engagement activities as well. One of my favorites is whole body movement. Spelling time is a great time for whole body movement. I like to break up our reading block with spelling in the middle. Not only do the movements help students learn to spell better, but they also get the students out of their seats and get their blood flowing. We like to clap our spelling words based on the type of letter we are spelling. This also doubles as handwriting practice. Letters which go to the top line are clapped over the head. Letters hitting the middle only are clapped in front. Letters going under the line are clapped down. For example, the word, "bag" would be clapped up, middle, and down as we say the letters and spell the word. All teachers struggle with classroom management. It was definitely something I struggled with when starting out. One veteran teacher warned me, "If you don't have classroom management, you have nothing." Then she proceeded to run her classroom like a bootcamp full of robots. I tried this approach, but we were all miserable. There had to be a better way. What I've found is that a positive, structured classroom full of engagement opportunities will eliminate most behavior problems. Engagement is the key. For my most recent peer observation, I had a math lesson all planned out. We were using work mats to relate addition to subtraction. We chanted, "part-part-whole," and used our arms to show adding to the whole and subtracting from the whole. The students really got the lesson, which was a big improvement from my attempts to teach the concept last year. I felt good about the lesson going in because I was prepared. I was still worried about that unknown factor: how would the kids behave? Would I get 85% engagement? It turns out, I didn't need to worry. Both my peer observer and observing administrators had nothing but positive feedback. They said my greatest strength was classroom management. That felt really good!