Ups and Downs

Week two was full of them. I like to think of week two as the week where my students got comfortable and let their true selves shine. Unlike week one, there were tears, there were behavior problems, and there were bad grades. But among the bads were greats including 10/19 100%s on our first spelling test, my very first teacher present from one of my students, and me starting to figure out what I seriously need to be doing to educate my students.

I spent two nights in the TFA office this week. The first being for a brief course in drafting a math unit assessment and the second being a Workshop course. Although I stayed at my school until 6:00 to drive over to the office, I was so happy to see faces I don't normally see during the week. I will say that these little sessions make me feel so much better about what I'm doing in the classroom. They provide a round table of best practices discussion, help for individual issues in the classroom, and ways to be a successful teacher.

My PD came into my classroom on Thursday and from what she has shared with me, she thinks my classroom and management are going pretty well. She sat in on a fun lesson about observation and predictions with mystery bags. At the end of each day, I give my students who end on yellow or purple Skittles, or magical growing beans in my classroom. In one of the bags were Skittles and a student raised his hand to predict what the group had and instead of saying Skittles, he said magical growing beans which made both me and my PD laugh.

A group of us went to our friend's lake house on Lake Wylie in South Carolina and had so much fun. It was so nice to be outside, enjoy each others company, and relax. Although there were some injuries along the way ( see my back and Mallery's toe) we all survived labor day 09.

On to week three which I am sure will bring even more stories, ups, and downs. My school has not addressed Obama's speech to students that is taking place tomorrow. I would love to tune in but the TV is not hooked up in my classroom and the computers are a little on the slow side. I hope there will be some way to watch it or it is at least mentioned before the start of school tomorrow. Off to plan, pack and prepare!