A Day of Victory!

Today was an EXCELLENT DAY! Let me splain; there were 3 main victories.

Victory #1

One of my students has a significantly lower reading level than my others (like kindergarten level low) and as a result, has basically resigned to answering "I dunno" to any question asked of him. Like ever. Like if you ask "Why don't you like to read?" he will answer with a shrug. When I prompt him with "Is it because it's hard?" shrug. "It's okay that you don't like it, I just want to know what makes you not like it." shrug. SHRUG!

Today, we did a fluency lesson. Fluency is a student's ability to read aloud with accuracy and speed. So we began by reading a passage that I had already picked out (it was the plane crash scene in Hatchet, which totally roped in most of my students because I purposely picked a super suspenseful place to stop---"Miss! Does he make it out of the water alive!?" "Oh, I don't remember, but you can borrow the book and read for yourself!" heh heh). He read as far in the passage as he could get in 1 minute by himself and I marked how far he got. I also wrote down words that he mispronounced and went over them with him.

The next step is to practice reading together in unison. That didn't work well with this student because he didn't know how to pronounce the words well enough to do it in sync; he was always waiting for me to say it and then he repeated them. So we did echo reading instead--exactly what it sounds like; I read 4-5 words and then the student does, then I say the next 4-5 words, etc. He did that really well, pronouncing the words perfectly after listening to me and looking in his book.


After that, he got to read the same passage one more time on his own to see if he could get farther on his own this time. He read 2 sentences farther! Not only that, but he pronounced 5 words correctly out of the 7 he had missed the first time! I was SO EXCITED, and it was so obvious that he couldn't help but be happy too. I asked why he thought he did better that time and he said without prompting, "because I practiced it." NO SHRUG! He is normally way too cool for school, but he totally cracked a real smile when he saw how excited I was for him. It's going to be a long road, but him seeing that practicing can give him actual results is invaluable at this point.

Victory #2

In after school, behavior has been going a lot better. We've implemented a "Swag Tag" system where students are given a raffle ticket when they are caught doing something good (being on task, answering a question, helping their neighbor, sitting quietly, etc). They write their names on the tickets and put them into a box. Every week, 3 names are drawn out of the box and the winner gets a prize. It's simple: the more good things you do, the better chances you have in the raffle!

Also an exciting thing is that next week, we are going on  field trip! We're going to the San Antonio Museum of Art and the kids are really excited to go!

So today I was working with a couple of girls on ELA before we started the enrichment lesson, which was on  Music today. The girls are best friends and CAN NOT sit together without talking and giggling. It inevitably resulted in the corps member leading the lesson to get frustrated with their talking and ask one girl to move across the room. She refused, he insisted. She finally got up, cursed AT the corps member in front of the whole room, got her things and walked out.

I caught up with her right before she reached the door. Small victory that she didn't keep going out the door; it was a distinct possibility. We talked through what had happened, talked about why the corps member might have acted in a way she perceived as really mean and what she could have done better. I asked if she thought she would be allowed on the field trip if she left today's lesson like she did, and she shook her head. I asked what she thought she should have to do to regain her ability to go on the field trip. Together, we decided that she should have to go back into the library and finish out the lesson. After everyone was leaving, she would apologize to the corps member for her behavior.

SHE DID IT. SHE DID ALL OF IT.

I know it's hard to understand how big of a deal this is, but I know I always had a hard time asking for forgiveness in that way, and it was a huge piece of humble pie she had to swallow. She took it like an amazing young woman and I was so proud of her that when she said sorry that I almost cried. It was
amazing and I could tell she was happy with herself for making the right choice. It was wonderful.

Victory #3

Today our team hosted a family literacy night at our school. We invited students to bring their families for a night of ELA games and Math games. Our two ELA coordinators basically organized the whole thing on their own with a lot of pressure from our partners in the school, and they bore it so gracefully and everything went fantastically!

About 150 people came in total, and there was hot chocolate (which you could earn by playing 2 ELA games and 2 Math games and getting stickers in your "passport") we also had dinner provided by our wonderful parent liaisons. I was so proud to be a part of our team tonight because we all prepared for our respective games thoroughly and it was obvious to the parents that we cared about the students and that we're an asset to our school. I never doubt that fact, but it's nice to parade it around in front of interested parents.

I got to meet one of my students' families, with her little brothers and sisters who were incredibly adorable. I joked around with students who I normally have to redirect in class, which was extremely refreshing and I'm sure they liked that version of Ms. C. a little better. We also had visitors from another CY team to assist in our program, so it was fun to show them around and show our school and our team off to them. We had a lot of fun and I know the kids had a blast.

As you can read, I had a fantastic day! I love my job!

The Burritos

So we have 3 lists of students that we focus on in the school:

Students that are struggling with course content (in my case, English).

Students who struggle with behavior in class.

Students who struggle with attendance.

My ELA focus list contains the students that I tutor in English and spend most of my time with. 

However, behavior students also get to spend time with me in the form of Leadership Lunches. Once a week, I meet with two groups of five students for behavior coaching during their lunch period. We talk about things that we can do to be good leaders, what it means to be a good leader, our goals for behavior, etc. 

My first group met for the second time today. Last meeting, we came up with a group name; the Burritos. It was a contentious vote on the team name, but Burritos it was. Now, one of my students in class always mentions that he is a Burrito. I use it in class to redirect those students by saying "Is that how Burritos act in class? Didn't think so." 

So today in our meeting we tried to list things that we've done over the last week that are good things, things that good leaders do. Everyone could think of at least one thing, so that was a positive! However, two burritos got in a fight during class and had to be sent to the office. Baby steps!

One thing that always makes me smile is how happy the students are to get their invitations to lunch. They hold onto those papers more tightly than they do any of their actually important home work assignments. Students who are cooler than cool can't help but excitedly ask where they should meet me after they get their food. We also have a lot of students that ask us to be able to come to the lunches. I think we're doing an effective job at hiding the fact that students HAVE to eat with us because their teachers referred them to the behavior intervention program. :)

Tomorrow I meet for the first time with my other group of students. I have high hopes for them, but I'm a little nervous. This is the big leagues as far as behavior problems goes; we take the worst-behaved kids and stick them in a room together and handle it like champs. I gotta get pumped! 

My student that I made the reading deal with switched his choice to Hunger Games, which I had also suggested. Yesterday, I asked how it was going and he said, "boring." I was incredulous. Today, however, he said it was going well and he asked if he could borrow the second book after he finished this one! I said of course!! Now I have to get my hands on Catching Fire... 

My cursive-loving student finished the alphabet! He had me write it out on a piece of paper so he could practice at home. As long as he has that love of learning, he is going to be just fine. 

Tonight I joined the choir at my church! The old choir director left, and so did most of the choir, so it was the perfect opportunity for a mediocre singer to jump in! I've secretly always wanted to sing in a choir, and I am taking full advantage of this chance! 

Things are going really well down here, I feel like I'm making at least a small difference for every student I come in contact with, and that makes it all worthwhile. :)

By the way, it got up to 85 today. 

"I want to learn all of it!"

Wow, I have really let myself down when it comes to reflecting on my service. I've let writing this blog morph into an obligation to others in my mind, when it really is a service to myself. I know I'm going to want to look back and flip through these virtual pages to relive this year, and if I keep this up, there won't be many pages to flip!

In my defense, last week I had the whole week off for Thanksgiving. Or rather, we had Wednesday-Friday off and I took two personal days to show Patty around San Antone. It was an amazing break and was the perfect combination of binge-watching Breaking Bad (we finished the series) and actually doing things (we walked 5 miles along the riverwalk on Thanksgiving). It was exactly what I needed. 

School is continuing on. Today I met the teacher I will be paired with for the rest of the year. I am really excited for our class; I think the teacher will be what the students need. She is a permanent substitute who has a lot of elementary experience and has her teaching license. My students had a positive reaction to her, and that's half the battle! 

One of my students is an excellent worker and behaves magnificently, but won't stop talking about how he "hates" reading. He only read stories about sports, and even then he only likes books written about the NBA (I couldn't help laughing when he said this matter-of-factly as if he wasn't limiting himself to under 0.001% of the books in the world). So I made him a deal. I told him that I wanted him to read a whole chapter book cover-to-cover (he tends to read two pages and decide he doesn't like it) before Christmas break. The catch--it couldn't be about sports. I asked what he felt like he should earn for such a feat and he said a bag of Skittles. I think that can be swung. :) I have been incessantly recommending books that I know any sixth-grade boy would enjoy, and today when I asked him which book he was going to choose, he said Hatchet, which was one that I was most vocally pushing. And he remembered the title from over a week ago! He is soooo going to at least like reading when this year is up.

One of my other students asked today in afterschool if I could teach him to write in cursive. He didn't have any homework or classwork to do, so I obliged. He was so eager, it was adorable!! He loved the loopy letters, but he especially liked the capital "D". We didn't get to practice the whole alphabet because I kept having to conference with students who were misbehaving, but I told him that tomorrow we could at least teach him how to write his name in cursive. He objected instantly. "I want to learn all of it, Miss! All the letters." So you know exactly where I'll be tomorrow after school. :)

Also, I decorated our apartment (sort of) for Christmas! I put up some lights in the windows for our neighbors to enjoy and today I creepily overheard a compliment. Our windows are open because it's mid-70's here right now (jelly?) and a man was walking his dog and said to our neighbor who was out smoking on the porch, "Hey man, I like your lights upstairs!" to which our neighbor replied, "Oh, that's not our apartment." It's a little sad how warm and fuzzy this made me feel as I sat in our living room. But warm and fuzzy I felt indeed. 

Goodnight!

P.S. I am super excited to see my parents and my little brother this weekend for Dave's graduation! Hooray!!!

P.P.S. Last week we did an afterschool lesson on appreciating each other and saying nice things to one another where we all wrote things about each other that we liked. The result was wonderfully, awkwardly adolescent. Here is my paper after all the students wrote on it. It makes me happy.  

Roller Coaster

Today was full of ups and downs, but mostly ups. I'll start at the very beginning, because that's a very good place to start. ;)

It has been a wild couple of days since my teacher moved out of my classroom and into her new classroom. The substitute is really great, and definitely on top of his game, but obviously the lessons suffer when there's not a teacher in the room. One of the school administrators asked me to lead the lesson for today, which included four new vocabulary words. I said I would rather not, because City Year is actually supposed to avoid that very situation, and because my teacher had allowed me to pull my focus list students out during vocab days and we had been playing a game the students really liked (trashketball). But the admin put some pressure on me, saying that I knew how the lesson went and it was important for the class to stay on track yada, yada, yada, I ended up agreeing.

So I had the words made up in a PowerPoint complete with funny pictures to add some pizazz. 

My first lesson went less than wonderfully. The students weren't being respectful whatsoever, and I actually stopped instruction to remind them that this wasn't part of my job and that I was leading class to help them learn the words and that the least they could do is respect me by not talking. That kept them quiet for awhile and they actually got kind of into the lesson! We discussed words like 'humiliating' and 'gloated' and the students really enjoyed giving their examples and ideas about the words. However, I knew I had gotten a little hard on them when one of the students' "powerful" sentence for the word 'rage' was, "Ms. C felt rage when the class wouldn't stop talking while she was teaching." Whoops; but I guess it's good that they could see me get frustrated with their disrespect. 

The substitute led the lesson in all the Pre-AP classes that I don't assist in, an he also led the class that has the worst behavior. I was trying to take a step back from leading and I figured he could handle it. It went okay, but the students were really out of hand.

Fast forward to last period. The sub insisted that I lead class again, and I begrudgingly acquiesced. It went great! In the middle of the words, a student raised his hand (instead of yelling out!!!!) and asked if I was their teacher now. I said no, that I was just leading class to help them stay on track. He and several others said, "Aw man, you should be our teacher now." Cue heartwarming happiness. Almost every student got all the words written down and shared at least one of their sentences with the whole class. 

Also, one of the other subs that I've worked with was eating lunch in the teacher's lounge while I was in there and he told my current sub that he was lucky to have me in the classroom. He said I had a "real way" with the students. We were talking about what City Year is and my plans for after this year, and he said that he thinks I'll be an excellent teacher. It meant a lot coming from a 20-year retired teacher who had been working with special ed students for the last 40 years. He had some serious street cred. 

I did miss working with just my students. I checked in with them and told them that we could play trashketball with the next set of words, and some were disappointed, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. At least they enjoy working with me!

Two students got moved off of my focus list because they're doing really well in their ELA work, which is exciting, but I'll miss them! One of them completed an entire, standardized-test style expository essay after going through all the steps with me (prewriting, revising/editing, the whole nine yards) and I was so proud of her! 

AND one of my reluctant students (let's call him Harold), who loves to read graphic novels, took my book recommendation! I suggested Maus, a historic graphic novel that tells the story of the Holocaust with cats and mice as the an/protagonists. He loved it! My other focus list student even asked if he could please read it after Harold is done. Cha-Ching! 

Oh, and I accepted my offer from Teach for America to teach Government and Economics in the Greater Nashville area. So excited!!! Pat already got offered a job and a very successful charter school in the downtown area, so we will officially be moving to Tennessee this summer!

Sorry for the long post-- I guess I should post more often! :)

Trashketball

Today was a really positive day as far as tutoring went, however, there is a hitch in my giddilong, as my grandma would say. My teacher is getting moved out of my classroom on Monday. 

She will be reassigned to a reading intervention class, and I will get a new teacher, likely one who comes temporarily out of retirement, in my classroom. I'm not extremely worried because behaviorily, the classes can honestly only get better than they are now. However, I don't know how this teacher will react to City Year or my requests to take students out of class to tutor them, especially because my teacher now is extremely supportive about me getting time with my students. 

Today, my students and I played a game as we were learning new vocabulary. It's called trashketball. The students would write a Powerful Sentence (7 words or more) on a post-it using the new word, read the sentence aloud, crumple their paper and toss it into the goal. They loved it! One of my students said, "Miss, this game isn't fair."

"Why? We're all gonna stand behind this line!"

"Because, Miss, I'm too good."

:) 

Needless to say, we got through all of our words.

Also I had a great experience during our flex period (home room) when I went to work with a student on writing. I walked into the class and was assaulted with hugs by two students. Many of the others shouted, "Ms. C!! You're in this class? Awesome!" One student even asked me to sit by her an made a label for my seat that read: "Ms. C's Seat" It made me feel really loved. 

I started telling some students that I planned to teach next year. A lot of ten don't knew that I'm really a social studies teacher, so they're surprised when I say that social studies is my favorite subject! I tell them that I'm going to teach social studies next year and they say, "Oh, here?!" 

"No, at another school in a different city."

"Whaaaat?! No!"

:)

Josue's reaction: "Imma move to that city and be in your class." I think he meant that half in a nice way and half in a threatening way. Haha. 

I already know I'm going to miss then so much!!

Our afterschool program is going through some trials, but my co-coordinator, some teammates, and I are working really hard to figure out how to handle behavior issues without having to kick students out of the program. Because they all can be good-natured kids, and we don't want to be the ones who discouraged them from being involved. But something's gotta give, because it is stressing my team out a lot to redirect students constantly for an hour after working hard all day.

The end! Sorry my posts aren't very organized, but I'm not teaching prewriting strategies until tomorrow! ;)

Tope-y

Sorry for the long lapse between posts, but things have been getting pretty hectic down here! I am much more at peace than I was during my last post.

Last weekend, City Year joined the Rotary San Antonio club (which is second largest in the WORLD!) to build a playground for a local school. It was extremely fun, and I had fantastic jobs. I split my time between drawing and painting a world map with continents on a cement slab (12' by 24') and seeing how many countries of the world we could name (would you expect anything else from me?) and playing with a ball that was taller than I was. I made some friends with some 8-year-old boys who thought that ball was the best thing they'd ever seen. All in all, the event was spectacularly well-organized, and I'm so proud of my roommate and my friends for pulling it off so flawlessly. I know they worked extremely hard planning all the activities. 

School has become a lot more positive too. Don't get me wrong, class is still the very definition if chaos, but my perspective had changed. I am focused on my students' success and measure my daily impact by their improvement rather than the whole class' on-taskness (it's a word). 

I am quickly becoming attached to my students for sure. Every time I take them out of class to work on something, they are excited and ready to leave that chaotic environment. I've even had to set up a rotation of other students who hassle me every day to please take them too because they want to work out there with me! 

There are a million little things that fulfill me every day, like a student telling me twice that he gets to make a video in technology class because he is that excited. 

Or a student saying he really likes the class common read book because the character seem really cool. And then catching that student reading the book in after school. 

Or a student apologizing for being mad during class because the other students were being so rude he couldn't concentrate. 

Or a student who hasn't done one iota of class work this year completing a discussion response because I told him I didn't mind if his answer had a curse word in it. He thought he was getting away with sooooo much. 

Or a student saying "nice one, Miss!" when I got a question right during a literacy board game we were playing. 

Or one of my students being vocally upset when I said we wouldn't be going outside today because he needed to catch up on his reading but then being comforted by the fact that we would work outside tomorrow. 

Or a student who has been at loggerheads with me about being respectful all year borrowing my pencil minutes after saying, "I don't like you at all. We're not friends anymore" and then being the only one to return my pencil at the end of class! 

Or today in afterschool when the corps members served as a panel for our students to ask questions about college and we actually had to cut the discussion short because they had so many questions! Excellent questions like, "do people still get bullied in college?" and, "do people sometimes drink and smoke but still do okay with their grades?" and "can you flunk?"

I love my job, even if it's hard all the time and sometimes harder than it is fulfilling in the moment. It always ends up being worth it for the students who show me that I'm not wasting my time. It's certainly going to be an interesting career!

And this morning I saw a beautiful rainbow. San Antonio is a beautiful city and I'm lucky to live here for a year.

One more funny story:

On Halloween, one of my teammates dressed as a nerd with "broken" glasses. In afterschool, a student said, "Sir, are those fake?!" And I said, jestingly, "You mean his eyes? I think those are his real eyes. Maybe his hair, that looks kind of fake..." And the student said, "You're right! It looks like a tope-y" 

"A tope-y?"

"Yeah, you know, a fake hair, a tope-y"

"Ohhhhh, you mean a toupee?!"

"I guess so!"

Chicho Boys

It's getting harder and harder to motivate myself to write a blog post. But I pretty much live off of affirmation from my friends and family, and I know the only way to get that is to tell you all how it's going.

Right now it's going. Our afterschool program is well-attended, but behavior is proving to be a huge stumbling block. Today I planned a fun outing, taking the students outside to play some frisbee (the theme was college culture), and they were roughhousing a lot and pushing each other even though I reminded them seconds before we went outside that we had to respect each other. So I lectured them. Which I hated. I told them that I their behavior was unacceptable and that they were being extremely disrespectful to people who were there to plan fun activities for them. It was extremely disappointing.

Not that I don't believe that high expectations are the fuel of learning, but I think mine were too high for the maturity level of my students. I have worked with mature-for-their-age highschoolers for 4 years, so I suppose I am assuming too many similarities between that group and my current group of 6th graders. I don't really know how to handle that disparity.

I have been pulling my focus list students out of class the past couple days to work on concepts, and that's been going well for the most part. Most of the students I take are happy to go, some are complacent. I took an extra kid who is normally a behavior problem in class in my group today to ease some of the burden off my teacher. It was a great set-up until he had to leave for a doctor's appt. 

I know this post is poorly organized, but I don't really know what else to say. There are things that have happened that I'm happy about.

Yesterday I went produce shopping at Chicho Boys Fruit Market, which sells Grade B produce from the packing district for ridiculous prices. See receipt below; I'm telling you, the prices are ridiculous. So that was thrilling. Haha

Also, I got a group together to play ultimate frisbee tonight, and it was a success! We played a whole game after work before it got dark, which is 7:30. Blah.

And tomorrow most of my school team is going to the Spurs home opener against the Memphis Grizzlies! It'll be fun to watch and be in a full NBA stadium. 

I would love to hear from anyone who reads this. I'm feeling kind of desperate for any ideas on how to be more effective and I'm just getting frustrated when things don't go as planned. And I miss the people I love. 

"Yay!"

Today was much better in pretty much every way from the past few days.

I did my first "pull-out" tutoring session during class today, and when I told one of the students that he'd be spending some time with me at the beginning of class, he literally said, "Yay!" 

Also, a positive from a couple days ago was that I had to talk to a student about his behavior in our afterschool program, and I said, "You know, I want this to be fun for you and I would really rather not have to yell at you ever." And he responded, "Miss, you've never yelled at me!" I'm glad he feels that way.

Also, a student led a couple cheers today during power greeting and his normal outgoing self turned into adorable shyness. 

One of the teachers that I've only spoken to once came up to me while I was working in the library, patted my back, and said, "You guys are such a blessing to this school." :)

Today was the dance. And I completely forgot how awful/wonderful junior high dances are in every way. It was comforting to know that this dance was extremely similar to my own junior high dance experiences. City Year had a VIP room set up for students who had kept 100% attendance for the first 9 weeks, complete with games, face paint, and a photo booth! A few students hung around in there for the entire time and I heard "This is way more fun than out there!!" more than once. One of my students lost to me at Jenga and then kept challenging me to games as a "rematch." I obviously didn't let any of the kids win on purpose because then what would they learn? 

Also, I had a good "Boiler Up!" moment with a teacher at my school who is a fellow Purdue alum because today was college shirt day and I obviously was wearing my Old Gold & Black. And it just so happened that when Alex said he didn't really have a college shirt, I made sure I brought a Purdue shirt for him to wear. How lucky! 

And yesterday a 6th grader who lives in Alex's apt. complex and hangs around his roommate asked for help with her homework, so I obliged. In the middle of our testing for factors of numbers, she said, "I like you, Mae, you're cool." :)

In the midst of all the negativity I've gotten from students the last couple days, there have been a lot of positive things, so I wanted to make sure I reflected on those. My mind finds it much easier to dwell on students who don't like me or reject me and downplay the ones who show me affection and approval. I'll work on letting those dominate my thoughts. 

Tomorrow is a half day!!!! For the students, that is. But we get to have a team potluck for lunch and I'm bringing apple cider. Yummmmm. 

The Riddle

Today was not great.

I've gotten a little off track from what I'm supposed to be doing as a corps member in the classroom. I've been so focused on helping my teacher regain control of her classroom and redirecting all the students who are off task. I think it's valuable work, and I can see that what I'm dojng is helpful, but it's not what I'm supposed to do as a part of City Year. I am supposed to focus on those students that are within reach of success and failure at the same time. Those students who have potential but are getting swallowed by the system. So I've got to redirect my attention from saving the class from certain destruction to helping my students save themselves from becoming collateral damage.

Which sucks. I really want to help my teacher create a successful learning environment where all her students can learn effectively. But that is not my job and I understand that I will not be able to do both things. So I have to help my focus list students first, and then contribute to my class.  Lesson learned the disheartening way.

I felt a lot better when I went on a run this evening and was reminded why I do this job. I live in a really nice area of San Antonio and I was running around my residential neighborhood when I ran by a junior high school. It is not a part of the inner city district and is one of the highest-achieving schools in SA. The inequality was staring me in the face. I was running by the houses of children that went to this school and I could see how my students are robbed of so many things that lead to success. I saw a girl hanging Halloween decorations in her yard until her dad drove up and she yelled "Daddy!" and ran up to him (yes, that seriously happened in real life) and there were kids sitting on the porch working on what I assume is homework. It reminded me of my school in West Lafayette where parents would be worried about a 5-point in class assignment missing and my students' biggest day-to-day concern was where to park the cars that were given to them by their families.

It's not fair. My students didn't choose the lifestyle they live here. They didn't choose to go to my school or live in the neighborhood or have the responsibilities they have. But they will choose what they know if they don't see there is a viable second option that is desirable to them. And that's what I'm supposed to be helping them with. I don't feel very impactful at this moment, but I believe I can help these students see the second option by helping them see that they can be successful in school. I think I can. My students are smart kids who are plenty capable of being successful in school if they put forth the effort. The riddle lies in finding a way to motivate them to do well academically.  

Cop-Out Post

Too lazy to post about today. It was training, I missed my kids at school! They were taking a benchmark test, so I couldn't be in the room any way, but I still missed them.

So anyway, here is a website that makes fun of CY in a goodnatured way. A lot of the jokes are of the inside variety, so sorry if it's not as amusing to you as it is to me. :)

http://whatshouldwecallmycityyear.tumblr.com/

FYI:

CM - corps member
TL - team leader, sort of our boss
PM - project manager, legitimately our boss and our TL's boss
FL - focus list

The Competitive Nature of Sixth-Graders

Today I will write things that I am grateful for, providing vignettes from my day for color and context (yes, quite).

I am grateful for sixth-graders' unabashedness. They will say whatever is on their minds, and their minds are weird. Two days ago, I was working with Charlie, and somehow mentioned I was from Indiana. And he instantly said, "Aw, Miss, is that why you have to wear your hair like that?!" When I told him that people from Indiana, in fact, can wear their hair however they please, he seemed legitimately surprised. 

I am grateful also for moments of innocence from students who I thought were jaded. Today in one class, a student who was significantly behind in his superhero story was wasting time, so I went up to him and said, "what's going on man? We don't have time to waste!" He exasperatedly put his head back and said, "but, ugh, this is boring!!" So I was already kind of frustrated with how off task the rest of the class was and how far behind they were, so I came back quickly with, "you know what is even more boring than this? Staying in sixth grade the rest of your life." His reaction was terrifying and endearing. His eyes got huge and he picked up his pencil and said "miss, if I do this can I move up to seventh grade?!" I had not expected such a candid reaction from him, and was quick to say that yes, of course, and that we had plenty of time to make up te work he was behind on, but sheesh did that light a fire under him!

I am grateful for the competitive nature of sixth graders. A group of students was acting out during class while they were supposed to be writing. So I sat down at their table and told them I would write with them. That didn't work well, so I said, "I bet you guys can't sit here an work for five minutes without talking!" And started my watch. The next five minutes were the quietest of my day. They didn't even stop to realize that I hadn't actually bet them anything. The challenge was enough.

I am grateful for my after school co-coordinator. We had our introductory unit this week, and everything went off spectacularly! Running an after school program is a pretty complex task, especially coordinating a team that is as inexperienced at running an after school program as you are. But my co-coordinator and I have managed to pull it off and we already are averaging double the attendance from last year! 

I am grateful for the wonderful Diploma's Now team at my school. We have awesome curricular support and today our English/Language Arts curricular expert gave all the ELA tutors a rundown of what writing looks like on the STAAR test (Texas standardized test). It will make me so much more effective to know what they'll be expected to do next year! 

I am thankful for all my supportive friends back home! I know I can call any of them and talk for an hour to renew my spirit and regain my motivation! It's awesome to hear about the things you all are doing because I can feel pretty isolated down here. 

But I am grateful for the friends I've made in San Antonio. I can tell some of these people are going to be in my life after City Year and that contributes to this year being way more than worth the hard work and long hours.

Lastly, I am grateful that I can wear clothes that are not my uniform tomorrow! Joy of all joys.

My Shoelace has had Enough

Today was the coldest day so far: 63 degrees. It was also rainy, however, which added a complication not only to my morning, but also created a huge hike in our schools' absences today. 

Today Josue and Charlie were both absent from my classes, but I noticed my impact directly on another student, we'll call him Jesus (Hay-soos). So Jesus normally is super disruptive in class, but he can generally get work done when instructions are repeated (he is often talking through instructions and misses ten). So today, he was extremely disruptive at the beginning of class, but as soon as I focused my attention dokey on him by kneeling next to him, and explained exactly what he should be doing, he got on task and worked, even when I walked around the class. All it took was a direct intervention in his behavior! Very rewarding. 

Afterschool went swell today!! At the end of the program, we did a group share of "highs and lows" and 2 out of 3 highs were about coming/joining after school! It was great. They made up the rules that we're going to follow during our program, and a lot of them came up with some awesome rules, as well as spot-on reasons for why we need to have rules! I was very proud to be in charge of that group today. 

My shoelace stayed in place all day, through 10 hours at school, eating dinner at the Rusty Bucket, and walking through Walmart, and then came untied  as I was approaching my apartment door. What's that all about? On the other hand, I kind of know how it felt. 

Good night.

ESL and Mariachi

I am updating this blog from the cozy comfort of my own bed. It happens to be an air mattress that is not meant for permanent use. Crazy, you say? Perhaps. But if I can make it through the year without acquiring a twin mattress that I probably won't have any use for in the future and certainly have no desire to transport, I will. And honestly, I still get the there-is-no-feeling-like-laying-down-in-bed-after-a-long-day feeling, so why give up now?

Today was a good day, but it was hard to come ban to school after we had a three day weekend, especially since the students did not. So they were all, "where we're you?" And we were all "... Uh, sleeping..." 

Except I was not sleeping! I had an all-day interview with Teach For America! I've gone back and forth on my opinion of the program and it's effectiveness at minimizing the achievement gap, but I believe I could be an effective teacher with TFA support, and I would especially love a community of young teachers around me for my first couple years. So, I hope I get the position! I'll find out on Halloween, and they'll make me an offer in a city they choose to place me in and then I can take or leave that offer. We will see. 

So, anyway, today was a little hard. I made some progress with a few students though! For example, a student that previously told me to "shut up and get away" didn't ignore me when I talked to him today! Let's call him Charlie. So Charlie has been a big issue in class because he not only gets zero percent of his work done (literally all he accomplished one class period was scratching out the name he had written on his project the previous day) but he will talk incessantly to all of those around him thereby dragging everyone down. Normally, I try to be really real with him, taking the tack of "seriously? What are you doing? Do you realize that a zero on this project will be hard to recover from? Do you want to repeat this class? If you don't like it, te inky way to get out is to do your work" and his typical response is to turn his back to me physically and ignore me. 

But today! He talked back to me. He told me I was annoying and asked why I cared whether he did it or not. So I told him it hurt me SO MUCH to watch him waste himself and let himself down by. doing. absolutely. nothing. I also told him that he could be as mean to me as he wanted, but I wasn't intimidated by him and I didn't think he was funny, so he might as well stop trying to bully me. He didn't sound impressed, but he didn't turn away, so I asked what he wanted to be when he grew up. He didn't give a straight answer, but I gathered that he didn't want to be a junior high student for life, so it was a little productive. And then, he cursed at another student, but apologized to me for doing so. That showed me that he respected me, however little. I can tell I'll be able to reach him, if even just cracking the surface.

Josue did not have a good day in class today but he asked if he could eat lunch with me, so I might try to do that tomorrow.

And the after school program started today!!! It was fantastic! The only hiccup was that a few people came who hadn't turned in permission slips, so they couldn't legally stay, but they took the slips to get signed so they can start coming tomorrow! I hope that it becomes the cool thing to do; I am proud to say that a few of the kids that I know are popular we're in attendance. It's only a matter of time. Muahaha.

A few of us stayed after after-school to help at the ESL parent night for parents of kids in our English Second Language program. It was awesome to see the parents and hear the principal speak to them in Spanish. Our school has so many great resources to help these students learn English! 

AND our mariachi band played. That's right, our school not only has band and choir, but also mariachi. They were excellent, had their music memorized (4 songs!) and there was even some singing. I love San Antonio! 

The only bummer of the day is that I got a blister from sharpening too many pencils. I know, happens to the best of us. 

Anecdotal Evidence

Overall, a really fun day. Here are a few anecdotes:

We had 16 students in tutoring after school! A 50% increase per day this week!

I got a work plan made up for the entire year for after school lesson planning. It's color-coordinated in rainbow order.

A class of students applauded me when after I gave a short presentation about our after school program during their homeroom-type class.

A few students kept accidentally calling my teammate Alexandr "Ms. K" or just "Miss." I might have encouraged a kid to say "Bye, Ms. K!" when they left tutoring. I also might have high-fived that kid after he did it.

There was a dead cat in a box outside the school today. At least, I think it was a cat. One student described it as "a cat and a dog mixed together and cut open." I did NOT go see for myself. 

3 students sat outside and read books with us for power-reading!

A student I had never met needed help on English and Social Studies homework. I was floating around having students sign-in for after school and I told him how much I loved social studies and how much I'd love to help! When I was leaving, he said, "Miss, are you gonna come back?" 

3 students that came to after school tutoring were on the football team and missed part of practice to get extra help. It was the day after progress reports went out, so it probably wasn't their choice, but still!

My friend Bridget told me that she was talking to a TFA recruiter and mentioned my name. He remembered me and said that I had written really good essays on my application! That got me all fired up for my final interview that's coming up Monday!

I got a box of random stuff from my mom! It included open bags of dried goods, 3 pairs of sunglasses, and a box of tissues. 

"Miss, My Backpack Closed?"

Today was great!

Reasons why:

1. My teacher's TFA supervisors came in today to conference with her (and me!) about our issues in class. They had a lot of good ideas, most of which centered around my teacher being herself as much as possible. It was a conflicting message from what the administrators have been telling her (basically to be meaner to the kids) but I think it was really valuable. If you have a personality that can be strict and hard, kids will respect you for that and behave well. But if you have a personality that is more compassionate and caring, you can't MAKE yourself be strict and hard because kids can tell and 1) they won't respect you and 2) you won't like yourself or who you are while you're teaching. And the TFA people complimented my teacher and me for how well we're working in the classroom and said that they'd never seen a TFA/Corps member pair work so closely together. :D

2. Josue cheered outside with us again and (shock!) so did they student that he had been fighting with! Even though having students outside is distracting sometimes and might diminish our cheering a bit, it was amazing to see those boys interact kindly with each other! Also, Josue led one of the cheers with me. :)

3. I told you yesterday about my awesome super hero, Mr. Popular. Well, the next step in our students' imaginative stories is for them to partner with another super hero/villain in class and then use that character to create conflict in their story. A LOT of students, some not even in the classes that I help, chose Mr. Popular as their partner/nemesis! They were telling me about it all day and saying how excited they were to beat up on my superhero. It was awesome! :D

4. 11 students came to after school tutoring today! Almost double from yesterday! And we got some permission slips returned from students for our full program starting next week! Plus, some of my toughest behavior students were there! I'm so excited to spend time with them where I don't have to constantly redirect them and they can see me in less of a structured environment. Hopefully our numbers will keep increasing!

5. One of the students that used to be in a class that I helped got transferred up to Pre-AP. I mentioned him before. Well, he now has class right after one of my most difficult classes. So today, I was cleaning up after that class and I was feeling pretty flustered because they were being pretty disrespectful and off-task. So he comes in and steps on my foot (something he has done every time I've seen him for the past couple weeks). It made my heart smile because I had just been laid low by this earlier class and it was nice to have that familiar sign of "affection" from one of my students. It just made me breathe a little better and laugh a little. :)

6. Every day after class, one student always stands up, puts on his backpack, turns his back to me and says, "Miss, my backpack closed?" Makes me chuckle on the inside every time.

7. One of my more off-task students stayed after school and I helped him catch all the way up with his super hero story board! He was reluctant and may have said that he hated ELA a couple times and may have rejected my high five, but he was ALL caught up by the end, which made me do a dance on the inside! And maybe a little on the outside.

Extra Brain Power Expenditure

Alright, all, I'm ditching the questions. Writing the blog had become more of a chore than I liked, so I've got to make the structure a little looser so I won't just decide not to do it. I'll still try to hit the basic points, but you'll just have to hold on to your hats and guess which question I'm answering. Sorry for the extra brain power expenditure.

So today was a Monday. I had a really fun weekend with lots of activities, which I will quickly rundown. Friday after work I played some basketball with Alex in a park by a Salvation Army. There's a pretty interesting crowd that gathers there, believe it or not. Then we met some friends downtown for First Friday, the shindig that happens in SA ever first Friday of the month with all sorts of live music and craft vendors. Then Saturday Alex and I did some morning Power Yoga that made me feel pretty NOT powerful. We signed up for this free week at a studio so we wanted to get our free's worth. But then there was a farmer's market going on so we noshed on some crepes and walked around the Pearl Brewery Area, which was really pretty awesome! Then some people came over that night and went swimming with Shelby and I at our apartment pool, we went out for Thai food (and bubble tea!!) and chilled out while watching an episode of Will & Grace. Sunday, Shelby, Ryan, and I went to church and then the pastor and her family took us out to lunch at Fidelo's, which may have been the best Mexican food I've had since I've been here--and that's saying a lot. Then I went back downtown for a pushcart derby that was happening, which wasn't as exciting as the flyer made it sound, but still worth seeing. I then did laundry and called my family. A great relaxing weekend!

So now that we have that out of the way, it's safe to say that Monday was a little hard to get back in the swing of working at school. There were some great parts though!

Josue has been cheering outside with us in the mornings for the last couple days! He chose to stay outside and give high fives with me rather than go inside with the other sixth graders because there's another boy that he can't seem to get along with. I told him it was a good idea to stay farther away from him, because they're both my friends and I don't want them getting into trouble. And he really kind of likes the cheers! He was singing one of them in class.

Also, we're writing imaginative stories in my teacher's class. The students are making up super heroes and giving them 5 strengths and 5 weaknesses. So my teacher asked me to make one up so we could both use ours as an example. I made one up--his name is Mr. Popular, and he's shockingly very closely relatable to most of my students. The best part was when I offered to share my super hero with the class, they all stayed quiet. Even the class with the terrible behavior! I had to remind a few of them a few times, but it was heartening to see that most of them were really interested in what my super hero was like. I'm gaining some ground!

Today we started tutoring after school, but only 6 kids showed up. We haven't started our full after school program and the advertising for tutoring was pretty last minute, so I'm not that disappointed in the turnout. However, tiny part of me (the same part that cries at the end of Cool Runnings) was hoping for a huge number of kids. I will reach that huge number, mark my words!

I'm excited to see the numbers for after school grow as we get into the swing of things, as well as continue to see improvement in the class with the worst behavior. I will help the kids that want to learn in that class, and while I'm at it, I'll help the kids who don't want to learn.

Penat Buter and Gelly

1. How did today differ from how I expected it to be?
2. What are the high points of the day?
3. What are the low points of the day?
4. What is one experience that caused me to grow today?
5. What am I excited about for tomorrow?

1. Today was a little worse than I expected it to be. I think I was a little complacent because yesterday went so well, but we were in the library yesterday, and today we were back in the classroom, so all the students were up to their old tricks. It really is getting destructive in one of my classes and students who want to learn are not able to, literally. So hopefully my teachers and I can meets to come up with some kind of solution because it's really out of hand. I expected behavior to be a little bit of a challenge today, but we were playing a review game, so it should not have been nearly as bad as it ended up being. Stay tuned.

2. We distributed our student survey and got a lot of awesome feedback! A LOT of students wrote that they were either very interested or somewhat interested in attending our after school program, so that is really exciting. We also rolled it out to the team and talked about our procedures for submitting lesson plans and all that, so it was nice to finally have thew hole team on the same page about it. There was a space for students to write in topics that they were interested in learning about, and we got a lot of serious answers that will help us a lot in planning our units, but we also got some creative answers, such as "penat buter and gelly," "apps on my phone," and "how to solve life's problems." If only I knew about these things! 

Also, we started pulling out potential focus list students to do an assessment with them, and as I was pulling a student out to work on hers, we were walking down the hallway and talking and she said, "Miss, you're cool." Ahhh, music to my ears.

Josue has been doing much better in class! He's working towards earning one of my felt-tip pens if he doesn't say anything mean to anyone during class. He almost got it today, but then he called someone a name I won't repeat here. He is doing leaps and bounds better in his other classes, and I'm excited for the day that he'll earn the pen from me!

3. This one class is just terribly out of control. A high-low point was a student in class who put his head down mid way through. I asked if he was okay and he said that he couldn't play the game because he had a headache from all the talking. It broke my heart! He wanted to participate but couldn't. So after school, he came into my teacher's room and asked if he could finish the review game on his own since he couldn't during class. HE is the reason that I am going to regroup and redouble my efforts to rein in this class. My teacher doesn't like to be a strict disciplinarian, so I am going to offer my services in that area, because I am beyond the point of caring if the students like me. I have asked them nicely to be quiet over 10 times and they have disrespected me and my teacher to our faces. It's time.

4. I grew today when Lexie and I presented our After School program plan to the team. It was awesome to get reactions and input to the work that we have been doing so far, and I learned a lot from the questions and reactions from the team. I realized that I think my high expectations for this program can be met. We are working to put a structure in pace to support our teammates as they plan units and lessons. After getting student feedback from the survey, I am so optimistic about our program!

I also grew while I was troubleshooting my problem class with Pat over the phone. He is a literally award-winning classroom manager, so talking to him about this taught me how little I know about how to manage a middle school classroom. I taught seniors and the sweetest group of freshman imaginable during student teaching. All the students were highly-motivated internally and externally. I didn't have to make up a behavior rewards and punishment system. I am SO SPOILED. That ends now.

5. I am excited to meet with my teacher tomorrow to plan a new attack on our most disruptive class period. Something has gotta give with these students, we can't go on like this!

Awkward Thumbs-Ups

Sorry for my hiatus from posting! Every once in a while the voice inside my head that tells me that reflecting everyday is a healthy practice and that a lot of my friends from home are reading about my journey gets drowned out by the voice that says sleep is a healthy practice and that no one is reading this anyways. I'll try to sort those voices out. In the mean time:

1. How did today differ from how I expected it to be?
2. What are the high points of the day?
3. What are the low points of the day?
4. What is one experience that caused me to grow today?
5. What am I excited about for tomorrow?

1. I expected today to be like the step back in "two steps forward, one step back" because we missed school on Friday for our full day of City Year training. I enjoyed the training, especially seeing everyone again, but I missed being at school and I thought about my teacher often as well as about my students who normally are really disruptive, including Josue. But today was great! A lot of them said, "Miss, you're back! Where have you been?" It was nice to be missed. Josue even said that he wishes I could go around to all his classes with him. Dawww. It was certainly a smoother transition than I expected.

2. A student called me Miss C! Until now, most students just say "Miss! Miss!" and don't really care whether they get me or my teacher to come help them. But today! They said my own name! It's the simple pleasures.

Also, students are getting to be pretty open, almost too much so. One sixth grader was really excited to tell me that he danced with a seventh grader at the dance they had on Friday. I gave him an awkward thumbs up for lack of anything else to say.

Another student came up to me before school and showed me his schedule, which he said had changed. He got moved up to Pre-AP English with my teacher! I was so excited for him, and I told him so, but he said that he wouldn't have me any more in class. I said I'd still be there during the flex period and whenever he wanted to talk to me. It was sweet that he was bummed about that, but there was so much to be excited about because he moved up!

Also, this morning a random lady and I shared a smile over two young girls and their mother when they got on the bus. Their hair was all done in braids and they had cute little bobbie socks on. I love sharing smiles. And then she complimented my hair and asked how I got it to curl just so. I told her I let it do what it wants and try not to anger it.

3. Attendance calls were a pretty big disaster today. Normally, we get a list of students who were absent from our attendance clerk during 3rd period so that late students have come in. We then take that list and call the ones who are absent to find out why they are absent/when they're coming back. Today, we got the data and made the calls, but several parents told us that they had dropped their kids off and that they had no idea why they would be absent. This happens a few times every day, and the parents find that their kids have been skipping class or wandering around, but today it was a lot. Come to find out that the attendance clerk gave us the absent list from the WRONG DAY. We had called so many wrong parents and their kids were actually in school! It was terrible. We had to call everyone back and apologize, which was really embarrassing. THEN we had to start the process all over again with the right list! It made us look really bad, but the mistake wasn't even our fault. The process took twice as long, unsurprisingly.

4. I grew today when I kicked my butt into gear and went for a run. Since moving to San Antonio, I have eaten my way all around town. Everyone needs to come visit me, if only for the delicious food. I have zero regrets about the amount of tacos and barbecue I have consumed, but I have regrets about the sedentary nature of my life to date. So, to reconcile with myself, I will exercise every day, and let myself indulge in whatever delicious food I desire within reason. We'll see how well it works out, but I know as soon as I leave San Antonio I will wish I had eaten infinitely more tacos, so there's no sense in depriving myself! Right?

5. Lexie and I are going to distribute our After School student interest survey tomorrow! I'm excited to start building our after school program into something that is really cool for students and that they can get a lot out of and grow into amazing young adults!

Competition makes everything better. As do funny hats.

1. How did today differ from how I expected it to be?
2. What are the high points of the day?
3. What are the low points of the day?
4. What is one experience that caused me to grow today?
5. What am I excited about for tomorrow?

1. Today was pretty on par with what I expected. I may change this question, because I'm getting bored with it and don't really have an interesting answer to it every day. What would you guys like to know? 

2. High point during power reading before school: 3 corps members were reading books that I lent them!

I finally got to sit down with my teacher and hash out some goals we have for the year! It was fun to get to know her a little better but also come up with fun stuff we can do with the class. For example, one goal they have is to read 40 books during the school year. My teacher and I are going to challenge them by reading books ourselves and competing with the classes. We haven't decided what the prize will be if they beat us, but it will probably involve us making fools of ourselves in some way and may involve silly hats. So far, I have read 3 books this school year. Some kids are kicking my butt and some haven't finished 1. 

3. I had to take my student to the principal's office today. Since I've talked about this student a lot, I think I'll give him a fake name for blog purposes. So, henceforth he will be known as Josue (Ho-Sway) because I really like that name. Since I've given Josue that journal, he's used it in most of his classes and told some other corps members about it, which is great! The only thing is that it's not helping enough. He still curses at teachers and other students so the teachers kick him out of class (understandably). So he was just bumming around the hallways and I left our class, with permission, to see what he was doing. A teacher came into the hallway and said he needed to go to the principal because he was being disruptive all day. So we tried to track down an administrator, but they were all busy, so I just took him back to the class he was supposed to be in and the teacher let him come back in. Also, Josue usually turns his journal back into me at the end of every day, I rip out the pages he wrote on to signify a "new start", and give it back. Today I didn't see him after school, so I didn't get it back. Fingers crossed he didn't leave it at home! Or, even worse, left it somewhere that someone could pick it up and read it, because I tell him that he won't get in trouble for anything he writes in there as long as he doesn't say it out loud. And he takes advantage of that.

4. I grew today when I sat outside with two school employees during their lunch break. One of them was the data clerk for the school, and she handles a lot of the attendance issues that the school has. So Alex and I were telling her where we were from and why we are serving, and she told us some of the problems that kids have. It was really interesting because most of the kids she deals with we have no contact with because they're the ones who simply don't come to school. She described a 17 year old who has come in to enroll in our middle school, but came in to sign up 12 days ago and only just made it back in today. He sat through lunch and then told her that he was going to leave. It was so sad to listen to, but it reminded me that there has to be a point where a student decides for him or herself that they are going to try and be successful or that they are just going to give up. On one hand, I am so distraught for their situations and I worry about them, and on the other hand, I'm just dumbfounded. That there are people out there with no middle school education who work every day, maybe even get married and have kids, and have life satisfaction. For myself, I can't imagine being satisfied with my life if I knew that I could have achieved more or if I thought I wasn't trying my hardest. It's just confounding to me and I'm not sure I'll ever understand that people are satisfied with much LESS than the status quo. 

5. I am excited to hear back from the principal about our after school proposal and hopefully roll out the student survey. To stay on track for beginning our after school program on October 7, we've got to get the survey back ASAP!

Also I'm excited to be back to playing volleyball tomorrow night. 

Be Quiet, Miss is Reading!

1. How did today differ from how I expected it to be?

2. What are the high points of the day?

3. What are the low points of the day?

4. What is one experience that caused me to grow today?

5. What am I excited about for tomorrow?

1. Today went much faster than I am used to expecting, and everything went really well. My classes are slowly improving in behavior as I try out different methods of interacting--or not interacting--with them in class. 

2. High point #1 was during power greeting and there's no way it's going to be as funny in this post as it was in person, let's just get that out of the way. We do a chant in power greeting that goes as follows:

Corps Member: "My name is [name] and you know what I got?!"

Rest of team: "WHAT DO YOU GOT?"

Corps Member: "I gotta team that's hotter than hot!"

Rest of team: "HOW HOT IS HOT?"

Corps Member: "Batman and Superman"

Rest of team: "UH-HUH UH-HUH"

Corps Member: "Can't do it like [name of other corps member] can!"

Rest of team, while the called-out corps member dances: "GO [name] GO [name] GO..."

Other corps member takes over, and so on

So we were doing this cheer, and it gets a little silly because we're using our last names that the students call us by, like Miss C, and Miss Liquez, and Mr. Perez, etc. Today, one of our team members, JoAnn (Miss San Miguel) got called out and she faltered on her first line and it came out "Me name is..." in a hilarious voice. I would best describe this voice as the voice of an Irish pirate. Anyways, we all completely lost it and the cheer devolved into hysterical laughter. It was awesome, and the kids definitely saw that we were having a good time.

Also a high point was that I tried something different with the difficult class today! Instead of walking around and redirecting them, I practiced doing exactly what they were supposed to be doing. I read silently, I took notes, I waited quietly for instructions. It actually worked during reading time!! I was sitting at a table that is notorious for giggle-fits and outbursts, and I sat down and started reading. They eyed me, but read for a bit and then started talking. I looked up from my book and said quietly, "Excuse me, I'm trying to read." and they were quiet!! A couple minutes later a student hushed another student and said, "Be quiet, Miss is reading!" It was partly for the laughs, but it wasn't disruptive! I was thrilled that the students who wanted to read at least had a little more of a quiet atmosphere to do it even if some students still chose to sit in their seats and not read. At least they were quieter! Also, at the end of class, one of the students who knows me said, "Where were you all period, Miss? You weren't in here while I was in here!" I told him that I was but that I was quietly doing what students were supposed to be doing. He was shocked! :)

Also the weather has been GORGEOUS the past couple days. Highs in the mid-80's with it being closer to 60 in the morning. I will totally be able to do that for 9 more months.

Also I got to hang out with Alex after school and go with him to buy a violin, attempt to go to a yoga class but get lost and decide to go tomorrow instead, and try a healthy Mexican place close to my apartment I've been eyeing. It was a great way to spend my evening!

3. While I was trying to model good behavior for my students, some students were misbehaving in other parts of the class. I guess I'll keep having to try to figure something out, but at least there's a slight improvement. 

There are tiny little "low points" throughout the day, but today the little "high points" outweighed them, so I really don't have much to add in this section. Hooray!

4. I grew today when I thought about how much the phrase "I'm proud of you" can mean to a student. It always seems awkward to say to anyone. But why? Is it that it implies some sort of ownership or superiority to that person? I feel like that's what often stops me from saying it. I've been intentional about saying it to Pat a lot, because there is SO much to be proud of him about. It's always worth saying because I know that I love it when my parents say it, even if it makes me blush. So today I used it with my students generously. Because I am proud! I am proud when my student does something that I ask them to do! I am proud when a student ignores the boy saying something really hurtful to him because we talked about not giving that bully what he wants! I am proud when a student shows me the creative story they wrote about dinosaurs. I just am, so I told them. And when I told them, it occurred to me that they might not hear that from anyone else. A lot of these student have wonderful parents who are proud of them, but some of them don't. And there is no way to tell who is who. SO I TELL THEM ALL. The end.

5. I am excited to get feedback on our after school proposal from the principal! Our official proposal was submitted today so that we could roll out the student interest survey by Thursday and get our program started ASAP. I'm actually proud of what Lexie and I put together for the proposal so I'm excited to hear what the head honcho has to say. 

Also I'm excited for Power Reading tomorrow. On Wednesdays we have taken to reading quietly in front of the school instead of cheering. It makes the students wonder what we're doing and gives us a chance to talk about how much we love reading! Plus, we make it look cool. 

"You know who it is"

1. How did today differ from how I expected it to be?
2. What are the high points of the day?
3. What are the low points of the day?
4. What is one experience that caused me to grow today?
5. What am I excited about for tomorrow?

1. Today was a little more stressful than I expected it to be. I implemented a plan I had for that student I was telling you about. I picked up a little journal for him so that maybe he could write down all the bad words that he thinks and say really mean things about people without actually saying them. I ran it by the special education aide that is in class with him, and she thought it would help, so he used it all during class and then took it with him to his other classes. I encouraged him a LOT to write in it when I heard him curse, and he actually did write in it a lot! I told him that no one would read it but me and that I didn't care how mean or bad his language was. He definitely heard that part. He filled quite a few pages and used it in most of his classes! I don't know if it stopped him from saying the things aloud, but at least some of them might have gotten written instead of said. However, he said that one of his teachers saw him with it and said she would take it away if she saw it again. So me and the aide are going to go talk to her to say that it's a tool that we're using to help him. Hopefully she'll understand. It's pretty complicated stuff, helping students. I can understand why most teachers not only don't have the time, but don't have the patience to deal with all their students' problems, especially those who are the most disruptive. It's really tempting to just get them out of class so you can move on. And sometimes that's the best thing to do for the rest of the class. But I'm there to help the students the teacher doesn't have time/patience to help.

2. Doing attendance calls was fun today. There was one parent whose voicemail greeting was, "You know who it is, leave a message." We had a lot of fun coming up with witty messages to leave that parent, such as, "Actually, we don't know who it is, but we hope it is the parent/guardian of______" Dennis even came up with a Rhodes attendance jingle: "Rhodes attendance/Where is your kid?" Obviously none of these are going to be used in real life, but it helps to make a serious task a little silly.

I see all sorts of crazy awesome people on the bus. For example, there was a gentleman today who had an American flag skullcap under a NASCAR hat who was wearing a fanny pack and listening to a CD walkman. Prime people-watching on the Via bus system, friends.

Mystery moment: Every morning I get off the bus near my school, a school bus without a label on the side pulls up to the intersection. It's full of grown men, and they are chanting and clapping constantly as long as I'm within earshot. I think it may be a chain gang from a prison on their way to do work, but I'm not sure. Any way, it makes me happy every morning to hear them chant, because the cheers are upbeat and have happy themes.

3. One of my classes is just proving to be a conundrum. My teacher and I talked about it, and we are really at a loss as to how to get them to behave themselves. It's a madhouse, and the teacher does nothing differently, it's not right after lunch, they're in assigned seats (for those who choose not to move and refuse to sit where they're supposed to). I JUST DON'T UNDERSTAND. Hopefully, the teacher and I can put our heads together and come up with some kind of solution, because they are pretty much standing still and falling way behind the other classes. The problem is incessant talking, even when the teacher stops class and uses all kind of attention-getting tools to get them back on track. It may last for 1 second, no exaggeration. If you have any ideas, PLEASE TELL ME.

4. I grew today when I became more practical about implementing the after school program. Lexie and I created a student-interest survey to hand out to students, but met a roadblock when we realized that we would have to print 800 some odd copies for that. So we got creative and decided to make it into a powerpoint that the teachers would go through with students during their flex period (a sort of homeroom used for enrichment and remediation) while the students record answers on their own sheet of paper. While we were thinking of solutions to the paper problem, my initial reaction was to cling to the idea that I had come up with. But then Meta-Mae, that person who is the real brains of the operation, reminded me that that idea was impractical and not a friend to the trees, so it was silly to cling to it. I'm glad that happened, and that I can be humbled when original plans have to change, because I talk about flexibility being one of my strengths. I think we can all talk about how flexible we are until we're reminded, yet again, that we really don't like change and we really do like things to go our way. I'm a work in progress, kay?

5. I am excited to hand in our proposal for the after school program to the principal tomorrow and get the ball rolling on handing out our student surveys. Also, I'm excited to see how I can better help students in the toughest period to stop disrespecting the teacher. Something has gotta work. Right?

The Running of the Bus

1. How did today differ from how I expected it to be?
2. What are the high points of the day?
3. What are the low points of the day?
4. What is one experience that caused me to grow today?
5. What am I excited about for tomorrow?

1. Today was pretty on par with my expectations. I expected that I would be pretty happy because it was Friday, but that the students might be a little rowdier for the same reason. Both were true, except in one class! Usually, all three of the classes that I assist in are pretty terrible behaviorally. Today, though, there was one that was surprisingly on task and respectful. It was great! My heart definitely swelled when I looked around and didn't have anyone to redirect and could actually sit down and model student behavior by reading my current book (Redwall by Brian Jaques).

2. OMG I had a great moment today. A student who is a huge behavior problem came into class late per usual, and was talking out of turn per usual. But for some reason, he respects me, so I asked him to please take notes and he half-heartedly did. And then the teacher asked a question and he looked at me and said the answer. I told him that he should raise his hand and answer and he did! The teacher called on him and he gave the answer and she said "great job!" It was seriously like a climax scene from a feel-good movie. That moment carried me through the whole day. I hope I can work with this kid more often. He has terrible problems in other classes with yelling at other students and using profane language regularly. But today, he came back to the classroom I serve in between every period to talk to me. He would tell me how many cuss words he said in the last class and I would tell him that he doesn't have to use that language. I would say, "You know you could keep those words in and then come talk to me about it, right?" and he would say "Yeah, but you're not in all of my classes!" So I told him we could talk about it after school and that I'd see him on Monday, but he said he was suspended from school on Monday. I HOPE and PRAY that I can make a big enough difference in his behavior before he gets expelled from school, because that is a legitimate concern. It will definitely be hard for me if he leaves school because I can feel a rapport building and I know he is far less likely to graduate if he has to go to alternative school starting in 6th grade.

Also, we did appreciations as a team! I knew that I would be needing some uplift at the end of this long week, so I suggested to our team leader that we do some kind of affirmation/appreciation. Those of you who know me know that my love language is totally words of affirmation, so I jump at any chance I can get for people to say nice things to each other! --plug: my Wall of Affirmation is still taking material if you feel compelled to send any warm wishes my way via snail mail. :)-- So we all wrote a bunch of positive things about one another. I loved it.

And Alexa gave me a ride home today so I didn't have to ride the bus!
And I'm about to go to Rosario's for some top-notch Mexican food and see my friends from other school teams!

3. I'm still nursing my cold, but it is much better today by far! One other not-so-cool thing was that my bus this morning was a full 2 minutes early, so I saw it as I was walking up to the stop and had to sprint ahead of the light to make it on time! However, I was telling Shelby that one thing I love about taking the bus is that you only have to be late once. Once all that panic and sprinting of making it onto the bus, you're instantly right on schedule. Compared to driving where you're late the entire time until you make it to your destination, I prefer the bus feeling.

4. I grew today when I wrote appreciations for my team. I am so thankful for every person that is a part of our school team and I loved taking time to reflect on why exactly that was. This group of people is outstanding, but in such different ways. here are so many strengths on the team, but they're certainly well spread out among our team members. It's really beautiful to be a part of such a diverse, effective group. I know it's going to be an amazing year.

5. I am excited to finally know for sure that I'll be with my teacher all year. Once we find that out, I'll be able to have a one-on-one meeting with her to figure out how to tackle these classes for the rest of the year and which students I'll be meeting with for extra tutoring help! 

The Rareness of Blue Trees

1. How did today differ from how I expected it to be?
2. What are the high points of the day?
3. What are the low points of the day?
4. What is one experience that caused me to grow today?
5. What am I excited about for tomorrow?

1. Today was much better with my teacher back in the classroom, as I anticipated. It was even a little bit better overall than I expected after such a late night last night. I had much more positive interaction with students than negative, which is more than I was expecting.

2. So, a student inadvertently told me that he liked me today. He did so in an interesting way: there is a teacher's aid in some of my classes to help with students who have behavioral disorders. She is very confrontational and this student is extremely vocal about his dislike for her. He often talks back aloud to try and get a rise out of her, which is usually effective. Today, she had told him to do something and in response he said, loudly, "I HATE white people!" After he said this out loud while I was kneeling next to him trying to get him back on task, he instantly turned to me and said, "I'm definitely not talking about you, Miss, not about you." I tried not to react and said, "I appreciate that, but you should probably start taking notes...." It may be terrible, but I was thrilled that he even thought to say anything to me. He could have easily just let me think that he hates me too, but he felt like he needed to be clear that he didn't hate me! Hooray!...?

Also, I made a very teachery, non-hilarious joke and totally got a couple students to laugh. They were doing an activity on a blue piece of paper. When they finished, the teacher said they should turn it over and do another activity on the back. Some students wanted a new piece because their markers had soaked through. They asked me if they could have one, and I said that they should try to make it work on the back, because blue trees are very rare, you see, and we have to do our best to conserve these blue trees. Both students that were on the receiving end of this gem smiled and laughed graciously. BONUS, they did their work on the back side of the paper like I asked. Bam.

3. I've caught a cold. It was really only a matter of time what with spending all day in an overcrowded 6th grade class and the amount of high-fives I'm giving to kids who not only wipe their noses on their hands in front of me, but whom I've also seen pet stray dogs that wander up to the school. I've been diligent with washing hands and hand sanitizer, but nothing boosts the immune system like actually having the virus, right? Right?!

4. I grew today when I had to explain to a student why he should do the classwork even though he thought it was way too "babyish" and easy for him. He was excellent during silent reading time, but would continue reading his book when the class was supposed to be taking notes. I asked why he wasn't doing what he was supposed to and amidst all the whining and "uggghhhh"s, he said that this was way too easy for him and they'd already done it in 3rd grade. So I thought about how to go about it. If it was too easy, how do I handle it? When I was in school, I did things that seemed stupid because I knew that I still needed to get a good grade on my report card. Plus, I liked feeling smart, of course. But this guy, he needed a better reason.

So I told him he had to prove it to me. If he wanted to do hard stuff, he had to prove to me and the teacher that he could do this stuff. He said some more "ugghghghgs" so I tried an example. I said, "If I told you I had a million dollars, would you believe me?" and he said, "Yeah right." So I countered with "What would I have to do to get you to believe me?" and he said, "You'd have to show me all the stuff you bought and act like you were super rich." Bingo. He didn't instantly do his work, and he was still reluctant to do anything, but I could tell that he got what I said and if I keep reminding him, maybe it will be enough for him to prove that he's ready to try harder stuff. Because I would be THRILLED to provide such stuff.

5. I am excited for it to be Friday! It has been a really rewarding week, and I am in no way "working for the weekend" (you just sang the song, didn't you?) but I am ready to have a couple days off to recover from this kid-cold and I'm also ready to start my year-long partnership with my teacher! I can feel that this is going to be a really great experience for both of us!

7:45s

1. How did today differ from how I expected it to be?
2. What are the high points of the day?
3. What are the low points of the day?
4. What is one experience that caused me to grow today?
5. What am I excited about for tomorrow?

1. Today was much better than I expected!! Hooray!!!! There was still a sub and there was still terrible behavior and kids still ignored me and didn't do their work, but my perspective totally made it better! I focused on the students who were gaining something or changing their behavior because of what I was doing and it was 39238 times better! Also, we had parent night in the evening, and there were a LOT of parents there, which was a pleasant surprise! We got 24 parents to sign their kids up for the after school program before we even have the first day planned! I was so excited about that. So, overall, much better day than I prepared for it to be. Especially for a day where I was at school for 12 hours, 7:45 to 7:45.

2. First high point that comes to mind is food-related (duh). Between school and the parent night, a few of our team went out to a barbecue place and it was the best brisket I've had so far. It was soooooo good. I was dubious at first because it looked questionable on the outside, but the inside was very clean and decorated really creatively, and they had some of the best mac and cheese I've had to date.

Also! One of my students who I've had a lot of trouble with in class signed up for after school program! In class he refuses to do any work because he says it's too "babyish" and he needs harder stuff to do. I made it clear that he has to show that this work is too easy by doing it really well, but I think it will take a couple more days for that to sink in. BUT his parents came and asked about after school and said it sounded really great for him and signed him up. HOORAY! I definitely did a happy dance inside because I am sooooo willing to give him harder work to do once he shows me he can do the easy stuff.

AND another student from class found me in the cafeteria as I was floating around before school and wanted me to sit with him and his friends! So I sat and talked with them about Purdue and Drew Brees and my favorite football teams until it was time to go to class. This is why I do what I do.

Also, I was all prepared to ride the bus home from school at 8:00pm, but my teammates made sure that one of them gave me a ride! So Elisha drove me all the way home 10 minutes out of her way! We had an adventure with surprise rain and construction that got us all turned around, but it was still at least 45 minutes sooner than I would have been home. I am so thankful that she offered to give me a ride!

3. I feel like my low points of the day are going to start getting repetitive, because my low point again was that some students verbally or nonverbally told me that they were not happy that I was there. Today the good outweighed the bad for sure, but there were still students who ignored me or disrespected me and that always sticks out in my mind.

4. Also, a few of my students are going through emotional times. They have a lot of frustration for any number of reasons, but they tend to take it out on each other and then keep it inside, which is painful to watch. Sometimes they want to tell someone, anyone about it, but sometimes they shut down, won't do their work, and won't tell you why. This age is already so hard with all the hormones that our bodies aren't used to, which can make boys violent and girls dramatic, but these students have problems to compound the struggles that all of us went through during that time. It's hard to watch them go through that, remembering how terrible I felt during this age with a small fraction of the worries these children have on their hearts. It's growing for me to reflect on how I felt during this age and how far I've come since then, and try to translate that into helping these students overcome all this difficulty to focus on important things.

5. I am excited for my teacher to be back in the classroom. There will still be behavior issues I'm certain, but at least she can be there to dole out discipline and give the students definite tasks to do rather than having to guess with a lesson plan that the sub was given. 

The First Hard Day

1. How did today differ from how I expected it to be?
2. What are the high points of the day?
3. What are the low points of the day?
4. What is one experience that caused me to grow today?
5. What am I excited about for tomorrow?

1. Well, I was nervous today because my class had a substitute. And today was actually the first pretty hard day that I had. Before, we were just observing in classrooms, with pretty low expectations of involvement. This week, we're with one teacher all week, and we're expected to do the best we can to support the teacher with the whole class. This hasn't necessarily been difficult, but today I felt the expectations were even higher because the sub didn't have a whole lot of control or knowledge about my teacher's procedures. I actually ended up leading one class during flex time (a period in the middle of the day that is used for enrichment and remediation) because the sub didn't have any lesson plan for that class. It went pretty well, considering I had only watched my teacher do that lesson once and I wasn't sure AT ALL that that was what she had planned on this period doing during today's class. It was a challenging day for sure, and some of that I'll write about later.

2. During power-greeting, I was greeting everyone at the door--like the super nerd that I am-- with "Happy Constitution Day!" 97% of the kids just smiled and probably thought, "Whatta weirdo..." but a few asked what that was! Even though their response once I told them wasn't usually positive, but more like "ugh, they're all dead, why does that matter?" THEY STILL ASKED. That is what I am counting as a victory. Hop on board.

Also, our team brainstormed a bunch of ideas for our after school program and it got me really excited!! I will post more details once Lexie and I have a chance to iron out what we would like our school's program to look like. I'm just happy that our teammates seemed to really buy into the idea of everyone running the program together and it being something that is really relevant and useful for our students! Yay!

Also, I had a lot of prep periods, so I got to go outside (it's been rainy this week, which  means a bearable temperature) and read and talk with Alex. A nice break.

3. There was a near-fight in one of my classes. Luckily, another teacher walked by and saw the shoving and stopped the boys by yelling. I went to get the administrator, who took the boys away for most of the period.

Also, the period that was difficult behavior-wise yesterday was downright miserable today. A student flat-out ignored me when I asked them to do what they were supposed to be doing, students were hitting each other, throwing post-it notes, and saying curse words loudly to friends across the classroom. I actually had to let some students stay off task and focus on the ones that actually wanted to do the assignment but couldn't hear the substitute's instructions over the din. That's what was the hardest: there were at least 5 students in there who WANTED the information. They wanted to do what they were supposed to do but couldn't because their classmates were being too disruptive.

Oh, and riding the bus home in the rain during late rush hour is about as fun as it sounds.

4. Today was rough for me in class. I was really optimistic before about all the students liking me and wanting to do what I said. I told myself even then that wasn't going to happen, but I still had the hopes, you know? Well, now I'm fully immersed in reality and I know that there are students who don't want me to help them and don't have any trouble telling me that to my face. Which sucks.

However, there were just as many, if not more, students today who did precisely what I told them, asked me pertinent questions, and showed interest in having me help them with their assignments.

The growth lies in focusing on these students rather than the first type. WHICH IS GOING TO BE SO HARD. So please help me, and when you ask me how my service is going, please make me focus on the students who are positive. Because there are a lot of them. But I tend to focus on where I can improve or what I'm doing wrong, which isn't terrible. Except it is terrible for my self-esteem. Because this is hard.

5. Tomorrow I am excited to wear our Diploma's Now t-shirt to school! AND there's a parent night at which I'll be meeting parents and trying to convince them to sign their kids up for the after school program!

Please think of me during the day tomorrow, though, because my teacher will still be out and there will still be a sub.