College Futures

I begrudgingly got in one of the two open check-out lines at Target, frustrated that on a Saturday evening they would have so few lines open. I had lost track of time and needed to get my five year old home for dinner before the earth melted under us and hangry-ness took over.

Glancing up I realized I knew my cashier and somehow my heart leaped and sank at the same moment. It was the older sister of a group of children I taught and coached years ago. I had not seen her in years. Her family is one of those that will find it's way into your thoughts at strange times when you are not thinking about school at all. I've wondered about them for years, hoping they would all be doing well. It was wonderful to see her, but was she really here working at Target? Please, please, please, I prayed, let this be her job while she is going through school. Please let her be in school.

It turns out she is in school. Nursing school, which is a perfect fit considering her kind nature and how well she took care of her younger siblings. And her siblings are all in school too. Two are at the local community college, one of them is about to transfer to a four year university. The youngest is in her senior year of high school and wants to be a vet.

I cannot tell you how wonderful it was to hear all of this news. Any frustration at the long Target lines vanished, and I became the woman holding up the lines for others as we talked about her family.

There are children you teach who you know will go to college. Their families will make sure of it and financially it has been planned since the day they were born. There are other children whose futures are not so clear. Not because they cannot handle it, but because it will be a financial strain on their families, and they are up against many, many other factors. You desperately hope they will go, but are not surprised when you hear they did not. Heartbroken, but not surprised. Having a family with the financial resources to send you to college is a gift.

This family in particular stuck out to me. We traveled together for a jump rope competition and they were the ones who taught me that Taco Bell is the cheapest fast food by far, and told me exactly what the cheapest items on the menu were. As elementary school students they had a firm grasp on how to maximize their money so they would not be hungry.

I taught one of them in one of my remediation reading classes, back when our school was year round and every 9 weeks we would offer a one to two week optional class at the school during our intersession breaks. That year my class was designed for kids in danger of not passing the 5th grade reading standardized test. (The group did not know this. They thought they were hand picked to be reading coaches for new first grade readers.)

I never did learn if those children passed their tests, but I knew school was a struggle for each child in that class. These were kids who did not just struggle academically, but were also up against many, many challenges in life. School was understandably not a priority.

Yet all these years later I was learning that one of the students is headed to a four year college. Sometimes as educators we forget that passing the end of year tests is not an indication of how well the student will do in life. Struggling in fifth grade does not mean that they will not go to college or have a job in the real world. Not passing a test is not a sign that a child cannot make it in academia. Thank goodness for that. We are not in the business of giving kids a set future. We are there to give them as many skills as we can to get them on their way. We may not even see their successes when they are in front of us, but that does not mean they will not have success down the line.

Ever since Saturday the family has been in my thoughts more and more. I hope everything the older sister said was true. I hope one day the youngest is my vet and that a four year college goes well for all of them.

Test Prep Frustrations

On most days of the week I pull my fifth grade reading group for guided reading- we sit down with a book, read it and talk about it. We often examine open-ended questions like how the characters changed, or what they learned. There is independent writing about the text but it is often tied together with a discussion. I even sneak grammar questions in, but since it is all around one fairly motivating text these tasks seem easily swallowed. The group is lively and I really enjoy working with them- and I believe the feeling is mutual.

Except on Fridays.

On Fridays we have test prep instead of straight guided reading. We work on a passage like one they will see on the May SOL test and answer the multiple choice questions. It isn't quite as enjoyable. This past Friday I found myself fighting back tears right along with them. One fifth grade student even crawled under the table and announced, "This is why I HATE Fridays! I hate test prep!" I don't blame her. I hate it too.

Their ability to discuss a book seems to stop cold when they are presented with four answer choices. They freeze. One is often stumped by vocabulary she hasn't learned in the year she has been in the country, and another could write an essay on why each of the four answer choices are correct- and the logic is usually just close enough that it is hard to reason with.* 

We wade through each question as I silently attempt to identify what test prep skills are missing so I can sneak them into my guided reading group during the week. 

I want these students to pass. They work so hard every day that they deserve to pass the end of year test. Let me re-phrase that- they deserve to have the knowledge and ability to pass the test. I want them to be able to sit down with that beast of a test in May and confidently answer the questions because we have prepared them for it all year. I'm their teacher- it's my job to give them that skill, isn't it? I don't want to throw up my hands and scream the test is unfair, and I don't want to give excuses for why these three may not pass. I want every moment of our blood, sweat, and tears throughout the year to pay off.

Yet on Fridays I often sit back and wonder what we are doing. If we can discuss a text during the week, find deeper meaning, identify vocabulary based on context clues, and analyze the author's message, then why are Friday's so tough? Are we learning how to be meaningful readers the rest of the week and Fridays we are only focused on passing an arbitrary test? Or do Fridays serve to keep me honest- bringing me back to earth about my students' progress? They do help me identify the holes in my student's learning so I know what to teach during the week. Yet they also can disillusion all four of us if we aren't careful.

For awhile as an educator I screamed about the uselessness of the standardized tests. Yet my voice became hoarse and no one listened. These days I'm more focused on the students in front of me- if this is how we are going to play the game then I want to give them the best opportunity to do so. What skills do they need in order to succeed with these current educational expectations? What needs to happen differently? 

Friday afternoons haunt me into the weekend as I find myself replaying their frustration in my mind. We spend the week enjoying reading and then end the week with thirty minutes of biting pencils, sighing loudly, and desperately trying to solve the mystery of how to answer standardized test questions. I have no answers, or no thoughtful conclusions to this. Just a sense of frustration and failure as a teacher.

*I was one of these test takers. I know what it is like to read four choices and be able to argue each choice, to the point you lose the ability to identify the 'best' choice. Best in whose standards? 

Pre-reading Skills vs the Alphabet

"Does she know all of her letters?" the pediatrician asked me at my daughter's four year old well-visit. After a pause I had to respond, "I think so, almost all of them, on most days," because I really wasn't sure. I hadn't sat down with flashcards to quiz her and there had been days she this summer she confused k and x. The pediatrician looked up at me for a moment, perhaps wondering what sort of mother doesn't have an immediate working knowledge of her four year old's alphabet skills, and responded with, "They are going to want her to know all of her letters and letter sounds by the time she gets to kindergarten." 

Well, yes, I suppose they do want that, but there are plenty of kids who don't know their letters and the sounds. I'm pretty sure that before she goes to kindergarten she'll work out her confusion between x and k, and if not then we'll break out some significant teaching strategies to help her learn the difference. "She will. I'm not worried," is what I told my pediatrician, but what I really wanted to tell her was about all the other early reading signs my daughter is mastering.

I wanted to tell her how my daughter loves to play with words, isolating the initial sound and telling me what letter a word begins with. I wanted to tell her how my daughter loves pointing to words within a text- even when we are reading a chapter book. She loves working on her one to one correspondence, making each word I say match her finger. She loves finding environmental print and reading signs to us "Target," "CVS," "Zinga." She plays with rhymes constantly and will yell out rhymes from the back of the car when we think she's deep in thought. What about her love of books and stories, how she loves being read to, loves looking at the pages of her favorite books, and loves making up her own stories?

Perhaps I'm just a proud parent, but there is so much more to reading readiness than simply knowing the alphabet. I'm OK with a few letter confusions if the other components of literacy are coming along.

The alphabet is an easy piece of knowledge to question in the doctor's office, and even on kindergarten entry assessments. But reading is so much more than that. It's so complex- each little component our children need to grasp before true reading comes together. I'm not ready to quiz my daughter on her letter knowledge. Not yet. She has time. But I am ready to encourage word play, rhyming games, one to one matching, a love of books, and lots and lots of read alouds.

Love, Learning, and Our Communities: What we see when we celebrate success at the end of the year

The business of the school year came to a grinding halt as we watched the last bus pull away from the school and head into the neighborhood on the last day of school. Just moments before the building had been filled with laughing, clapping, and shouts of goodbye from happy students on a hurry to start their summer. Now all that was left were the teachers, the empty building, half packed boxes, and one last celebratory staff meeting standing between us and the start of our summer.

It's funny how a place can feel alive in one moment and in the next go back to being just a building. Just a place. That yearly shift in a school between being filled with the energy of students to being nothing but long empty hallways is such a reminder of why we teach. We may focus on data points, closing the gap, improving our lessons, writing school improvement plans, and increasing scores because they are our profit margins. We may consume data as though it is the only sustenance that will keep us alive. But all of what we may do, all of those vitally important professional tasks that drive us to provide better futures for students are meaningless if we forget about the little beings we are doing it for.

From preschool to fifth grade our students are everything. Each one is a different human being entering our building every morning for a new experience. Each one comes to us in search of a place to belong, a need to feel love, and a hope to learn. Each one watches us for signs that they are important within our rooms and school community.

On the second to last day of school we decided to create a slide show of our student successes. My special education team and our school counselor wanted to go beyond data points and celebrating a year's growth and look at the other successes each child made. So we started pulling students aside and asking them, "What did you learn this year?" "What are you proud of?"

Here are some of the responses:

"I learned to be a part of morning meeting."

 "I learned to to be a good friend."

 "I learned to use calm-down strategies."

 "I'm a good problem solver."

"I can read with fluency."

"I learned I like math."

These were the students we struggled with, pulled our hair out over, held meeting after meeting to problem solve about, and lost sleep the entire month of September as we lay in bed wondering how we were going to help these little ones get through the year. And in June? These little ones could articulate their successes themselves. They did learn to be a part of morning meeting. They figured out (with our careful coaching) when to use calm down strategies and how to not hit their friends. They discovered aspects of the school day they liked. They found a place to belong. They learned they were loved.

 The end of year data points don't capture their small successes. Their reading and math scores are captured within the whole school data. They made amazing gains on paper. But it is the story behind those gains we need to embrace. They are more than data points and are bigger than part of a gap that needs to be closed. They are little humans, but humans none the less. They are why we teach. Why we give up personal time on weekends to plan, why we work extra hours, why we are in this profession. Without them a school is just a building and we are just doing a job. With them we are a community of learners preparing for the future.

End of Year Testing Season

Yesterday as I walked a student from our reading group back to class she innocently asked me if we were going to have reading group on Friday. "Because if you are," she explained, "I won't be here. I'll be in Paris to see my dad. And after Paris I'm going back to Africa because I miss my mom."

My heart stopped. And I am ashamed to say, it did not stop because she was leaving, or because this sweet, lovely girl has been in this strange country all year without her mom and now will finally go back to see her (as a mother this makes me tear up just thinking about it). My heart stopped because if she leaves on Friday she will only be able to take half of her SOL test.

Yes, my  thoughts immediately went to testing and not to the actual child's well being or what is best for her. What has happened to me? What has happened to all of us? There was a time I called this time of year pool-brain season because once the pools opened it seemed impossible to get any work out of the kids. Now it's testing season, and once testing has started it is impossible to get any non-test thoughts out of the teachers.

Sadly, because she gave us so little notice we have two choices, we can give her the test early and let her last two days of school in the United States be while taking the standardized test, or we can let her miss the test and get dinged as a school for a sub-group student who didn't participate. I don't know what the decision is, or even who is involved in making it. A large part of me is hoping that it will turn out she was wrong and she isn't going to Paris this Friday, but on the last Friday in June so she can finish out the year. Or that she is only going to Paris and Africa for the weekend and will return the following week. (Because people do that, right? Go to Paris and Africa for the weekend?) 

More than anything I'm hoping I can use this as a reminder to myself to keep focused on the students first. 

Background Knowledge

Last week I hurriedly grabbed a non-fiction book I thought would be perfect for teaching that we can make inferences with non-fiction texts. VGLA binders (the alternative to the state assessment for students who are learning English) are due in less than a month and we are frantically trying to get them completed. I was really focused on getting a text that would lend itself to inferences and would be at the right reading level (which is harder than you think. Inferring from non-fiction turns out to be not nearly as simple as with fiction.)

So I sat down in my group of two and explained the worksheet in front of them. In the first box they would need to record their background knowledge on the book's topic, then record what the text said in the next box, and then write the inferences they made in the last box. They nodded along until I handed them the book, titled "Africa". One student messily scribbled, "Africa is big," as his background knowledge. Fair enough. I don't know what other background knowledge a fourth grader in Virginia would necessarily  have. Yet the other student stared at me awhile before she wrote, "Africa is a wonderful place to live but you can't go into the forest by yourself or you might get hurt." Then her pencil hovered over the paper for awhile as though she couldn't decide to write next.

That's when I realized. In my frantic focus on teaching nonfiction inferences I'd forgotten about the actual students I was working with. She was from Africa. A year ago she was still living in Africa. And here I was asking her to tell me her background knowledge on the entire massive continent. You know, just write a few sentences in this tiny box to pretty much sum up the place you called home until a few months ago.

She looked at me and began to tell me a story about her and her mom back in their kitchen in Africa. The other member of the group stopped reading and we both sat and just listened- her insights about how different her kitchen was there were far more interesting than what we could find in the leveled text book I'd chosen. Slowly I took the worksheet away and replaced it with a piece of blank notebook paper. She didn't need to worry about fitting her story into a box- just write what comes. We'll figure out non-fiction inferences another day.

Eric Jensen, Poverty, and Relationships

About two months ago the education blogging community was furiously debating whether or not grit is racist. It brought about some interesting points of view from both sides of the debate, and hopefully added to our larger understanding of what we expect from all students, what it means to be successful, and what students need to achieve that success. Not long after stumbling into the debate I read Eric Jensen's book, Engaging Students with Poverty in Mind. None if it is new information, but what I appreciate is that Jensen does an excellent job of bringing up the many different factors that impact students from poverty, along with the research that shows how these factors interfere with students. I found that much of what he says resonates with Responsive Classroom, and it is reaffirming to read the list of research studies that support the ideology Responsive Classroom is based on.

Instead of just saying "students need grit," and leaving it at that, Jensen lists seven factors that teachers need to consider when teaching students from poverty, which he determined by examining the effect size of these factors in various research studies. The seven factors with the greatest effect size? Health and nutrition, vocabulary, effort and energy, mind-set, cognitive capacity, relationships, and stress level. 

As a special education teacher who has primarily taught in schools with high poverty, relationships is the factor I have always found to be the key to everything. All humans have a biological need to connect, and Jensen sites a 2012 study that links relationships to the size of the hippocampus, which controls learning, memory, and emotional regulation (24). I've found that when I've connected with students everything else falls into place. They believe in themselves, become less stressed, feel more secure and are willing to learn, take risks, put effort into their work. 

Students, regardless of their socio-economic background often walk in our doors in the morning carrying a tremendous amount of life we only see through slumped shoulders, tired eyes, or angry expressions. We never know what they had for breakfast that morning, what fight they overheard between their parents, or what they believe about themselves. Yet it's these unseen stressors under the surface that drive our students' actions and their approach to school. What we see in our classrooms often looks like apathy, anger, frustration, or restlessness. Jensen describes these states as attractor states, which he defines as "the preferred or default state toward which conditions or systems tend to move. In other words, people become attracted to states according to their frequency of occurrence. As the brain strengthens repeated neural networks over time, these attractor states become habitual. Soon these states become comfort zones" (39).

It sounds odd that apathy, anger, or frustration would become a comfort zone. Think of someone you would describe as an angry person. They get angry quickly, argue with everything, and see every event that happens to them as the world working against them. This is where they are most comfortable operating. It's their attractor state, and where their thought patterns go time and time again. It is true for our students as well. Many of them have been reacting to their environment for years and have developed thought patterns to help them survive and process the world around them. They bring those thought patterns into school and use them to process what is happening in our classrooms.

So what do we do? There is so little in our students' lives we can control. We can't change their home lives, and we can't force them to forget their stressors when they walk through the school doors. What we can do, however, is to create an environment that allows our students to relax, take risks, and experience positive emotions. We need to shape their mind-body states within our classroom, the one environment we can control.

What our students need is a place to belong. When our students walk into our schools in the mornings, and then into our individual classrooms they need to feel like they are part of a family. They need to trust us and their classmates, feel safe to take risks, and feel like they are important to their community. They need to feel so strongly connected with us that when they walk in our doors they feel like they don’t have to carry their burdens alone. They need a place to experience and practice a positive mind-body state. A place to feel what it is like to have hope.

Our relationships matter. We aren't just teaching a series of facts or academic strategies, but instead teaching students that it is possible to thrive when the world seems stacked against them.

"Did you have any good questions today?"

A few weeks ago in church our pastor opened by relating an interview he'd heard on NPR with Elie Wiesel, the author of Night. During the interview Wiesel discussed how when he came home from school his mother wouldn't ask him what he learned, but instead "did you have any good questions today?"

The power of asking that question to a young child is overwhelming.
Did you have any good question?
Did you not just take in the information, but instead studied it, rolled it over in your head, thought about it, and challenged it?
Did you take what you were learning and seek to learn more?
Did you wonder about what you saw throughout your day?
Did you shift from being a passive observer of your day to being an active one?
Did you move beyond participating in required tasks but instead think beyond what is asked of you?
Did you admit to something you didn't understand and try to understand it?


We want to take all of our students beyond being passive learners and make them engaged learners. We want them to think for themselves, interact with what we give them beyond our expectations.

We need more of this in classrooms. It's so easy to teach specific, direction instruction and so easy to measure specific, direct instruction. It's harder to teach and measure questioning, but think about the broader implications when we do.

*unfortunately I have yet to find the npr interview but I will keep looking*

Support from the Leasing Office?

At the end of the day Tuesday we were called into the library for a teacher-appreciation celebration. It wasn't the PTO who was hosting it (they'd done their appreciating last week), nor was it our administration. It was one of the apartment buildings that feeds into our school.

I've never heard of another apartment complex doing this, or taking this much concern or time for their families. In the beginning of the year the apartment complex donated school supplies to needy families. They come to school and work as mentors for students who live there. They tutor children on site. They took the time to serve us coffee and brownies and tell us how much they appreciate what we do for their community. Not their own kids, not their own families, just what we do for the community.

We need more of that.

Think of the message it sends to families- school is so important that even your leasing office is going to show up at your school and visit you. Our students don't just have a apartment complex, they have another set of eyes looking out for them, asking how they are, and letting them know that they matter.

I looked on their website and didn't see them bragging about their involvement with their families. Other than a generic blurb about a commitment to social responsibility it mentions nothing about how the building is involved in the community. They don't do this to pull residents in, they (seem to) do it because they genuinely care.

The times I am proud to be a teacher are becoming fewer and farther between. Listening to the apartment complex thank us was one of those times because it reminded me of how important education is. It's not just about getting kids to pass tests, it's about building a community.

Genuine Friendship

At the very end of last week we found out one of my students was moving. We were all shocked and heartbroken. This student is absolutely incredible and she is the poster child of what having high expectations and a good balance of general education inclusion and a special ed placement can do for a student. She surpassed all of our  of expectations academically, socially, and with her general language. She is incredible.

At the end of the day today one of the students from her gen ed kindergarten class was brought into my room crying. We were in the midst of end-of-day chaos and were trying to get book bags and jackets on without complete losing our minds (this is a daily adventure). When this little kindergarten girl and her tear-streaked face entered the room we all stopped and stared.

The teacher with her explained that the girl had a card at home for our friend who was leaving but she had forgotten it. I looked at this little five year old crying and felt my own eyes fill with tears. This little one was truly sad to see my friend go. Their teacher had done such an incredible job including her in the classroom that her kids didn't see her as "that special girl". She was a part of their community and she had true friends in there.

My friend hadn't shown any emotions yet during the day and we weren't sure how much she was processing her move. Yet when her friend walked in crying her expression immediately changed. "Oh no! What's wrong?" she asked. Although she hadn't been concerned for herself, she felt empathy and concern for her friend. They had a real friendship.

Friendship is something we can teach about, model, and encourage, but it isn't something we can force. Kids are "friends" in our classes, but whether or not they are genuine friends is up to them.

These girls were genuine friends.

I hope that wherever my friend ends up she will find other genuine friends, as well as teachers who are able to foster these relationships.

Spring Break Woes

Spring break is almost over. I'm not sure how that happened. The whole week was wonky, starting with the snow fall on Monday, and as you can see from the picture, Little Lipstick was not impressed. 

First day of spring break. Not what we expected.

Don't get me wrong. Little L LOVES snow. Her favorite book is The Snowy Day. She loves her snowsuit. She loves putting on snow clothes. She loves watching the snow fall. She loves feeling the snow go "PLOP" on her head just like in the book. She loves watching Mommy walk with her feet pointed out, like this. She loves riding in the stroller while snow falls around her. She just doesn't like interacting with the actual snow. And of course, I'm sure she's not thrilled with Mommy snapping a picture at her distress. 

The snow threw us off our spring-break game. Somehow the week turned into a stay at home and cuddle week instead of a "let's enjoy this week off to get busy and go on adventures" week. 

I spent a lot of this week pondering my decision to be a teacher. It's been ten years since I started. Don't get me wrong, I love my job. I love the work. I love the day to day with the kids and I love the intellectual challenge it inspires in me. 

Perhaps it's the fact that my little brother, five years younger than me, is in the midst of his first year at a big law firm, showing the world how successful he is. Perhaps it's the continued anti-teacher movement in the media, perhaps it's frustrations at work, perhaps it's a looming ten year college reunion  perhaps it's just my yearly "what am I doing with my life" crisis. I'm feeling regret at ending my doctorate program, regret at staying in the classroom, resentment of my enjoyment of my job.

Why do we do this to ourselves as teachers? Why is being a teacher not enough? Every year I hone my craft, become a better teacher, read books and do action research that improves my work in the classroom. Yet it's not enough. 

If I leave the classroom and pursue a doctorate will I miss the day to day excitement of teaching? Will the intellectual stimulation be enough to keep me from regretting a job I'm good at. 

Why isn't teaching enough? How can we make it more than "just teaching" while still being a team player, a member of a collaborative school, and making a true impact on children's lives? Why does it have to be "just" teaching?

Innocent Waffles or Test Driven Breakfast?

On Saturday morning I sat my 18 month old daughter in her high chair and we began to make waffles together. As she repeated, "waffles, waffles, cook, waffles, cook" over and over again I happily narrated what I was doing as I went along. We stirred the batter together and then I poured it into the waffle iron as she watched.

As the steam rose from the waffle iron I found myself explaining to her what was happening- how the waffle mixture was going from a liquid to a solid. And in my mind I could visualize the state standard for this concept, complete with the reference number. Concept taught: check.

*long sigh*

Teaching has become so embedded in me that I can't even just enjoy making waffles anymore- and I'm no longer enjoying learning moments with my daughter, apparently without even thinking about it I'm inserting our state standards into daily activities. I don't think this is how Saturday mornings are suppose to go.

What's important?

Last week I displayed a picture of George Washington on the smartboard. "Who is this?" I asked with trepidation, knowing that questions without choices were not always my class' strength.
"George Washington!" one of my kiddos announced without missing a beat, even though my other friends were silent. Although he'd missed the lesson from the day before and he hadn't been exposed to GW at all this year, he apparently remembered our George Washington unit from last year.

I felt good for about two minutes. Wow, I must have rocked that unit last year, I thought. This is what you want as a teacher- to teach something and then have them remember it the next year.

Then I started to think about how after two years I'm still working on getting this friend to be able to identify the letters in his name. Two years, 5 letters- it's not going so well.

Why waste all that time on our good friend George Washington? Were there other skills I could have been teaching instead of a drill & kill recognition of a famous American? Is knowing who GW is going to help my friend at all later in life? Am I filling his head with useless knowledge when I should be focusing in on more essential skills?

Grant it, the useless knowledge I'm referring to is the exact information I am suppose to be teaching. I'm not making things up, I'm teaching the curriculum. Technically I am doing my job. But is what I'm doing the most beneficial for the students?

Truly Organized Chaos...

One of the cruelest twists of fate in Virginia schools is that because we start after labor day we are forced to have the 100th day of school and Valentines' Day close together. In my own district, they were back to back.

We. Are. Exhausted.

And it is only Thursday.

However, while it has been an exhausting and overwhelming couple of days, it has also been fabulously fun and exciting.

We started planning for our Valentines party a few weeks ago. We made a list of everything we needed to accomplish and slowly but surely crossed everything off. Make valentines, decorate valentines, make decorations, cook a treat. I used the 100th day of school to force the students into making 100 links in a chain as a decoration for our party. (Not only did we work on fine motor skills but we were counting by ones and tens, over and over again, AND worked on a sense of magnitude. And in the end it just looked really pretty. Ha! I love hitting 5 birds with one stone!)

Our party wasn't just with our class, but was a combined party for all three classes in the intellectual disabilities program. The idea of bringing our classes together made it much more of a real PARTY for my kids. It wasn't just any old classroom celebration. Partying in another room is a BIG DEAL.

When it was finally time for our party this afternoon we somehow struggled through the door of the other classroom carrying our homemade valentines, our store bought valentines, our Valentines snack mix, and our decorations. I was exhausted before we even sat down.

It didn't take long to realize that despite the fact the exhaustion never disappeared, the party was worth every moment of chaos.

My second grade girls had a great time decorating for the party- what a sense of purpose they had as they got to practice their vocabulary (up, down) and direct us in where their chains should go. Then children took turns serving one another the treats, each one asking one another what they would like- allowing them to practice their language and encouraging them to listen and interact with their peers.

Then came time to pass out the valentines. I have never, ever, in ten years of teaching, seen valentine-passing-out go smoothly. Not in the primary grades where kids have trouble reading one another's names. I don't think it is possible for it to go smoothly. There is too much excitement and just too many little paper cards with candy falling off for it to go well. (That's OK. If it went well the kids probably wouldn't have any fun.)

So, needless to say, it was CHAOS. But happy, organized, productive chaos. We took children around the room directing them to hand one another valentines or put valentines into one another's bags. We tried to work on eye contact and language when we could ("say thank you", "say Happy Valentines Day") and at moments when it was just too chaotic to push the language we settled for smiles.

The kids were so happy. Despite the noise and confusion they

I've come to find that it is a bit rare for our students to have the opportunity to give people something. Many of them don't draw so they aren't in the typical childhood habit of drawing pictures and giving it to every adult they see. They don't make arts and crafts independently, and they aren't writing love notes to teachers. Frequently they are in the position to have things given to them, often by younger siblings who busy parents trust to hand out snacks, backpacks, or toys. But giving to others is something everyone enjoys doing. It makes us feel good to help others, and we should never deny anyone the chance to make someone else happy.

Our kids loved the interactions with one another. They of course loved getting the valentines, but they also loved handing out their valentines.

At one moment I looked up to watch one child slowly walk toward another, his hand clutching a valentine and a huge grin on his face. The girl he handed the valentine to lit up, looked him straight in the eye and smiled. For a moment it was just the two of them, two kids celebrating Valentines day the way every child in America does.

It was one moment that all the chaos and confusion of our Valentines' party seemed to come clear. As teachers we were exhausted, overwhelmed, and wondering if at any moment all of our students were going to fall apart from too much sugar and too much stimulation. As I watched those two I realized it was a risk that we needed to take as teachers. Interrupting all of that instruction time to plan the party, make treats and cards for one another- it was worth the opportunity to give our kids the chance to just be kids. To make one another happy, to enjoy one another's company, to just be silly and goofy and have an authentic purpose to use language.

Yesterday I wondered about my sanity and whether or not I was in the right profession. Today I drove home once again thanking God for my amazing and eye opening job. This job has me turned into a bipolar mess, but it is worth every moment.

Play in School- What's Appropriate?

 One of the silly things I miss about my old school was my amazing room and my house keeping corner. I had one of those nice wooden kitchen sets complete with an oven, sink and refrigerator. I had it in a corner where I had a fake window. Over the sink I'd stuck a clock and a calendar. I LO

VED my house keeping center. I found it to be such a great teaching tool- we had so many opportunities to practice spontaneous language over there, as well as chances to teach children how to play appropriately and interact with one another. I had a stack of envelopes and cards there as well so that the students could write notes and letters to one another, or take orders if they were playing restaurant. I had a cash register so we could practice counting money while we were playing. Lots of opportunities for language.

Every kindergarten class at my old school had a kitchen center, so I didn't think anything of it. Last year I mainly had kindergarten students, along with two first graders.

I'd frequently thought about all the great things we could do this year if we had a toy kitchen, but hadn't done anything to actively get one. I was surprised to walk into the kindergarten classrooms at my new school and not see toy kitchen centers. It seemed like such an integral part of our kindergarten rooms at the think tank.

Last week an instructional aide for another classroom popped into my room to ask me if I wanted a toy kitchen. The after school care had found an old one they didn't want and immediately thought of me.

"YES!" I exclaimed, without thinking. I was ridiculously excited by this development. Finally, we'd get down to our important play-business in our room.

One of my colleagues, who has been teaching students with intellectual disabilities for years, happened by my room later that day. I have the utmost respect for this teacher, and truly listen to everything she says. She expressed great concern for me taking the play kitchen. "This isn't preschool, this is kindergarten. Our kids need to be exposed to age appropriate toys and games. If the general education kids aren't playing with it in school then our kids shouldn't be playing with it in school."

Interactive writing we did during free choice a few years ago

I was stunned, but I could understand what she was saying. What does it look like to have my second grade students walk into a classroom where there is a toy kitchen? What message does that send to the rest of the school?

The thing is, I firmly believe that general education classes should have more time for creative play. I would have LOVED to have a toy kitchen in my gen ed first grade classroom. There are so many ways to use it for academics. Just because it's play doesn't mean we can't use it for learning.

I thought long and hard about whether I was going to keep the kitchen. I don't want to make my children any more different than they already are, but I also want to give them opportunities for growth. The kitchen allows for organic language opportunities. It teaches them to have interactive play, something they aren't going to learn without adult assistance. We can put math and literacy into the center. It will never just be "playing". If asked I can always explain what the kids are doing and how it supports their goals.

The first day I let three of my students go to the kitchen center I sat back to take notes on the language they were using. Without an adult prompting them they were having back and forth conversations- they were playing- using the toy food and pretending to eat. These little things are HUGE for my kids. I honestly had never heard this group of children communicate with one another like that.

I just can't put aside my beliefs on the importance of play. I'm sure there are higher-ups in the county who may come down on me when they realize what we're doing. But until then I'm going to keep using the kitchen center to enrich our free-choice time. We're going to keep using it to practice talking to one another, using appropriate social skills, stretching out the sounds in our words while we take one another's orders, counting food we're putting onto plates, and following photo recipes we've previously cooked.

Play?

The first day back after our hurricane break I was losing my mind. The careful rhythm I'd found myself in the weeks before had somehow disappeared along with the 70 degree weather and I could barely remember what came next. Finally at the end of the day I lost it. Deciding that we'd play a game for math instead of trying to work on our individual math tasks I pulled out Hi Ho Cheerios. (For my kiddos this game is brilliant- as far as math goes they have to count a set amount of fruit on the spinner, then they have to select the same amount of fruit. We're hitting counting, recognizing numerals, AND selecting the same amount- all of which are tough skills to do. Not to mention that we're reinforcing turn taking.)

One of our friends had earned his break time and was happily playing with his play dough. Typically he doesn't really pay attention to what the other children in the class are doing and doesn't usually tolerate waiting his turn. Plus, he already can count, select, and recognize numbers so the game wasn't going to hit any of his math skills. I planned on getting the game started then going back to work on math with him when his break-time was over.

As I set the kids up and began explaining how we would play my friend came up to us. He looked at my aid and said "play".

There was silence. The aid and I looked at each other in shock. He used spontaneous language to ask to play with other kids? Spontaneous language? Asking to participate in a game with other students? Even the other kids were slightly stunned.

Of course! We said, and got him situated. Taking turns wasn't easy for him, but he certainly enjoyed the game and he let us coach him through the turn taking process. He followed the rules, selected the right amount of fruit and put it on his tree.

For a day when I was losing my mind, fighting back frustration at everything I was doing wrong as a teacher- desperately trying to remember what was coming next- my little friend's actions immediately made it all better.

All the stress I was putting on myself vanished as I watched my friend ask to play. I can feel like the earth is falling apart, yet there are successes. Small successes. Baby steps. I can't forget to watch the kids and celebrate their progress. It's not about perfect lessons- it's about the progress the kiddos are making.

Learning to play like kids

There are those moments in teaching where you take a step back and observe yourself as an outsider might- and at those moments you are pretty sure that you would be committed to a mental institution for serious help if anyone else came along. Or just fired, no questions asked.

Yesterday I stood at recess in my fancy-I-have-an-important-meeting-so-I-will-for-once-look-professional-shoes (IE high heels). My teammates and I stood back smiling, saying silent prayers to the recess gods for allowing it to stop raining in time for us to go play on the black top and get some of our Friday energy out. The sun even came out so that we could see our shadows (ever since a science experiment where we made shadows with flash lights we've been obsessed with shadows). The kids were running around chasing each other and screaming, which is technically against the rules (no tag games) but it is so rare for our kids to actually play together and interact like typical kids that we overlooked the pesky rule.

Then I saw that one of my kids wasn't playing with everyone else, but was watching them intently. Finally I realized that she just didn't know how to begin playing with them. She could see that they were having fun and she wanted to join in their game, but she didn't know how to begin. Wanting to teach her play skills that she could use both at school and at the playground near her house I walked over to encourage her to join in the game. Quickly I knew this was going to involve me joining in the game was well. After prompting her to ask if she could play we took off. Grabbing her hand we ran across the blacktop, my blue fancy heels clicking as we went, yelling, AHHHHHH, the zombies are getting us! AHHHHHH, run! as my friend in a wheelchair drove after us pretending to be a zombie.

From a PC standpoint it was a pretty awful game. For one, our school doesn't celebrate Halloween so I am pretty sure playing 'zombie' on the playground isn't really appropriate. Then there is the fact that the 'zombies' were one child in a wheelchair and another child with Down syndrome  Not to mention it was a game of tag which of course is a big no-no in schools these days. So there I am, the teacher, running in my heels, encouraging other children to play zombie tag and run from the children with the most obvious disabilities.

It LOOKED terrible. I can see myself defending my actions to the school board now.

However, the kids really were taking turns being the zombies- it just so happened that when I joined the children with the most obvious disabilities were the zombies. Of course the kids in our classrooms didn't blink an eye- they weren't thinking- get away from the kid in the wheelchair- they were thinking- hey, it's his turn to be zombie- run!

It was the most age-appropriate free play I've ever seen out of my kids. Sure it wasn't totally PC, but how many kids on parks outside of school play total PC games? The kids in our program need to have social skills so that they can interact with their typical peers outside of school as well. If we only teach them to play teacher-led and teacher-approved games we'll only separate them further from their peers. Sure teacher-led games will look pretty, but childhood isn't always pretty. If our kids need to be taught how to play zombie tag, well, let's do it.

The smiles on our kids faces said it all- everyone was excited to take a turn to play zombie- to actually interact with each other instead of standing around passing a ball in a teacher-led (and let's be honest, boring) activity. For once recess looked like a typical general education recess, complete with squeals and laughter. I loved it and they loved it.

My feet, however, did not. The blisters were totally worth it though.

**I should explain that we don't actually have a playground right now. We have a mound of dirt and a black top. Starting a new school means being patient with things like getting playground equipment.**

Bipolar Teacher

There may be nothing that makes me feel more bipolar than my job. The highs are oh so high and wonderful- and the lows? Oh my goodness. The lows make me want to run and hide under a rock and never ever come out. Not even for ice cream.

On Thursday I left school with an incredible high. One of my little ones was spontaneously communicating in ways he never had before. He wrote his name for the first time ever- independently- and I just couldn't believe it. Baby steps. Each little step is something, but in this line of work we celebrate every inch. Thursday I finally felt like I belonged right where I was- in this school, in this classroom, with these kids.

But Friday? Friday was a disaster. Friday I felt that I should fire myself as a teacher. The kids would be better off with someone else. My family would be better off if I let this job go. My teeth, oh my poor, grinding teeth. There may be nothing else left after this year.

The day started with realizing that my brand new building was lacking a very important, very expensive computer program that I absolutely had to have to complete extremely important paper work that had a very important deadline. So through emails we all frantically tried to figure out a way for me to run back to the think-tank on my lunch break so I could plug my data into their program. Of course while I'm worried about how I'm going to find coverage, make sub plans, eat lunch, and somehow manage to use this computer program one of my kiddos is having a BAD DAY. And it tends to be that when you have a bad day in my class everyone has a bad day because regulating our emotions is something everyone is working on.

So we are all trying our hardest to survive the BAD DAY. I'm trying to manage the email chain and talk to the adults coming into my room who are dealing with the computer software issue. I am scheduled to have one of the reading specialists come into my room to do a lesson that I am super excited about so I'm trying to keep us on task so that we'll actually be finished with everything we need when she comes in. I finally got one of the assessments that I was suppose to complete in September so I'm also frantically trying to assess everyone of my kiddos (keep in mind that it is a BAD DAY so the assessments are often interrupted with shrieks from across the room). 

I am trying to hold it together and one of my kiddos keeps telling me she's sick. She's very dramatic so I ignore this. Yes, I've learned this lesson a million times. When I was a gen ed teacher I was thrown up on after I denied a child a chance to go to the clinic. But- we all know what happens when you let one kid go to the clinic- the rest of your year is spent trying to figure out whose really sick and whose not sick. The child didn't feel hot- she seemed to be her normal self- so I ignored her request. "Let's see how you feel at snack time" I replied- because if they are still sick at snack time then you know they are really sick.

A child once drew this picture of me. Yep, me. And it is how I felt about myself on Friday.

So yes, at snack time I finally break down and send her. Yep- a fever. So not only did I make that poor girl suffer through reading workshop but I exposed the rest of the class. Teacher. of. the. year. I fire myself.

I manage to make it to and from my old school in minimal time and get the information I need. This means of course that I don't eat my lunch and I don't have time to prep for my afternoon lessons. 

As everyone stares at me from the rug and I wonder what we're going to do next I decided that we'll do some interactive writing because, hey, it keeps us busy and it involves minimal materials. I'm trying to manage the BAD DAY behavior while peppily saying "Hey kids, what sounds do you hear in 'time' Let's stretch it out like a rubber band? OK- ready.... ttttttiiiiiimmmmmm" when OH MY APPLE PIE one of my friends yells out "I hear a T"

I fall over. I didn't know he knew what a T was. I mean, I swear yesterday he saw a T and said "4". 

"Great!" I smile. "What do we hear next?" The same usually quiet and reserved child shouts out, "I" 

And then- "M, like mouse".

In the same moment I want to cry because the BAD DAY is still happening and we all have headaches and I haven't eaten and I have no idea what I'm going to do after we write the word time and I'm overwhelmed and frustrated and I don't feel like I am being the teacher these kids deserve. And yet- my friend matched sounds with letters. HE MATCHED SOUNDS WITH LETTERS. 

It's not even bipolar anymore- it's just confusion and craziness because I no longer know what to feel. The frustration mixes with pride and happiness. I hug my friend and high five everyone. I try not to cry and ignore my growling belly and all my stress.

We. are. learning.

Baby. Steps. 

We can do hard things.

Giddy job love

I. love. my. job.

I took the day off for my daughter's one year doctor's appointment. I ended up taking a full day off after realizing that going in for the morning would be confusing for the class and that it would just be easier for them to have a substitute for the whole day.

All week we've talked about how I'll be out. We made our "Guest Teacher Handbook" where we list the important information a substitute might need to know- like how we line up, what we do for snack, our favorite times of day (quiet time when we get to read books) and where we go for the fire drill. We marked the calendar with a sticky note to know when I'd be out. There was lots of reassuring to everyone that it was still going to be a great day even if I wasn't there.

There was also a bit of horror that I was taking my daughter to get shots.

"You know she's going to cry," one of my older students said in an accusatory tone. "If you give her shots she's going to cry."
"Is her mom driving her?" another asked.
"I am the mom" I replied.
"NO, you're a TEACHER. Is her mom driving her?"
"Why would you take her to the doctors and not stay with us? Why do you want her to get shots?!?"

This went on all day.

When I got home last night I realized I was going to miss them. Like, a lot. Don't get me wrong, I'm loving cuddling (ok, it is no longer cuddling, it is following her around trying to keep her from getting hurt and/or making a massive mess in our house) with baby Lipstick, but I love my job.

Last night I found myself frustrated that I wouldn't be there to carry out some of the routines we'd put in place this week. I had an idea for how to make one of my friends enjoy read alouds more that I can't wait to put in place. We've made so much progress in reading with one of my kiddos- I can't wait for the next time we have our reading group.

I come home almost giddy- tired, but giddy. The kids are awesome. I love the work. I find myself wondering why anyone teaches anything but this population. It is so much fun.

Don't get me wrong, I am exhausted and overwhelmed and always feel like there are at least 10 different things I could do better every day (at least), but despite all that- I love it. I kind of wonder if Mr. Lipstick is slipping something into my coffee every morning that's making me so happy.

So for right now I'm going to embrace the awesomeness of my kids, the job and my coworkers. I'm going to celebrate all the fun we have, our tiny baby step successes that we're making every day. I'm going to keep reflecting on what I can do better and try to stop worrying about everything that COULD go wrong. IEPs and paperwork and stress will come down the pike soon enough, but for right now life is good.

Mind in the Making- Perspective Taking

Most of us are about to get very busy trying to develop classroom communities that can solve conflicts peacefully. We're all about to spend time coaching children through problem solving skills in hopes that doing this can minimize any physical and verbal aggression in the classroom that is oh-so-fun to deal with when you have a million other things to do.

Mind in the Making shares research by Larry Aber of NYU that shows a focus on problem solving isn't actually the solution to the childhood frustrations that get aggressive (Galinsky, 87). Before a child is ready to use problem solving skills he or she must first be able to take the other person's perspective and identify the person's intent. 

When some children get into conflicts with peers they immediately assume a hostile attribution bias, where no matter what they are convinced the other child is out to get them. As educators we can help these children stop and go through what Aber calls an appraisal process. We can help train our students to to step back and interpret the actions of others before making basic assumptions.

As teachers we can help children go through attributional retraining (Aber's term), where we help children look for clues in order to interpret another person's intentions and take that person's perspective. We need to help them realize that they do not immediately have enough information to appropriate assess the situation and must consider more information before they can determine "whether it was an an accident or a hostile act" (87). 

As an early educator this is huge- before we can begin to help children identify problem solving steps we first must help them take perspectives and appropriately assess the situations around them. It fits in with what Responsive Classroom teaches, as well as the Patterns of Thinking theory. Taking perspective is essential for children to be able to understand and interact with the world around them (and here in DC it would be nice if some adults tried it as well...)

One of my awesome former (*sniff*) colleagues read this chapter and immediately got to work on figuring out how to include perspective taking in her beginning of the year curriculum. She found this list of books that are recommended to use with teaching these skills. I'm excited to dive into this list and see how I can interweave them into my existing curriculum. 

Any other books out there that are perfect for teaching perspective taking?