ELA 101

As I sit to write this beautiful Saturday evening, I can’t help but think back over the course of the past month.  How is it that the first month of school has already vanished?  We’ve already completed several assignments, we’re about to begin our first novel, start MEAP-ing and fall weather is finally rolling in.  I suppose that juggling the roles of wife and mother would make even my time as a teacher seem to go faster, so adding cross country assistant, writing project fellow and church worship team singer probably adds the detail necessary to understand my surprise.

In any case, this first month has reminded me why I love what I do and why I feel that it’s so important to keep doing my job.  Just as I’m learning by working with the middle school runners, it’s so important to set and maintain a comfortable pace.  As a novice runner, I’m starting to find my “groove” – the speed at which I feel like I could run forever.  Once I find it, I settle in and enjoy the adventure. 

Even with a steady pace, there are crucial moments when a runner needs to step up and devour more ground.  Starting strong.  Finishing hard.  Taking advantage of the downhill.  These are all strategies I’m learning and sharing with these young runners.  And it’s amazing the parallel I’m finding within the classroom.  There are times when we need buckle down and cover some ground; other days we’re loose and laid back, considering our surroundings.  And still others, our muscles ache, we feel the pain and we have to decide whether to push through the pain, round that next corner to see the fans cheering us on toward the finish line, or give in to the frustration, succomb to the difficulty and give up.

I’m in it for the long haul.  Slow and steady or fast and furious, we’ve set an adequate pace to sustain us in our learning this year!  For my student readers…..are you in it with me?

I’ve been purposely avoiding this post, but I feel that the time has come.  Having worked through a pretty intense first unit, I was structuring this next two-week timeframe with a few more light-hearted activities that accomplished the same tasks.  Seventh grade students are working on writing comics to illustrate the importance of text and image interplay, while Eighth grade students are engaging in descriptively writing about a topic of their choice. 

Where we’d originally been in the high 90’s or even 100% return on homework, a few of my classes have fallen to around the mid-to-low 50’s.  Trying to seek out the reason behind the sudden drop, students reported that forgetfulness was the main culprit.  I really hope that the talks we’ve had in class will be effective.

As parents (or students) what do you find to be helpful strategies to increase motivation? 

I can hardly believe we’re already wrapping up the third week of school!  Some days, the newness of the school year still lingers in the air.  Other days, it seems that students are as comfortable as they were by the end of last year.  Either way, it feels good to be getting into the groove of the new school year and hectic schedule. 

Today we wrapped up our first unit with both the seventh and eighth graders.  These past two weeks, students have been good reading and writing skills and test-taking strategies.  In this unit, students have completed the following tasks:

• read two selections and completed comprehension questions
• crafted a written response where they used evidence from the reading selections to support their position on a topic
• written a brief story based on their knowledge and/or experience
• provided feedback on student writing and identified qualities of the writing that both enhanced and diminished the overall success of the piece.

This unit also contain embedded lessons that allowed students to discover the value of working together as a team.  Students were also introduced to the process of formal writing, where specific details from the text are used to support an opinion. 

In other news this week, I am continuing to assist with the middle school cross country team, and am thrilled to have completed my first 5k run last Saturday.  I accomplished both of my goals, which were to run the entire course and not come in last. 

Students received their first reading logs this week as we visited the library for the first time on Thursday.  I plan to upload a copy of the reading log to Edline as well.  I’ve explained to students that the format of the log might vary as we learn the best ways to make use of the paper.

Thanks for reading and I hope that you find time to relax this weekend.  How will you be celebrating the first day of Autumn?

Hopefully I have at least a couple devoted readers, and to you I sincerely apologize for my late post today.  After a 14.5 hour day yesterday, complete with a car-deer accident, and 2 (yes 2) trips back home between the end of the school day and the start of the open house, I spent most of today catching up.  Additionally, Mr. Cornwell and I left at the start of 6th hour to take Calder to his appointment, which meant my conference hour was spent writing up my sub plans.

In any case, here I am!  Since both classes are currently working on the same unit, I figured I would write one post to cover everything.  This week students have been reviewing strategies to apply to information and narrative reading, especially in relation to answering questions about the text.  We have just recently begun writing in response to these reading selections as well.  After brainstorming with each class, we acknowledged the fact that most students do not use quoted evidence in letters or essays they write.  We’re working on finding supporting evidence, paraphrasing parts of the reading selection, and finding small portions to quote directly in their writing.

Next week we will be refreshing students’ memories about narrative writing, responding to student work, and perhaps taking a second look at writing in response to reading.  To all the parents reading this post, if you could contribute a comment telling me a way in which reading and writing impact the work you do, that would be a great way to share the real-world connection with my students!

As I told my students, my goal is to post every Friday with a “newsletter” type update abou the happenings in our classroom.  I also mentioned that if I felt inspired to post again throughout the week, I would certainly take a moment to do so.  Inspiration struck today.

In my previous entries, I have mentioned how pleased I am with the students’ behavior and the open-mindedness they are showing in regards to the new discipline policy.  As we continue to seek ways to make the middle school the best it can be, we have discussed the fact that many parents cannot make their way to the office in the mornings because of the congestion on the stairs.  Plus, the line of where the “top of the stairs” technically ended and the “hallway” began was becoming blurred.  One possible solution was to keep the gates closed until the bell rang, so we put that plan into action this morning.  While preparing for the day, I heard several comments from students about how they were “behind bars” or “held captive.” 

The principal assured them that it wasn’t a punishment, but rather a way to keep the crowd manageable and in the designated locations.  I didn’t think much of the comments this morning, but on my way back to class following my lunch, I noticed the bushy or longer styles on a couple of our young men, and it reminded me of the pictures I’d seen in my parents’ yearbooks.  I began thinking about how things truly do come in cycles.  I thought about the changes that each generation experiences, and it was interesting to think about my place in that change.  I think it was the first time I recognized that I was on a different side of the….well, gate, I suppose. 

I’m not sure if this is more an observation about the students, or myself, but it struck me today how much these students seem to be aware of the changes, and that engagement is exciting!  I think it’s good to see students thinking critically and voicing their opinions.  Again, I’m very optimistic about this school year and look forward to future debates and discussions with these inspired youngsters!

By the time you reach the top level of any school or workplace, there’s a level of comfort and in some cases a sense of entitlement that begins to penetrate your thinking.  In the four days we’ve been in session, we’ve had several rousing discussions about the changes being made around this building. 

And while there may be some lingering sentiments of frustration or confusion, I feel that we are really starting to see things differently – both students and staff.  I am extremely pleased with the way students are openly discussing and critically thinking about how a culture of respect can improve the atmosphere within our school.

This week students have shared information about themselves, discussed ways in which they can be leaders within the school and helped define what respect looks like through acrostic poetry.  With close to a 100% return on student homework and far less distracting behaviors in the classroom, I am confident that these young men and women have what it takes to far exceed my expectations for this school year!

After the first week of school I can say without a moment’s hesitation that things went swimmingly.  I have been thoroughly impressed by the level of responsibility and accountability the students have demonstrated this week.

We’ve spent a great deal of class time talking about this year’s motto, “Building a Culture of Respect” and what that looks like on a daily basis.  Students have crafted poems, shared in small cohort groups to improve those poems, and presented to the class in an Author’s Chair format. 

In nearly every class there has been close to a 100% return on homework and student behavior has been tremendous.  Weeks like this have not been the norm for me, so I appreciate it and look ahead with hope (and confidence) that it will continue!

After countless hours spent planning and preparing my classroom, I find that there’s nothing quite like a classroom full of students.  It will take me some time to adjust to my morning conference hour, being on my feet all day and talking a lot more than I’m used to, but for now, being in the classroom feels like coming home.

While running on the treadmill last night, the idea for this poem popped into my head.  As we will be working on definition poems later this week, I thought it fitting and decided to share.  I welcome your comments!

School

School is earlier to bed and much earlier to rise. 

School is butterflies dancing in the pit of my tummy. 

School is remembering combinations and crumpled schedules in sweaty hands. 

School is new haircuts, braces, glasses or clothes to slightly conceal the nerves. 

School is talking, learning, teaching, and laughing my way through the day. 

School is my internal schedule, my second wind of the calendar year. 

School is hard work and frantic fun.