A New Focus

Yesterday was the first day that I really yelled at students. It upset me that a few of them weren't taking Writer's Workshop seriously. I also yelled when students weren't getting into line quickly, instead they were talking with one another. What prompted me to yell was that I felt that students weren't taking my directions seriously. I think the yelling scared them a little. They definitely listened, but I don't want it to get to the point where I'm constantly yelling.
By the end of the day there was a really negative feeling in the classroom. So many kids were on red. As I reflect on this, I realize that the most common reason for card flips was students talking with each other and not following directions. From my conversation with another teacher, I realize that this is a fairly common problem that all children have. By punishing them for it, I'm really just frustrating them. I'm not teaching them how and why they should not be talking. So I'm going to do a mini-lesson on this today. I want to acknowledge that I also want to talk sometimes, everyone does, but if we always talk then we won't get the things we need to get done so that we can play math games, have choice time, etc.
Teaching can be really messy, and I feel like I made a bit of a mess yesterday. I came to pick up the kids from their special, Library. They were all really excited to show me the Tomie dePaola books they'd picked out because we'd been doing on a mini author's study on him with Read Alouds. But rather than have a discussion with them about it, I was so up tight and beholden to the schedule I had made, I had them put them away and take a spelling pre-test. Why did I not have them share the books they had selected? It was such a good thing that they were eager to find more Tomie dePaola books. And I completely smushed that enthusiasm. UGH.
One thing that I'm thinking about it is teaching them how to write book recommendations. I've already received a few Tomie dePaola books from children who want me to read them as Read Alouds. I want to formalize the process a little, and I want them to be able to write recommendations for the class about different books.

staying away from burn out

Sometimes it's hard to regain your energy, especially in the middle of the week. My room is really coming along, but there are still huge elements that I'm working on. I want my whole group instruction to be more engaging. I feel pretty comfortable with the Literacy portion of the day, but in math and writer's workshop there are some kids who I believe are falling behind because they can't focus or follow the way the content is presented. There are definitely some things I'm going to change. I'm going to try to localize the material (have students have a copy of what's on the overhead to highlight), and I'm also going to chunk the lesson better so that I make a quick teaching point and have students work independently or in small groups for a few minutes before coming back to whole group instruction. This will give me a chance to help pull up my students who are behind.

But most important, I can't stress out too much about the shortcomings of my lesson. This is kind of a separate topic. Sometimes I feel like there just isn't enough time for me. I get home and usually there's just time for me to eat dinner and watch a little TV or read a book before I have to go to sleep and get up early the next day. Sometimes I think I need some space from the kids, but there just isn't enough time for me. I wonder if I was able to work a little less and give myself a little more relax time, would I be less impatient, more observant, and fairer with my kids?

Some Cliff's Notes from the last couple weeks.

Kyandrea and Lakesa are still works in progress, but the classroom is
really growing.  It's exciting to see the room develop with
all of the work that my students and I have been doing.  There
are definitely some things that I pushed the kids to do too
quickly (group work takes a lot of work and training in order
for kids to be successful!).  I'm trying to take things slow,
focusing on one or two major things a week.

One thing that I'm trying to do is great every student at the
door with a handshake in the morning.  Some kids like it and
some aren't big fans, but it feels right to me.  I'm also
trying to do activities in Morning Meeting where I can be
goofy and do silly things like dance.

I did lose my patience with the kids on Tuesday.  They were
off and I wasn't feeling so great either, and there was some
yelling which I'm not proud of, but on Wednesday we all had a
better day.  Everyday I feel more and more confident and
comfortable, although I had a panic attack on Sunday when I
started thinking about all the different things I needed to
plan for the whole week.  But it helps to understand that I'm
not alone, that all the other teachers are overwhelmed at
times as well.

One other thing, the Teacher Advancement Program meetings (we
meet in grade clusters and talk about different systems and
practices we're implementing in our classrooms) really freaked
me out on Tuesday.  I was intimidated by all the coherent
ideas that these teachers were implementing in their
classrooms, whereas my focus on differentiation was in many
ways half-baked and not time appropriate.  But once I get over
that, I think the meetings are a good thing because they give
me a lot of ideas to steal.

My Life as a Teacher-Day 4

This is such a challenging job. I'm dog tired right now, but I'm still really happy. Some of my kids are challenging, but I'm glad that each one of them is there. So many things have been learned this week:

• I have amazing colleagues who are great to talk to
  
• I withheld affection from my students because I had the old "Don't smile til Christmas" mantra, but that made it so that it was hard to build trust. There are certain kids who just need a lot of validation, and I have to be willing to give that to them, even if it means I'm not doling out attention evenly among students.
• Stay calm, I'm in control. Students know it. I'm actually a lot stricter on students than I realize.
• Don't stay up all night lesson planning. You need at least 6 hours of sleep or you and your lessons are roadkill.
  
• Don't get impatient. It's natural to want to get all of the classroom structures up, but not healthy, sane, or possible. Slow and steady will win this race.
• Show that you control the class, but also give students voice and agency to move the class as well.