Barack Obama, principal September 14, 2009

Last week when the president made his speech to schoolchildren, the Prince arranged for an all-school assembly beforehand.  The teachers went up on stage one by one and we introduced ourselves, and read aloud our hopes & dreams for the year.  Then we posted them on a big board on the stage, so the children could see who we are, and that we also have things we want to learn or do or get better at.  Several news stations were there, and we were on the local news that night.

My class was very excited, but couldn’t sit still for long, so we left before the speech.

A few days later, Miss Slinger was talking to the Prince outside while we were at recess.  After he left to take the 3rd graders inside, Miss Slinger came over to me, laughing.

Apparently one of our girls had asked her, “who was that man you were talking to?”

“That’s Mr. ____, our principal.”

The girl sighed, obviously disappointed.  “Oh, I thought that was Barack Obama.”

summer is almost over August 16, 2009

I received my back-to-work letter from the Prince (my blog name for our principal).  Our official back to work day is Monday, August 24, and the open house will be Thursday, August 27.  We have tons of meetings scheduled, plus a full day of staff development, and only two half days open to work on our rooms.  I’m wondering how he thinks we can get our rooms ready with only two half days….Especially since he said we shouldn’t try to get in our rooms this week, as the engineers are still working on getting the furniture back in.  We always are able to work the week before; if this is really true, next week is going to be some sort of stress nightmare.  I can see myself sitting in endless meetings, agonizingly bored and longing to get to work in my room.

Tomorrow I go to a leadership team meeting at school, so I’m going to ask him about this.  I haven’t had a migraine for two weeks and I don’t want to start now.

conducting the preschool symphony January 9, 2009

Things I heard today:

*the music of Dan Zanes, which I played during journal time

*Ruby, telling Miss Slinger very clearly and indignantly that Boy A had touched her on her bottom.

*Miss Slinger putting my sudden thoughts into words:  “Maybe he’s the one who has been touching Princess on her bottom!”  Princess is nowhere near as articulate as Ruby; in fact, she can barely tell a coherent story.  And the boy who normally stands behind Princess and in front of Boy A has been gone all week….So maybe Boy A — who is quite restless and is always touching other kids — has been touching her on her bottom all week!  And Princess might have gotten it mixed up and told her mom it happened on the bus.  AUGH!

*Edward, struggling to count to one.  No, I am not kidding.

*”Three!  Four!!  Two!”  the class shouting out numbers after I asked them to listen to my castanet sounds and count in their heads how many clicks I made.  This turned out to be quite difficult.

*Chester telling me quite confidently the sounds for five letters of the alphabet.  He also counted to five for me, accurately, and in English.  Phew!

*The noise of the kindergarten class next door, totally running their inexperienced sub ragged.  (Miss Slinger said that when she peeked in, the sub mouthed to her the words, “this sucks!”)  Poor woman.

*The silence that fell next door when the Prince went in and restored order.

*My sneezes, which increased in frequency as the morning progressed.  I suppose stress can weaken your immune system….

The Prince stands up to me August 20, 2008

Yesterday at our mentor/master teacher meeting, we met Wonder Woman’s replacement, and at her request, went through our end of the year notes on what worked, what didn’t, and what we want to do differently this year.  I was rather pointed in my concerns — lack of leadership, bad test scores, being at the final stage under No Child Left Behind — and the Prince gave me a bit of a smackdown.

It was great.

I’m not sure that any one else at the table knew what was going on, as it was between the lines, but it was clear that he was talking about me, and about Wonder Woman, as he expressed his concerns about gossip and negativity (zing!  that might totally be true) and he pointed out that our test scores are not getting worse, they’re just not increasing fast enough to meet NCLB’s moving targets.

So suddenly I was rethinking things, like perhaps Wonder Woman was too negative about the school, and perhaps I was too quick to agree with everything she said, and….maybe I was wrong.  And as for our scores, and our AYP status, he may be right that we are improving (just not quickly enough), and that the district has no plans to shut us down.

I was delighted to have him show some spine, and some anger, and to see that he is fighting.

So, I decided to be on his side.  And I’m not bummed about going back to work anymore.

Not really looking forward to September July 22, 2008

When I heard that Wonder Woman was moving on to a better school, I emailed the principal (let’s call him the Prince, shall we?) telling him my concerns and asking for some reassurance. 

That was a month ago, and no, of course he hasn’t responded.  The Prince probably doesn’t have email underground where he’s buried his head.  Ostriches probably don’t really DO email. 

I bumped into Nan on the street yesterday, and it was wonderful to see her.  At least I have her.  In September:

•  I’m going to have a new assistant, and it could be someone terrible (someday I will post about “Marlene,” the world’s worst assistant teacher)
• I’m going to have a new teacher for my special ed students, since Ali is going off to teach her own preschool class
• Wonder Woman is gone (and her replacement can’t possibly be that good)
• our good AP is gone and the replacement has been demoted from principal (!) and makes people raise their eyebrows when you say that she’s the new AP….

In September I am going to work really hard on the art of LETTING GO and will do my work as mentor teacher professionally and with as little stress or emotional involvement as possible.

And mostly I’m just going to go in my room and SHUT THE DAMN DOOR and concentrate on four year olds, who can be a lot more wonderful than most grown-ups.