4 minutes inside a teacher’s brain February 20, 2009

Sit on your bottom, fold your legs, hands in your lap, eyes on the teacher.

Why doesn’t this work anymore?  Why are my students ignoring me?  Why is Duck lying down on top of Ferdinand?

Everybody needs to sit down and listen right now.  I appreciate the way Edward is listening.  Thank you, Edward.

Good morning children.  (“Good morning, Mrs. X!”)  What is the letter of the week?  (“W!”  “wuh!”)  Right, the letter of the week is Ww.  It makes this sound:  wuh. 

Why is Leo wandering the room?  No, no, no, let’s not start that again.

Leo, if you want your clothespin for centers time you need to sit down right now in the meeting area.  Okay, let’s practice our letter sounds.  Do you think I can trick you?  (“Nooo!”)

Leo is not paying any attention.  Try to hook him.

Leo, look, I’ve got the letter cards.  Do you think I can trick you?

Leo is not looking at me.  Move on.

What sound?  (“MMM!”)  Right, mmmm.

What sound?  (“KKKuh!”)  Yes, /k/.

What are Miss Nelson and that special ed teacher from the district talking about over there?  Are they watching me?  Talking about me?  Argh, it’s so distracting.

What sound?  (“NNNN!”)  Yes, nnnn.

What the heck, Titch is totally not paying attention.  I know he doesn’t know most of the letters and sounds, and no wonder.  He’s not looking or listening at all.

Titch, please look up here.  Titch.  Titch!  Thank you, sweetie, please pay attention and do the sounds with us.

What sound?  (“aaaa!”)  Yes, aaa.

Great, lost him already.  And Duck is picking his nose again.  And wiping it on the kid next to him!

Duck.  No.  Please keep your hands in your lap.  What sound?  (“LLLL!”)  Yes, llll.

Leo is only doing about every third sound, and he usually loves to do the sounds with us.  GREAT, now Owen is not paying attention either.

Owen, Titch, Duck, look up here.  You need to look to learn the letters and sounds.

Why isn’t Swimmy wearing his glasses?  Why was he pouting this morning?  For that matter, why was Titch pouting this morning?  Why did Duck and Owen get in trouble in music class?  Why didn’t I remember to write the morning message?  Why have I been getting migraines every day for three days in a row?  Why are Duck and Princess so hyper today?

What sound?  (“RRRR!”)  Right, rrrrr.

Will you look at that?  Princess is paying attention!  She is looking at the cards, and listening to her friends say the sounds, and copying them.  Oh man, at least Princess is learning something today.

Thank heaven for small mercies.

i hate the first day of school September 4, 2008

It’s here.  The room is ready (except for my desk, which resembles a demolition site), but I’m not.  I’ve been having weird dreams (I was dying of cancer in one dream, running away with a New York City firefighter in another, and hanging out with Martha Stewart and a rock star in another) and not sleeping well.

I told my husband this morning that I think the reason I hate the first day of school is that it’s all so awkward.  Once we get going we’ll have this awesome, streamlined, smooth-functioning routine, and it will be easy to plug things into the routine.  On the first day there is no routine, and so we do a little bit of this (tour the school) and a little bit of that (our first morning meeting and calendar time) and a little bit of this (drawing self-portraits) and a little bit of that (touring the classroom and opening up our first center).

Also I feel like a big dork.  I feel like I don’t know what I’m doing the whole time.  Like maybe I completely forgot how to teach over the summer.

I can’t wait until this morning is over!

My school family August 11, 2008

Every day, at the end of our morning together, my class stands up and holds hands in a circle, and sings the “School Family Song,” to the tune of “You are my Sunshine.”

You are my family, my school family,

I feel happy when you are here,

I hope you know, friends,

How much I love you,

When we’re apart,

I’ll keep you here.

(We put our hands on our hearts for the last line.)  This song is from the book I Love You Rituals, by Becky Bailey, which is well worth getting for anyone who spends time with young children.  I only use a few of the songs but with tremendous effect.

Last year, sometime early in the year, we drew pictures of our family members.  K., who is an only child, had one more person in her picture than I expected.  I sat down and asked her to tell me about the people in the picture.

“This is me, this is my mom, this is my dad, this is my grandpa, this is my teacher.”

“I’m in your family?” I asked, confused.

“Yes,” she said.  And then it dawned on me.

“Is this because of our song?  I’m in your school family?”

She beamed.  And I felt so honored.  (Also aware of my power, and how careful I need to be.  When I sing a song about a school family with my students, they believe me.  They believe everything I say.  I need to be very, very careful about what I say.)

Anyway, we are a family.  Each year, I have about twenty new children, and I’m sort of their teacher, sort of another mom.  I love them, and I tell them so, and often, they love me back.

Opening up centers on the first day of school August 1, 2008

On the first day of school — my least favorite of the year, but that’s a different story — my centers are all closed. 

The house corner gets roped off with a sign that says “Closed” even before the open house, so the children already know when they arrive on the first day that they can’t just wander over to the shelves and start grabbing things.  (I’ll post more about our morning routines later.)

At the end of our first morning meeting, we get in a line (alphabetical, of course!) and make a “train.”  I’m at the front, blowing on my train whistle, and we all say “chugga chugga choo choo!” together until I come to a stop at the art center.  The train goes all around the center so that everyone can see, and I introduce the art center.  I show them what’s there (on the first day; not much), and where things go, and explain how they can wash their hands at the nearby sink, and then tell them how to use (and clean up) the playdough that is set out at the art center. 

Then I tell them to look at their “train tickets” — which are the nametags they are wearing around their necks — and that anyone with a red train ticket gets to go to the art center today.  The four kids with red nametags get all excited, and they sit down to play with playdough under the supervision of my para, while I take the train back to the meeting area, where we play games or sing songs or read books.

On the next day, we get back on our train and stop at a new center, say the manipulatives center.  The kids with the green tickets go there, we return to the art center and the yellow tickets get dropped off there, and I go back to the meeting area with a smaller group.

Each day we open a new center, and I cycle each group through each center.  It takes about 3 weeks, and a lot of planning ahead of time.  I like doing it this way because it teaches the children the rules and routines of each center over time, instead of trying (and failing) to explain everything all at once on the first day, when they are just itching to play.

Slowly but surely we learn where everything in the room is, how to play and share at each center, and how to clean up at the end of centers time, while at the same time we are building community and comfort and respect.

(image courtesy of starpreschool.com, via google images)