Thank You Little Prince

A brilliant, thoughtful, wise colleague of mine has often said that one of the roles of a first grade teacher is to tame the children. The vision in my head of taming is one that makes me somewhat uncomfortable when I think of children. So I've turned to the definition of tame from The Little Prince: "It means to establish ties." - from chapter 21. That makes perfect sense to me as a teacher.

I've got a little friend this year who is making me question this. He was born in the U.S. and lived here until just over a year ago, just before he turned six. For reasons I don't fully understand he (and his brothers) were sent to eastern Africa to live with their grandparents. Their mother relocated to our area and my little one returned to the U.S. Technically, by age, he should be in second grade but he just barely makes the cutoff and he is now in first grade (a more appropriate place for him). This is his first experience with school. He's been in day care before but never in school.

Academically he's actually doing pretty well. He's not yet at grade level in reading and writing but he is making quick progress in both. In math he's really capable. Honestly I'm quite impressed by him academically.

The taming issue comes in because he does not know how (or is unable) to behave the way one is expected to do in school. I don't think I'm overly strict about this but I do expect that he have some control of his body and his voice. I do feel as though I am trying to tame this child.

The struggle I'm facing is how to 'tame' this child without squelching him. He's got so much potential and I don't want to turn him into a compliant dullard (not that I think that's actually possible). Am I worrying over nothing? Am I right to be concerned? If so, how do I help this student without losing my mind?

A Surprising Moment

These two boys are as different as one can imagine. On this day, during our math workshop, they were working together to fill in one of our big 100 charts and finished it pretty quickly. When kids finish their work stations during math workshop they can go to our math library (just a tub full of math related books) to find something to read. These two boys picked a book together and sat down together. I would never have expected it. It was absolutely wonderful.

"Ramona"

The look on this little one's face is so perfect. This picture was taken on the second day of school. I had no idea then that it so perfectly captured her personality. She's a great kid.

Ramona loves her friends and being at school. Her attention span and stamina don't last that long, but she's excited to get started on everything.

At only six it's hard to say what her future holds but I fully expect her to be a bit of a prankster. She just has that twinkle in her eye all the time. Not dangerous or cruel pranks, but fun. She's the kind of kid all of the other kids like.

Ramona has actually been absent quite a bit and I'm sad each day she doesn't show up, eager to be with the other kids and excited to start learning.

Animated Words

Practicing writing high frequency words is an important job in first grade. It also tends to be a pretty boring job. We write them in rainbows using colored pencils, using doodle pros, with dry erase markers on plastic display stands and with light on a glow station.

That's great for a few weeks but it gets dull pretty quick. So, to mix things up and keep them interesting we've added animating words. Using FableVision's Animationish kids take turns during language arts workshop animating the words we are studying that week. It requires writing the word at least two times, most write it three times. Then they watch the animation as well.

I love playing around in Animationish and I know we'll be using it in a lot of other ways throughout the year.

It's Not All About the Tools, but Tools Can Be Fun

Teachinghistory.org has a wide range of resources for teachers (mostly history teachers, of course but some of these resources are handy across curricular areas).

One piece includes reviews of websites and technology tools. I try not to get caught up in the tools, but I find it handy to have reviews of them to help me determine what would work best for a specific lesson or need. I can't try out every tool and really explore it the way I would like, so this is a pretty nice substitute. In that vein, I recently wrote a review of Primary Wall for this section of teachinghistory.org. It's basically an online wall on which folks can stick post-it notes. My first graders enjoy using it.

"Laura"

This little darling arrived in the U.S. at the age of 3 1/2. She started kindergarten at our school last year and it was the first time she'd really been away from her mom. I'm sure that was hard for both of them.

She was very quiet last year as she was learning English. She's still a pretty quiet child. But she participates and engages in conversations.

Laura listens to everything around her. She doesn't miss a thing. She's like a sponge, just soaking everything in.

She's very responsible and mature. I know that she will take care of anything I ask: remembering to deal with something at a certain time, taking something home and returning it signed, helping another student with a task, etc. She does not seem six most of the time.

I did not know Laura last year but have had many conversations with her kindergarten teacher. I feel like I am getting the opportunity to watch a flower slowly blossom. Laura opens more each day. It is an amazing process to see.

It has been years since I read any of the Little House on the Prarie books so I do not feel truly confident in this name choice. It is based more on my memory and perception of Laura in the books than it likely is on reality.

Teaching Heroes on teachinghistory.org

If you teach early elementary grades you probably teach specific famous individuals in your social studies curriculum. Often those people are treated as heroes, or superhuman in some way. It can be a challenge to teach young children about famous people in a meaningful way.

I wrote about these challenges and ways to address them in my latest teachinghistory.org post.

Stress Tests

My oldest daughter has hit that critical grade, 3rd. This is the year she is required to begin taking standardized tests. That will start next week with our district's practice standardized tests.

As I may have mentioned in the past, this darling daughter struggles with anxiety. She does not, however, struggle with academics. I really thought we had convinced her not to be concerned about these tests, but it seems I was wrong.

Tonight, in a flash of exhaustion and frustration unrelated to school, she said, "It's just my life is so hard."

I managed not to laugh and pulled her close to me and asked what was making things feel so hard. The first thing out of her mouth was about these practice tests next week. Ugh. Really? Sheesh.

My response to this was to tell her that she doesn't have to take these tests. If they are causing her stress and anxiety then I will write a letter saying that we refuse to have her participate. We did talk a bit about what these tests are, why they take them, and what to expect. (I don't really believe in all of the things I said, sadly, but I don't need to add that burden too.) My great hope here is that she will actually take these tests, but without any stress or anxiety, and finds that they are nothing to worry about. That said, if she is still worried and upset about them I will refuse to let her participate.

"Max"

Meet Max, from Where the Wild Things Are. He's a natural leader (including leading many of the wild things in our classroom) who is not afraid of anything. Fortunately, he tends to lead in mostly positive ways.

Max walks in every morning full of energy, excited about the day. I can always rely on him to be focused on the task at hand (as long as I keep it interesting) and help others do the same.

That said, he is still six (turning seven this month). He loves to play with the Matchbox-like cars or Legos whenever he gets the chance. I often have to ask him to be a bit quieter as his exuberance carries him away. At recess he never stops moving, but is often the first to help out a friend who is hurt or upset.

Picturing him in ten or twenty years is an exciting venture. He's got serious possibilities ahead of him.

Knuffle Bunny Fore! A High Flying Adventure

We did it! We finally finished writing, illustrating, and reading our Knuffle Bunny book! Not surprisingly the pigeon even managed to sneak onto at least one page in here.

"Dennis"

I'm not sure this name is a perfect fit, but Dennis the Menace comes to mind with this little guy. He can't sit still to save his life, he drives some adults crazy, and he is always smiling.

The look you see here is pretty constant, no matter what is going on. When he gets in trouble (see above issues with body control) he is never upset. He'll go off to take a short break or go sit somewhere away from certain friends or whatever the consequence is without any complaint, sulking, or the slightest sign of frustration. I find it really fascinating.

He is engaged in everything. Sometimes that means he is an excited, active participant in our class discussions or in small group explorations and sometimes that means he is an excited, active participant in side conversations or small group distractions. He is in the midst of it all.

There are a few adults who work with him in small groups regularly (reading groups and a special pull-out support) and he tends to drive them a little batty, the way Dennis does Mr. Wilson. However, in spite of that it is clear these women adore this guy.

I, somehow, don't work with him in a small group on any sort of regularly scheduled basis. So I can simply adore him. He makes me smile. Sometimes I have to try to hide that smile in order to not reinforce questionable behaviors, but he makes me smile.

I'm more than halfway through writing about the students in my class and this is taking a lot longer than I had anticipated. However, it has been and is a wonderful exercise for me in thinking about the positives of all my darling kiddos.

Lucky Happenstance

I've become a bit addicted to Groupon, Living Social, and such things. Occasionally I purchase one because it seems like such a great idea and later realize that I really have no idea what to do with it. (In my defense, I do often purchase them with specific, fabulous plans in mind.)

One recent purchase was for five posters. I don't recall what brilliant idea I had in mind when I hit Buy! but I found a great use for them.

My class happened to creat five rules this year through our hopes and dreams for first grade. They are written on a poster in our classroom which we have all signed. But it's not a great reminder for first graders.

So I took each rule and created a poster with pictures of students illustrating that rule. I'm hoping the visual reminders all around our room will keep us focused on what we think is important this year.

By the way, the order of the rules here is the order in which they created them. I love that "Have fun" was their number one rule.

Serious about Mo Willems

My students are obsessed with Mo Willems and his books, most especially Piggie and Elephant, the Pigeon, and everyone in the Knuffle Bunny books. In fact, my students love the Knuffle Bunny books so much that they have written, as a class, a new one. I will be sharing it in the next day or so when we can record it.

Thanks to our amazing librarian, I have a number of pictures from Mo Willems' books. When the books have been so loved that they are falling apart, she removes them from the library and replaces them with new copies. She has given some to me to cut up. I am using them around my room as encouragement to my students.

Their response has been, not surprisingly, positive. My favorite reaction, however, was to the pigeon. As they always look for him in any other book by Willems they were thrilled to find him in our classroom. Many said something along the lines of, "That sneaky Pigeon snuck into our classroom!"

Now the question will be whether or not I can manage to update what these little friends are saying regularly. I think they will lose their power if I don't change their speech bubbles pretty often.

Losing...time, my mind, who knows what else

I am not the teacher I want to be, or genuinely believe I can be, right now. I have had either meetings or duty four mornings this week. That means that from the time my contract day begins until lunch three and a half hours later I am either in a meeting or with my first graders. Lunch translates to about fifteen minutes of time for myself most days (once I get the kids mostly through the line and do any other essentials like copying or handling an issue with another teacher or administrator). Of the four days that my students have specials (P.E., music, art) I have had meetings during two of those times and missed that time completely today because P.E. was canceled for upper grade field day.

I don't mean to sound whiny, although I know I do. I just realized this afternoon that one result of this is that I do not give as much to my students as I should. I don't pull small groups or meet individually or check in with them as they work the way I should. I spend some time holding back and just surveying the room rather than digging in. I just don't have the energy to do it.

Something has to give and right now my students are the ones losing out. That's not right and I have to figure out how to fix it.

"Alice"

I'm never sure what will happen next with this little one, hence the name Alice. Alice in Wonderland is a sweet girl who stumbles through craziness. I think my little Alice may encourage, albeit unconsciously, some of that craziness.

She's very social and genuinely likes everyone. After an assembly today the performers were walking through the crowd slapping high fives. Alice managed to connect with every single performer. She was in the midst of things the entire time, at least until I dragged my class out of there.

In some ways this little one seems much older than six. Her eyes often have a wisdom that is at odds with her little-kid grin. She's one I am enjoying getting to know better and better everyday.

Highs and Lows of Reading

My wonderful co-teacher and I were working on progress reports today. As a clear sign of my exhaustion or lack of brain power or etc. I had to ask her a couple of times if she had a kid in a reading group or if I did. Typically she did but there was at least one time I had the child. As soon as she said it I realized and could handle my role in the conversation.

We got to one (of my favorite) kid(s) and I was sure she must have him in a reading group because there is no way I would forget meeting with him. She said no. I looked skeptically at her. She repeated her refusal. I looked questioningly. She pulled out the list of our reading groups.

He was in one of my groups. I have never once met with this student.

I have a student who has never met in a reading group, not once in the month we've been meeting with the kiddos. He has not mentioned to us that he has never been called for a meeting. We have never realized he wasn't getting that instruction time. #majorfail

On the silver lining side of this saga, he is reading above where we expect him to be. I have to admit I would feel a lot worse if he were struggling more as a reader. But still...

Then tonight my daughters gave me a new story to tell (thank goodness). I lost all patience with them - that's not the good part - and told them we would not be reading any Harry Potter tonight. That worked out well when the 3rd grader realized she had some serious word study homework to do. The four-year-old kept bugging her until I sent her off to find a book to look at.

She brought over Dora's Sleepover. It has pictures within some sentences to help an early reader. But I would not describe her as an early reader yet. She started reading it and pointed at words for me to tell her. I gave her the first couple and then there was a picture. Then she kept going on her own for a couple of words. She was getting her mouth ready beautifully at each word and if she thought of a word that made sense that started that way she would say it. This got her pretty darn far. She needed help with about every third or fourth word, on average. But she was reading quite a bit on her own and feeling really, really good about it.

I'm grateful to end the day on a high note.

"Froggy"

The smile you see here never stops. Between those curls and that smile this child makes my day regularly. In fact, yesterday he totally pulled me out of a funk. One of our assistant principals came in just to hang out with our class for a bit and he walked up to her as soon as she entered the room and asked her, "Are you a spy?"

I have no idea what prompted the question but it was awesome. This AP is lovely but I think she was a bit thrown by the question. She loved it too but seemed unsure how to answer.

My students love the Froggy books. Froggy is excited about everything, often over zealous in his excitement, and often unaware of the challenges and problems he may be causing. That's this friend. And, just like Froggy, it is wonderfully fun for him and everyone around him.

He can be sensitive and feel awful when things don't work or he makes a mistake. I have to watch myself about that. I need to be gentle when working with him in areas that are challenging for him.

My hope for this year with Froggy is to encourage his excitement and not stomp it down in my carelessness.

Meaningful Results are Worth Our Time and Energy

Our school is in the midst of a transition. We're moving to more structured, rigid PLCs (professional learning communities). It's causing some tension and stress.

After lots of discussion with others and some serious reflection of my own I've identified my biggest concern. Everything about the way a traditional PLC is designed, in many ways, is focused on test results. The wording is about results in a vague way but those results boil down to standardized tests of some sort.

I tweeted my frustration about this yesterday and have continued to think a lot about it. Interestingly enough I just skyped in with a school in Florida to share my thinking about what matters. Andrea invited me to give the Encienda I gave at Educon last year to the staff at her school. They are planning to use this format for future staff meetings.

If you're a fan of Chris Lehmann you'll find the main gist here really familiar. This recording happened before I really got my brain wrapped around my personal frustrations with PLCs and the focus of educational reform in general and as it very specifically pertains to me. Looking at the video now I am pleased with my beliefs.

I care about results. But that doesn't translate to standardized test scores. Results in the lives of children are so much bigger than that.

Jump to 1:50 to watch the actual Encienda talk. The first bit is me chatting with Andrea and others at her school.

"Madeline"

Madeline may be the smallest child in our class. But her personality and smile far outstretch her size. She comes in every morning with a great grin and gets excited about anything we do.

Other kids love to follow her because she is full of good ideas. Watching her on the playground is a joy. She brings a lot of that into the classroom as well. During discussions or while at work stations her enthusiasm, excitement, and energy spread pretty quickly to those around her.

She may be pint-sized but she fills our classroom.

"David"

I chose the name David for this little friend because of his love for David Shannon's David books. Plus, he is a lot like David. He is wonderful kid who is always getting himself into trouble. He's never malicious but he can't sit still, talks all the time, and has trouble following directions. In short, he's a six-year-old boy.

I had David's older brother in my class a couple of years ago. These two boys couldn't be more different. The older one is a total rule-follower. He would get so upset when other students weren't doing what they should be doing. It's hard for me to remember that these boys are brothers.

I'm thrilled to have this little guy in my class. I got to know him a bit in kindergarten and was hoping to have him this year. He has a wonderful smile and we get to see it a lot. When he figures something out for the first time, it is exciting beyond words. He wants to share it with me, with other teachers, with anyone who will listen. It's great during our share time!

By the end of the day David usually has me worn out, but all he has to do is smile on his way out the door and I'm on my way again.