thanksgiving

Well, I got everything I wanted to do done yesterday. This morning I sat and watched Little Women...my favorite book growing up and a good 'Christmassy' movie. It is nice being off.

Dan and I went to go and see Harry Potter last night....I love Harry Potter. Goblet of Fire was my favorite book so far so I really enjoyed the movie. We stayed up late, ok, midnight and we even found See's Candies at Ridgemar!!! They are selling them at a kiosk for the Christmas season. mmm-mmm. We are taking them back to Jackson with us. I used to bring a box back every holiday when I lived in CA.

I'm kinda sad about the movies though. They waited so long to make them all that the actors are growing up. Neville Longbottom has *really* grown up, lost all his baby fat, etc. I am not sure they will pass as high schoolers, of course movie people do it all the time. I guess we will see what happens.

We had one language center kid who just read the entire Goblet of Fire novel (800+ pages). In addition to the fact that he could have just gone and gotten a copy in Spanish, he actually finished it! He borrowed book 5 from me and was in chapter 7 when we got out for Thanksgiving. Pretty impressive, huh?

puedo hablar...

Ok, more on the calling of my student's momma, since I realized that it sounded a little odd. I tease my kids, especially those who are more ADD, that I am going to call their mommas. Well, I have this one kid whose mom and two sisters live in Mexico City, he doesn't talk to her a lot, lives with his dad and older brother. As much as I can tell he was there this summer and hasn't talked to her since. Well, he started saying that I should go ahead and call his mom..."What do you want me to say?" "Tell her I'm ok."

We went through that banter for a few days, then Friday he brings me his mom's phone number in Mexico City, writes down her name and tells me to call after 8. I asked did his mom speak English and he said to ask for his sister Georgina cause she speaks "a little." (this last bit was with a grin and a giggle, so I'm not real sure how much 'a little' is.) So I really think he does want me to call. Not sure what to say, he is a good student, very bouncy, the boy who taught me what "tuba" means in spanish, but a sweet kid. He apparently misses his momma and wants her to know he is doing ok.

So, does anyone know how to call Mexico City?

fall cleaning time

Posting since I am waiting on my husband to get home. :)

Today, the last day before a week long, much needed Thanksgiving break, I chose not to do the originally planned writing center activity. Instead I chucked the lesson plan and offered my students the following deal: "You help me get my life organized here and I'll show you the movie you want to watch the last half of class." Worked like a charm.

The things I accomplished today:
1) sent every bit of paper, book, stuff to the correct teacher/office...even the stuff that has been sitting in my room for 3 weeks...ok, the entire year.
2) moved my two filing cabinets across the room and away from the air conditioning/heating sensor (the air guy says that was my heating problem)
3) moved my desk
4) cleaned out the files left by the teacher before me
5) organized the class library
6) alphabetized all the folders
7) cleaned my boards and put the birthday calendar up permanently so I don't have to keep doing it
8) got rid of all the boxes in my room and put empty ones behind the books so they don't push over.

all in all a productive day.

also I learned a little spanish:
"Puedo hablar con de la mama de Hernan, por favor?"
One of my students wants me to call his mom in Mexico City and tell her he is ok. I am sorta tempted to do it cause he really did want me to.
and
"que de histe" (spelling extremely rough?) 'What did you say?'

my day in the library

ok, well to start off with, myself and the other language center reading teacher are bribing our kids to read long books. if they read 160 pages by the middle of december, they will get to go on a field trip downtown. tool around awhile, tour the library and go out to eat for free. i have conned most of them into trying.

then i spent the rest of the day alternately admonishing and praising my students for behavior when the sub was here. it culminated with yelling at them about posting a note to the pointy part of the flag and leaving it for my 9th graders to find this morning. my 9th graders translated it for me. my list of spanish curse words gets longer by the day. the first girl was so embarrassed she almost wouldn't tell me. i did get out of two girls in 7th who posted it. he wasn't there today so i'll get him tomorrow. :)

so today i give 7th their rant about behavior and how lots of them are seniors and 6-7 months from now they will be done with high school and i shouldn't have to be telling them how to act. basically a 'grow-up' speech. :) then i had to take them to the library because i had to wait a week to get in. i'm helping these groups of boys find books (16:9 boy-girl ratio remember) and get so frustrated that i take off my jacket while i'm talking to them. apparently this surprised them cause they all go "whoa! what are you doing?" "Taking off my jacket. I'm hot." "Right, Ms. You're hot!" what do i do? blush.

This is not what i needed today. especially from the class i'm supposed to be mad at. though i never stay mad at 7th period very long cause they are good kids and generally i like them. there are quite a few kids in there that shoot off a smile like "you can't be mad at me." and there i go and don't hold them to it. I should be a better disciplinarian.

bragging on my kids

Ok, so I don't actually teach any of these kids, but I am super super proud. yesterday we went to state cross country. And OUR GUYS WON FIRST! In the state of Texas, North Side has the best 4A cross country team! We got written up in the Star-Telegram the day before.

Just wanted to brag.

friday night plans

what am i doing tonight? i'm going to the drive-in with 3 middle schoolers. :) a promise made to take them during Rambling Road Trip VBS this summer...then they didn't show a G/PG rated movie for 3 MONTHS!

We're going to see chicken little. wanna join us?

www.thebrazos.com

From Ft. Worth exit 429A from I-20/820 to US-377
Take 377 Business to Granbury Square
377 becomes Pearl St.
Go 2.5 miles on Pearl St.
The Brazos is on the right, before the High School
The estimated driving time is about 50 minutes

substitutes

now normally i have excellent luck with substitutes, or at least am not in the building where i know all the problems....but today....

1st period the sub was late. she took the job last night, no excuse. we start at 8:35 for crying out loud. my teacher assistant got the class started. then 2nd 2 kids and the teacher assistant came down to ask, "what are we supposed to be doing, cause the class is crazy. they are all listening to music, etc." well, apparently, the sub lost the instructions and didn't know what to do. the directions were on the board; the grammar packets were in the basket by my desk. . . seriously, figure it out. I went up there and by the time i got there the students had found the work and passed it out and started working on it. 4th, apparently they didn't do anything. 5th, they hunted down the grammar packets and did it themselves because she told them she didn't know what they were supposed to be doing. 6th, nothing...that is when i found all this out. i went up there 7th, passed out the packets myself and got them started. most of them were doing their work between blaming this girl of being pedro's (another kid in class) girlfriend. go figure that. oh and they tagged my board up...mostly in dry erase markers, partly in regular markers.

what did my sub do today? she make some excellent pencil drawings because she is an amateur artist. did she attempt to make them do their work? did she check or worry about what they were doing? you know the answer to that i'm sure.

so this is my quandry. i *was* going to let them watch a video tomorrow if they did the grammar packets efficiently today, but most of my classes didn't do them and those that did didn't get them till the end of the period (except for 7th). though i shouldn't punish the students for the sub being crazy. i'll just make sure that she doesn't come back to my room. i was visably angry today when i went up there after school, but i didn't say anything to her about it. i asked what they did and she said she didn't know what they were supposed to be doing and she lost the assignment page. i wouldn't be so upset about it but i was in and out of my room all day and she didn't ask. she said she didn't know where the packets came from, they just appeared. :)

on a happier note, the conferencing is going very, very well. most of my student are actually very very close to passing and many of them could make 3/4 on their essays if they work at it. so the day wasn't a complete bust.

conferencing

tomorrow and friday myself and a teacher down the hall are conferencing the students that we teach on their writing for the state test. i am actually quite excited about it. i get to spend a whole day talking to the kids and *really* giving them things to help them w/o having to shush kids every 5 minutes or stop and find more work for those that finished early to do. we have gotten subs for two days so we can do this. i can really talk to each and every kid and given them things to hold on to. it actually should be a lot of fun.

raising expectations

Our school just got some kind of insane grant to do High Schools that Work. It is a smaller learning community program. The kids will go to a freshman academy then will choose a major and stay in that academy till they graduate (they can swap majors if they like later one). Really neat idea. Great for the teachers cause you will teach the same kids and can keep track of them and help them out a lot. It really is very helpful to talk to other teachers about kids cause you can find out if it is just you or if they are slipping or if something is up with them.

We had to go to the faculty meeting today and hear everyone complain about how the students can't all take ap classes (should be up to 80% on a distinguished grad plan) and how we need an extra administator just to call parents and you can't help kids out if they just can't do it. I really hate faculty meetings that end up that way. The principal got frustrated and actually told the teachers that we are doing this next year and if they don't like it they need to let her know and she will get them transferred for next august...or even January. :) Lots of fun.

to write or not to write....

In my first 3 months being a reading teacher I have realized that I in fact really, really love to teach writing. I understand writing, I retain the information about the people who are writing gurus and I think I'm pretty good at getting the students to do it. This six weeks I decided to teach writing. It is on the test, the kids need it and the other teachers (that are teaching English) are not doing it. Well I say that, they aren't doing it as much as I would, but they are writing some.

Today I created this awesome lesson where the students choose a generic topic (first day of school, championship game, etc) and then they choose 3 styles of how to write an introduction (description, dialogue, interior monologue, action, etc.) It is cool cause they rewrite the same thing 3 different ways. They can see how they can rewrite things to match the story better, how you can say the same thing 3 ways and practice with different methods of writing. I found that last year students would only try one way of writing an introduction. They ALL used begin with a question. Thus, they never branched out and never really refined that method either. I'm trying it different this year.

So far I have at least two kids that *never* do anything that are interested and asking how to do it. One literally didn't write anything last year. The other wrote some stuff for me, but didn't put much effort and *never* asked questions about how to do it. Both kept trying to get me to help them and wrote stuff!!! Yes, that seems like a small thing, but really it is a very big thing. I'm super proud of them. small victories.

update on the kids who hang out in my room. Today I had 3 who used computers, 3 who finished their intro paragraphs before I let them on (one i made stay after because he goofed off all 7th period). One kid told me that he wished he could know what I was like outside of school (not being a teacher) this i laughed at and told him that was a much more interesting teacher than I was a person. I explained that my husband and I read books for fun...and that we went to the movies for the first time in a *long* time on Friday and it almost got vetoed cause there wasn't anything Dan wanted to see. But I conned him into Zorro (Antonio Bandaras :). I think I convinced them that I wasn't that interesting a person.

computer time OR Can you Cumbia, Ms?

I have this set of laptop computers that live in my room right now. The school bought two carts of 16 computers each and I volunteered to learn how to use one. :) I let my students use them for class projects but they can't surf or look up other stuff during class. Two of my students came and asked to use them after school so I told them they could. That was Wednesday 5th period. By 4:00 (school lets out at 3:35) I had a dozen boys (nope no girls) in my room all on computers varying from "Latin Chat" to Cruz Azul merchandise (Mexico City's soccer team) to streaming cumbia. My thought on it is that most of my kids *don't* have computers and can't just play around on computers, get comfortable with them, etc. I was a little worried about Latin Chat, but by the next day the filter had caught it and blocked it also. :) yes, about 6 of them came back Thursday. Both days they stayed till about 5, then walked home. Friday a bunch showed up but I told them it was Friday and they should go home. (The internet was down anyway.)

So my new goals:
1) Finally learn a little Spanish. This is ridiculous. I seriously need to know some.
2) Learn how to cumbia...or at least be able to tell that it is cumbia music by listening to it. It has a different beat to it. When I get a good artist/group, I'll let you know.
3) Come up with some official plan to let students use the computers.

i feel like crying

Never in my year and half (almost) of teaching have I wanted to cry after getting out of school. I want to scream or give up or reintroduce corporal punishment, but never ever cry. I'm not much of a cryer really. But today that is how I feel.

First my kids should be doing study guides today. After I get 300 questions about why, can't we just . . . . They got down and actually did them.

Fifth period there were three boys, who I put up with because I like them, who all decided that I had somehow wronged them because J was passing and the other two were, in fact, not. I told them that J had turned in his make up work....they hadn't.

Sixth the girl who spent the entirety of last year trying to give me a heart attack by saying she was pregnant has actually gotten pregnant. She missed the last six weeks of last year because her family was relocated to a shelter (something that most people don't know, I'm just nosy and check the withdrawal forms to see where my kids go). This girl does not need this. She is a junior but not quite motivated enough to overcome taking care of a child.

7th period...This class is bouncy. I cut them a deal a couple of weeks ago that there could be no more bathroom passes, they have to ask before class starts and they can come in 1 minute late if they do. I expect people not to take advantage of me when I cut them a deal. My best kid, the kid who is not enrolled in my class and one of my talkers all get brought to my room by the teacher across the hall. They were in someone else's classroom... "Are these yours, Mrs. F?" Yes, they were so I send them to get tardy passes. Yes, they had asked to be late so they can go to the bathroom *NOT* to wander across the building. So I had to send the two enrolled in my class to the tardy calculator to get tardy passes. My best kid has literally never had a tardy this year...nor an absence. He was really mad at me because I sent him. His brother was embarrassed first period because I called him by my best kid's name.

Then there was this one kid. He put down his backpack (Kenny from the Halloween zombie episode) and left. Just distinct enough that I know exactly whose it is.... He never came back. I figured he was late...then he never came to class and I was mad. What kind of kid lets me see them and then doesn't come to class? After school I track down every kid I know that is friends with him. "Where is he? Did you see him? His stuff is in my room but he never came to class." I tracked down kids who aren't even friends with him. I was starting to get really worried. about to call his house looking for him, when he walked in (30 min after school let out). WHERE have you been??? He sat down and I got out of him that there was some type of stomach problem and he went home. I'm not sure there isn't more to the story because 'stomach' sounded like spanish the first three times he said it. He wasn't pronouncing it right. He lives like two miles from the school. So he missed all of class to go home and come back. I reminded him that you can't just leave school. You have to get checked out, go to the nurse or go to the office. You can't just walk off campus. He said he understand, he was sorry. He didn't mean to make me worry.

So this is my thing. What compels a kid to just walk home during 7th period? Was this premeditated? I mean, he *came* to class. Then he went home. Didn't tell anyone. I don't think he is lying flat out to me because there is no reason to. Plus the students had already given a dozen reasons for him not to be there (in-house, soccer practice, fell in the toilet :) )....

Regardless I was so relieved that he was ok and not laying in a ditch somewhere that I didn't write him up for skipping. but i did want to cry. :)

how do you explain grumpy?

Today my Reading I kiddos, my kids who have immigrated in the past 2 years instead of when they were 8, were being 9th graders. They come bouncing in saying my room is hot. :) now it is currently 51 degrees outside and I would say that is on par with what it was at 8:30 this morning (love the new school start times!) So I smile and tell them that I *hate* cold weather and that it makes me grumpy. "what's that, ms?"....Hmm. How do you explain grumpy. It completely stumped me. I pulled out the spanish/english dictionary and *it wasn't in there!* So i pulled out a language learner's dictionary and read the definition. But it isn't unhappy, or sad or really even moody. I just said that cold weather puts me in a bad mood. But I really wanted to say, "No, it just makes me a little grumpy." :) Oh, well.

On a side note, my kitty hasn't left my lap all evening. We are curently waiting for my hubby to get home. yes, he isn't home at 10, the new baseballwarehouse website launches the first week of november (we hope).

also, practicing my spanish today. I learned that you have to be careful when saying J in espanol because it can come out like you are saying "gay." All this was triple checked from 3 different sources (2 kids, one teacher) just to make sure that I wasn't having the wool pulled over my eyes. Still can't believe that I have taken French, Greek, German, Chinese and learned some Russian in country and *still* don't know a lick of Spanish. Seriously, that is a little ridiculous right? I'm getting better though. I can at least guess what they are saying to me about 1/2 the time now. :)

day of adventure

Today we went to the new Super Target downtown. Super excited about it now. It is really close, not that crowded and has all the stuff we want. :) dan's happy about the food selection...I found naan bread and fuji apples -- neither of which I have seen since I left SF.

In a moment of excitement we bought Scrabble....This is to tide us over until Civ IV comes out next Tuesday!!! Our pre-order copy from Amazon should show up on Wed. Yes, we are dorks. We accept this and deal with it. We are super excited about it. I've played Civ since ... Well I played FreeCiv first, then CivII...Then Civ III, all the expansions...now Civ IV. It got a 9.4 from IGN. It is good because it is not too much about war, lots of strategy, etc. :)

Miracles

Want to know a miracle? Yesterday my 4th period & my 7th period classes were *completely silent* during silent reading time. Now, that may seem like a no-brainer, however, if you have classes with ratios of 16 boys/9 girls (7th) and 6 ADD (i swear i'm not exaggerating) students (4th) you tend enjoy the small miracles. :)

best story of the day:
there is a teacher at my school (1st year) whose students managed to pull the pins out of the door *while she was teaching.* she went outside to check on a kid and the door fell over. :)

terrible blogger

that is what I am...a terrible blogger. oh well. make due with what you get huh?

I am currently in my second 6 wks of school. My schedule has changed twice and I have sifted down from 183 kids in 6 classes to 145. I have about 20-27 in each class which is actually incredibly good odds. :) I love my kids. most days they drive me completely bonkers, but I love them.

what am i teaching? 20 9th grade language center kids (been in the US 1-2 years) and 125 TAKs prep kids. I have every remedial student in the 11th and 12th grade. Every student who didn't respond to my or the other 10th grade teacher's proddings last year to pass the state test, yes every single student. :) but i love them .... I keep telling myself that.

here are some of the kiddos I have:
-a kid who invariably, without fail, is completely rude to me, appologizes, lays down on my floor to "take a nap" then gets up to do his work. won't quit talking, i spend 1/3 of the class focusing on him alone.
-3 boys in the same class who can not talk in inside voices. literally. i ask them to bring it down about 3 times a day when we have class discussions. all are late, all skip repeatedly. :)
-2 boys who every time they do something wrong they wink at me. and say "come on ms!"
-1 boy who "teaches" me spanish. i can't repeat anything he teaches me because most of it remains unconfirmed. tests me daily by coming up and speaking in spanish just to see if i understand yet.
-2 girls who assure me the boys behind are not being flirted with. "trust me, ms. we are not flirting with *them*" i get the distinct impression that these boys aren't interested in the cute girls sitting in front of them....
-one boy who apparently was a pick-pocket in mexico on the streets as a child. i really like the kid and cant get mad at him. however he can't stay in his seat, talks nearly exclusively in spanish if it isn't with me (problem during small group discussions).
-a kid from auto tech who assures me that i should have let them fix the alternator in my car when it went out last week and shook his head with the most fatherly shake saying i should have known. :)

and a million sweet kids who actually try to do their work. it is fun...but stressful.

2nd wk of school....

But i have great news so i decided to put in a short post. i'll try to catch up next week when they get my class sizes below 35.....


http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/business/12461791.htm

YA novel #5 - The exchange student by Kate Gilmore

This novel is about a girl whose parents sign up for an exchange student from another planet. This is set in the future after the world has been annihilated by a ecological catastrophe. The heroine is involved in rebreeding all of the animals on earth. All the common sci-fi stuff is there, food replicators, etc. her exchange student eats a lot, turns colors according to his mood and is very interested in the animals. their relationship develops but she can tell that there is something she is not telling him. Great story, good sci-fi background. a little slow, but most sci-fi novels are, aren't they?

YA novel #4 - 3 days off

3 days off by Susie Morgenstern

This author, though born American, originally wrote this in French and the translation retains a sprinkling of French phrases and a scene where the main character tries to understand an American tourist as they go through the city together.

Now, when the title says 3 days off what do you think it would be about? A vacation? A snow holiday? No, you would be wrong. the main character here actually gets suspended for telling his English language teacher he would like to know what color her panties were. Apparently he didn't mean to say it, just blurted it out. but gets suspended for 3 days nonetheless. he gets up every morning to figure out how to tell his mom. she actually gets fired from the factory the same day he gets suspended so he chickens out of telling her and has to pretend he is going to school. he can't actually return until she comes to school with him. he is a teenage boy, thinks a lot about the girl he likes, wants to get out of the town he lives in and move to a bigger city, etc. All ends up well, he learns his lesson. The whole book is only 89 pages so it is short enough to read quickly. There are 3 sections/chapters, one for each day.

YA novel #3 - Both Sides of Time

Both sides of Time by Caroline B. Cooney -

Apparently this is a series. The Time Quartet. It is a cute love story about a girl whose boyfriend cares more about his car than her and she wishes she lived in 1895. As she is walking around a condemned house that is about to be demolished, she ends up "falling" through time to 1895. She falls in love , gets caught up in a murder and falls back to her own time. All ends up well in the end. This novel is well written, fun and a bit sappy. :) I am interested in finding the rest of them because I wonder where the story goes.