The principal announced over the intercom this morning that there were a lot of absent teachers. Yikes! The colds are going around like mad! Ms. Conrad is totally sick with a head cold, but she was a trooper and came in today - thank goodness!
Both Amy and I forgot to look over our response logs last night, so we tried to work on them, but neither of us had time. She had to run off to a meeting, and I was organizing students into groups for Social Studies and setting the room up for EMA/Morning Meeting. We decided to just give
them back on Monday.
I checked in homework by myself officially today! It was a fun experience, but it was tough to keep on top of the students while checking over the homework. I had to do some serious multitasking! I'd look over the math homework while asking students to quiet down or ask if they were reading the morning message and following directions. Amy was watching me from afar, and complimented me later in the day for being on top of everyone.
She was pulled out for a meeting before the day had started - follow up from yesterday's student in crisis incident. It was up to me to make sure that the students took their spelling test and got to chorus on time. The students were a bit rowdy and I had a hard time getting them quiet - I utilized a number of classroom management techniques, but they still wouldn't listen. Finally, after lots of patience, they quieted down - but it took so long that we missed morning meeting. They were upset, but it was a good lesson for them to learn.
I taught math again today - 2 digit divisor long division! It's a tricky subject, but if they follow the steps, they are destine for success. The lesson went really well, and I even threw in a few tips about rounding the divisor to estimate how many times it will fit into the dividend. The one thing that Dr. Morse and I both emphasized was for students to show their work - because there are so many steps to long division, it's easy to make a mistake, but by showing work (and using scrap paper when necessary) students are less likely to make careless mistakes.
No sooner did I finish up in math and switch to science when Dr. Morse asked Ms. Wink if she could steal me back. She had just gotten a phone call - her daughter had a fever and needed to be picked up from school. Dr.Morse needed me to pinch hit for her! YAY! what a compliment! I was happy to help - and I totally hammed it up! I taught it so much better the second time.
In SS, the students were separated into 5 Native American tribes - groups that they will be learning in for the next several weeks. After getting their assignment, they read packets about their tribe. Ms. Conrad asked me what my plans were for after December. I said that I was hoping that somebody would get pregnant, which made me laugh in my head because it reminded me of a hilarious Tracy Morgan clip that my friends and I were obsessed with a couple of years ago. Anyway, she and I had a great conversation about how I can go about getting a job - she suggested that we talk about it on Monday over lunch. YES! That made me feel pretty awesome!
After school, I stayed after with Jenn and Amy to go over the magnet lesson. Amy was thrilled with the improvements we made to the PowerPoint and planned to make with the handouts. It should be a fun lesson.
I was so excited to go to "Oktoberfest" with the 5th grade teachers, but everyone dropped like flies. Ms. Conrad was sick and went home, Dr. Morse left school early, Mrs. Callahan and Jenn both had commitments, and Amy was exhausted from yesterday. I came close to backing out, but I decided to stop by - hey, I bought cookies, might as well stop by. I'm glad that I did! I only stayed for about an hour, but it was nice to see the teachers out of the work environment. It was also nice to see that they are friends - after coming from a job in which I was friends with almost everyone I worked with, it's nice to know that colleagues can be friends outside of work in elementary education too!
I left Oktoberfest and drove to BC to hang out with those former work friends. My friend Judette was in town from San Francisco and a bunch of us met and made dinner. We sat around the table, laughed, and caught up. It was a great way to end my week! Good food, great friends, fun memories.
I finished reading "Poppy" by Avi. It's a story about a field mouse who takes on the self-appointed "leader" of Dimwood Forest to avenge the death of her love, and to save the future of her family. It was a quick read and very entertaining. I also loved that the the main character is a girl - she is clever, brave, and ends up outwitting the evil dictator. A great read that is part of a series - it would be easy for students who like this book to keep on reading the other two books. There are many illustrations throughout the book, which can help young readers to transition to chapter books.
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