Max Teaching

This book by Mark A. Forget, PhD has been
instrumental for me teaching
my students reading and writing strategies. Without
this book, I would have really struggled through this
semester of college and my first semester of teaching.
This book lists and explains in explicit details so many
reading strategies. For those of you who did not have
this book, you need to find it and buy it. Inside the book
are handouts to copy and every step to teach each strategy.
I attended a workshop the week before school started and
had hands on instruction for all of the strategies used, but
as most of us know, when we leave, we also lose much of
what we have learned, just as our students do. This book
is a must for the beginner teacher or for seasoned teachers
being forced to use and document teaching strategies. The
website is http://www.maxteaching.com. Check it out.

Hunting Deer or Reading Books????

For the past 2 weeks, I bet I have had 15 students
absent for 3 out of 4 days a week.....HUNTING.
I'm sure that I'm not the only teacher in Arkansas
with this problem. These students have DEER on the
brain. As you can see, my husband does too. So, how
do we teachers catch these students up? Really.
Christmas break is in 3 weeks, the students' minds are
already on vacation. How do we reel them back in? There
is so much pressure on EOC exams, but so much teaching
time is lost for many reasons. Are we really expected to
teach every student all of the frameworks. How do you
do this when there is NEVER a time that all students are
present. I know, we do the best we can and hope for the
best, then, when results come back around September
about the EOC, we will hear about it. Somehow, someway,
we must make sure that all students see and/or hear about
everything we have taught all year long. Boy, we have a
long road ahead of us.

WE ARE THE BULLDOGS

Now that Football's over, Basketball starts.
I can tell you that my students that are
involved in Girls Basketball have a lot to live
up to. Their coach comes to my classroom
periodically and ask about her players' grades
and behavior. This is AWESOME. This coach
has so much influence on her players that they
try so hard to do well, for the most part. The
students know that I will email the coach during
class if they start acting out. These girls don't know
it yet, but they are getting such great lessons in
discipline, that many probably do not get at home.
I do believe one person can make a difference in
many people's lives, and this coach is one of those
people.

When Did School Become So Complicated?

Has school always been so crazy? I mean, When I was in school, the worst thing was fighting. Fighting with the fist was the way this happened. Now, we worry about guns and drugs. Even though we don't usually see them, these things are all around us. As teachers, we don't just teach, we have to police our classrooms. I am probably safe to say that all the schools have patrol on their campuses. How did we get to this? Will we have a time when we don't worry so much? I catch myself wondering about my students taking arguments home and away from people who could help them. I have students that have said that they take their fights outside the school, so that they don't get suspended. Oh my, they don't seem to be worried about the consequences of fighting. The possibility of getting killed. Granted, in Star City we don't have a huge problem at this time. But it just takes one time. Almost makes you scared to even say it out loud. These signs posted around the school are a constant reminder of what can happen or has already happened, somewhere. We aren't just teachers, we are surrogate parents for some of these kids. We have to teach them about consequences of their actions and how important it is to be the "bigger person". How easy it would be to just teach our content.

So, Who Loves Chocolate?

My daughter, Jaclyn, had to find a book about Chocolate. So I found this as a perfect opportunity to use it twice. We found a book called The True History of Chocolate.

I Love Chocolate. I was surprised at how much the book talked about the many aspects of Chocolate. The book describes the different types of chocolate from milk, white and dark and how they are formed from sugar and milk. Chocolate is native to South America and has been documented to have been used since around 1100 BC. The chocolate we know is produced from seed of the tropical cacao tree. The seeds have an intense bitter taste. After fermentation, the beans are dried, cleaned and roasted.

Chocolate is one of the most popular flavors in the world. I know that I will get chocolates on Valentine’s Day from my husband. Chocolate is used in beverages, also. Some health benefits have been discovered such as a decrease in blood pressure and reduce the formation of free radicals. It has also been said to be toxic to some animals like dogs and cats due to some alkaloids that are in the chocolates.

The word Chocolate comes from the Aztec and means “bitter water”. The storage of chocolate is sensitive to temperature and humidity. If refrigerated or frozen, the chocolate can absorb moisture and causes a whitish discoloration to form from the fat and sugar rising to the surface. Although this chocolate looks unappealing, the chocolate is perfectly safe to eat.

Many manufacturers use chocolate, but the Hershey Company is the large chocolate manufacturer in North America, in second is the Mars Corporation. We can’t forget about Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, one of my favorite movies. Did I say that I LOVE CHOCOLATE?

Are 2 Days Enough?

So, we just had 2 days off for AEA Days. The students were so excited about these days that it was difficult to teach. I found myself wanting the days to hurry up too. I just wonder how next week is going to be with Thanksgiving break coming up. I need to cover Photosynthesis in 5 days. It may be pushing it, but we got to try. Any ideas? How do you keep their attention through the Holidays? We already lose so much instructional time due to assemblies, pictures and state testing, that meeting frameworks is difficult. Hopefully the students will learn something. I've thought that after the Holidays it may be good to recap what we learned prior to this. Either way, I'm looking forward to the days off as much or more than the students.

DIVERSITY?

Do these photos look diverse? Maybe not to the untrained eye, or maybe yes to the trained eye. Diversity in my classroom goes way beyond the color of one's skin. The diversity that I see in in backgrounds, educational levels and maturity levels. One of these students will never see any grade less than an A in any class and the other has IEP modifications. Fortunately, this year I do not have to deal with language barriers or medical ailments causing major diversity issues such as some of those listed in our Chapter on Diversity, but the diversity in my classroom has a different twist...to teach the different levels of cognitive development in each class, everyday. I do have to take into account everyday the different levels of learning these students have. I have to keep in mind that the advanced student may get bored and the struggling student may not be getting it at all. Different methods I try using is group work with peer teaching and I also make different assignments to make sure each student gets enough or not too much material for their learning experience. This is a tough task, at least for me. I'm learning to balance my time and trying to balance lessons for each student. Trial and error is frustrating but it does pay off when you see the struggling student make an A on the same test you gave the advanced student. Makes it all worth while.

Teacher In Action

Welcome to My Room

Well, so far my principal has been in my room for evals 3 times. I actually teach better when he's in the room. I am not nervous and the kids act great (so far). My mentor has been in my room this week too. I like others observing me. I guess I feel that if I'm doing something that I don't know that I'm doing (crazy faces or something like that) that they would tell me. Do you think so??? Anyway, still haven't decided what I think about teaching yet. It's getting easier and my prep time is much less. Hopefully I will find out that I love it and want to teach forever. We'll see. Lindy

I DID IT!!!!!!

Today I figured out how to add links to my blog. Wow!! It really was simple. I missed the icon about adding blogs. I guess this is how our students feel when they learn something new or when they finally figure out a concept they had trouble with. As teachers, we have to keep trying to get them all to "figure" something new out. We must teach them to be responsible/accountable for their learning. I learned a few new teaching strategies yesterday in our Saturday meeting. I plan to use some of these in the next couple of weeks. Hopefully one of these strategies will click with the students and allow some of the students a new method of learning. Reading skills are a must and we must teach them to learn to read. We have a long road ahead of us and we must never give up. We sure don't want our students to.

Can you believe it?

Can you believe we made it another week? Well, I have to say it is getting easier for me. I'm still just one sentence ahead of my students but I'm finally getting the hang of getting ready for tomorrow. The students are getting to know me and how I want my class to run. Don't get me wrong, they are testing me every day, but I do feel they realize that they can't run me off that easily. I have tried to incorporate many different types of activities in the classroom to help keep them engaged. They HATE to take notes. I try to have lots of pictures in my powerpoint slides, and the pictures have to be of either something gross or something weird. They love gross and weird. Hey, if it gets them interested I'll try it. Anyway, another week has come and gone and I am still here.

Thank Goodness for Weekends

I was really looking forward to this weekend. Ready for a little time away from 10th graders. Don't get me wrong, they are not bad, they just absolutely wear me out. I think I like teaching, seems easier than I expected, but I am having some trouble keeping up with everything. I haven't assigned any homework. I've given a test and one graded quiz, with a few quizzes thrown in to get their attention. I did talk with another teacher who says he has not given his first algebra test yet. This made me feel better. I'm giving another test this Tuesday and will probably assign something for homework this week. I have had a couple of students ask me about their grades for the first 9 weeks progress report. This is when I decided to scrape up some numbers. I've used this weekend to do my school work-college work that is. I am about one paragraph ahead of these students and about 1 hour ahead of my own work. Thank Goodness for Weekends.

Survivor Woman

I started out with only a pencil and textbook in hand, then somehow I managed to compile 130 students into 7 periods of classes and gave target testing and Chapter 1 test all in the first 2 weeks. If that's not surviving, I don't know what is.

I can't believe that 2 weeks have passed. So far I really like teaching the subject and the students. I also worked at the hospital this Saturday and was worried at the patients coming in from Louisiana, fortunately, we did not get many the first day. I started wondering if I would have any students for Louisiana in my classes next week. Hopefully the storm will pass through quietly and these people can get back to their homes.

Anyway, I'm learning as much as my students and this is keeping me going 90 miles an hour. I feel more confident every day and know that I will be able to do this job.