my plan for the special ed department was approved, however it couldn't be implemented because of our block scheduling, unless the AP of instructional support taught 10 periods a week. my principal gave me two options:
1) bring in a retired sped teacher for $3000+ per session for the year (she said she'd find the money)
2) receive more training and support from our AP and outside sources and keep it as it is.
I discussed it with my team and we decided on option two. We made the ICT class our subject of inquiry study this year, and discussed strategies in depth. We are going to structure a continuum between all of our classes. Two teachers made phone calls to all the parents and I held a parental conference with one of the difficult children. And we've been ignoring the poor behaviors whenever possible and acknowledging the positive behaviors with tons of praise.
They whipped their butts into shape and have been amazing for the past two days. All we need is ten minutes of their attention for instruction and they just fly with it.
today after the warmup (which they all did!) i taught them how to do two step equations. we had planned on them practicing equations, breaking, and then moving back to instruction to break down word problems, then having them practice again. i had 2 different levels of problems prepared.
what happened at first is that two kids found the lesson to be too easy. my co-teacher gave them a scaffolded workbook that let them advance to the next level independently. after the kids started their individual practice, some wanted the advanced book, too, so they worked extra hard on their problems. then other kids just raced through so i gave them the word problems sheet. some kids finished more quickly than others so i plucked them from their seats around the room and grouped them together to create their own challenging word problem on chart paper, with the corresponding equation and solution.
by the end of the class, 6 kids had successfully worked on a worksheet of two step equations of varying degrees of difficulty. four kids had worked through the workbook section on combining like terms and mutistep equations. 4 other kids had begun working through word problems successfully. and six kids worked in 2 groups to create their own challenge word problems with equations on chart paper. to top it all off, the most ED kid in the group agreed to sit outside for concentration's sake and did quite well.
they all ended up doing different things naturally, but the bottom line, they were all able to solve the two step equations. it was the best lesson all year, and it was naturally so differentiated without much planning.
i'm hoping for continued good results, but i know there will always be ups and downs.
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
better day
i stayed up late last night working on a document for my principal's brainchild. when i handed it out this morning, at first my principal said "wow." but upon further inspection, she said "this is a starting point..." umm no, this is it. this is all i'm doing this semester with this work. i feel confident enough to tell her i've worked on the process and feel that we have made ample progress and need to move on. we will revisit the document at the beginning of next semester.
i'm finding my voice again.
we have a supposed ICT class that's 77% IEP's. it's also our most crowded class. we are spoiled with small classes in our school; we have two cohorts with 12 students each, one with 14, and then the special ed cohort with 26 kids, 77% of them special. and we are so understaffed, they only have a coteacher in math and ELA. how is this servicing their needs?
as teachers, we can't even manage that class. it's practically a self contained class of 26. i know i'm really good at what i do, however, i'm struggling beyond belief with this class. and they're worse with other teachers.
teachers voiced their complaints to the principal today. she didn't know what to do. i did a little investigating and some aris work and realized we could move half the IEP kids into one of the smaller cohorts and move one of the ICT teachers to give math and ELA support to the second group. of the two new cohorts, one class would have the legal 60:40 ICT ratio, but the other would be 47:53. not ideal, however it's better than the current 77:23 ratio. and both classes would have 18 or 19 students.
i did my researched and pitched the idea to my AP. he said we can reprogram the handful of kids tomorrow and start them fresh on monday. so tonight i put together a document outlining the changes for the cohorts. i feel like i accomplished something worthy. now i hope my AP of special ed approves the plan.
my music students are learning how to play jingle bells with two hands. it's frustrating for them but they're excited to play a "real" song and not just the baby songs with one hand.
tonight i had grad school. last week i had a paper due, and i seriously half assed did it 30 minutes before class. it was really substandard work. but i got it back tonight and got an A. my teacher said she gives tons of A's, but you only keep that grade if you eventually hand her your corrections and edits. but she's awesome, because she asked specific questions for me to address and basically edited my paper for me. i never expected such hand holding in grad school, but i'll take it given the stress i'm under!
and lastly, my coworkers and i started a biggest loser competition today. i weigh a freaking ton. i'm also ultra-competitive, so i'm hoping the competition will keep me losing and i can lose 15-20 lbs by december 22nd.
i'm finding my voice again.
we have a supposed ICT class that's 77% IEP's. it's also our most crowded class. we are spoiled with small classes in our school; we have two cohorts with 12 students each, one with 14, and then the special ed cohort with 26 kids, 77% of them special. and we are so understaffed, they only have a coteacher in math and ELA. how is this servicing their needs?
as teachers, we can't even manage that class. it's practically a self contained class of 26. i know i'm really good at what i do, however, i'm struggling beyond belief with this class. and they're worse with other teachers.
teachers voiced their complaints to the principal today. she didn't know what to do. i did a little investigating and some aris work and realized we could move half the IEP kids into one of the smaller cohorts and move one of the ICT teachers to give math and ELA support to the second group. of the two new cohorts, one class would have the legal 60:40 ICT ratio, but the other would be 47:53. not ideal, however it's better than the current 77:23 ratio. and both classes would have 18 or 19 students.
i did my researched and pitched the idea to my AP. he said we can reprogram the handful of kids tomorrow and start them fresh on monday. so tonight i put together a document outlining the changes for the cohorts. i feel like i accomplished something worthy. now i hope my AP of special ed approves the plan.
my music students are learning how to play jingle bells with two hands. it's frustrating for them but they're excited to play a "real" song and not just the baby songs with one hand.
tonight i had grad school. last week i had a paper due, and i seriously half assed did it 30 minutes before class. it was really substandard work. but i got it back tonight and got an A. my teacher said she gives tons of A's, but you only keep that grade if you eventually hand her your corrections and edits. but she's awesome, because she asked specific questions for me to address and basically edited my paper for me. i never expected such hand holding in grad school, but i'll take it given the stress i'm under!
and lastly, my coworkers and i started a biggest loser competition today. i weigh a freaking ton. i'm also ultra-competitive, so i'm hoping the competition will keep me losing and i can lose 15-20 lbs by december 22nd.
Monday, October 11, 2010
i wish i was *just* a teacher
the issues with my coworkers as mentioned in the last post have blown over. i had a talk with my team and everything was cleared up.
but in my ultimate quest for money and responsibility, i feel that i'm cracking. i'm handling everything but i just lack me time. my whole life is spent running around for other people. i'm finally heading to bed every night sometime between 11pm and 1am which is an improvement, but that means i have even less me time.
sometimes i wish i could just teach and come home. but i can't.
for the month of november, i've been asked to run a 90 minute campus wide PD (for over 100 teachers and staff members) and to travel to florida for one day to run 6 hours long of PD activities at an educational conference. both of these tasks involve me selling something i truly don't even believe in, the brainchild of my principal that i've been asked to implement. i feel my work in this area has been lacking, and my school poorly implemented the idea, thanks in part to yours truly. even though i have a few weeks to plan what i'm doing, i still feel my heart beating quicker every time i think about it. including now.
but in my ultimate quest for money and responsibility, i feel that i'm cracking. i'm handling everything but i just lack me time. my whole life is spent running around for other people. i'm finally heading to bed every night sometime between 11pm and 1am which is an improvement, but that means i have even less me time.
sometimes i wish i could just teach and come home. but i can't.
for the month of november, i've been asked to run a 90 minute campus wide PD (for over 100 teachers and staff members) and to travel to florida for one day to run 6 hours long of PD activities at an educational conference. both of these tasks involve me selling something i truly don't even believe in, the brainchild of my principal that i've been asked to implement. i feel my work in this area has been lacking, and my school poorly implemented the idea, thanks in part to yours truly. even though i have a few weeks to plan what i'm doing, i still feel my heart beating quicker every time i think about it. including now.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
not a team player
right now our teacher teams are working on personalized education plans for each student.
we use our 2 hour PD block in the afternoon for appointments to meet with students and help them set goals for the year. however, many students aren't showing up for their appointment because there is no incentive for them to stay late.
when i threw the question out during monday's meeting as to what we can do to entice the kids to come in, a few teachers had the suggestion of holding their appointments during advisory time instead, and that the teachers who don't have an advisory would surely not mind covering each other's classes so that the appropriate teachers can hold their meetings with the students.
we're talking voluntary, unpaid coverages, every day, for about 2 weeks in a row. HAHAHAHAHA.
the teachers (mostly first and second years) were going on and on about what a great idea this was to get all our student meetings finished in a short time.
i spoke up and said: #1, we were given 2 hours every wednesday for four weeks to do this. if we don't do it during this time, our principal will just pile more work on us to do during this time. so let's figure out how to get these kids in the door and forget about using advisory time. and #2, even if i was paid for every coverage, there is honestly no way i would do it.
one teacher was stunned i said that and started to get on my case. i told him as the dean, i cannot commit to taking on another class every day. the staff members seem to think my "free" periods are for me to frolic around when in fact they are professional periods and i have a ton of work. and truthfully most days i have NO free time to myself. i am pulled into meetings left and right, have to deal with student issues, and have have a ton of paperwork.
i redirected the group towards brainstorming ideas to get the students in. that lasted for 5 minutes when the vocal teachers decided there was no way. they gave up. then one rookie insisted he was going to speak to the principal about paying us for doing it in the morning, like that is going to happen!!!
at which point, a second year teacher muttered under his breath next to me well that's not going to work anyway, as long as *some people* are not going to be team players.
hot damn so i'm not a team player!
i do everything for this job. i'm the dean and the inquiry specialist of the school. i spend every period i'm not teaching working to make everyone else's life easier. i prepare for and run meeting for the staff 2-3 times a week and no, i don't get paid any extra for this. the teachers come to me for everything they need. i'm lucky if between everything i do for the school, i get 20 minutes of downtime a day. so why in the world would i take on an extra period? it's not possible for me at this time.
secondly, the teacher who backhandedly accused me of not being a team player lives a typical brooklyn life. he's in his 30s, single, lives with a roommate, just goes home or chills after work.
my personal life looks like this: i work until 4 or 4:30pm at school. then with my kids in the car i drive my husband to work and then drive home. i get home around 5pm. then at 5:30pm twice a week i go to college. i get home about 10pm. i eat dinner. i lesson plan and grade (since i can barely use my preps for this.) i do laundry for my family and clean. i try to relax a bit. i'm lucky if i get to bed by 1am.
in the morning i need to get my kids ready and out the door. i walk in at 8:00am on the dot. if my paperwork isn't completely overwhelming from the day before, i try to use 20 minutes to get my classroom together and finish up any lesson preparations. then i start my rounds to the different advisories to check for uniform infractions, make announcements, print up necessary detentions, and then rush to my second period class. I CANNOT GIVE UP THIS TIME. the other teachers think it's just fun free time for me. this really pissed me off.
my personal life, i believe, is a lot more stressful than most of the other teachers at my school. but it never stops me from doing my job. and i hands down have more responsibilities at the school than any other teacher. some of them are purely for personal gain (think teaching credit recovery for extra $$$ and advising the music club) but everything else i do, even though i do it for $$$, has a direct benefit for every teacher and is completely a part of me working for the team.
but whatever. maybe i should level with the teacher that pissed me off. i barely have room to breath during the day. i really envy every other teacher, who i see relaxing, sitting at their desks grading, and having lunch when they want. i don't know what more they could expect of me.
oh and i did offer to stop in and help conduct some student appointments but told them i could not be tied down to covering a class. but that wasn't good enough.
we use our 2 hour PD block in the afternoon for appointments to meet with students and help them set goals for the year. however, many students aren't showing up for their appointment because there is no incentive for them to stay late.
when i threw the question out during monday's meeting as to what we can do to entice the kids to come in, a few teachers had the suggestion of holding their appointments during advisory time instead, and that the teachers who don't have an advisory would surely not mind covering each other's classes so that the appropriate teachers can hold their meetings with the students.
we're talking voluntary, unpaid coverages, every day, for about 2 weeks in a row. HAHAHAHAHA.
the teachers (mostly first and second years) were going on and on about what a great idea this was to get all our student meetings finished in a short time.
i spoke up and said: #1, we were given 2 hours every wednesday for four weeks to do this. if we don't do it during this time, our principal will just pile more work on us to do during this time. so let's figure out how to get these kids in the door and forget about using advisory time. and #2, even if i was paid for every coverage, there is honestly no way i would do it.
one teacher was stunned i said that and started to get on my case. i told him as the dean, i cannot commit to taking on another class every day. the staff members seem to think my "free" periods are for me to frolic around when in fact they are professional periods and i have a ton of work. and truthfully most days i have NO free time to myself. i am pulled into meetings left and right, have to deal with student issues, and have have a ton of paperwork.
i redirected the group towards brainstorming ideas to get the students in. that lasted for 5 minutes when the vocal teachers decided there was no way. they gave up. then one rookie insisted he was going to speak to the principal about paying us for doing it in the morning, like that is going to happen!!!
at which point, a second year teacher muttered under his breath next to me well that's not going to work anyway, as long as *some people* are not going to be team players.
hot damn so i'm not a team player!
i do everything for this job. i'm the dean and the inquiry specialist of the school. i spend every period i'm not teaching working to make everyone else's life easier. i prepare for and run meeting for the staff 2-3 times a week and no, i don't get paid any extra for this. the teachers come to me for everything they need. i'm lucky if between everything i do for the school, i get 20 minutes of downtime a day. so why in the world would i take on an extra period? it's not possible for me at this time.
secondly, the teacher who backhandedly accused me of not being a team player lives a typical brooklyn life. he's in his 30s, single, lives with a roommate, just goes home or chills after work.
my personal life looks like this: i work until 4 or 4:30pm at school. then with my kids in the car i drive my husband to work and then drive home. i get home around 5pm. then at 5:30pm twice a week i go to college. i get home about 10pm. i eat dinner. i lesson plan and grade (since i can barely use my preps for this.) i do laundry for my family and clean. i try to relax a bit. i'm lucky if i get to bed by 1am.
in the morning i need to get my kids ready and out the door. i walk in at 8:00am on the dot. if my paperwork isn't completely overwhelming from the day before, i try to use 20 minutes to get my classroom together and finish up any lesson preparations. then i start my rounds to the different advisories to check for uniform infractions, make announcements, print up necessary detentions, and then rush to my second period class. I CANNOT GIVE UP THIS TIME. the other teachers think it's just fun free time for me. this really pissed me off.
my personal life, i believe, is a lot more stressful than most of the other teachers at my school. but it never stops me from doing my job. and i hands down have more responsibilities at the school than any other teacher. some of them are purely for personal gain (think teaching credit recovery for extra $$$ and advising the music club) but everything else i do, even though i do it for $$$, has a direct benefit for every teacher and is completely a part of me working for the team.
but whatever. maybe i should level with the teacher that pissed me off. i barely have room to breath during the day. i really envy every other teacher, who i see relaxing, sitting at their desks grading, and having lunch when they want. i don't know what more they could expect of me.
oh and i did offer to stop in and help conduct some student appointments but told them i could not be tied down to covering a class. but that wasn't good enough.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
it's all about the benjamins
I thought I was insane last year with my per session activities, but this year I'm even more nutso.
I'm definitely feeling it and I'm getting home at 5pm every day as opposed to 3:15 like my first year or 4pm like last year, but I don't mind it. And even the nights I have school at 6pm, I feel just fine. I actually enjoy grad school this year!
I thought I might be burned out from working the summer, but the new freshmen are pretty great as a whole, so I'm managing.
A breakdown of my per session activities is as follows, in hours per week:
Math tutoring class: 2
Algebra credit recovery: 2
Geometry credit recovery: 3
Inquiry specialist: 2
Detention: 2 - 4
Music club supervisor: 1
That's a minimum of 24 hours per paycheck. Plus miscellaneous weekend activities come up from time to time.
Sick money, and good for my resume. But I wonder how long will I last this way...
I had to suspend a freshman today and her mother screamed at me over the phone, defending her daughter. The girl racked up 2 detentions in 2 days (stellar for a first year student) and then stole work from my desk during detention to copy the work and pass off as her own, thereby getting out of detention earlier. Uh academic dishonesty anyone? I didn't even nail her for that; I cut her slack as a first year student and only gave her a level 3 suspension.
But the mother called me worthless and basically pulled a "la la la i'm not listening to you" over the phone and tried to go over my head. i swear i thank god every day for my job and my supportive administration. they always tell me to do what i think is right and back me up on everything.
in other news, my music students learned how to play notes with their left hand today. they just love to show off when the faculty and administrators pop in to listen. and we get visitors every day! everyone who stops in is amazed that these kids, who never have read a note of music in their life, are playing songs after just a week. for the past two years the music classes were never this successful. no one even tried to teach them how to read music; they were told to play by ear. and they never got past mary had a little lamb.
i guess the other music teachers never took the time to teach them the language of music; maybe they didn't believe the kids could learn. but heck yeah they can! and they're awesome! a couple of them want to perform at the end of the year already!
whatever, i can go on and on about how proud i am of these kids. i like teaching math, but music is so interesting and so much more gratifying! for now at least, while it's still new to me:)
I'm definitely feeling it and I'm getting home at 5pm every day as opposed to 3:15 like my first year or 4pm like last year, but I don't mind it. And even the nights I have school at 6pm, I feel just fine. I actually enjoy grad school this year!
I thought I might be burned out from working the summer, but the new freshmen are pretty great as a whole, so I'm managing.
A breakdown of my per session activities is as follows, in hours per week:
Math tutoring class: 2
Algebra credit recovery: 2
Geometry credit recovery: 3
Inquiry specialist: 2
Detention: 2 - 4
Music club supervisor: 1
That's a minimum of 24 hours per paycheck. Plus miscellaneous weekend activities come up from time to time.
Sick money, and good for my resume. But I wonder how long will I last this way...
I had to suspend a freshman today and her mother screamed at me over the phone, defending her daughter. The girl racked up 2 detentions in 2 days (stellar for a first year student) and then stole work from my desk during detention to copy the work and pass off as her own, thereby getting out of detention earlier. Uh academic dishonesty anyone? I didn't even nail her for that; I cut her slack as a first year student and only gave her a level 3 suspension.
But the mother called me worthless and basically pulled a "la la la i'm not listening to you" over the phone and tried to go over my head. i swear i thank god every day for my job and my supportive administration. they always tell me to do what i think is right and back me up on everything.
in other news, my music students learned how to play notes with their left hand today. they just love to show off when the faculty and administrators pop in to listen. and we get visitors every day! everyone who stops in is amazed that these kids, who never have read a note of music in their life, are playing songs after just a week. for the past two years the music classes were never this successful. no one even tried to teach them how to read music; they were told to play by ear. and they never got past mary had a little lamb.
i guess the other music teachers never took the time to teach them the language of music; maybe they didn't believe the kids could learn. but heck yeah they can! and they're awesome! a couple of them want to perform at the end of the year already!
whatever, i can go on and on about how proud i am of these kids. i like teaching math, but music is so interesting and so much more gratifying! for now at least, while it's still new to me:)
Saturday, September 18, 2010
A Breath of Fresh Air
WOW I can already tell this will be a much better year than last year.
Firstly I had to jump through some hoops and ask favors of a couple of people, but everything worked out with my college. One of my professors changed my failing grade to a B+ and I am able to retake and replace the grades for the other two courses. I feel so refreshed and motivated.
Secondly, my students seem so different this year. Of course I recognize we're still in the "honeymoon" phase, however I just can tell these students are a totally different crop than last year. They seem more intrinsically motivated and more respectful in general.
Also, I only teach two or three classes every day. I have 2 periods a day off for dean work this year. Plus, there's a second dean now, so the workload is lessened.
And best of all, I only teach two algebra classes, and one MUSIC class!!! i'm teaching the kids how to read music and play piano and they are loving it. i'm loving it, too.
i still have a lot of dean work and per session activities that add stress, but my program is so manageable and my students so wonderful this year, that i just know it's going to be much easier this time around.
Firstly I had to jump through some hoops and ask favors of a couple of people, but everything worked out with my college. One of my professors changed my failing grade to a B+ and I am able to retake and replace the grades for the other two courses. I feel so refreshed and motivated.
Secondly, my students seem so different this year. Of course I recognize we're still in the "honeymoon" phase, however I just can tell these students are a totally different crop than last year. They seem more intrinsically motivated and more respectful in general.
Also, I only teach two or three classes every day. I have 2 periods a day off for dean work this year. Plus, there's a second dean now, so the workload is lessened.
And best of all, I only teach two algebra classes, and one MUSIC class!!! i'm teaching the kids how to read music and play piano and they are loving it. i'm loving it, too.
i still have a lot of dean work and per session activities that add stress, but my program is so manageable and my students so wonderful this year, that i just know it's going to be much easier this time around.
Monday, August 16, 2010
recap and moving forward
i ended the year with 56% of my students passing. that's pretty pathetic but I did my best. over 25% of my kids were SPED and the rest were downright low functioning nearly 80% 1s and 2s) so i'm ok with the results.
i just finished up a successful summer school class so I think my stats will go to about 65% passing but i've accepted my low scores either way and am looking forward to meeting the new freshmen in september.
i have a new, interesting schedule for this upcoming year. they reduced my teaching load by another period to do dean work so now i only teach 3 classes. i'm teaching two algebra, and then one music class which i've never done before. it will be a piano lab which i'm nervous about, but it's nice for a change of pace.
but i'm extremely stressed right now. i might lose my license and be kicked out of grad school. i was stupid and didn't follow through with things and got 3 ABS grades. One of them I never resolved, but I handed in the work to the other 2 professors. However both professors never changed my grade and now it's too late. One professor, who still is teaching at the school, has downright refused to return any emails or phone calls and my GPA is horrendous. I also took a class last semester where the professor visited me at my school and he told me I got an A, but it's not on my transcript. Apparently I was on academic probation, so they didn't register me (although the teacher was visiting me so I had no clue this was an issue!) and now I basically wasted the entire semester with that class because I have to retake it.
so i'm on academic probation with 2 semesters left. 2 semesters to take my pre-thesis class, my thesis class, plus retake the 3 ABS classes that turned into Fs and the observation class. There is no way in hell they're going to let me do this and I just don't know what to do! I got a letter in July telling me to speak to the department chairperson, but after calling, emailing, and then visiting in person, I found out she will not be in until the first week of school. The school secretary that was in when I visited told me she thinks they will kick me out.
This is not looking good.
I am really good at what I do, but really bad at school.
I am just going to go down as soon as the chairperson gets back, give it my best shot, and hope for the best. This is really stressing me majorly. I fucked up so badly.
i just finished up a successful summer school class so I think my stats will go to about 65% passing but i've accepted my low scores either way and am looking forward to meeting the new freshmen in september.
i have a new, interesting schedule for this upcoming year. they reduced my teaching load by another period to do dean work so now i only teach 3 classes. i'm teaching two algebra, and then one music class which i've never done before. it will be a piano lab which i'm nervous about, but it's nice for a change of pace.
but i'm extremely stressed right now. i might lose my license and be kicked out of grad school. i was stupid and didn't follow through with things and got 3 ABS grades. One of them I never resolved, but I handed in the work to the other 2 professors. However both professors never changed my grade and now it's too late. One professor, who still is teaching at the school, has downright refused to return any emails or phone calls and my GPA is horrendous. I also took a class last semester where the professor visited me at my school and he told me I got an A, but it's not on my transcript. Apparently I was on academic probation, so they didn't register me (although the teacher was visiting me so I had no clue this was an issue!) and now I basically wasted the entire semester with that class because I have to retake it.
so i'm on academic probation with 2 semesters left. 2 semesters to take my pre-thesis class, my thesis class, plus retake the 3 ABS classes that turned into Fs and the observation class. There is no way in hell they're going to let me do this and I just don't know what to do! I got a letter in July telling me to speak to the department chairperson, but after calling, emailing, and then visiting in person, I found out she will not be in until the first week of school. The school secretary that was in when I visited told me she thinks they will kick me out.
This is not looking good.
I am really good at what I do, but really bad at school.
I am just going to go down as soon as the chairperson gets back, give it my best shot, and hope for the best. This is really stressing me majorly. I fucked up so badly.
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