It has been an adventure.... teaching Kindergarteners. I absolutely love it, & I truly cannot picture myself doing anything else.
It is VERY HARD though. Children at this age are at VERY different levels. While half of my class is reading or very close to reading, the other half varies from knowing 2 letters of the alphabet to knowing all of the letters but not understanding sounds. I am teased for staying up at the school all the time by... everyone, but I honestly don't see how everyone gets it done by 3:30. My room is a mess, I've got paperwork falling from my ears, & I have to call a handful of parents back to tell them whether or not they should be concerned over a test score taken by their children on a computer that lasted over an hour.
Deep breath...
I still love it. I love it because of my students. I love it because even though I'm stern, they throw their arms around me & tell me that they love me. I love it because each of my students are turning into success stories.... and I love it because every day, I learn something new. I feed off of constructive criticism & I do better the next day. My classroom may be a mess some days, but learning is going on every day. We learn about manners.... one student came in saying "What???" and now he says, "Yes ma'am." We learn about people & ourselves, science, nature, weather, time, money, numbers, addition, subtraction, patterns, letters, sounds, words, writing stories, writing sentences, poetry, rhymes, holding a pencil, holding scissors, moving our bodies from side-to-side, moving in rhythm to music, left vs. right, geography, artists, musicians, ..... and this is in one day! :)
Really... when I type my lesson plans for the week, it is ridiculous how many objectives I have to select, but it's very true. We cover a lot in a single day of Kindergarten through singing, dancing, centers, computer activities, read alouds, reading big books, pocket chart activities, guided reading, calendar/carpet time...
Deep breath again...
I'm studying the book of Esther right now using Beth Moore's Bible study. I think God is revealing a lot of things to me that I've been putting on the back-burner while all of the before-mentioned things have been made such priorities in my life. Don't get me wrong... Christ is still my rock & salvation, but I've put a lot of things in regards to my spiritual life in 2nd, 3rd, or 4th place to teaching. I've got quite a history for doing this to myself... letting my perfectionist tendencies get in the way of my health or my relationship with Christ or my family/friends. A precious woman in my church has become my 2nd mother here in Amory, and she knows it. She will stop me in my tracks at school (she is an assistant right next door to me) and look me in the eye & tell me to slow down and stop trying to prove I can do this. She told me a week ago that my goals for myself as a teacher are extremely high, much higher than the expectations set for me by the administrators in our district, & their expectations are very high. I think my Amory mama is right ... actually, I know she's right. I'm making this a 24/7 job, and I can make time to relax, spend time with Jesus, & perhaps, go to a gym -- I'm thinking this will have to happen in January. :) Church happens on Wednesdays & Sundays, but honestly, when my Amory mama sat me down and was talking to me, I realized that I'm making church another chore to get done after school... I'm not doing it for the right reasons. Wednesdays are especially difficult because I go straight from school to church to teach preschool choir... then I go to prayer meeting, & sanctuary choir practice is until 8:30. I am exhausted & starving by that point...
So, goals for 2010, starting now:
1. Make time for listening to God, talking to and praising God, & reading scripture every day.
2. Leave school as others leave. Remember, it will all still be there tomorrow, or bring some stuff home & work on it while chilling on the couch. On Wednesdays, leave school at 3:30 & go home for a little while!
3. Make use of that fancy new iPod sitting under the Christmas tree in Tupelo, & go work-out. (This may help me accomplish #2)
4. Spend time with people I've put on the back-burner this semester.
It's been a good beginning to teaching, but it's time to get myself back to being Julie. After all, God's called me to be doing this very thing, why should I be treating these experiences as if I'm accomplishing yet another chore?
"Your God is present among you, a strong Warrior there to save you. Happy to have you back, he'll calm you with his love and delight you with his songs." Zephaniah 3:17
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Monday, November 2, 2009
sixty days into teaching Kindergarten.
Sweet Mrs. Margaret Ann Kennedy made me realize that I hadn't updated this since the twelfth day of school! We are now on day sixty. Every day, when we flip the number on the 100s chart for how many days we've been in school, I ask the students if they feel "___ days smarter." They always say, "Yes ma'am," but I don't think they realize that it's really me that feels sixty days smarter. They do not know how much they have taught me about everything: teaching, life, motherhood, God, etc.
Ole Miss equipped me well for this first teaching job, but nothing could have prepared me for 21 5 & 6-year-olds with VERY DIFFERENT needs. I have one learning very basic fine motor skills: cutting, tracing, learning to walk up & down stairs, and how to not potty in her pants, and I have one reading fluently. Of course the remaining nineteen fall in between, but their needs are all very different, too! The biggest challenge? Teaching the boys how to use the urinal and keeping the girls from piling into the same stall.
I have an absolutely amazing group of co-teachers at my school who are so giving & encouraging. One of the problems with first-year teachers is feeling isolated & not having the help they need. I do not have this problem at all! Teachers are coming into my classroom quite frequently to check on me or ask me if I need anything, and it has been this way since the very beginning. I am very blessed to be here. I know this was a God-thing, being placed in this small little Mississippi town to learn how to be a teacher. I have two great principals who have loved on me & encouraged me, five wonderful co-Kindergarten teachers, & a sweet class of students who love to "show-off their good behavior."
So, a basic overview of exciting Kindergarten events & lessons we've survived thus far:
1. 50s Day (on the 50th Day of school)
2. Field Trip to the Circle Y Pumpkin Patch (so much fun!)
3. first tornado "drill" (was a REAL tornado)
4. opening up a pumpkin to pull out the pulp & seeds & count (that pumpkin had 400 seeds!) The kids loved it.
5. learning about Pablo Picasso. The kids retain this info exceptionally well. They can locate France, Spain, & the US on a world map now, say a few French words/phrases, & tell you Picasso's style of painting & collage.
and so much more, but this is my fall break day, and I have got to get busy writing my lesson plans for the week. We are learning the letter Mm, and we are studying our second artist: Henri Matisse. We are reading Where the Wild Things Are & If You Give a Moose a Muffin. We are going to paint with marbles, draw a picture of a monster contained in a jar, graph M&Ms, & make a collage inspired from Matisse's "Ivy in Flower."
Ole Miss equipped me well for this first teaching job, but nothing could have prepared me for 21 5 & 6-year-olds with VERY DIFFERENT needs. I have one learning very basic fine motor skills: cutting, tracing, learning to walk up & down stairs, and how to not potty in her pants, and I have one reading fluently. Of course the remaining nineteen fall in between, but their needs are all very different, too! The biggest challenge? Teaching the boys how to use the urinal and keeping the girls from piling into the same stall.
I have an absolutely amazing group of co-teachers at my school who are so giving & encouraging. One of the problems with first-year teachers is feeling isolated & not having the help they need. I do not have this problem at all! Teachers are coming into my classroom quite frequently to check on me or ask me if I need anything, and it has been this way since the very beginning. I am very blessed to be here. I know this was a God-thing, being placed in this small little Mississippi town to learn how to be a teacher. I have two great principals who have loved on me & encouraged me, five wonderful co-Kindergarten teachers, & a sweet class of students who love to "show-off their good behavior."
So, a basic overview of exciting Kindergarten events & lessons we've survived thus far:
1. 50s Day (on the 50th Day of school)
2. Field Trip to the Circle Y Pumpkin Patch (so much fun!)
3. first tornado "drill" (was a REAL tornado)
4. opening up a pumpkin to pull out the pulp & seeds & count (that pumpkin had 400 seeds!) The kids loved it.
5. learning about Pablo Picasso. The kids retain this info exceptionally well. They can locate France, Spain, & the US on a world map now, say a few French words/phrases, & tell you Picasso's style of painting & collage.
and so much more, but this is my fall break day, and I have got to get busy writing my lesson plans for the week. We are learning the letter Mm, and we are studying our second artist: Henri Matisse. We are reading Where the Wild Things Are & If You Give a Moose a Muffin. We are going to paint with marbles, draw a picture of a monster contained in a jar, graph M&Ms, & make a collage inspired from Matisse's "Ivy in Flower."
Saturday, August 22, 2009
JOYS of teaching Kindergarten :)
I have taught my sweet class of five-year-olds for twelve days now, and I love it. I cannot imagine myself teaching any other grade now.
Every day, I learn something new. I learned how to hang students' art work on bulletin boards without tearing their work when it comes down. You hang it with masking tape & put a drop of hot glue on the tape that faces the wall.
I have hundreds of stories already to share, but I have two personal favorites.
Wednesday, I decided to teach our first science lesson. We studied "Chicka Chicka Boom Boom" all week, and I brought a coconut to class. The students sat in a circle on the carpet with a crayon & a chart with the five senses on it. I had a chart enlarged on the board. I walked around the circle holding the coconut for "seeing" the coconut. We passed it around the circle for "feeling" it, and we passed it around again and shook it beside our ears to "hear" it. Of course, that leaves smelling & tasting the coconut. I have to say, I had no idea how to crack a coconut. I knew I needed a hammer, and I knew it would be a little messy. Of course, I had no idea how messy it would be.
I put the coconut down, and I took that hammer, and the first time I hit it, it just spun around on the carpet. The students thought that was hilarious. They laughed & laughed each time I hit it and it didn't crack. Finally, I decided that I would just hit it as hard as I could because if it didn't open, my lesson would be a waste. I smacked that coconut so hard, the milk shot across the carpet, and several students got wet. They LOVED it!!! I passed around one half of the coconut and let them smell it, and I went around and forced the students to taste it. Oops, all along we were documenting our observations on the charts using pictures. It intimidates them when I write words. So, the end of the experiment, each student got a brown circle and they had to draw a smiley face if they liked the coconut and a frowny face if they did not. We made a bar graph with these coconuts, and it turns out 14 students actually liked it!!
The students are still talking about that hammer & coconut days later. :) Coconut science experiment=success. Next time, we're putting a shower curtain on the carpet though. :)
The next story makes me cry every time I think about it.
I have a student who will not talk. She did name the colors, shapes, & letters she recognized during an assessment I gave her, but she will not talk in front of the students. Well, I teach Writing Workshop every afternoon before nap time. It's important for the students to put their stories (that they love to share) in "writing." A few are already getting the idea of using words they do know how to write (their names, Mama, Love, etc...), but for the most part, they are drawing illustrations and writing using squiggles & random letters. After the students write, we meet on the carpet, and I select a few students to sit in the author's chair and read their stories to the class. Friday was the first day I introduced the author's chair to the class. I had a talkative student share, a quieter student next, and finally, this little girl who just smiles and never says a word. She was SO excited about sitting in the chair. She held up her story, and I asked her to read her story to the class. She just smiled. I asked her if she drew herself in the picture, and she pointed to herself. I asked her if she had brothers, and she pointed to them in the illustration. I asked her if she'd like to tell her story using a puppet, and she nodded. I gave her an elephant puppet, and she just smiled and smiled holding that puppet. No words.
Well, after an author shares, I ask the students to raise their hands if they want to ask the author any questions or praise their stories. Usually, I have a few hands up, and I end up having to coerce a few other students to think of a compliment. After this little girl's story, every hand was in the air. This made me nervous, until I started calling on students. They all wanted to share their compliments. Their compliments were, "I love that you wrote your story about your big family!" "You used a lot of pretty colors in your picture." "I can see your writing all the way on my square. Thanks for making it big enough for me to see!" "I want to meet your brother just from "hearing" your story!" etc...
My assistant, Miss Smith, and I were absolutely floored. The students loved on sweet shy girl without coercion, and I don't think she stopped smiling the rest of the afternoon.
Teaching Kindergarten has its REALLY tough moments (watch the kids around scissors, glue, & crayons for real), but moments like those are so sweet, it makes the tough moments completely worth it. :)
Every day, I learn something new. I learned how to hang students' art work on bulletin boards without tearing their work when it comes down. You hang it with masking tape & put a drop of hot glue on the tape that faces the wall.
I have hundreds of stories already to share, but I have two personal favorites.
Wednesday, I decided to teach our first science lesson. We studied "Chicka Chicka Boom Boom" all week, and I brought a coconut to class. The students sat in a circle on the carpet with a crayon & a chart with the five senses on it. I had a chart enlarged on the board. I walked around the circle holding the coconut for "seeing" the coconut. We passed it around the circle for "feeling" it, and we passed it around again and shook it beside our ears to "hear" it. Of course, that leaves smelling & tasting the coconut. I have to say, I had no idea how to crack a coconut. I knew I needed a hammer, and I knew it would be a little messy. Of course, I had no idea how messy it would be.
I put the coconut down, and I took that hammer, and the first time I hit it, it just spun around on the carpet. The students thought that was hilarious. They laughed & laughed each time I hit it and it didn't crack. Finally, I decided that I would just hit it as hard as I could because if it didn't open, my lesson would be a waste. I smacked that coconut so hard, the milk shot across the carpet, and several students got wet. They LOVED it!!! I passed around one half of the coconut and let them smell it, and I went around and forced the students to taste it. Oops, all along we were documenting our observations on the charts using pictures. It intimidates them when I write words. So, the end of the experiment, each student got a brown circle and they had to draw a smiley face if they liked the coconut and a frowny face if they did not. We made a bar graph with these coconuts, and it turns out 14 students actually liked it!!
The students are still talking about that hammer & coconut days later. :) Coconut science experiment=success. Next time, we're putting a shower curtain on the carpet though. :)
The next story makes me cry every time I think about it.
I have a student who will not talk. She did name the colors, shapes, & letters she recognized during an assessment I gave her, but she will not talk in front of the students. Well, I teach Writing Workshop every afternoon before nap time. It's important for the students to put their stories (that they love to share) in "writing." A few are already getting the idea of using words they do know how to write (their names, Mama, Love, etc...), but for the most part, they are drawing illustrations and writing using squiggles & random letters. After the students write, we meet on the carpet, and I select a few students to sit in the author's chair and read their stories to the class. Friday was the first day I introduced the author's chair to the class. I had a talkative student share, a quieter student next, and finally, this little girl who just smiles and never says a word. She was SO excited about sitting in the chair. She held up her story, and I asked her to read her story to the class. She just smiled. I asked her if she drew herself in the picture, and she pointed to herself. I asked her if she had brothers, and she pointed to them in the illustration. I asked her if she'd like to tell her story using a puppet, and she nodded. I gave her an elephant puppet, and she just smiled and smiled holding that puppet. No words.
Well, after an author shares, I ask the students to raise their hands if they want to ask the author any questions or praise their stories. Usually, I have a few hands up, and I end up having to coerce a few other students to think of a compliment. After this little girl's story, every hand was in the air. This made me nervous, until I started calling on students. They all wanted to share their compliments. Their compliments were, "I love that you wrote your story about your big family!" "You used a lot of pretty colors in your picture." "I can see your writing all the way on my square. Thanks for making it big enough for me to see!" "I want to meet your brother just from "hearing" your story!" etc...
My assistant, Miss Smith, and I were absolutely floored. The students loved on sweet shy girl without coercion, and I don't think she stopped smiling the rest of the afternoon.
Teaching Kindergarten has its REALLY tough moments (watch the kids around scissors, glue, & crayons for real), but moments like those are so sweet, it makes the tough moments completely worth it. :)
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Kindergarten Orientation
I absolutely adore my 21 students. I met twenty of them Orientation week. I know all of their names, I know who can write their names already, and I can already tell which three students I'm going to have to sit on this year to get them to behave. :)
I LOVE IT!!!
I would be posting pictures all over this blog and Facebook, but being a professional teacher (instead of a student teacher haha), I can't do that, but I can show you lots of pictures from Orientation if you ask me in person. I have the CUTEST picture of my class from last week in my purse right now. They are wearing HUGE pirate hats... most are making the funniest, "arrgg" faces. You will be able to tell the fun and excitement we will be having this school year from that one picture. :)
Here are a few pictures of my classroom...:)
Brittany & Blake got married last Saturday... the day after my crazy Kindergarten orientation week came to a close. It was an absolutely beautiful wedding!!! I was so proud to be a bridesmaid for my sweet friends!
I LOVE IT!!!
I would be posting pictures all over this blog and Facebook, but being a professional teacher (instead of a student teacher haha), I can't do that, but I can show you lots of pictures from Orientation if you ask me in person. I have the CUTEST picture of my class from last week in my purse right now. They are wearing HUGE pirate hats... most are making the funniest, "arrgg" faces. You will be able to tell the fun and excitement we will be having this school year from that one picture. :)
Here are a few pictures of my classroom...:)
Brittany & Blake got married last Saturday... the day after my crazy Kindergarten orientation week came to a close. It was an absolutely beautiful wedding!!! I was so proud to be a bridesmaid for my sweet friends!
Thursday, May 28, 2009
when i said 4th grade teacher, i actually meant...
Kindergarten orientation is this week. Monday-Friday, I will work with my precious babies on standing in line, signing up for lunch, holding a lunch tray, and other basic school procedures. 8:30-11:30.
I am so excited because I will know how to plan for August. I will already know my babies. :)
Sunday, May 17, 2009
i am a teacher (revised)!
this is the age group of kids i will be teaching in the fall:
i will be teaching....
i am a.....
i will be teaching....
i am a.....
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Happy Graduation/Mother's Day Weekend!
This weekend has been incredible.
I graduated from Ole Miss, Magna Cum Laude (although I still crack up thinking about the speaker saying, "whether you graduate Cum Laude or Thank you, Laude!"), and it was a beautiful day I got to share with my parents, grandparents, niece (Anna Kaitlyn), and Matt Chisholm.
Although my four years at Ole Miss have been difficult, I loved the friends I met along the way, and I have been mentored and loved on by some incredible professors. I was always disconnected from my classmates and peers in Oxford. Many of my classmates hung out in the bars after observations in schools, and they knew not to bother asking me (and for right reasons). I just never could understand how they can work with children every day AND maintain that lifestyle. I hate that I wasn't able to influence my peers as I should have, but I'm thankful that my faith in Christ has grown stronger these past four years, and I haven't lost Him in the madness that can come with being a college student.
I didn't feel like many of my Oxford classmates were passionate about teaching, and this school year, I just decided to let go of constantly trying to be liked and moved to the Tupelo Center, where I was loved and encouraged every single day. My classmates became my second-mothers, and I was able to be Julie Kate, for the very first time in my years at Ole Miss. My talents and passion came alive at the Tupelo Center, and at graduation yesterday, I stuck with my group from beginning to end. We became a family during our fall action lab semester, and this semester, during student teaching, we came together once a week to debrief and encourage whoever it was that was crying on that particular day. I think someone was crying at every meeting this semester. I cried during our last meeting. I struggle with saying good-bye to people.
Graduation day was the end of that season in my life, and while I have beautiful, sweet memories from that season, I'm ready to embrace this new season. God worked in my life throughout those four years, and I praise Him everyday for constantly reminding me that He was near, no matter how exciting or difficult life was at the time. I realized how prepared I am for this next season during the last interview I had at an elementary school. I do not know whether I was hired or not, but it was a very postive experience. I was comfortable with the interview committee, I was confident about my knowledge and experiences, and I didn't let the difficult questions (and there were several) put me in a difficult place. I was able to be myself (excited and passionate) and professional all at once, and that is God living through me, at His fullest.
This morning is Mother's Day. Anna Kaitlyn (my 7 year-old niece) & I put together a basket full of bath goodies for Mama, and she had two giant vases of flowers from Don & JoHanna (in Hawaii) and from AK & me. She woke up this morning and got so tickled because Anna had taken Dixie bathroom cups and spelled out MOM on the kitchen table. It was so funny; I love that my girl can read and spell now. She wrote in her "prayer journal" during big church this morning, and I peered over to see what she was writing, and she had written, "Jesus, it is Mommy & Grammy's speshul day. Thank you for my mommies. The preechr is tellin us to thank them today but I want to thank you 1st for them. Thank you Jesus." :)
I think that says enough.
I graduated from Ole Miss, Magna Cum Laude (although I still crack up thinking about the speaker saying, "whether you graduate Cum Laude or Thank you, Laude!"), and it was a beautiful day I got to share with my parents, grandparents, niece (Anna Kaitlyn), and Matt Chisholm.
Although my four years at Ole Miss have been difficult, I loved the friends I met along the way, and I have been mentored and loved on by some incredible professors. I was always disconnected from my classmates and peers in Oxford. Many of my classmates hung out in the bars after observations in schools, and they knew not to bother asking me (and for right reasons). I just never could understand how they can work with children every day AND maintain that lifestyle. I hate that I wasn't able to influence my peers as I should have, but I'm thankful that my faith in Christ has grown stronger these past four years, and I haven't lost Him in the madness that can come with being a college student.
I didn't feel like many of my Oxford classmates were passionate about teaching, and this school year, I just decided to let go of constantly trying to be liked and moved to the Tupelo Center, where I was loved and encouraged every single day. My classmates became my second-mothers, and I was able to be Julie Kate, for the very first time in my years at Ole Miss. My talents and passion came alive at the Tupelo Center, and at graduation yesterday, I stuck with my group from beginning to end. We became a family during our fall action lab semester, and this semester, during student teaching, we came together once a week to debrief and encourage whoever it was that was crying on that particular day. I think someone was crying at every meeting this semester. I cried during our last meeting. I struggle with saying good-bye to people.
Graduation day was the end of that season in my life, and while I have beautiful, sweet memories from that season, I'm ready to embrace this new season. God worked in my life throughout those four years, and I praise Him everyday for constantly reminding me that He was near, no matter how exciting or difficult life was at the time. I realized how prepared I am for this next season during the last interview I had at an elementary school. I do not know whether I was hired or not, but it was a very postive experience. I was comfortable with the interview committee, I was confident about my knowledge and experiences, and I didn't let the difficult questions (and there were several) put me in a difficult place. I was able to be myself (excited and passionate) and professional all at once, and that is God living through me, at His fullest.
This morning is Mother's Day. Anna Kaitlyn (my 7 year-old niece) & I put together a basket full of bath goodies for Mama, and she had two giant vases of flowers from Don & JoHanna (in Hawaii) and from AK & me. She woke up this morning and got so tickled because Anna had taken Dixie bathroom cups and spelled out MOM on the kitchen table. It was so funny; I love that my girl can read and spell now. She wrote in her "prayer journal" during big church this morning, and I peered over to see what she was writing, and she had written, "Jesus, it is Mommy & Grammy's speshul day. Thank you for my mommies. The preechr is tellin us to thank them today but I want to thank you 1st for them. Thank you Jesus." :)
I think that says enough.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)