Back to School...

Today was the first day back at school in a week... Boy, did I miss those kids! They have stolen my heart. I miss my students from last year dearly, but these new kiddos... we have something special, too. Many of them were eager to be in my class, and they tell me so quite often. I suspect this has something to do with the rap my class and I did last year at the talent show. Pressure's on. Now I have to think of a way for us to at least be as cool and exciting as my class was last time, if not more so. This year is going to be ch-ch-ch-fantastic in it's own way!


Everything about teaching feels so different this time around; which probably has a lot to do with my management and organization. If each year gets better and better, I imagine I'll never want to quit teaching! Spending time in my classroom was something I found enjoyable last year, but this year I find myself never wanting to leave. It's such a comfy place where I feel at home. Hopefully my students do, too. Their desks, books and groups are much more organized than they were last year, and my desk is never the disaster it frequently was one year ago. 


One of my favorite activities we did at the beginning of the year was our Malleable Intelligence activity. In order to invest my students in our Big Goals for 2nd grade (a "Meets" -- 80% -- on Reading and Math Benchmarks, as well as mastery of Math Fluency Facts and achievement of their personal growth goals in Reading Fluency), I spent one afternoon's lesson talking to them about how our intelligence is malleable. I asked them what they thought intelligence meant; many of them knew it had something to do with how "smart" you are. I corrected them by saying that when we talk about intelligence, we are talking about all the things we know. Then I told them to think about clay or playdoh; clay and playdoh are malleable. What do we think that malleable means? This got the students to say what I wanted to hear: it means you can change it, you can squish it in your hands, you can make it into different things, etc. 


At this moment, I shared with them that our intelligence, or all the things we know, can be changed just like clay; by working hard and wanting to learn, we can directly change how "smart" we are. One student raised his hand: "So, if we work hard in school, we can get smarter?" "That's exactly right!" I said. (This is where I took the teachable moment to get them excited about a quiet signal: I say Work Hard! Then the respond Get Smart! And we all yell Woo-woo! We also chant this before quizzes and tests.) Finally, we got to the really fun part: watching our brains grow! I gave each child a sponge capsule (the kind that expand from vitamin-sized pills to different shapes when soaked in water) and a glass of warm water. "The sponge is your brain," I told them, "and the warm water is school. What happens when we go to school and use our brain?" We dropped the sponge capsules in and over the next few minutes I heard many squeals of delight and gasps: "Whoa! My brain is growing!!" That's how I got 'em hooked on school: working hard and going to school makes your brain grow! Now when we talk about why we learn different things in school, the students tell me: "So that our brains can grow and we can reach our Big Goals for 2nd grade!" So precious... 


Blessing #26: Text Messaging
I am so blessed... I love text messaging! I know lots of people complain about the impersonality of it all, but I really enjoy the art of text messaging. Makes you really think about the words you use; whatever you say has to be succinct enough to convey your intentions in 160 characters or less (otherwise, the recipient may not get the entire message if you have different service providers). In a world where people can oftentimes be verbose and ambiguous, it's nice to use a form of communication that to some extent doesn't allow for that. Of course, you miss the biggest part of communication and understanding: tone and body language. Still, I think text messages are pretty nifty and a decent way to communicate. (Plus, it opens the door to be in communication with more people than you would otherwise; you don't have to be best friends to text message someone. Another way to connect with more people, I say!)


Don't forget to count your blessings. 
Much love. ♥