A quick glance back in time to two weeks ago

It's November, which I think means it's officially fall.  The leaves outside are starting to become gorgeous and the weather is too chilly for my liking.  Also, school finally turned on the heat in our rooms on November 1st, after refusing to do so even though my room has been 56 degrees for over a week.  I was teaching in a coat and fingerless mittens and everyone upstairs (where it was toasty warm!) kept saying "oh, are you cold?".  YES!  Walk into my freezer classroom and check it out for yourselves!  But now we are all warm and comfy.  Thank you, November.

Click above to visit {Farley's page} and link up for her November Currently! 

It's gorgeous out, good music playing, a long list of to-dos, lesson plans to finish, and wouldn't it be nice to have an assistant?  Not that I can't get it all done, it's just that I could get so much more done with some help.  Ah, well.

I have a busy week with my sister's wedding coming up, so I'll probably whip up my go-to fall treat to freeze for next Tuesday when I'm supposed to bring treats for the staff...

Pumpkin Butterscotch Muffins

It's been a super busy few weeks and I've had that constant feeling of being behind.  I've been teaching on my own for a few weeks now since Miss M's last day was mid-October.  It has been pure craziness since then with the school auction, grade cards due, meetings-meetings-meetings, the school 5k, conferences this week, and just generally getting used to having Miss B as the teacher all-day-long now!

I'm going to take you back in time to two weeks ago...

Mid-October

We had a party for Miss M on her last day...we really do miss her a lot right now- students and teacher included!  I love having my classroom back, but being able to pull kids and get other things done during the day was really great!  I was so lucky to have such a wonderful student teacher to work with. It was a great experience.

We got her a few gifts- just a couple of my favorite classroom things, cards from the kids, and a we made a little book about things she should do (and not do!) in her future classroom from my Student Teacher binder {on TpT here}.

I felt a bit like Oprah with my "few favorite things", except not quite as Oprah-esque because I'm a school teacher and cars aren't within my budget, even for just one person (that person being...me).  We got Miss M a {Music Wand} for getting students' attention, and a set of {SmartPals} with erasers from EAI Education.  My SmartPals are easily one of my favorite classroom purchases ever.

   

Miss M's last day was a Wednesday, then we had CPR and first aid training on that Thursday (no pictures, because no one wants to see that!), then Friday day-off but evening-on with the school auction.  The night was really great and hopefully we made a lot of money for the school!  Teachers each worked a shift, and my shift was running bid numbers during the live auction (so fun!) and then handing out sliders as a special treat later in the evening.  I love getting to run around and visit with parents and see everyone outside of the school day.

 I spent the weekend getting my grade cards together and ready to print on Monday and hand out by Friday.  It was a bit of disaster since we've always handed out grade cards at conferences, but conferences weren't for a few weeks (this coming week, actually) so it felt rushed.  Not to worry- it all came together!  I don't want you to lose sleep over it.  I didn't.  

That was all two weeks ago.  Never a dull moment with this job!  

Happy Teaching!  

Teachers are superheroes... and a message from the Kid President

When I found out I had a student teacher, people told me two things: "You will have so much time to do things now!" and "You are going to be so busy!".  And both of those could not be more true.  How is it that I can have so much down time and yet not be able to get everything done?

I'll tell you.

Because the time I have is random time at school when I wish I could be on my computer getting things done except my student teacher is teaching using my computer.  If I want to be productive during that "down time" then I'm actually planning ahead of time for my time and who has time for that?  Not me.  Then we are at school late every day going over things for the following day week.

You know what I've learned?  It's really super hard to explain everything you do as a teacher for a 15 minute lesson let alone an actual entire day of teaching.  Here's how I manage the class.  If that doesn't work, do this.  Teach this.  Look this up.  Help kid #1 write his name on his paper.  Reteach to kids #20, 14, and 16.  Check in with #4.  #9 leaves early today.  Also, send this upstairs.  Today there's an assembly.  Prepare for the next lesson.  Explain this.  Use these exact vocabulary words.  But let them know they may hear it said like this also. They need to know both.  Circulate the room.  Here's 12 books.  And 15 binders I've put together.  Plus my jump drive.  Also, here's all my passwords to every website ever.  oh wait LOCK DOWN, everyone hide (seriously, that happened).  Get copies made.  Check these papers.  Oy vey.

Seriously!  Wow.  Teachers impress me.  Great job, guys.  Pat yourselves on the back, because our job is hard and we make it look easy and that's the ultimate definition of A-MAZ-ING.  **note:  I don't feel like I make it look easy, I feel like I'm herding cattle and running around like a chicken with my head cut off, but somehow I pull it together and they appear to be learning. 

Here's what the Kid Prez says.  There's some great one-liners, so pay attention.  

Get your learn on!

She's new here

I got to meet my student teacher today, we'll call her Miss M for all blogging purposes.  She came in to meet me, check out the school, and help out in the classroom.  I felt bad giving her somewhat "dull" tasks, but those were the things that have to be done before school starts!  We sorted Base Ten blocks, put up bulletin board letters, moved textbooks and workbooks around, and walked around chatting with other teachers.  Have I mentioned how much I talk to the people I work with?  It's a lot.  Maybe excessive.  I don't know how I get my job done on some days.

I saw that {The Polished Teacher} had a link up for our own student teaching memories.  I loved my student teaching and had great experiences in both schools and grade levels.  I'm so glad my university forced me to do a second intermediate level grade student teaching- I fought it like crazy, but they told me I had to!  I probably wouldn't be teaching 4th grade right now if they didn't.  Here's the peak and pit of my semester experience:

Ask too many questions.  How else will you learn?  You only get to be brand new at this one time.  Take advantage of it!  Take part in everything that you can, otherwise when you start teaching you will be like "who knew this was part of the job?".  

I made an information binder for Miss M just to introduce myself and our class.  The students haven't started back yet, but I have a rough idea what the class will be like.  This way I could be sure she had  important information (emergency procedures, phone numbers, faculty members, etc) right off the bat.  Here's what it looked like:

It had a welcome letter and all kinds of "fun stuff" inside:  About the Cooperating Teacher, About our School, Emergency info, About our Class, Daily Schedule, Class List/checklist, Log sheets for websites and ideas, and pages to create her lesson plans.

After the first day of school, we will sit down together and plan out her 10 weeks with me.  I call this The Grand Plan.  This way I know what I will be teaching, and she will have a heads up on which weeks she is teaching and when she is taking things over and handing them back to me.  

I have it all {here} if you're interested in checking it out.

(or click on the picture below)