One Task Done!

I'm not very good at following this advice most of the time.

When my principal asked me if I wanted a college student to observe my classroom, my first thought was sure! So I agreed to have a fresh faced, nineteen year old in my classroom for her ten hours of observation.

It was an interesting experience.  She was super dedicated and came way more than her required hours.  She sat in on a grade level planning meeting, went to GATE, went to specials, and observed some special ed  teachers.  

I didn't do anything special to prepare for her because I didn't want to put on a "dog and pony" show.  I went about my normal teaching routine so she could get the most authentic view of teaching possible.

It wasn't all sunshine and rainbows.

She saw a life chat where I told my students I was disappointed in them.  Nine of them failed to do their must do assignment.  During their hour of independent reading while I pulled conferences, they had to write down what they thought the theme of their book was and why on a post-it.  Two minutes, tops.  Yet, they didn't follow directions and that's disappointing.

She got to witness  a student receiving a citation for being off task (despite five reminders), having a melt down, breaking my pen, and running away.  I calmly let the office know I had an eloper and went about with my day.  The rest of the students didn't know. I'm so fortunate to have a supportive administration and counselors that stepped in to handle the student's crisis and keep me in the loop about how to best help the student.

She got to talk to some of my students about their work and filled notebook pages with observations (which makes me a little nervous!)  She helped prep an activity and witnessed the joy of making hundreds of copies.  Since we share planning responsibilities, everything is made in sets of 200.  

Her last observation was Monday, so I got her a card to wish her well with the rest of her classes and gave her my contact info.  If you're reading this Ms. F, I'm glad you observed! I'm here if you need anything!

I really lucked out with my student observer.  I hope to see her again because she lives in the neighborhood and has younger siblings at my school.  The other students have been in for maybe an hour or so, but she cranked out all of her observations in the start of the semester (smart girl!).

I want to be more involved with mentoring (since I didn't have one and want to give back), so one task (partially) accomplished!

It Returns

As I previously blogged about, my giant map from my previous blog, Project Postcard NV, will be returning to my classroom this year.

I'm really excited to use it to teach the 50 states and to use with geography, land forms, US regions, and so forth.  I'm excited to use some post cards to make literary connections to our read alouds.  One of the first post cards we'll put up is the Saint Louis arch since we're reading The Lightning Thief. 

This evening, after the arduous task of finding the map and post cards, I organized by region:

I decided this year, I want to add a little more.  I want to focus on colleges from each state to promote options to my students.  I want them to start thinking about their futures and making goals.  I want them to think outside of the box and that they have options besides UNLV.

If you are willing to send a post card from your college, it would be very much appreciated!

Ms. Vice
Iverson Elementary
1575 S. Hollywood Blvd
Las Vegas, NV  89142

These are my students, round 2

As I wrote yesterday, my students are

I found two more:

Yes, grammar is tricky.  At least my students have not only grasped, but internalized the growth mindset.  He'll get there!

And here is just a heartwarming one about the importance of college and perseverance.

Good job fifth graders, you made me proud.

Anchor Charts Updates

It's Monday and my to grade pile is looming at a good three inches high.  We had our first unit test for reading last week and well at 8 pages per test and close to eighty exams to grade...I'm happily procrastinating with blogging :)

Here are some updated anchor charts from my classroom:

Our writing ideas poster:

This goes along with Being a Writer. My students are absolutely loving writing time.  There is so much freedom during the first unit and my students are feeling like real writers.

Here is our finalized verbs chart:

They're still working on linking verbs but have a good grasp on helping verbs!

Here is another chart for our small group reading notebooks:

It's helpful to have one place to remind students of my expectations for them.

Lastly, I decided to show some collegiate love for my undergraduate alma mater, Arizona State University:

(yes, there's also a Deathly Hallows icon in the window).

Our school is rather close to UNLV, where I earned my masters, so there is a lot of hype surrounding the Rebels.  To balance this out, I wanted to have some ASU love too :)