Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda

Before, this lesson was just an idea.

After a long trip to the grocery trip where I picked up 17 different types of candy and shoved them into paper bags labeled as "Mystery Bags", it become a day's lesson. Here are their finished posters with 3 similes and 3 metaphors about their mystery treats...

Mystery Treat Reese's peanut butter cup

Mystery Treat: Chocolate gold coins

Mystery Treat: Lifesaver gummies

Verdict: This lesson was much too short to impart any deep meaning upon students. Like all quickies, it just wasn't worth all the trouble.

I should've gone thorough review of similes and metaphors before giving students any supplies. Also should've given students a rubric to check their poster for correct similes and metaphors.

That would've helped students correct their mistakes instead of sheepishly presenting their posters while other students noted the mistakes.

It could've been better. Next year.

Hello Muse

There are so many moments in a day, most of them passing by like the debris in a goldminer's pan. It's often the smallest, seeming insignificant specks that ends up staying and turning out to be a glint of gold.

I was snaking in between rows of students' desks, stamping their homework, when I noticed this displayed on the front a student's binder:

I giggled upon reading this and couldn't stop myself from nerdily stating, "That's a metpahor."

As I walked away, my mind started drifting and I computed:

cupcakes = sweets

cupcakes > muffins = metaphors

and thereby

sweets=metaphors

A riddle game with metaphors and similes! I'll call it Sweet Treats! (The name of the game needs some work if anyone has ideas).

By the time I reached my desk I had envisioned:

1. Paper bags filled with different candies- starbursts, mini reese's cups, lemonheads, airhead, etc.

2. Students partnering up and being handed a paper bag with a sweet treat inside. Students making a poster with 3 similes and 3 metaphors about the mystery treat, illustrating it as well.

3. Then presenting their posters to the class and the class guessing the treat solely based on the 6 given similes and metaphors. For every mystery treat the class guesses, the class earning a point. And by the end of the day, the class that has earned the most points winning ALL of the treats in the paper bags.

That means this Friday's P.A.T. is covered. The kids will be happy and learning, there'll be a great prize giveaway, and it's all thanks to a sticker on a student's binder.

A Girl Named M.-Part 2

I mentioned M earlier, and after finding out recently that 2 of my former students from my very first year of teaching are pregnant (?!?!), I decided now rather than later is time for some one-on-one intervention with struggling students.

It’s proving to be far more difficult than I thought. To M, I’m not someone to be feared, revered, or inspired from. To her, I’m just an annoying gnat to be pushed away for the 54 min period that we have together. That’s why I’ve resorted to going to her house, meeting her foster grandmother, and anchoring M at a table to finish her essay.

So she turns in this essay that it took all the cajoling to do and what happens with the very next essay? Yup. She freaking doesn’t do it again. But, I tell myself, that’s to be expected. Did I expect one tutoring experience to undo previous years’ accumulation of bad habits? So I put on a brave face and try again. This time, I’m following to her after-school tutoring at our school, sitting right next to her, and literally stabbing her with my red pen (accidentally) because we’re so close together. Amidst such loveable declarations consisting of “I could tell you put make up all over your face” and “Your eyes get REALLY tiny when you laugh” I make sure she finishes all her missing work.

And throughout the session I get a small, rare glimpse into her life. We chat about thanksgiving at her home and she shares that its her birthday during Thanksgiving break, which she’ll spend doing nothing like all her days, duh Ms. Won. As she talks I notice the word “stupid” marked on her arm and I don’t know if it’s a statement to the world or to herself. The bell rings and as she trudges away, a smidget brighter than when tutoring started, I wonder how it would feel like to be her. To walk home alone, an hour later than most other kids because she spent the whole school day doing nothing and have a mountain of work to make up. To come to school the very next day and to do the same thing over again, marking something new on her arm, which may have a duplicitous meaning or not. And it makes me strangely love her foreign, angry, antisocial ways.

Pièce de résistance

I am a nerd. Or so my students tell me.

Proof: I purchased a dymo label maker not to make labels with but to punch out my favorite words with, and stick them onto my personal “WORD WALL”.

Proof: I listen to audio books religiously and find myself mimicking the author of each audiobook. Right now I’m reading Frank McCourt’s ‘Tis so I find myself thinking phrases like, “Ay don’t give a fiddler’s fart!”

Proof: How I say “proof” like how Dwight would bark, “fact”!

So it utterly boggles my mind when I see students who not only find learning difficult but unpleasurable. I mean, sure throw me a dense textbook and force feed facts down my throat and I’ll find education detestable, but trust me when I say that what goes on in my classroom isn’t comparable to any college course. If anything, it’s borderline kindergarten.

Going beyond not wanting to learn, those resistant students block any trickle of knowledge from leaking into their brains. I remind myself that all students have their own stories and are full of potential, but some days, it feels more like a battlefield than a classroom. I’m amazed by how much they actively block me from doing my job.

That’s when I calmly try to accept that I can only change myself. Unfortunately I’m just as stubborn as the kids, and I cannot stop being the nerd that I am. So it's back to the drawing board to concoct a piece de resistance that’ll make those students surrender their fight. ‘Tis the fight of a teacher, eh?

Let's get together~yeah yeah yeah!!!

I love seeing people get together, even if it's for a silly cause...

like dressing up as thuggish World Cup soccer players for Halloween.

My fellow teachers. My crew.

Sup.

Rising from the ashes

I wanted to title this blog, "Phoenix" to describe an improved lesson plan from previous years but in all honesty, it ain't that good. I'm just excited to add on a new element to a previous project, even if it isn't phenomenally better. It's one of the perks of teaching...you always get a second chance.

So my annual feast of idioms lesson got a little sprucing up this year. Usually I end the lesson with a worksheet on which students have to:

- list 6 different idioms

-write the real meaning of them

-incorporate into a sentence

But a student out of all people told me about how her previous teacher made them write whole paragraphs using one idiom.

She was complaining, but I droned her out as the cogs in my brain started whirling. My mind drifted off into storyland where the students would create their very own story based on 1 of the 6 idioms, complete with illustrations!

Need I mention that cut the cheese was the most popular choice amongst my oh-so-sophisticated 12 year old students? But as long as it's a dang good story, they can cut the cheese as often as they want.