So, things are finally starting to settle down in my second year of teaching. This is going to be a crazy week, as one of the sixth grade teachers is going to be moving down to fifth grade, but at least that means we'll have smaller classes (Currently I have two classes of around 30. With the third teacher, it will be three classes of around 20).

( Read more... )

Tomorrow is my second first day of school as a teacher. At the beginning of summer, I dreaded this day, as last year was hard.  But after an amazingly relaxing summer (I'll have to put up pictures of my China trip eventually!), I'm much more ready to take on this new year.

I was reading last year's post from right before the first day of school, ( Read more... )

I survived my first year of teaching ( Read more... )

We're preparing for the state writing test (next week, AHHH!), and so my fifth graders are having to do a lot of writing based strictly off of prompts. They've missed being able to write about anything they want, and so I wanted to give them a chance to do a free write. They were supposed to write an essay about a page long, on any topic they ( Read more... )

 ...until winter break. I am SOOO excited.  This past week has been crazy, and I could really use a break.

Speaking of the holidays, you know what would be an awesome gift you could give me and my classroom? Donate to one of my Donor's Choose projects!  I currently have one project up for graphic novels, and another up for social studies materials ( Read more... )

So...I haven't been posting much. I've just been so busy! The rest of Institute went well, overall, and I'd love to talk about it some more later.

For now, though, it's 1:30am, so I just have one thing to say: My first day as a 5th grade teacher begins in 6 hours .

I really should get to bed. Sleep is probably more important than planning at this ( Read more... )

Well, I started teaching math today. Let’s just say, my improving skills at reading comprehension didn’t transfer over well. I failed pretty miserably today at teaching my kids to identify subtraction questions in word problems. It was a difficult objective (particularly for students who have trouble reading), my students were behind where I ( Read more... )

(Cross-posted from my TFA blog)

Yep, there was some doubt as to whether I’d be able to say that by this point in time. But my first week of teaching at Institute, while rough, was something I survived!

With all the lesson planning and such, I’ve been getting no more than 5 hours of sleep a night, which is the main reason why the week has been hard ( Read more... )

(Cross-posted from my TFA blogThe first week of Institute is over! It’s been an exhausting ride, particularly since I went home for 24 hours for my sister’s graduation in the middle of it. (Driving 6 hours on 3 hours sleep is probably not a good idea, and locking my keys in the car afterward was an even worse one, since it cost me $130!)I worked ( Read more... )

This past weekend was Homecoming Weekend at my school, which means it was also the weekend for Pigskin Revue (basically an annual musical revue).  My mom came to see me perform this year, which was exciting.  I loved having her around, even if it means I didn't participate in most of the Homecoming activities.  So yeah, overall the weekend was nice ( Read more... )