4th Quarter Begins....

Well, I actually missed the first two days of the quarter due to illness. Apparently, Las Vegas is a great place to have fun....and come down with a cold. The Grand Canyon is a great place to NOT get over your cold and Phoenix is a great place for that cold to turn into an ear infection. Regardless, I made it back to the action by Wednesday with at least 1/3 of my voice. It was great...I think the kids were so relieved they didn't have a substitute, and felt bad for me that they were really well behaved. We had a really productive and fun three days doing AIMS writing practice. They now feel really comfortable with a pre-writing method we reviewed from earlier in the year and wrote persuasive letters to the cafeteria...they love to whine and try to get their way, so it comes somewhat naturally, plus we all love to talk about food. To top it off, fourth hour got to watch Adam Sandler's "Lunch Lady Land" at the end of class. The amazing thing was, as soon as that thing ended every single one of them was working furiously, determined to get their letters finished by the end of the hour.

Well done, sixth grade.

I had a perfect tutoring session with one of my favorite people, Isaac. The great thing is, since he is learning to speak English, we get to chat and joke around and it is a totally legit learning exercise. He is so smart and a very dedicated student. He is still learning the language but makes sure he figures out all the directions and turns in the parts of his science fair project on time something many students fluent in English have a hard time with! He is an amazing person in his personality as well. So good natured...there is more, but I can't quite describe it. I consider myself blessed to work with him.

Success!

80.25% across the grade level on a persuasive text assessment.

Holler...and on material taught and assessed during the week and a half before break.

My low class went from 52% to 73%.

**I used texts that were written at a 4th grade level for my two lower classes--but with questions that were written to 6th grade level standards.

We will get them to master with grade level texts, but we have to build them up!

Little by Little

I just realized I didn't post back with retake results! I stayed at school that Monday 'til 9:45 when the janitor warned me that the alarm system was about to be turned on so that I could get results ready to be turned back to kids. The overall average on the assessment went from 52% to 71% in one week! Some students are continuing to retake so they can master objectives. It is exciting to see that investment.

We wrote essays this week. Welcome to formulaic 5-paragraph essays! I saw some great work from many of my students. I am excited to start writing tracking. I am also excited to borrow a document camera and show some student examples of both strong essays and common places where people went wrong. Below I am going to type an essay that one of my students wrote. This student is an English Language Learner, though she has tested out of the program. She is incredibly hard working and an amazingly sweet individual. The students got to choose anything they would like to write about for their first expository essay. I had briefly talked about the AIDS pandemic on Monday--World AIDS Day, the day we chose topics. Kelly asked if she could write about it. I helped her get started, but these are her words and sentiments. I am really proud of her achievement. I'll transcribe the essay:


HIV/AIDS affects kids around the world by killing their parents, kids getting sick, need to take care of their parents.

When AIDS kills parents, kids became orphans which affects them because they don't have someone to take care of them. They're with hunger because they don't have parents to feed buy them food to eat. And by that, they could even die. By killing parents you hurt the kids feeling. They could die if they cry a lot of get very, very sad sometimes too.

Kids get sick for a lot of reasons. For example, kids get sick because when the kid is inside the mother's stomch and the mother has HIV the kid were be born with HIV because the kid has the blood of her and her blood is with the disease. If the HIV gets wrose the disease would be called AIDS. The kid will die faster if the kid doesn't have medicen to take. If the kid has medicen to take the kid will die in a longer time.

Some kids need to take care of their parents because they have HIV or AIDS. People that have that disease need a lot of care. But this taking care of your parents could stop them to be educated. Also, it could affect their future because they're not going to be able to go to school. Taking care of your parents is good but bad at the same time.

As you can see some kids in the world have HIV or AIDS that affects their education, future, family, and friends. That could affect letting them succeed in the future.

I commented at the bottom of her paper:
You are going to change the world if you keep writing like this!

I believe it is true.

Retaught

I was really impressed with my students this week. The vast majority of them saw their individual data and then worked hard to master the objectives they had struggled with. I had several students who had mastered the objectives act as teachers or coaches to guide students through practice questions. By Friday, students were able to answer practice questions correctly and explain their answers in a logical way. I also realized the potential for using kids as teachers to develop confidence, leadership skills and investment--but also the coaching that they will need to do so effectively. I saw students getting frustrated when other students weren't listening to them or get overly bossy...I know they will be able to do it, especially because they like the role of teacher so much, but they will need some guidance.

We will see how well this really worked when they retake on Monday...

Reteach?

I am spending the evening with excel...entering assessment data. It is clear that objectives will need to be retaught. Luckily, I have planned each of these POs to be taught at least 2 times during the year...but this data is not pretty. Where I was hoping for us to push the few percentages over the 80% goal, we dropped considerably. It makes sense...expository text is often more difficult for students. However, I am disappointed in myself and my ability to invest my students in working hard to really grasp the material. I am proud that I am assessing and tracking and that I have data to KNOW where I have gone wrong so that I can go back and figure it out. I WILL figure it out. These kids WILL master these objectives...

I think we can, I think we can....

Today I am assessing expository texts. It is a beast of an assessment--I am assessing 5 performance objectives. I believe that my students are more invested in actually working hard on this assessment, and they know what that means. We have drilled and drilled reading carefully and completely. I am hopeful that they will improve their class averages from the last assessment. From how they have done on daily work, I believe they understand these concepts....think happy thoughts....

Oh, and I bought SMARTIES candy for each of them to remind them how smart they are. Hopefully they will be smart enough to realize that if they throw any candy or wrappers that they won't ever get candy again....


I'll update soon!

I lost one of my favorite students today. Mom said they are moving but they don't know where to. There was a look of fear in her face as she said this. She told me her daughter said she didn't want to leave. Right now, I feel like this is an opportunity lost. How long will it take her next teacher to see what a light she is? To see how hard she works, but also to realize how much help she needs to be brought up to grade level...to have the opportunities that she deserves? I realize now how much I have connected with so many of my students this year. Even as some push and push and push...I love and appreciate them. I believe that I am doing right by them.

Another student just didn't come back today and the other kids said she moved. This breaks my heart. The lives of my students are increasingly uncertain as the economy goes south. Some families may be making rent, but if their landlord can't pay the mortgage, what happens?

It is hard. It is real.