procrastination (and a small freebie-ish thing)

Kara gave me a blogger award . . . and I'm totally not with it enough to do more than just give her a shout out right now. I think if I listed seven random things about myself right now( per award rules,) they would all start with, "I am stressed out because . . ." But, if you're actually reading this, go check her blog out.

Three things:

- One: I get a new paraprofessional. TOMORROW. Guess when I found out? In the middle of the school day today. Guess who doesn't know? My kids. Guess who is going to be hating life tomorrow because we don't deal well with change? Anyone that comes anywhere near my room.

Also, they didn't even tell me this guy's name. Yes, that's right, GUY. I, um, am not good with talking to guys. I, umm, got teased a lot at lunch today. About my new man. *gulp*


- Two: I have a cute display in the hallway. Pictures tomorrow because I was going to lose the game if I didn't pack up my stuff right then. (My mentor and I occasionally try to race out of the school. This sounds slack, but it never happens until we've both worked at least 30 minutes past quitting time. I won today, but usually loose.)

- Three: I made labels for my new leveled library (that should arrive tomorrow if UPS doesn't randomly leave the box somewhere!) They fit the layout for the Post-It 1 Inch circular labels. If you by chance want labels to go on your books to label them by guided reading level, click for the PDF on Google Docs:

Levels A - C

Levels D - F

Levels G - I

Levels J - L

Clutter-Free Classroom, Week One

I've never done this whole "linky party" thing before, but when I read about the Clutter-Free Classroom Project that's going on, I knew I had to join in. As a first year teacher, I'm still getting my organizational system down. Add that to my classroom not being finished until after I'd had students for a few weeks and not getting my bookcases until December, I feel like I'm behind the game. At the beginning of the year, I was embarrassed for our principal and assistant principal to come into my room. It's so much better now, but . . . ugh. It's definitely a work in progress. 

The challenge for Week One was to take "before pictures." Some of these are cringe-worthy . . .

Our Classroom

As you walk in . . . you'll notice that there are no desks. I teach a primary-grades special needs class (emotional disorders,) and I only have 4-5 kids at a time. This means my room is kind of small compared to the regular classrooms in my school, and it's positively minuscule compared to some I've seen on blogs.

And here's my whole room, from the far side. To the right in this picture are my cabinets, which I don't have a good photo of. Both of these photos were from right before break, so there are a few things I've organized this week that you'll see below.

Teacher/Group Area

At the beginning of the year, I had my desk and the parapro desks away from the main tables. I'd wanted this so that the parapro and I would keep engaged with the students. This worked for me, but not for her. Now that I have no parapro (but interviews are ongoing!) I have my desk behind me so I can quickly get to the phone or my e-mail without interrupting our learning. 

Here's our small group table, my desk, and my bookshelves. My laptop sits on my desk, so I can get to it quickly to check e-mail or google the correct spelling of Lusitania. The bookshelves are much more organized than they were in August, but they still need intensive work . . . 

These magazine files (IKEA!) hold our current work in each subject (reading, writing, math, science, and socio-emotional.) I need to make labels for each of them to make it easier for a sub to find things, but since I was reminded once again on Friday that I'm not allowed sick days . . . it's not at the top of my list. If I have to have a substitute anytime soon . . . we'll have bigger problems than just finding materials quickly.

Here's my teacher toolbox, inspired by Create - Teach - Share. It just got finished on Friday, actually.

One of my two teacher bookshelves. It is a mess. I think my first step will be adjusting the shelf heights. They're not really working for me. The second thing? Finding if I can get rid of the books on the top and bottom shelves. I inherited them, so I think they're school property. I'm going to ask my mentor and AP about it, because I don't use them. 

This is my calendar area and behavior chart. Obviously this picture wasn't taken this week, but it still looks the same. I want to clean up my random-note area near the phone.  I think I could maybe make a cute bulletin board?

Classroom Library

Okay, this is one area that had given me a lot of trouble. Just Monday it looked . . .

Ugh. Atrocious. Our "most loved" books were stacked on the top shelf, lesser ones neat but hard to look through on the second. Dry erase slates piled on the bottom. Tons of unused space, but no organization at all. Yuck.

I finished with this at 4:30 on Friday. My mentor walked in right as I was finishing to say goodbye, and she stopped mid-sentence and was like WOW. I still need to figure out what to do with those last few books and the square containers, but it's so much better. These books are all organized by category. When I get my new leveled library on Wednesday (thanks, DonorsChoose!) they will be organized separately. 

I just got this bookcase at the end of December, so it's on my to-organize list. I want to get the shelf heights changed here, too. My leveled library is going to go here, and should take up the middle two shelves. I think our personal book baskets will stay on top, the lap desks on the bottom, and our bucket-filler buckets will move to the top of the black bookcase. 

The Closet

Ummm. I don't really want to show you these pictures. If the library was pretty atrocious, this is horrifying. . . 

It is a wreck! So much of the stuff in here that I inherited is just taking up space, and the three things I put in here (puzzle mat, stuffed animal bin, and crate seats) are just lying on top. I really need to work on this. I've tried several times, and got a lot of things into plastic boxes and put up the little metal shelf, but it's still . . . ugh. And, umm, triangular. Yeah. It matches my irregular octagon room. 

So, there you have it. I'm pretty pleased with how my room is now compared to in August, but I know it still needs lots of work. I'm hoping that this project (and learning from other teachers completing it) will help get me motivated and give me more ideas.

oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree . . .

We've been crafty lately, with mixed success.

My guys tried to make the traditional, white paper snowflakes one morning this week. I'd been in an IEP meeting, and came in about ten minutes late and tried to do it with them. . . no go. Two problems: our imaginations aren't very big ("What do you mean, just cut out shapes? Which ones? Where? But I don't want mine to be different!") and our cutting skills just aren't too great, considering we can all kind of be perfectionists. It didn't exactly work out.

All of my morning sweethearts made Christmas trees, though, and they look amazing. I saw the idea on A Special Kind of Class and wanted to go for it. We used die-cut circles and stars, and I punched out billions of colored dots to use as ornaments. I think they turned out adorable!

The one in the middle is by one of my darlings. Mine is left, the assistant's is right.

My friends that are in my class during Literacy Block as well wrote a sentence to go with it, then typed it up. Someone is missing, BTW; I have more than two during Literacy.

They all loved it, especially the hole-punch ornaments (the custodial staff hates me.) They look so cute in the hallway, too. The only thing I was conflicted about was the typing. When one particular little darling writes, no one but me can read it. I've been letting him type after he edits any time that our work goes into the hall. I want to recognize his awesome ideas and let him put up something his classmates in his other class will oooh and ahhh over when they see it, but I don't want to send the message that his handwriting is hopeless or an unimportant skill . . . 

Anyway, I'm really glad they had an awesome time and felt successful with this. 

stupendous snowflakes!

I feel like I've posted mostly about logistics, or little funny situations, or quotes from my class. I haven't talked much about what we're actually doing.

So. Here we go.

Normally, we have at least one activity a day that specifically targets following directions. Now, we follow directions all day at school, but I usually try to work on this behavior during a fun activity (a game, a craft, etc.) that is relatively non-threatening and doesn't really involve heavy academics. This keeps lack of academic skill and low motivation from being huge variables in the activity.

I was looking for a winter time craft that we could put up in our room when I ran across  a tutorial for snowflakes on Teaching in Flip-Flops. I immediately wanted them in my room. . . but I wasn't so sure that the activity would go that well with my guys and girl. She has third grade regular ed, while I have mostly first (and one second) graders with low tolerance of group activities, low rates of following verbal directions, etc. Also, first graders generally don't have the same fine motor skills as third graders. 

I decided we would try. And . . .

It went amazingly well! There were some hiccups:

- My guys wanted to pick their own colors, so we don't have an amazingly coordinated winter wonderland. I did not even bother to fight this battle; I only gave one prompt for how cool it would be if we had all blue/white, but they didn't bite. One even said, "Snowflakes are not blue, anyway." True that.

- They didn't have a whole lot of success with the cutting part. After we made one with them doing it all by themselves, I did all of the cutting/stapling and they did all of the folding/taping. Teamwork! I think if we ever do this again, I will get them into triangles and draw cut-lines on them prior to the activity. 

- One of my kids flat out was not interested. Could not have cared less. After the first mandatory snowflake part was done, that was it. She read a few books to herself while the boys got amazingly crafty. 

- I didn't have any fishing line or something transparent, so the black yarn is kind of a buzzkill. I'll be prepared next time.

Here are some pictures of our success!

This one was our "All By Ourselves" one, with extremely limited assistance. There were many do-overs, but they loved the finished product. They did two more mostly independently (not pictured.)

These two were our "I'll cut/staple, you fold/tape" ones. 

dear general ed teachers . . .

Do not jerk a child by the chin to get him/her to turn their face towards you under the premise of teaching eye contact. That child will then come to my room and jerk my chin in their direction when I eventually (and inevitably) speak to them without making eye contact (we're all a little autistic sometimes. . . ) Now you have that child invading people's space without permission, being rough with others. . .  And this child? Is not making eye contact with me, either, so now he/she is grabbing me by the chin while staring over my shoulder while nervously telling me, "Some teachers make you look at them. You have to."

You didn't just teach a pro-social skill. You just put me three steps backwards on the target behavior I was working on (asking for permission to touch/hug/etc.) and made both the child and I uncomfortable.

Thanks.

thankful

Some good things happened today:

- Mr first DonorsChoose project was funded! The first four levels of my leveled library should arrive after the winter ordering freeze. My project for levels E through H is being reviewed and should be up soon.

- The PTO may be buying me a tent for my room to make a reading nook. My long-term sub-sistant (ha!) was president last year, so she took note of how differently my room is funded. We will see . . .

- I got lap desks for my guys, finally! They were on sale at Michael's for $5 each, plus my teacher discount. Hooray!

- My book bins are in (but UPS wouldn't leave them because I wasn't there. Boo. Let's hope the signature release on the door works tomorrow.)

- We've started bucket-filling. My kinds are slowly taking to it. I also managed to find some cute buckets at Target in the dollar section! Well, actually, my mentor found them for me and I went to get them. :) We needed 7. I got 12. Heh.

absent

Hi. Umm, it's been a month. While I am not one for excuses ("but he made me do it!") there have been some interesting circumstances around these here parts:

1. I had a new friend join me on short notice. He hasn't learned the ropes yet, so I've been kicked/hit/bitten (yes, bitten!) quite a few times. Plus, my new friend runs out of my room frequently. My others ran out frequently in August if they were upset (not anymore.) He ran out last week when asked if he wanted to play legos or do Fast Math during choice time. Yeah.

2. My paraprofessional took all of her sick days, then quit with no notice. The day after her sick leave ran out, she didn't call in or officially quit, so I didn't even have a substitute. I've had some interesting substitutes in the meantime, by the way. I have a long-term one now, though. She's amazing, but not trained and having to learn on the spot. Plus, she's only paid to work bell-to-bell (paraprofessionals stay 30 minutes,) so it's hard to conference about logistics.

3. I have been sick. I have a nasty chest cold (AKA probably bronchitis) that's been messing with my asthma, plus I just finished antibiotics for an ear infection. As a side note, I don't know any other adult that still gets ear infections. This is my third this year. Weird?

Anyway, I'm going to try to be better about posting, because some of the things that go on around here are pretty funny. I need to be creating a memoir. ;)