Funny moments

Seventh grade really is an awkward stage. Now that i'm not the one experiencing it, this age is so much more enjoyable to observe. I think my favorite has been when one of my boys came in and said, "Ms. Mayans, do you know what is the worst? It's so embarrassing when you are talking to a cute girl and your voice cracks."  Hahaha, yup, I guess that would be kind of awkward. 

Well, another great moment came with the end of  our comma unit. After weeks of comma lessons and days of review and test preparation, I gave my student an overview test. To commemorate the memorable day in which they would prove their comma mastery, I wore my roommate's comma shirt to school (yes, I have a roommate who clearly is an English lover as well).  My students loved it!  I even had one student draw a picture of me (in my "normal" clothes that day, and in my "comma girl" superhero clothes). Oh, I love it. They then took the test and most of them did a pretty good job on it. I was pleased with most of the grades. Yay for commas!!!!

So here is another moment of seventh-grader-greatness. I was having a bit of a downer day, but this little jewel made me laugh out loud. Here is an email I received from a student. Besides the fact that it is slightly inappropriate to tell your teacher that she is hot, this grammar fatality is priceless.

Being Creative Takes Work!

This week I realized some of the differences between fun/creative/active lesson plans and some of the more hum-drum lessons....fun lesson plans require a whole lot more work. Work before. Work during. Some work after. I pushed my creativity during this week and it seriously wore me out. The hard part is this: I'm not even sure it was all worth it. I saw some students engaged and excited to learn, but I also saw plenty who remained unengaged and seemingly uninterested in the lesson I was teaching. Boo! :(

We started talking about argument and persuasion this week. To introduce it, I showed Super Bowl commercials and other persuasive ads and had the students analyze which ads they found most convincing and why. It was a pretty fun lesson. Yesterday we talked about the use of ethos, logos, and pathos in persuasion and argument. I'm not sure all of my studnets completely understood those terms, but we will use them a lot more this week and hopefully that helps. I have learned the power of repetition in the classroom. Whatever you want to stick in the students' mind, you just have to repeat about 4 bazillion times.

Speaking of repeating things, next week my students will take a test on the use of commas. This week we did so many comma review activities, I could almost see the commas coming out of my students' ears. I don't know why, but I love commas....I even plan on wearing my roommates shirt that has commas all over it for the test day (yes, I have a roommate who is basically as comma crazy as I am). I hope all this repetition has paid off and I can see how they have mastered these concepts.

We are also fully in motion in our Outsiders unit plan. I love coming to school and hearing my kids say, "Ms. Mayans, are we reading today!?!?" They groan when I say no. I'm hoping they love it more than just because they get to draw as they listen to the audio book. (One of the activities I discovered from a fellow teacher is a graffiti wall where the students draw symbols they find in the book. It has been a great assignment so far).  Next week we will read some more and talk about some more symbolism from Robert Frost's poem, "Nothing gold can stay" (which is in chapter 5 of the book).

Speaking of teaching next week, I have been assigned a practicum student to come observe my class and teach some lessons. Weird! It seems like forever ago that I was a practicum student walking into Mt. Nebo Junior High for the first time. This guy will probably be my replacement intern next year, so this is a great opportunity for him to see the dynamics of the school. I've given him a few lessons to teach this week, and I am excited to see what he is able to do in my classroom. That will be next week's adventure.

An Incredibly Long, Short Week

You may look at the title of this post and think, "What does she mean by 'a long, short week'? Has the girl gone nuts?" Well, sickness will do that to you. Teaching while you have a runny or stuffy nose is the pits, and this week I experienced both. I had to put away my pride and blow my nose in front of my students (usually I like to keep my nose-blowing to myself), and they looked at me with sad puppy-dog eyes and asked incredulously, "Ms. Mayans, are you STILL sick!?!?" Yup, my dears. I am most certainly sick. And that makes for a very long week.

To add to it, my mentor teacher came to observe my class on one of those sickness + headache days. Lets just say, I wasn't my most chipper self. Just last week we had a meeting about using positive reenforcement to get a students to change and obey, but I was feeling way past the point of using round-about techniques to get what I want. Ironically, when we met after for a post-conference about the lesson, she complimented me on my positivity while speaking to the students. REALLY?! I felt that I hadn't been too kinda that day, but I guess I managed to still be civil. What a surprise!

Anyway, so those are the reasons the week felt so long, but in all actuality I only taught 3 out of the 5 days. Maybe it was a good thing I was sick this week.

On Tuesday I had a substitute teacher while I went to a conference put on by the district for new English teachers. They focused on engagement in the classroom, and I re-learned a lot of strategies to implement into my lessons. Even though I haven't been teaching for very long, I can already feel how easy it would be to allow myself to get into ruts with teaching. Once a strategy has worked once, it is so easy just to run with that for a while. But honestly, I know my students will learn better if I always mix it up and try to get engagement from all of my students. All in all, the conference was successful in allowing me to re-imagine possibilities in my classroom. I am excited to try out my new ideas.

Friday also turned out to be a free day for me as well. The 7th graders had "Job Shadow Day" and didn't come to school, so I had the whole day to myself for planning and grading. I caught up on all my grading and planned my next few units. It feels so wonderful to have all my days planned up until mid-March. With me being sick, I am actually very pleased that I was so productive.

So at the end of the week, I have survived my sickness and am starting to get a little better (I hope). I have taught about commas and appositives. I have discussed stereotyping with my students in anticipation for The Outsiders. I have bought an audio book to do the reading for me in class (also a great idea I came up with while being sick and not wanting to lose my voice), and I have graded, planned, and prepared for the months ahead. Not a bad week, but I do hope next week is better.