Piles, Piles and Piles

We are in the 5th week of the school year, and my desk perpetually has 5-6 piles of papers covering it.  Of course, I know what is in each pile.  But when my department chair came into my classroom this morning, I felt momentarily embarrassed by my "lack of organization."  To make matters worse: continuously repeating in my mind are the words of one of my colleagues who dropped a nugget of advice on me at the Literacy Institute this summer: "To teach as long as I have (40 years!), you have to be organized.  If you look disorganized, the kids see it, and it affects their respect for you and what you do."  ...Yikes.

I am generally a very thorough grader, but I often do hand back papers long after I should have.  Sometimes, when a stack has been sitting on my desk for way too long (a week and a half to two weeks), I know I'm never going to take the time to grade it with care, so I just slap a check or check minus at the top of it and hand it back to the kids, or I give up and toss it in the recycle box.  For sanity's sake, though, it's ok that the students sometimes get the practice without a grade.  The really important papers are graded promptly and carefully, but those keep multiplying faster than I can keep up!

Here's what's going on in my classes this week:

SOPH WORLD LIT
We finished our study of Gilgamesh and Noah, and the students worked on their compare/contrast essays on "the flood story."  I haven't graded these yet, but this will be the first sample of these students' essay writing ability.  As I grade them, I will have a better idea about what we need to focus on in our writing practice.  The students have also been working on an open book/note test review that is provided by the textbook publisher.  These are higher-level thinking questions, and require the students to answer a multiple choice question about the text and then provide evidence to support the answer they've chosen.  I really like these.  The students sometimes get frustrated because the questions are harder than the questions in the book, but I offer as much assistance as I can and even let them work in pairs.  Furthermore, the students had to (as I mentioned in my previous post) use the key words of our "word wall" in a paragraph explaining what they learned in this unit, and they had to come up with 10 questions that would make good test questions for this material.  To help them prepare even more, I put a list of materials they should study over the weekend.  Monday is their test (I guess I should finish making that, huh?!) and Tuesday we'll start the next unit.

LA 2
This class received a new seating chart this week.  On an Activity Workbook assignment, most of the class scored 40's-low 60's.  They are constantly off task, talking in their native languages, and disruptive of each others' learning.  So, I moved them to seats that I felt would separate the talkers, combine those who wanted to practice their English with speakers of other languages, and isolate those who constantly disrupt others.  They've been in these seats for about 3 days now, and it is working wonderfully!  There are 2 girls in particular (one from the Ivory Coast and one from Peru) who have the highest grades and are the most motivated to learn English.  I placed them next to each other, and my heart just about burst when I saw how well they were working together today! :)  I will continue to work with this class on their behavior and patience with the language.

LDC 3
This week, we read a chapter in the Visions C book called "The Mystery of the Cliff Dwellers," and informative text about an ancient Native American culture.  The students completed all required work for the chapter (adding to the piles on my desk! LOL), and I wanted something fun that they could do to practice their essay writing skills.  So, I went to the Media Center and picked up 8 books on ancient cultures (Aztecs, Amazons, Romans...).  Then, at the beginning of class, I walked them through the basic organization for an essay (components of an Intro, Body, and Conclusion) and told them, "You are going to pretend that you and your small group of 3-4 people are researchers who have to write a professional report on an ancient culture that you'd been studying.  So, flip through your book, find a few things about the culture that you think are interesting, and follow the essay format to write your report."  The students liked that they got to choose which culture they wanted (though, there were some fights over who got Ancient Egypt!), and they worked really well, explaining to each other and talking about the different parts of an essay.  They'll finish the assignment on Monday, and we'll see how this introduction to essay writing went for them. :)

JR AMERICAN LIT
As we enter our study of the earliest explorers and settlers in American history, I showed the students and introductory slide show presentation about the 3 forms of travel books we'll study in this unit: journal, narrative account, and slave narrative.  As I talked about Christopher Columbus, John Smith, Jamestown, Plymouth, and early slave trade, the students were happy to chime in with facts they'd already learned in their American History classes.  They asked some interesting questions, too!: "If Columbus thought he was in Asia, how could he have named his book 'Journal of the First Voyage to AMERICA'?"  I'd honestly never even thought about that before.  LOL  Whenever the students ask questions and I don't know the answer, I tell them: "You find out, report back to me, and I'll give you 5 points extra credit."  So far, at least 4 students have earned extra credit, and the students are interested in asking questions!  They know the question has to stump me, though (and I know almost everything! haha!), so it has become a little competative.  We'll move through this unit in a couple of weeks' time and lay the foundations for the next unit on Puritanism.

This Week's The Bad/The Good:
The Bad: I had to deal with the rare occasion when my personal strife began to affect my attitude in the classroom.  Because I was dealing with personal unhappiness and frustration (which I'm blessed to say doesn't happen very ofen in my life), I felt myself being short with the students, being frustrated with my performance, and being negative toward everyone around me.  It was a struggle to bury that the best I could and try to be nice, supportive, and keep a smile on my face.  What performers we sometimes have to be.  It was exhausting!
The Good: I am really please with how the new seating chart is working out for my LA 2 students.  I hope they continue to stay focused and pratice patience when learning something new.  They are so quick to feel frustrated and give in to distraction at this level of English ability.  I'll continue to encourage them and assist them so they'll feel more motivated to do better.

Open House AKA Extra Planning Time

As an ESL teacher, I've become used to the fact that "Open House" night is an extra 2-3 hours I spend at school in the evening planning lessons for the next couple of weeks.  Parents just don't show up.  At best, I get 3-4 of my students, and 2-3 of my advisees.  That's about it.  I understand that there is a lot keeping ESL parents from the school in the evening, but it's just another example of how very little parents are involved in school these days.  Those numbers also speak to the amount of parent contacts I get during the year, too.

Anyhow, I'm definitely going to plan out the next month of lessons for all 4 of my courses as soon as I finish typing this! :)  At least that will get me well-organized for the next few weeks, and it will be less stress on me.

Here's what's going on in my classes:

SOPH WORLD LIT
We are just about finished with Gilgamesh and Genesis.  I'm doing something new this year: I've separated my units into sequential themes and put up a poster-sized paper that says, "How It All Began: An Archetypal Foundation."  On that poster, I've put words like "Archetype" "Epic" "Tragic Flaw" "Immortality" "Flood"...  Yes, it's like a word wall.  As a review before the test next week, I'm going to ask the students to define these words the best they can from memory, and then use them all to write a long paragraph explaining what we studied with these two stories.  :)  They'll hate it, but it'll be SO good for them!  Tomorrow, they'll start planning for their Utnapishtim/Noah compare/contrast essay.  That way, when they get back from Labor Day weekend, they'll have their brainstorming and notes all ready to go!

We are all kind of excited to be moving past this period of literature, though.  It's exciting at first, but it gets old very quickly.  Next up: Oedipus...and I ROCK at Oedipus.  :)  (The kids like it, too, which is always a plus!).

LDC 3
We are just finishing our unit on Mystery.  We read a Sherlock Holmes story from one of the novel adaptations the ESL dept. has.  It was "The Adventure of the Speckled Band."  The kids took notes and were little detectives as they read.  As previously posted, they used detective story terms, and followed the clues.  We even talked about plot and used Jim Burke's plot diagram and the students' notes to map out the plot of the story.  We had some good discussions about rising action and climax.  I was able to clarify some things for the students, and some of them made observations about how inaccurate plot maps are because the "climax is NEVER in the MIDDLE of the story.  It's always near the end!"  Very astute. :)

I'm not sure what our next unit will be, but I've found that these students (all freshman) are in great need of some writing skills.  I'll be introducing them to DOL and chunk writing very soon. :)  Mwahahahahahahahaha!

LA 2
This class is adorable.  Most of the kids are hard workers, and my 2 trouble students have been removed from the class, so it goes much smoother now.  My worst problem is all of the talking!  These kids are so quick to start up side conversations!  I've been able to tamp it down as of late, though, by sending one student in particular to do her work outside when needed; and walking around the whole time to help individuals as needed.
The students haven't figured out how to study for the quizzes I give them (if they'd only take my advice and study 2 specific documents each time, they'd be all set!), but they'll learn soon enough.

JR AMERICAN LIT
We just concluded our unit on Native American literature (origin myths) and the students did relatively well.  There were a few disappointments with the unit test, but it was expected.  I'm a hard tester because I give them the same tests any other CP (and sometimes Honors) students would get.  They'll catch on, and they'll be that much more prepared for the Graduation Test and End of Course Test at the end of the year.

From here, we move into the early explorers and Puritans--one of my favorite units to teach because we do The Crucible, and it is WONDERFUL. :)  This is a huge class, and they're pretty rowdy, so I'm hoping they keep it together enough to focus and enjoy.  I can always tell them that we won't watch the movie if they misbehave...that always does the trick.  Ha!

Meantime, these students are still working on their autobiographies every Friday in the computer lab.  Using Google Docs so they can share their documents, and I can edit and comment online has presented some challenges; but it's been an overall useful tool. 

This Week's The Bad/The Good
The Bad: Even though I'm getting my 7 hrs of sleep each night, I'm starting to still feel tired in the morning.  Has the school year already worn me down?
The Good: My students asked me why I smile when I "try to be mean."  I guess this means--even though I get irritated with them--I'm still having fun. :)