The Good and the Bad

Today was a rough day.

Well, the ending was rough so that put a damper on the rest of the day which went just fine.

My biggest group of students is six 4th and 5th graders. Two of the boys like to cause a lot of trouble but the girls (all in 5th grade) are generally well behaved. They want to participate and are usually engaged. I do have to work to keep them from chatting to each other all period though.

Today was a different story. The girls (and one in particular) would not stop calling out, making comments to other students and talking back when I told her I was taking points off. The boys were a bit sneakier causing their trouble more quietly so that they didn't get called on it as often. This led the one girl to start pointing out everything that the other students were doing. It just got worse and worse as the 90 minute period progressed.

I am so frustrated because I expect that six kids can be have themselves. I don't have a huge class of rowdy kids running around and yelling; I should be able to handle a measly six kids.

Part of the problem is that the space that we are in is so small. Students are sitting way too close together and don't have enough personal space. Then, if I need to separate someone there is nowhere for them to go. I have one small table on the back wall that I could move a student to but they would not be any farther away from the other students.

The space was just part of the problem today though. I don't know what I am doing wrong. My procedures are in place. I have the students wait in a quiet line outside the classroom before we enter. I remind them that they have to enter quietly, sit down and begin the Do Now. One student picks up the composition books from the back table and then they begin on the Do Now.

That's about where the smooth procedures get derailed. They take FOREVER to copy down their heading and the DO NOW question even though I remind them how much time they have left. Usually after I've given them 5-10 minutes to do this they have barely finished copying the question or they've written it down but not responded. I think that today part of the problem may have been that the question was too hard for them. They didn't understand what I was asking. ("Why is it important to know who your audience is when you write a persuasive essay?" We talked about this yesterday.) I'll have to work on that.

Well, tomorrow is a new day and I will try again. Also, I only see the 4th graders tomorrow and that always seems to be easier than the two grades together.

***

In brighter news . . .

The coaches are starting to be nice to me. I don't know what happened.

Last week one of them was in a better mood than usual so I took that opportunity to ask her for help with teaching my kindergarteners their letters and sounds since I know that she specializes in early childhood. She was very helpful and gave me a lot of good ideas.

Since then, things have been going better. They say good morning to me when they come in the room and actually talk to me during the day.

Yesterday, I foresaw a huge fight coming--it never happened.

There was a tall box belonging to the math coach that had been sitting on the dividing line of the room since the first week of school. I had been using it to put my hand outs and clipboards on while I teach. Well, yesterday she finally got rid of the box. I replaced it with a small desk because I NEED a place to keep all my stuff while I teach and there is no other space at the front of the classroom. Knowing how things have gone so far, I was SURE that she would have a fit and say that it was in the way (it's slightly bigger than the box). I was all prepared for what I would say.

She never said a word.

I don't know what's going on with them but I hope that it continues. I asked them for some advice with my rowdy kids today and they did help some. I think maybe they like it when I ask them for advice. I'll keep on asking if that's what it takes.

The nerve of some people . . .

Yesterday I was at our monthly ESL meeting for the region. I was sitting with two other TFAers and one other woman. The guy had missed the last ESL meeting because his school hadn't told him about it. He only found out about this meeting when he arrived at school that morning via a post-it note. Luckily the meeting was being held just down the street from his school and he was scheduled to do push-in for the majority of the meeting so it wasn't a big issue. He was planning however, to return to school to teach the last period, his history class. He mentions this to us and the woman sitting with us starts going into how he can't leave the meeting because it is mandatory. He explains that he learned about it last minute and that his school was expecting him back. He also said that it was a really difficult class and he didn't want to leave them with a sub--he needed to be there with them. So, this woman continues to go into how he can't leave, his school knows he has to be there, "and what? so you're NEVER going to take a day off the whole school year?" He says no, he's going to try not to. She tells him that he is entitled to his 9 days and he should take them off. He tells her that he just wants to show that he is dedicated and build a good rapport with the principal. She says that they don't care if he takes those days off--they're his. Sooo, he goes to the facilitator of the meeting and after arguing with her for a while about how he needs to get back to his class, she lets him go. After he's gone the woman sitting next to us turns and says "You know he's not going back to his school. He just wants to get out of here." I so wanted to smack her. The other TFA teacher said to her "We actually know him and he IS dedicated to his students. He really WANTS to be with his students and he really WON'T take any days off this year." She just couldn't comprehend that this could be possible.

Random

I don't know why this strikes me as odd, but I can't get over hearing people talk about the Yankees and being upset that they didn't make it to the World Series. I don't even care about baseball it's just that I am used to always hearing about the Yankees as being the team that everyone hates (apart from the random few that are diehard fans but that everyone else shuns). Last night (or was it the night before?) I heard the new anchors talking about how they were bummed that the Yankees lost and I though to myself Even they like the Yankees?? Oh yeah, I keep forgetting that this IS New York. Is this a strange observation?

* * *

I just have to say that today was the nastiest weather. And this is about the WORST weather that we get all winter in Arizona. I don't know how I'm going to make it through the Winter!

Holiday Reading

Check out the Carnival of Education hosted this week by Jenny D.

Thoughts . . .

I don't know how I am going to be able to go back to a full 5 day week next week. These last two have been so great. Not that I have done anything interesting, but the random days off have given me time to catch up and plan. Last night was the first night that I had my planning for the next day done by 6pm so that the evening was all mine to veg. Over the weekend I also planned a month-long reading unit and writing unit for my group of second and third graders.

Yeah! Progress!

But that's about where it ends with my long term planning. I'm hoping to get some more accomplished this weekend. I want to tackle my 8th grade writing plan next.

I'm still struggling with what exactly I'm supposed to be teaching these ESL kids who all speak English. I know that they all need a lot of help with reading comprehension and writing so I am trying to focus on those areas. I just keep questioning myself all the time as to whether or not I am doing the right thing. I'm constantly worrying that I am pulling them out of some important lesson in their classes and that this ESL program is becoming detrimental to them rather than helping them. Maybe if I were more confident about my teaching skills and what I am teaching them I wouldn't feel this way.

And, I know that maybe I shouldn't speak too soon, but I'm not sure if I like being a pull-out teacher. Yes, I have so much more freedom than all of the other teachers. And, yes, especially in my region, where micro-managing is taken to an extreme level, I'm probably the only teacher in the school who doesn't get told what to do. I just keep seeing all of the classes and wishing that I were a classroom teacher. I would love to have my own class of second graders.

I still love the kids in ESL, and the idea of being the first teacher of new arrival students--only that's not my situation. I think I could really get excited about teaching a self contained ESL class. I'm just not in the right neighborhood for that.

Three day weekend!

First day of the long weekend and it's pouring down rain! Well, this should be conducive to all of the planning that I told myself I would do. I won't feel so bad for not getting out of the house an doing something! Though I might pack up my books and head over to the Tea Lounge on Union Street to get some work done. I love that place.

I do feel guilty though that in my first months of living in NYC I haven't had any motivation (or much opportunity) to explore and do fun stuff. During the school week I never get out of Brooklyn and even then I only see my classroom, the subway and my neighborhood. Every Friday night the new teachers at my school go to happy hour. That's usually the biggest outing of the week and I'm generally home by 10 which seems so late! Ah, the life of a teacher!

***

Today I got my order from Amazon.com. I got the 6+1 Traits of Writing book. I really love the concept and want to know more about it. I have all the rubrics for the model (from various workshops at Institute) but I don't really know where to start with implementing it. My plan is to get through some of the reading this weekend so that I can incorporate it into my lesson planning.

I'm hoping to use the 6 Traits to help me take my students beyond the bland Four Square Writing that they are currently doing. I'm going to emphasize that these Traits are applicable to Four Square writing (which they have to do in every single class and in every grade from K-12). I, however, don't plan on using the Four Square in my class. I really despise it. I know that I can get away with that for two reasons. The first is that no one in my building (administrators, coaches, other teachers) know what I am supposed to be doing therefore no one ever checks on me, I've never had my AP come into my room and tell me what should be on my walls or that my bulletin boards aren't up to date, etc. (I'm really sort of loving this freedom). The other reason, and probably most important because this is a justification that I could actually give an administrator, if asked, is that I have to prepare them for the NYSESLAT in the Spring which does not use the Four Square. In fact, it provides it's own graphic organizers which, if used like the Four Square produce the most horrifically organized papers. (I know this from the diagnostic I gave). So, I'm really looking forward to getting to know the 6 Traits and implementing them in my classroom.

Ok, so I'm going to stop procrasinating now and get down to work!

New KIPP School

KIPP is opening a new charter school in Houston to serve the students displaced by hurricane Katrina. The school will be largely staffed by Teach For America teachers who were also displaced by the hurricane.

I think this is such an inspiring story. I give major credit to KIPP as well as the TFA teachers for jumping on this and making every effort to make this school year meaningful to the students.

Teach For America in the News

Here is a link to an article in the New York Times that gives a basic run down on Teach For America. For those familiar with the organization, the article doesn't present anything new but I thought it might be interesting for those who may not have heard of Teach For America.

Professional development

I completely understand that in theory professional development can be a great thing. Veteran teachers and new teachers alike can benefit from new instructional strategies and revisiting or perfecting the ones that they already use. Why then is our hour-long professional development every Monday such a waste of time?

Actually, I think I can answer my own question. It might have something to do with the fact that our PD is presented as one session in the auditorium to every teacher in the school regardless of what they teach.

Our first session was on protocol for teaching Math to the new standards. There are a lot of teachers who don't teach math. (Me for one). This week we had a session on Four Square Writing. Leaving aside my personal thoughts on the Four Square, this session seemed at first to apply to more teachers than math. Then the presenter said that she would only be speaking to writing in grades 3-8. She said that teachers of the early grades should just "sit back and see what the rest of the grades are doing." There is a K-2 Four Square, but she wouldn't be discussing it. What a waste of time for those teachers. So they are clocking the required number of hours, but they are gaining nothing from it. Why not just let them go home (or work in their classrooms) if the PD is explicitly not applicable to them.

At the end of the hour I saw the two gym teachers make a bee line for the door. I hadn't even realized that they too were forced to suffer through these weekly trainings. Will there ever be even ONE session applicable to them? I highly doubt it.

What if, instead of meeting whole school in the auditorium, we had smaller more specialized PD sessions? We could team up with other schools in the district so that Social Studies teachers, math teachers, early elementary teachers, etc. could work separately to really focus on their teaching areas. Then, PD might actually serve it's purpose of helping teachers.

Expectations

There are certain things that the students at my school do without being instructed.

You don't have to tell them how to write the heading on their papers. It has been so ingrained into them that it just comes naturally. When a first-year teacher tries to present a particular way of writing the heading for her class, they promptly tell her that that isn't the way it's done. She's doing it all wrong.

Last week I gave reading comprehension diagnostics to all of my students. When I collected their tests, all of them had numbered the paragraphs in the reading selections. Someone had taught them that this is what you do when you take a test and they didn't need anyone to remind them.

They knew what was expected.

Wednesday we had a fire drill at my school and I caught a glimpse of how orderly the students could behave if only the expectations were set in place. I fully expected our first fire drill to be utterly chaotic. Based on the madness every day when just a third of the students go to lunch, I could only imagine what it would be like when the entire school poured into the halls to try and exit the building.

I was completely mistaken.

Somewhere along the lines, the students had been taught how they were expected to behave during a fire drill. The consequences for misbehavior during a fire drill must have been pretty clear too because every student was perfect. Students were lined up in perfectly straight rows. No one so much as whispered to another student. And everyone walked out of the building in a calm and orderly fashion. Another TFA teacher at my school commented, she had never seen so many students in the hall at one time. She had also never seen the hall so quiet.

All of us first-years were so amazed at how well behaved they were. This just proved how our school could be if only the expectations were set. Did the administration not see this as well? If the students can behave like this during a fire drill, why can't we expect this of them every day?

I feel like the focus is always on the small insignificant things rather than the imortant issues. Don't even think about writing the heading incorrectly but go ahead and run around the classroom and talk back to the teacher. Where are the priorites?

The same goes for the expectations of the teachers. The administration comes around checking to make sure that all ten memos are posted and that the bulletin boards have student work that is not a day over two weeks old, but does anyone even stop to see how the lesson is being taught and if the students are engaged?

I gave my fourth graders their reading comprehension diagnostic today. I had planned to go through the diagnostic question by question alligning each one to the standard that it was testing. From there I would make a mastery chart and start focusing my instruction on the questions that they got wrong. Then I graded them . . .

Three fourth graders took the diagnostic. One only answered eight out of twenty eight questions and got none right. The second answered all of them and got six correct (But I know that he must have guessed on at least most if not all of them because the diagnostic was really long and I didn't expect any of them to finish today and he finished early). The last student refused to answer any questions because he was rebelling in response to my not letting him go to the bathroom after we clearly discussed my bathroom poilicy last week and I let him use his emergency "pass" already).

So basically, all the tracking of questions that I was going to do is useless now as I just need to teach them everything.

Weekend Planning Plans Derailed by Toothache

Friday I got a lot of work done at school. I tied up most of the loose ends with paperwork and finally decided on my official schedule. Finally knowing what my schedule and groupings were, I had planned to spend the weekend writing lesson plans.

Then, the killer toothache set in. I had felt it coming on earlier in the week and went to the dentist but it was so bad that I was told I needed to see a root canal specialist. Due to some incompetence on the part of the dentist (which I won't go into details) and problems with insurance (I was covered but not yet enrolled) I didn't get to see the specialist. I finally resolved everything Friday at 5pm, unfortunately too late to see a dentist. So there was nothing left to do but stock up on pain killers and suffer through the weekend.

And suffer I did. The Tylenol with codeine wasn't even strong enough. I spent the weekend on the couch alternatively crying, banging my head against the wall, walking in circles around the room and not sleeping at all.

I finally got the root canal this afternoon. I still have to go back for another visit but thankfully the pain is gone. Needless to say, I got zero planning done. And tomorrow I have my first day with a full schedule of kids.

You've got to be kidding me . . .

Today in our weekly PD it was mentioned that the region doesn't want us to use the term "bullet points" anymore because it has a negative connotation.

First day of graduate classes

My Saturday just disappeared in the blink of an eye.

Today was our first meeting at Pace for our graduate classes. It was actually pretty good. I'd heard from a lot of '04 corps members that the Pace classes were a waste of time. Well, they revamped the whole structure of the program and from what I saw today they did a pretty good job. Instead of meeting for classes twice a week after school, we only have to go one Saturday a month from 9:00-5:30 and then complete online assignments during the week. Our Saturdays essentially consist of three classes that we are taking: Curriculum and Instruction, Child Study, and Learning Teams. We're grouped all day by our content area so that we are always talking about things in the context of what we're teaching, which is nice. I think that the best part of the day is the Learning Team. The Learning Teams are led by TFA curriculum specialists. In this part of the day we have the opportunity to really discuss what is going on in our classrooms and ask specific questions that we have. I also like that this part of the day is led by TFA because I think that it helps to refocus on our goal of significant academic gains. In our training with the DOE, which was only two days, I already started feeling disconnected from the movement. Now we will be able to come back to that every month.

In other news . . .I found out today that we have a new addition to our corps. One of the displaced corps members from New Orleans has joined my region in Brooklyn. She's been through so much and now she's starting all over again here in New York. She's from Brooklyn so it was easier for her to come back home than to move to Texas (where a lot of New Orleans CMs have gone) or wait for the schools in Louisiana to reopen. I wish her luck.

One step closer to having kids in my classroom

I finished testing the last students today.

Students get into the ESL program though a series of steps. First, their parents fill out a Home Language Identification Survey (HLIS) when they register their children for the first time. If they answer a certain combination of questions (such as "Which language does the child write?" "Which language does the child speak with friends?") with an answer other than English the student then takes a English language test called the LAB-R. If they student scores below a certain number on that test, he/she goes into the ESL program (or bilingual or dual language if they are available). Today I finished the last of the LAB-R testing. Of the six kids I tested, only one will be in the ESL program.

Now I have my final count (pretty much) for my classes: 14 students. I made some tentative groups by grade level. There are four groups: 4 eighth graders, 3 fifth graders and a fourth grader, 4 third graders and a second grader, and one kindergartener. Now I have to work on making a schedule. I started talking with some teachers today about how I might schedule this. For now I'm thinking that I'll take the eight graders during their writing block and work with them on that since one of their teachers expressed a need in that area. For the third/second graders I'm thinking about taking them during their morning literacy block and doing pretty much them same thing their teacher is doing with the class but modified for ESL. I talked to the kindergarten teacher today about pulling her student out for some periods (he needs work on English vocabulary) and for other periods pushing into his regular class. I haven't had time the chat with the fourth/fifth grade teachers yet so I'm not sure what the focus there will be. Hopefully I can make a final schedule tomorrow and then start meeting with the kids on Monday. Yea!

Not getting any better

I've already broken down into tears several times and it's only the third day of school. (And I haven't even started teaching yet!)

Today I went into school ready to talk with the teachers sharing my room so that I could finally get my space organized. One was really understanding and was ready to move everything around. She also agreed with me that I should take the back of the room so that when the teachers come into the room to talk to them they will not be crossing through my lessons. Then the second teacher got there and flat out refused to move any of her stuff. She said that she was already set up and she wasn't moving and that she had to be by the window and she didn't have to explain her reasoning to me. I finally said, OK, so I'll take the front of the room but you still have to move your stuff so that the other teacher can move her stuff over. She said that I and the other teacher could figure it out but she was going downstairs to do whatever. She came back ten minutes later and demanded "Well, did you figure out what you two are doing?" I should have had nothing to do with it. They were the two sharing half the space and therefore had to decide how to move their furniture. I just left the room (and that was the first time I started crying today).

It finally took the Principal to come in and help mediate and help me and the one cooperative teacher figure out a plan for THEIR stuff. The other teacher never came to help. So finally (!) I had my half of the room to myself. Then the cooperative teacher argued about my placement of my filing cabinet. She said that if I didn't move it she would. I just wanted to wait until I had my desk to see if there would be room to move it. She shoved the filing cabinet across the room and into the tiny corner that was meant to house my desk. I just couldn't take it anymore and started crying once again. I just don't deserve to be treated this way. I haven't done anything to make them so awful to me. As I was trying to eat my lunch (and still balling) I was seriously thinking of calling my Program Director and telling him that there is no way that I can do this. How am I supposed to get through this year sharing a room with these two ladies who are so nasty to me. I really don't know how I'm going to do it but I know that I'm not going to call him either. It's only the third day and I haven't even seen any kids yet.

I can already see that this room situation is going to be terrible. There are teachers coming in every five minutes to talk to the math and literacy coaches. Every time they will have to cross my chalk board. Every time the other teachers need supplies they will have to come to my side (and possible move the desks) to get to the cabinets. Whenever they decide to eat lunch we are going to smell their food since they have a fridge and microwave in the room. It really sucks. The only thing that I can think to be thankful for is that I have a permanent spot to be in and I don't have to travel to random classrooms or work on the stage in the auditorium.

I hope things get better. I finally got started on the Home Language Identification Surveys so that I can start to figure out testing and scheduling and start teaching.

Not what I'd expected for the first days of school.

I've been wanting to write a post since Tuesday night but I haven't had internet access. Sooo much has gone on in the past two days that I couldn't even recount it all now so I thought I'd go with the brief recap . . .

Tuesday I got to school armed with my fun decorations. I tried to start setting up my classroom but it was nearly impossible because the math and literacy coaches still hadn't moved out of my room. I only put up one border and then spent the rest of the day helping them move their stuff so that I could get to my classroom which was buried in books and furniture. Rather than being super grateful to me for all of the free manual labor that I was doing for them, they would yell at me for putting a box a books in the math area and not the literacy corner. The day ended with the custodians putting all the furniture I moved into the hallway (which belonged to the coaches) BACK in my room. Then I was forced to leave at 4pm because they were waxing the hall outside my room. I left feeling sooo frustrated.

Wednesday was a MUCH better day. I finally decorated my room, got all of the coaches' stuff out of my room, set up my filing system and worked on all of the little details. I put up paper and borders on almost every inch of wall space. I especially liked how I decorated the door and space above the chalk board with "Welcome" in 20 languages. I took quite a lot of work to find a rug and tables and chairs but by 730pm I left school with my room looking great and totally in order for the first day of school.

The first day of school was kind of a weird day. I didn't have any students so I worked on some more details for my room. Later I took a field trip to the school across the street and met with the ESL teacher who has been there for eight years. She was so helpful. I finally had someone sit down with me and explain exactly what I have to do as far as figuring out what kids I have, testing and forming pull-out groups. My administration told me nothing. Everything was going great until 2 o'clock. That's when they called me into the Principal's office (along with seven other teachers) and told me that they were taking away my room. My beautiful room that I loved so much and spent so much time on. They decided that due to space issues they were moving me into the room with the coaches. (I should mention that the room with the coaches is the exact same size as the classroom I'd previously had to myself. Small and cozy. I'd say a third of the size of a regular classroom.) They said that I'd get half the room and they would put up a partition and the coaches would share the other half. They said "Sorry about the inconvenience but it's not about you. It's about the kids. Just remember that." Can you believe they tried to use "It's about the kids" in this situation? Needless to say I was really upset. I walked out of the building at 3pm because I just couldn't deal with taking down all of my hard work just then.


Today I just worked on moving all of my stuff up to the first floor. So many teachers passed by my room today giving me sympathy for having to move and telling me how great my room looked. (and then telling me about the year they had to move four times). Every time I wanted to break into tears. When I finally got all my stuff moved the AP came and told me that I had to cover two periods of social studies. When I asked her what I was supposed to do with them she handed me a huge American History book and said "Is there anything in this book that you're more familiar with than another? You have an hour to prepare." I did get something prepared for them to do on the fly (not American history) but both classes were so wild and out of control that we never got past the "Do Now." I got back to my new room at three o'clock and the coaches STILL hadn't cleared out a space for me. It seems like the might be trying to renegotiate the half/half arrangement. Basically the last two days have sucked. And all this is not to mention the absurd bureaucracy that I'm just now starting to understand and the rumors that if my ESL case load isn't big enough I'll be sent to a second school.

It's hard to believe that I'm wasting so much school time with all this moving and BS. I haven't even had time to go through the cumulative records and figure out which kids are mine and start testing them so that EVENTUALLY I can form classes and start teaching.

I hope things get better next week . . .

My Classroom

I finally went to my school and got inside of my classroom today! Very exciting. It's small but I'm only going to have small groups of kids with me at any given time. It's really cozy--I love it. (There are other teachers who have the same sized room for 15 kids and that is really cramped.) When I got to my room it was still jam packed with books, supplies, desks, etc. My room used to belong to the Literacy Coach and Math Coach and they hadn't moved their stuff out yet. I met the Math Coach and she was the first person from my school who I've been able to talk to and ask school specific questions (I hadn't had any contact with my principal since my interview). I offered to help her move her stuff up to the second floor and I think she really likes me now because of that. She was introducing me to all of the staff and telling them to take care of me and give me supplies. She donated a few things to me already. I'll take anything I can get. The Literacy Coach still had tons of stuff in there so I couldn't really organize my room at all. Now that I know what the space is like I have a sense of how I want to arrange it. I want to have a carpet area but there's no rug in the room. The Math Coach said she'd try to find one for me. Yeah!

I FINALLY talked to the principal and it turns out there's an explanation for why he didn't respond to any of my emails over the summer. I found out this morning that the principal who hired me is no longer at the school. It's funny because I had gotten an email the other day saying when I could come into my classroom but I had no idea who it was from. Now I know it was the new principal.

I found out some other news about my classroom. So, we have some after school program at my school three days a week (M,W,F) and the coordinators need a place to plan and get organized for the kids after school. As luck would have it, that place is my room (my small, cozy room, remember). I asked my principal what I should do if they were going to be in my room but I had students. She said that they are only two adults and space is tight. Maybe sometimes I would have to take my kids to the library or sometimes they could go to the library. Doesn't it seem like the two adults should be the ones to go to the library rather than my group of kids who have a classroom. Why give me a classroom if I don't get to use it all the time? It doesn't make sense to me at all. I'm hoping that as things progress it will become obvious that the only thing that makes sense is for the the kids to stay in the room.

I was also told today that I should be having an ESL meeting on Tuesday. I'm sooo excited. I'm thinking that this could be the answer to all of my questions, though I know that I've wrongfully assumed that before (ESL training with TFA, Region 5 training). I still have to be hopeful. I really don't know what I'm supposed to be teaching!

After going to my school I went to the teacher store. I was so overwhelmed by everything there that I ended up only buying a few things (some borders, letters and a calendar). Then I went to Staples and spent $100. I was mostly focusing on buying stuff to get organized (file folders, hanging folders, file boxes the students can access, etc.). It's hard to know now how I will want to organize all of my paperwork, student paperwork, etc. In college I always started out with one spiral notebook where I took notes for all my classes for one or two weeks. Then when I got a sense of how I wanted to organize myself for each class I would go out and buy binders, notebooks, dividers. That's kind of what I want to do now (wait and see) but I want to have a start so that don't get bogged down with paperwork. I love organization so I have to get it just right. The other thing I bought at Staples was such an indulgence that I feel so guilty for spending $30 on it when I am so poor--a label maker. I love to label everything. I'm so excited but I'm having a bit of buyer's remorse.

So, things are progressing. Hopefully I'll be going to my classroom tomorrow to get some more work done. I still have to move all my stuff to my apartment too. I'm dreading having to make several trips on the subway with all of my bags. And it doesn't help that Williamsburg (where all my stuff is) is soo poorly connected to Park Slope (where I'm moving). Aargh.

The housing search is over (fingers crossed)

I don't want to speak too soon but I think the apartment search is finally over. I found a place yesterday in Park Slope with a girl whose roommate cancelled at the last minute. I contacted the landlord today to get my credit check, etc. I haven't actually moved my stuff in yet, but all seems good so far.

As this relief comes (I can finally start focusing on planning the first weeks of school) I am reading about the devastation from hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. I know that was somewhere on my ranking of cities. That could have been me. I can't even imagine. I think of all the work and preparation that I've been doing to get ready for the year and I can't fathom what that must be like to now not know if the house I just set up is still standing let alone if I would be going back to my classroom. Here's a link to the blog of a New Orleans corps member who is currently displaced from his new home.

The first day just keeps getting closer and closer . . .

Today was our last training day for TFA. We are finally free to go into our classrooms and teach. In some ways I feel so prepared and in other ways I feel totally lost.

The things that I am feeling good about are all the things that TFA has been drilling into us for the entire summer: classroom management, investing students, high expectations. What I'm really at a loss for is what it is that I'm actually going to be teaching my students. I know that I am responsible for the English language acquisition of my students but I don't know how I'm supposed to go about teaching it. Should I do it in the context of English Language Arts, or should it be in the context of the content areas. And then there is the whole thing about significant academic gains. I know that I can track and take responsibility for their mastery of English (speaking, reading, writing and listening) but what about content areas. Today we had an ESL break out group and we were repeatedly told to not forget about the content areas. In many cases we (the ESL teachers) may be the only educator providing any comprehensible content to our students. We can't forget about the content areas. But how am I supposed to plan lessons around several content areas for nine different grade levels? Especially when I may have some students for just 180 minutes a week.

Another question that comes up is how do I plan my rules and procedures for such a wide grade span? It's hard (if not impossible) to come up with procedures that would be the same for Kindergarteners as well as 8th graders. Should I break the grades up into K-3, 4-8 when planning rules and procedures, or even into three groups? I think that I may have around 18 total students (if I can trust the school's web site). It's hard for me to envision how my classroom will look and sound when I don't know what the groupings will be like and how many students there will be in each group. I feel like a lot of management strategies that we have learned are geared to a classroom of 25+ students. How do I adapt that to a smaller group of four students who are stepping into a classroom for the first time in this country?

All summer I've been thinking that there would be this magical day when I would suddenly know what my situation would be like and then I could start planning. I'm starting to realize that that day isn't coming.

I was given some advice (and I know that a lot of other corps members are doing this too) to just plan for teaching procedures and classroom culture lessons in the first two weeks. Like I explained before, I'm feeling like I can't do even that. I'm scared that the first day is going to come and I'm just going to show up at school knowing nothing.

So, having worked through all these anxieties by putting them down on paper (or the computer screen) I do have some next steps. First, I hear that principals should be back at schools on Monday so I'm going to try and contact mine and finally speak to him for the first time since my interview. Second, today I was given the number for the ESL coordinator in my region. That could possible be a good person to get some information. Or at least ideas on what ESL teachers do in other schools.

... and, to add to all of the stress, I STILL haven't found a place to live. It's starting to get to the point of desperation.