First Week Recap

Good morning! It has been an EXHAUSTING week as it was the first full week of school! Welcome back to Skyview! Because I am so tired, I struggled with coming up for a blog topic this week. I figured a recap of my week would be best, to try to reflect on how everything went. 

As I blogged last week, I was quite excited to try flexible seating in my classroom. To NO ONE'S SURPRISE, my students ate it up. The first day, I had them switching seats every 5-10 minutes to try all of the the different seating options. They actually did not care for trying all of the options (because I think they didn't want to move), but in the end, it was better that they did because some of the students are picking new seats every day. I have found that the students like the yoga balls, so I may have to purchase more further down the road. They like the big fluffy floor pillows, and some of them use the pillows with the camping chairs. I need to find a way to get donations, or tell the students that they can bring in more seating options too. Yesterday, I ended up taking 18 desks and chairs out of my classroom (I don't think my janitor was too happy about them all being out in the hall after school). My room looks quite large and rather empty, which is exciting! I kept an extra four desks in my classroom as I am going to lower the legs so they can sit on the floor and use a desk. Many students may prefer that option, so we will see how it goes over the next couple of weeks. 

I do think I will have a bit of a hill climb when it comes to using QFT (Question Formulation Technique) with these students. I'm not sure how the students will react to it. My classroom tends to be a bit different than other classrooms at Skyview, and I'm not sure how much choice they've had over the years. I worry that having such an open-ended curriculum will throw them for a loop, and they will react badly. But, if things are not going well, I know that I need to provide structure and support. 

I think we do have good students this year. We're both feeling each other out, and I think my students are trying to determine if I am being genuine and sincere. Middle school students usually wait for the inevitable (i.e. bad) to happen, so I think they're waiting for me to "flip". 

It has also been a great week for my mentee and myself. I know I haven't talked about my mentee much, but we had communicated a bit over the summer, so I was pleasantly surprised to have him as a mentee. We are communicating very well. I am trying to provide support in any way that I can, and he's great about coming to me when he needs something and he's been asking a lot of questions. Starting your first year of teaching is super stressful, so I'm just trying to help out when he needs it. I don't want to overwhelm him, but I think we already have a good enough relationship that he'll tell me when he just needs time and not help. 

I'm also excited for all of the new teachers in the building! We have a number of new staff members and a handful of student teachers. Their excitement and eagerness are spreading through the school and I feel like the culture of SMS is changing (slowly, but steadily). It's exciting for me because I feel like I'm helping change the way. It's a good feeling. 

My other big excitement is that my 10 Google Cardboards are on their way to my classroom! They're supposed to be delivered next Saturday (but the building will be closed), so I should get them on Monday, August 15th. When I went to purchase them on Thursday, I noticed that instead of paying $15 each, I could get two for $25! I posted only social media, and got another $75 in donations. That was a nice boost for the end of my work week :) I can't wait for my students to try Cardboard in the classroom. I hope that it's exciting and interesting for them!

I can't think of much else other than that I have a lot of work to do this weekend, and the cat sitting on my lap and the cup of coffee next to me are helping me stay focused. 

Enjoy your weekend and Go USA! I'll see you next week :)

- Rachel
@historicalipad
My Teacherspayteachers website
Donate a Google Cardboard to my classroom!

Flexible Seating

Good morning! I woke up this morning quite groggy and exhausted. This has been one long week. I worked on Monday for a mentoring meeting, had Tuesday off, then the entire district came back on Wednesday. It is always tough, as all of you educators know, to go back and sit through "sit and get" sessions. I see what our district tried to do with pumping us up and getting us excited for the year, but sometimes it falls of deaf ears... and that is what happened for me this year. It is partially my own fault, that I only had an hour and a half of work time in my classroom over the three days. I could have gone in earlier... I could have stayed later... but made the choice not to. 

One thing that did happen is teachers came into my room and asked me why I hadn't set up my classroom yet. I replied by telling them that my classroom is set up and that I am using flexible seating this year. I was a little bummed with the faces and replies I got back. There was not much support going my way on this, and I am not surprised. It took me eleven years to get here, and I know it might take one week to send me back to seating charts. My mantra for last year was "Whatever", so at least my mantra for this year is "Cautiously optimistic". I am trying new things - I am working towards believing more in student choice, so it only seems fair that student choice with seating falls in with that. 

Over and over, I tell people that I'm the "non-traditional" teacher, yet my classroom had only desks, set up in pods or in rows. People... that's not "non-traditional"! I knew that my classroom had to look a little different if I was going to walk the walk. I really liked the furniture from MiEN that I saw in Louisville, Colorado for GAFE, but knew I could never convince anyone to purchase $500 chair/desk combos. So I started to think about what I could use in my classroom cheaply. I was sort of thwarted at every turn, but found some cheap camping chairs from Kmart and a couple of floor pillows from Amazon. (The floor pillows are actually pretty awesome. I wish I could afford more for my classroom.) I also moved all of my desks and chairs to the outside of the room. I am bringing in a long folding table (will purchase a tablecloth since it's rather gross) and will allow the students to use yoga balls or the regular chairs for seating, and will also allow them to stand at any place in the room. I may also purchase yoga mats or bath rugs to add more floor options, and I am intrigued with a low table and floor pillows. I know I have more time throughout the year to add more seating options.

So... from the very first day of school, I will have a Slides presentation in the front of the room telling students that they can pick where they sit. I really don't care. As I said "I really don't care out loud", it cements that it does not matter to me where the students sit. Yes, I will still have to move students for misbehaving (it IS middle school) and some students may lose their privileges and have to sit in a classroom desk and chair. But it's the IDEA that students have choice. I think some of them won't know what to do with this... it's too different and weird.

Again, I am cautiously optimistic. It's these little things that make me want to continue teaching.

Thanks for reading! I'll see you next week :)

- Rachel
@historicalipad
My Teacherspayteachers website
Donate a Google Cardboard to my classroom!