Exhale.
The first quarter is over. Life somehow exploded in my face and one day, I'm desperately moving classroom chairs from one side of the room to the other between exasperated breaths before the first day of school and then next thing I know, I'm meeting with parents to look over the progress of their students in the first quarter.
Come again?
I guess that is the true enigma of year round school. It makes no sense and all the sense in the world. Time seeps through the hidden cracks between your fingers just slowly enough so you do not notice and then all the sudden, you look down and realize what you were holding onto is no longer there. So what do you do when you are out of time? Reflect.
So alas, here are my reflections. Imperfect and dramatized, but nonetheless, meaningful if for no one else, myself.
I taught four year olds for two months. More than two months actually. I jumped into a classroom with little classroom experience, even less classroom experience with kids below the age of 5, limited resources, no authentic energy, and a ton of adrenaline and was told to swim. Now I cannot tell you for certain that I swam, but I can tell you I certainly did not drown. I slowly learned some imperfect way to keep my head above water. At times, I accidentally swallowed some water when I started to slip, but always managed to emerge unharmed and with a stronger determination. My head is now above water and somewhere way off in the distance I can see the shore. The end of all three quarters. I can see my four year olds kinder ready--scratch that ABOVE kinder ready both academically and socially. I may not be swimming the most efficient and well traveled path, but I will get them there whatever it takes.
So the moment you have all been waiting for (or at least, should have been waiting for)--how was the progress? From day one to now---did they learn? The answer is absurd in its utter lack of simplicity. Yes and no. A lot and barely anything. Impossible to determine. I have no giant success stories. Most of my kids I required to come to the three week intercession or tutoring (or whatever tutoring looks like when you are deficient in colors, shapes and counting) while I take my time off. 13 out of 20 in fact. And in all honesty, I believe closer to 18 of my kids needed it, but I was only supposed to require 60%, so that is what I did. However, due to the increasing complication of being with a four year old (even your own four year old) all day long and balancing work, life and more, all my parents thankfully opted to continue to bring their child to the shortened days during intercession. Maybe during that time, for my five students who still don't know all ten colors or the two who cannot even identify blue--it will click. Maybe for my kids who get to 9 when they count and then say 20..it will click. Maybe for my student who only can identify 1 letter of the alphabet (my goal this quarter was ten)..it will click. I can only hope.
I did have successes however; which are so incredibly important to reflect on. Little or big--anything and everything is worth celebrating when you are up against the odds, as I must admit, I truly am. On my mid-quarter assessment, only 2 of my kids could tell me first and last (an incredibly hard skill at that age) and now well above half of my students can. All except for my new student can identify their first name in print, all of my students can hold a book correctly, identify print versus pictures on a page and all but two of my students can sort objects by either color or shape (a personal area of pride for me :D). All of my kids are attempting to write their name and two of my lowest performers are writing their names correctly (however sometimes the letters are jumbled and you have to take a second to find them all). Many of my kids who came in on the scribble phase are now starting to draw rudimentary people and objects and some of my higher performing kids are beginning to write not only their name, but the names of their classmates with ease.
Are the kids learning? YES. Are they learning enough? Harder answer.
All data aside though, I am proud of what I have done so far. Given the circumstances of my rushed beginning and utter lack of preparation, good things happened in my classroom. Now for the next three weeks, while I have time and more knowledge of what I should of been doing from day one curriculum, structure and management wise, I think things will be REALLY great next quarter. I have a lot of great ideas I finally have time to implement and I now KNOW my kids. I hate to admit it, but I probably know some of my kids (particularly the problem behavior kids because they tend to monopolize my time) more than some of my closest friends. Scary, but the reality of the job. So things are going to be good next quarter. Next quarter, I am positive I will have trials and tribulations, but I am also positive I will have more successes and clearer results than this quarter.
On a cuter note--I am surprising my student's parents with something amazing (or at least I think it is). I am interviewing each of my kids for a couple minutes at the end of each quarter to talk about school, what they are learning and their dreams. At the end of the year I am going to put it all together into a CD and give it to their family so they can see how their child grew (physically, emotionally and academically) from quarter to quarter. I conducted my first round of interviews on Thursday and let me tell you---HILARIOUS. Seriously, if I could post videos of my kids on the internet, they would be up in a second because I have never laughed so hard in my life. Whether it was odd proclamations of "I love playing robot at school" (we don't play robots--I assure you) or a mid sentence hesitation to proclaim "I gotta USE it!!!" (meaning use the restroom in New Orleans slang) or an inability to stand away from the camera, resulting in a zoomed in view of the nostrils- the videos are light hearted and adorable and sure to make parents proud (if not in this quarter, by the last quarter undoubtedly). Moments like that are days when working 7-9 does not seem so bad. While I take my job so seriously, as I am the front lines and essential force in combating the achievement gap for my kids--not a day goes by where I don't laugh. And not just giggle, but BURST into laughter. Because as important as it is for my kids to learn and as serious as I am about their learning, I cannot help but love them as my own. So on the days when I feel like 21 going on 40 as I crawl my aching bones into bed at 9:30 PM, silencing my cell phone from my younger more lively friends, I remember that my students also keep me young--laughing away the exhaustion and burden as T insists for the hundredth time that it is indeed again, his birthday.
In my personal life, I am so ready for a break. I plan to stay up past 9:30 (crazy for someone in their 20s I know), have a couple visitors (the first of which I am picking up in two hours from the airport!) and go home to reconnect with college friends. I plan to work on some requirements for my organization, prepare my classroom and attempt to become a better teacher with better results. I will not lie. This is the hardest thing I have ever done in my life, but also the most meaningful. And I know I may be young, but for those of you who know me well, you know I have seldom ventured into meaningless and easy tasks--always attempting to go down the most challenging and most impactful of streets, despite my youth. So I had a bit of a reality check today when I went into Supercuts to get a haircut (mom--you should be proud, I paid for a haircut for once) and the person cutting my hair assumed I was a Tulane student. At first, I thought almost offended--how in the world could she think I'm so young? Despite the reality of my youth, I truly often feel an older soul, especially since graduation from college. But then I realized, if I were more normal, I would still be in college right now. If I had not opted into the fast track for life, as I always do, I would be closing up the first month of my senior year of college. Busy--undoubtedly, but in a different way. For one surreal moment I closed my eyes and imagined myself in my single dorm room amongst 100s of 18 year old neighbors, my only stressors exams, papers and my own personal success. No one's academic fate and let's be realistic--future socioeconomic status--in my hands but my own. For one bittersweet moment I let myself daydream about the freedom of joining 100 different organizations and the mellowness of laying in the commons and the relatively easy life I left behind. I asked myself with hesitation, did I make a mistake? And in all honesty, I can say that I did not. Not even a little bit. Sure I miss college, or if nothing else, the amazing people I left behind, but all good things come to an end and my life right now is exactly what I want it to be. New Orleans is an amazing town filled with awe-inspiring stories, sites and cultures and I truly do love my job. It wears me down to the ground daily, but I always get up the next day because it is a beautiful joy to work with the students and families I work with. I am finding my niche in my new town with my new job and my new friends and it feels right. No mistakes, no regrets, just content exhaustion.
So yet again, I have left you with another stream of consciousness, less than inspirational, but surely genuine blogpost. I miss you and love you all and will be back in a Fort Worth in a few days for those of you I will have the pleasure of seeing!
"Happiness cannot come from without. It must come from within. It is not what we see or touch or that which other people do for us which makes us happy; it is that which we think and do and feel, first for the other fellow and then for ourselves." -Helen Keller
Friday, September 16, 2011
Thursday, September 1, 2011
Inextricably Linked
Perhaps due to my newly discovered closet love of writing or my need to feel productive, yet at the same time, find time to relax, I have been very consistent with my blog up until now. Usually, at one point every weekend, after a ridiculously long day of working, I have haulted midpoint and reasoned with myself I need to stop and take time to reflect on the crazy whirlwind that my life has become. Also, I need to inform the people who stubbornly (or perhaps loyally) insist on maintaining friendship despite my virtual nonexistence in their lives, I reason to myself halfheartedly, really just desiring a reason to put away the lesson plans. But this weekend I hit a wall. I had no desire to write, no desire to reflect, nothing. I was just exhausted and bitter and tired. It all stemmed from a less than successful day of teaching Friday, which carried over into a bit of the blues over the weekend that did not cease until a better teaching day Monday.
One realization I am coming to is that my current life happiness is inextricably linked with the progress and successes of my students. When C comes back from the weekend angry and violent, I find myself feeling hopeless and defeated. When M still cannot tell me red versus pink, I doubt my abilities as not just a teacher, but a human being, silly as it sounds. On the flip side, when T makes it through a day without any temper tantrums, I foolishly walk with my chest held higher, confident in my ability to make a real difference. When E sits with me after school and not only tells me almost all the letter names, but multiple words that start with each letter, including the names of other people in the class, I drive home smiling as if I just singlehandedly changed the world. These are exaggerations of course, but somewhere between the hyperboles, lies the deafening fact that I love my children so much that I refuse to let them fail at my hands. I feel like I am in tunnel vision right now, desiring only for significant and substantial growth academically and socially by June. I have a vision of the end of the tunnel, but I find myself questioning the validity of the paths I am taking at times.
Sometimes I am so caught in my own tunnel vision that I forget the tremendous life difficulties of my students. Four years old and already, so many of my kids have faced more life traumatic events that I have ever or will ever face. Perhaps because I grew weary of never eating lunch during the day due to a lack of a lunch break or because I wanted to use the ever enticing bribe of "Ms. Knipp will eat lunch with a table that is sitting quietly" as a classroom management technique, I began sitting down with my own lunch at the prime time of 10:45 with my kids to eat. Whatever the cause, it is one of the best decisions I ever made. Not only do I have a chance to help my students learn how to communicate effectively (i.e. we do not talk while another person is talking), review GLEs (i.e. what color is your milk?) and build relationships (my kids are absolutely FASCINATED by my inevitable lunch of Cheez Its and a peanut butter sandwich), but it is eye opening to the struggles faced daily by my kids. It breaks my heart when C brings up at lunch that his daddy is in jail and it shatters more fully when another student, J, wholeheartedly bursts out, "My daddy too! He used to hit mommy!" Then as C begins to describe how when his daddy and mommy used to fight, he would jump in the middle, I quietly explain that it is important that we can share what happens at home, but we should talk about something else during lunch, holding back the desire to just hold my kids and let them talk or cry or do whatever they need to do, knowing at this point in time, I have to make sure the other students are not subject to hearing about life traumas no four year old should experience. Time and a place I believe they say. When on the rug, Tr and C talk about how their daddies died, I am overcome with sadness, trying to imagine growing up my entire life without a dad. Life is rough for my four year olds.
During dramatic play, when Tr exclaims to the other kids, "The police are coming, everyone get down!" I immediately hold back reflexive giggles at the hilarity that later in the night turn into melancholy reflections at the sad truth that that sentence means something to a four year old. In the moment, I calmly explain that the police do not come to the dramatic play center, we just practice cooking and eating pretend food. Ten seconds later, as Tr boasts, "Time for a house party ya'll" I catch myself again in an odd paradox between refreshing laughter and somber reflection at the origin of the exclamation, once again clarifying that dramatic play is not a place for house parties. The tone then switches to throwing a party at Chuck E Cheese, which I praise with relief and later, as Tr yells out the names of her classmates and pretend writes, I ask Tr if she is writing a guest list for those who can attend, only to be told, "No Ms. Knipp, this is the no recess list", humbling me at my own influence in her life.
Pre K students are sponges. Literally sponges. Unfortunately, some of my students came in well acquainted with curse words and obscenity. Now, it is common occurrence that I am writing a note home to parents about a child saying the F bomb or flipping the bird and I hesitate, but realistically admit they probably learned it from another student. On the flip side, my students are learning. Learning lessons I try to teach, learning lessons I inadvertently teach and learning things I never intended to teach. Learning subconsciously and mostly accidently, when I start a sentence, "I really appreciate that....." they better get in criss cross applesauce because I am scanning the room for someone to praise. Learning purposefully how to count, shapes, sorting, letters, names, how to interact, independence and more. Learning ironically, my mannerisms, way of speaking and more and mimicking me with hilarious accuracy.
So I guess the point of all those tangents is one of the major realizations I have had is that my students learn so much just from modeling themselves after me. As my students have modeled themselves after their parents, brothers, sisters and other life influencers, I am now one of those influencers. If I yell at my kids all day long, take away their recess, snack and every privilege under the sun they will still love me so wholly because they are four and they are made to love. Every word I say they cling to like gold. Ask any of my kids what my favorite day of the week is, I assure you they will say Friday. Case in point- last week for our families unit we made a book of our drawings of our families and shared about them. The book was placed in the library section. I shared that my brother Andy was one of my best friends and that we liked to spend time together listening to music when I modeled sharing to my kids. Later, C brought me the book from the library and asked me to show him which one was Andy (yes he used his first name--two days later). Take away message? My life (and what I allow my students to see of my life) is a lesson in itself. It does not matter what kind of person I am, they will take a piece of me when they form their own little personalities, morals and ethics more fully (although at times, it is hard to believe their personalities are not already fully developed!) What I am teaching them by being me? Am I letting my frustrations during the day turn my positive behavior narration into last resort punishments? Am I subconsciously communicating to my students any disbelief in their ability academically or behaviorally? Am I modeling in my own interactions with them, the student I want them to be at the end of the year? Food for self reflection.
I am quite certain this came out as a collection of some amusing, some disheartening and let's face it-absolutely cute stories about my students instead of a revelation, as it feels to me. But I hope some part of this post shed some kind of light into the difficulties and opportunities I have as a Pre K teacher in a low income community. I cannot wait for the rewards which I cannot help but believe will come of academic and social maturity in each and every one of my students. In the mean time, I must reflect on my end goal and whether or not my lessons (both planned and inherent) are aligned.
Until next time.
"Every reform needs examples more than advocates" -John Kerry
One realization I am coming to is that my current life happiness is inextricably linked with the progress and successes of my students. When C comes back from the weekend angry and violent, I find myself feeling hopeless and defeated. When M still cannot tell me red versus pink, I doubt my abilities as not just a teacher, but a human being, silly as it sounds. On the flip side, when T makes it through a day without any temper tantrums, I foolishly walk with my chest held higher, confident in my ability to make a real difference. When E sits with me after school and not only tells me almost all the letter names, but multiple words that start with each letter, including the names of other people in the class, I drive home smiling as if I just singlehandedly changed the world. These are exaggerations of course, but somewhere between the hyperboles, lies the deafening fact that I love my children so much that I refuse to let them fail at my hands. I feel like I am in tunnel vision right now, desiring only for significant and substantial growth academically and socially by June. I have a vision of the end of the tunnel, but I find myself questioning the validity of the paths I am taking at times.
Sometimes I am so caught in my own tunnel vision that I forget the tremendous life difficulties of my students. Four years old and already, so many of my kids have faced more life traumatic events that I have ever or will ever face. Perhaps because I grew weary of never eating lunch during the day due to a lack of a lunch break or because I wanted to use the ever enticing bribe of "Ms. Knipp will eat lunch with a table that is sitting quietly" as a classroom management technique, I began sitting down with my own lunch at the prime time of 10:45 with my kids to eat. Whatever the cause, it is one of the best decisions I ever made. Not only do I have a chance to help my students learn how to communicate effectively (i.e. we do not talk while another person is talking), review GLEs (i.e. what color is your milk?) and build relationships (my kids are absolutely FASCINATED by my inevitable lunch of Cheez Its and a peanut butter sandwich), but it is eye opening to the struggles faced daily by my kids. It breaks my heart when C brings up at lunch that his daddy is in jail and it shatters more fully when another student, J, wholeheartedly bursts out, "My daddy too! He used to hit mommy!" Then as C begins to describe how when his daddy and mommy used to fight, he would jump in the middle, I quietly explain that it is important that we can share what happens at home, but we should talk about something else during lunch, holding back the desire to just hold my kids and let them talk or cry or do whatever they need to do, knowing at this point in time, I have to make sure the other students are not subject to hearing about life traumas no four year old should experience. Time and a place I believe they say. When on the rug, Tr and C talk about how their daddies died, I am overcome with sadness, trying to imagine growing up my entire life without a dad. Life is rough for my four year olds.
During dramatic play, when Tr exclaims to the other kids, "The police are coming, everyone get down!" I immediately hold back reflexive giggles at the hilarity that later in the night turn into melancholy reflections at the sad truth that that sentence means something to a four year old. In the moment, I calmly explain that the police do not come to the dramatic play center, we just practice cooking and eating pretend food. Ten seconds later, as Tr boasts, "Time for a house party ya'll" I catch myself again in an odd paradox between refreshing laughter and somber reflection at the origin of the exclamation, once again clarifying that dramatic play is not a place for house parties. The tone then switches to throwing a party at Chuck E Cheese, which I praise with relief and later, as Tr yells out the names of her classmates and pretend writes, I ask Tr if she is writing a guest list for those who can attend, only to be told, "No Ms. Knipp, this is the no recess list", humbling me at my own influence in her life.
Pre K students are sponges. Literally sponges. Unfortunately, some of my students came in well acquainted with curse words and obscenity. Now, it is common occurrence that I am writing a note home to parents about a child saying the F bomb or flipping the bird and I hesitate, but realistically admit they probably learned it from another student. On the flip side, my students are learning. Learning lessons I try to teach, learning lessons I inadvertently teach and learning things I never intended to teach. Learning subconsciously and mostly accidently, when I start a sentence, "I really appreciate that....." they better get in criss cross applesauce because I am scanning the room for someone to praise. Learning purposefully how to count, shapes, sorting, letters, names, how to interact, independence and more. Learning ironically, my mannerisms, way of speaking and more and mimicking me with hilarious accuracy.
So I guess the point of all those tangents is one of the major realizations I have had is that my students learn so much just from modeling themselves after me. As my students have modeled themselves after their parents, brothers, sisters and other life influencers, I am now one of those influencers. If I yell at my kids all day long, take away their recess, snack and every privilege under the sun they will still love me so wholly because they are four and they are made to love. Every word I say they cling to like gold. Ask any of my kids what my favorite day of the week is, I assure you they will say Friday. Case in point- last week for our families unit we made a book of our drawings of our families and shared about them. The book was placed in the library section. I shared that my brother Andy was one of my best friends and that we liked to spend time together listening to music when I modeled sharing to my kids. Later, C brought me the book from the library and asked me to show him which one was Andy (yes he used his first name--two days later). Take away message? My life (and what I allow my students to see of my life) is a lesson in itself. It does not matter what kind of person I am, they will take a piece of me when they form their own little personalities, morals and ethics more fully (although at times, it is hard to believe their personalities are not already fully developed!) What I am teaching them by being me? Am I letting my frustrations during the day turn my positive behavior narration into last resort punishments? Am I subconsciously communicating to my students any disbelief in their ability academically or behaviorally? Am I modeling in my own interactions with them, the student I want them to be at the end of the year? Food for self reflection.
I am quite certain this came out as a collection of some amusing, some disheartening and let's face it-absolutely cute stories about my students instead of a revelation, as it feels to me. But I hope some part of this post shed some kind of light into the difficulties and opportunities I have as a Pre K teacher in a low income community. I cannot wait for the rewards which I cannot help but believe will come of academic and social maturity in each and every one of my students. In the mean time, I must reflect on my end goal and whether or not my lessons (both planned and inherent) are aligned.
Until next time.
"Every reform needs examples more than advocates" -John Kerry
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