Spring break = spring reset

As spring break is winding down, I am thankful for the break from the hectic pace of school and now reflect on the goals I set at the beginning of the year.  Only about 50 days of school remain in this year.  I think back to our keynote speakers at the beginning of the year as well as several articles I read to kick off the school year.  They had one main thing in common - why.  What is your why?  Know your why.  Focus on your why.  Share your why.

I set several goals for myself including to engage more with parents and the community and to guest teach in all teachers' classes.  I started off by engaging parents through a dinner at our back to school night.  I have worked with our PSTO and CPSO to encourage more parent participation.  Why is this important to me?  I know that students do better in school when their families take pride in it as well.  And parents will take pride in a school that they feel welcome in and a part of.  We have a very diverse community and need to celebrate it.  For the last part of the school year I would like to host a family night event at school to welcome our new feeder elementary schools and connect them with our current community.  I have already created a rough draft and hope to work with the PSTO during the next meeting.

I have taught several classes for teachers, yet have several yet to go.  It has been difficult to find the time to teach classes and to coordinate with teachers' schedules.  I have found that it is hard for them to let go!  Why is this important to me?  It gives me a purpose and a reason to connect and work with my teachers.  It gives me the opportunity to spend time with students and see how they learn and act in a classroom environment.  I plan to continue this endeavor and teach as many classes as I can in the time that remains.  However, I now realize that I might not get to teach every teacher's class.

I also shadowed a student this year, led our PBIS team to model distinction by our AEA, and helped to decrease the achievement gap in our Iowa Assessment scores.  I attended the PLC institute and led our Instructional Leadership Team to implement the PLC process in collaborative teams.  Yes, these are all great accomplishments, but I know that there is more work yet to do.  And I have more goals yet to accomplish.  That is why this is not just a spring break, but a spring reset.  Time to have recharged, reflected, and refocused.  Why?  For the students, staff, and for yourself.  Have you taken the time for a spring reset?

Language Arts 8 - March 10, 2017

Sure, I'll teach your class on the Friday before spring break..... said no one ever! But I did.  I took over Ms. Starr's 8th grade Language Arts class Friday afternoon before we all left for break.  Everyone was ready to get out of school, including me.  But the students were willing to participate and complete the work we needed to get done.  Thank goodness for such good students!

Our task was to read the next section of Flowers for Algernon and make connections.  This is something students had done previously in the week.  I read this book many years ago.  So I asked students to help me remember what was going on in the story.  Students did a great job of filling in the gaps that I couldn't recall.  We read the section where the narrator was beginning to gain intelligence and discovered that people were not actually his friends.  Students made so many good connections and we had a fantastic discussion about whether or not it was worth it for the narrator to become smarter yet lose his innocence.  The vast majority of students said yes.  They argued that they wouldn't want to be left in the dark or that it wasn't fair that the other students could pick on the narrator.  Several students participated in this discussion, even ones I know were struggling with things outside of the classroom.  Students also made connections to times when they had been bullied or thought that someone was their friend and then realized they were not.  Someone also made the connection to the Tom Hanks' movie Cast Away by noting that it is almost like the narrator was marooned on an island until he began to gain intelligence.

Although we all had several other things on our mind (sun, sand, vacation), we had a great discussion and finished what we needed to do.  Students also made their selections for upcoming book talks that I hope I get a chance to hear!  I'm so thankful to have had a great class to work with before leaving for break.