22. Doodling

#64Challenge

We are happily (and slowly) making our way through the wonderful Global Read Aloud The Bridge Home. The kids are really loving it, and we are enjoying communicating with classes in Canada, Michigan, and Indianapolis.

The Global Read Aloud community has more ideas and resources than any teacher can possibly use. One activity I found especially compelling is Doodle Notes. Most of my kids took right to this. This gives them an opportunity to practice their listening skills, while playing with words, images, and colors. Sometimes I ask them to answer a question on their Doodle Notes as a way to finalize the lesson. I have found Doodle Notes a wonderful way to focus and involve everyone in the listening activity, at whatever level they can participate.

Here are some initial examples from all of my classes, advanced and intensive.

21. Truth

#64Challenge

Inspired by a journal entry from Terry Tempest Williams, I reflect on a moment with the student Harry I wrote about in previous post.




A child. A smile. I didn't expect to see him sitting there,
like an unexpected sunflower. I said "hello" to him.
The joy on his face! A comfort in this place. It brought me
to the knowledge once again: where I put my attention
expands. Simply that. I believe in the fire of this truth.

20. Calm

#64Challenge

Today I was heading into the cafeteria for my teacher lunch when one of our counselors stopped me. We have a student at our school--a 6th grader--I will call Harry since his initials are the same as Harry Potter. Anyway, as quiet and good as Harry is in my class, it turns out he is a raging bear when it comes to going to school. He misses a lot of days because he throws such angry tantrums he scares his parents into letting him stay home. The weird thing is this has been going on since 3rd grade, yet to this day no one has figured out the root cause of his angst. He is just a little quiet guy so learning this about him took us all by surprise.

The counselor stopped me to say he was in school today (he's been out the past 2 weeks),  and that he had told her he liked my class best because it's calm. I had to giggle. He's in 10th period with a few characters who want to do anything but work. Harry sits with other super quiet kids, so I guess that is his frame of reference. I wouldn't classify the class as calm.

When I giggled, Betty assured me that she knew this was the truth about my class because other kids have told her the same thing. I decided to just take the compliment the way she meant it. The day before our ESE specialist had said something along the same lines. I had giggled then, too.

So many times I feel things are just crazy out of control. But I'm beginning to realize it's just my faulty perception. I will give myself credit for what is going right, and call it a win. 😀

19. Things I Am Noticing

#64Challenge

This is not pre-planned. I've made no list. I just found myself here and felt it was time to just write about the things I noticed this week.

1. I gave my readers a survey and noticed that in general, things are in positive motion.

2. I hung up my Dream Flag for the first time in my CLMS classroom, and it is a beautiful companion.

3. I gave up hope that my disruptive learners would act differently. It enabled me to take more relaxed action when they did.

4. I was able to think creatively about how to handle specific situations with my advanced readers.

5. I'm developing different and more expansive ways to realize literacy.

6. The calendar seems to be my enemy at times because I have so many ideas. This has caused me to layer ideas together in integrated ways, yet still get the job done.

7. I found myself tuning in to learners who have been on the fringes. That felt good.

8. I introduced Doodle Notes to my readers with great success.

9. I feel bad I haven't gotten to found poetry yet.

10. I'm enjoying seeing the little successes every day.

What You Can't Hear

Inspired by Nick Flynn's poem of the same title.

There are little sparks, always,

little fires that burn

The fires are hope and fear

underlying all our thoughts

Hope that we can be different

Fear we won't

Hope that others will behave differently

Fear they will not

Hope that something will change

Fear it won't

Hope that chaos will end

Fear of never feeling peace

Hope for magic

Fear that magic is forever gone

What you can't hear

is the damage being done

The match struck, the hidden flame

eating away at anything that feeds it

We can only end the fire

by not providing oxygen

Don't breath life into hope

Don't give an inch to fear

18. The Really Real

#64Challenge

Inspired by Gary Snyder's poem "The Really Real"


This week began with my vow to be a
kinder, gentler, calmer, more loving teacher
yet I found myself at the end frazzled and
anxious, once again feeling like I have failed
myself in my attempt to be a different person.

I read Gary Snyder's poem this morning about
driving up a highway and all the commercial sites
and how it took getting off the beaten path to
witness the beauty of nature across a field, what
he called the "really real" unlike the highway and
the restaurants and urban life.

The really real is remembering to help a student
know the purpose of the assignment, when she
approaches and wants to know what her grade will
be if she doesn't do this particular assignment, and
we talk through it, how it isn't about the grade, it's
about what we are learning. She soon realizes her
frustration is because what she wrote didn't make
sense and so I asked her, What did you learn? and
it takes her a bit of time but then realizes, hey, what
I write needs to make sense to me or it won't make
sense to my reader. She goes back and by the end
of class is smiling broadly. No zeroes for her!

The really real is having to tell my AP that there is
bullying going on in one of my classes, and praying
he might be able to get through the bully, for I've
had no success.

Then there is a boy I will call Gary in my 2nd period
Speech and Debate class, a boy that keeps showing up
in my elective classes, witty and gifted, but often an
instigator. Yesterday I had to pull the big guns on him,
something I'm not sure I've ever had to do since we
started the PBIS system in our school. I wrote him once
for disruption, he went and got his lunch detention, and
returned to continue to disrupt. I warned him the next
step is a referral, yet he continued. So, yeah, I wrote
him a second time and booted him out of class. Perhaps
the class was a bit shocked, we were studying famous
speeches and I thought they weren't really into it,
weren't really paying attention, yet their papers
revealed they were, indeed, applying the lessons they
were to learn about pacing and reason and pathos. 
The really real, when the learning occurs even when
a teacher is constantly sidetracked by craziness and noise,
and is convinced everything is a failure. So, I guess this
is to say, no zeroes for me, even if I find myself
not as kind and gentle and calm as I'd like. It's the really
real, and writing this is a chance to stand in the field
and look to the sky and say...well, not all bad.

17. Slow Down

#64Challenge

I was having one of the best teaching weeks of my life.

And then I hit the Wall of Sound.

Yes, 2nd period did it to me once again. For nearly an hour I battled nonstop talking. Even with presentations going on, there were only rare moments when only one person was talking. My reminders to listen, to focus, largely went unheeded. By the end, I was tremendously rattled. I could feel myself physically affected by the constant noise.

Right after the class of 30 comes a class of 28. I managed to get them reading quietly while I caught my breath. But even still, I had done myself a disfavor by trying to do too much during that period, leaving me feel frustrated and angry. I was so grateful the next period was planning.

And I remembered what I needed to do: SLOW DOWN.

I took one thing at a time. I ate lunch. I wrote in my journal. I made some copies for next week. One foot in front of the other. And I made a vow to not push through my afternoon classes, but take it easy and enjoy them.

And I did. 😀  We did some discussion and writing and reading, ate a little candy, and played a game. My day was saved thanks to 2 little words: SLOW DOWN.



(Photo credit Paula Sizemore)

16. (More Than) One Plastic Bag

#64Challenge

Getting ready to experience the Global Read Aloud with the book The Bridge Home has made me seek out a number of different ideas. When the whole world is planning to teach the same unit, you would be absolutely amazed at the resources pulled together.

Today I had an open space with my 8th period I could have filled with something else. But I felt that their commitment to getting their work done and being such a great class deserved a little something extra. This is where the book One Plastic Bag came in, a picture book recommended to go with The Bridge Home.

One Plastic Bag is about a group of women in Gambia who figured out a way to use the plastic bags that were littering the landscape. They created out a way to spool them in strips and crochet them into little purses. It changed their lives and the environment. (See the purses here)

We read the book together, learning a few cool words along the way, and then I pulled out the activity. Let's make a jump rope from plastic bags.

I had brought all the bags I had from home. I ran a video explanation. And the kids took it from there. In no time at all, we had a usable jump rope. I even had yearbook come to take some pictures while they worked.

Everyone pitched in on the effort. Check out the photos!

15. October Motto

#64Challenge

A couple of years ago our Reading Coach got us all these little magnetic white boards so we can display special messages. I've used it in a variety of ways, and this year the plan is to broadcast my "monthly motto."  For September it was "All You Need is Love."  Today, I updated it for October. 

Over the weekend I thought a lot about the importance of "how."  Learners often don't know why they are doing things, and they also don't care how they do them. I want to put more emphasis on how we attain mastery, how we deepen our personal identities, and how we can be more creative. Mastery, Identity, and Creativity are why we do what we do--everything has to filter through that. But HOW we do it--that is where our values come in. Things like respect, responsibility, risk-taking, and making sure everyone feels like they belong. It's a work in progress, but the feeling in the classroom today was very positive as we progressed on our "whys" and paid attention to our "hows."  

Other Highpoints:

Shark Tanks are going well in Speech & Debate. My AP --a speech teaching guru himself--happened to stop in while one was going on. He got curious and stayed a while. The kids are really being sharks when it comes to picking apart the ideas presented. I'm happy to report that out of 4 presentations, two got funded!  

Intensive readers tried their skill at summary writing based on the close reading we did on Chapter One of House on Mango Street. This is the first assignment I'm actually putting a mastery score in the  gradebook. Happy to report that a majority hit the mark. 

Creative Writing started prepping for writing Post-It Note Plays. Their overarching theme is "actions have consequences."  We will continue this on Thursday, so hope to have more to report then. 

A