A New School Year

I have been in St. Louis for a little over two weeks now and have been frantically preparing for the first day! I was hired at Eskridge High School, which is in the Wellston School District. This is different because I was expecting to be placed within St. Louis Public Schools which has very different expectations for its staff and students, however, I am excited about the opportunities Wellston presents for me. The town itself is located just outside of St. Louis, in St. Louis County. It faces significant challenges with a high poverty rate, high unemployment rate, and very little industry and public transportation for its residents. At my school 99% of our 180 students are on free/reduced lunch and every student eats breakfast at the school. That being said, there are many success stories from our students. We have an excellent basketball team that goes to state every year. The football team plays JV, there are usually no more than 20 players, however, last year they were undefeated against schools 10 times our size. 100% of graduates have been accepted to college over the last 2 years.

That being said, this will be a particularly challenging year in Wellston. The district was taken over by the state a few years ago, and according to its individualized plan if the school does not make significant progress this year all of the staff will be fired and they will have to start anew next year. This is looking more and more challenging because while the school has been making small steps toward progress, last year the district as a whole only had about 12% proficiency on their state exams. I am going to have to be very conscious of how I use my time in my classroom to ensure that I am maximizing it as much as possible.

I am going to be teaching Geometry, Algebra II and Analytical Geometry this year. Having to prepare for three classes will be a lot to handle, and I am trying to do as much planning as possible before school starts. I don't have enough textbooks for each student to have their own, so I will have to work around that during classtime and for homework. Additionally, students do not typically have their own calculators. There is one set of graphing calculators for the school, but this makes it difficult for students to practice using them in order to be comfortable enough with the calculators for testing.

The veteran teachers at my school have been extremely supportive so far. Our new teacher orientation was cancelled, so I have been receiving bits and pieces of advice at random intervals during this last week from them. The veteran teachers have told me that one of the biggest issues with the students at Wellston is that they have to trust you and they have to learn that you care about them, otherwise nothing will be accomplished in the classroom. As a stranger to the district this will require a lot of team-building and culture-building activities during my first week instead of a lot of content knowledge.

I will let you know how the first day goes, hope all is well at home!

The last few hurdles

Our school was broken into earlier this week. We got to school in the morning and were told to check our classrooms, make note of what was missing and let the custodial staff know if we had any permanent damage. The school believes the culprits to be students, as they knew to cut the alarm cord during the school day, hence nobody knew about it until that morning. While cutting the alarm cable, they also managed to cut the phone lines, the network wires, and a few other important cables because the computers and fax machines no longer work at the school. When my group and I walked into our classroom we noticed the desks were out of line, school supplies were dumped around the room, there were gang tags spray painted on the wall and a red line was spray painted across both white boards and our chalkboard. I was going to be teaching number lines that day so I thought they just made my job a little bit easier - but the custodians were able to get the spray paint off the boards fairly quickly. Darn. We actually weren't even allowed to stay in our classroom that day. The spray painted gang tags on the wall were deemed a big enough concern that we were moved into a different classroom for the day so they could repaint our room and have it ready for the rest of the week. However, we didn't have the worst damage. All of the classrooms have LCD projectors at our school, about half of which were taken, we were thankful to see that our's was still in place. Coffee creamer was taken from the teacher's lounge and dumped all over several classrooms and in the worm terrarium. Poor worms. The vending machine glass was broken and the majority of the chips, candies and cookies were taken, except for about 4 bags of M & Ms, some butterfingers and a bag of cookies. I laughed when I looked at the machine at the end of the day and noticed those last few items were now gone too. I guess that is the least of the school's worries.

Even though the breakin was disheartening, I was so impressed with the way the Parks administration handled it. Everything was organized so that the most pressing needs were taken care of immediately (like our classroom) and others issues were taken care of within the school day. It was amazing to see how quickly the mess could be cleaned up.

One of my favorite students was expelled yesterday. He is a student that has a lot of energy and can definately be a lot to handle sometimes. It often takes him longer to understand a topic than the rest of the class, but when he finally understands it, you can see how excited he is through his actions and it is incredibley rewarding. So even though he was not an easy student, nor the smartest, he was one of my favorites specifically because of his energy and large personality. I finally figured out how to manage him and help him become a positive asset to the classroom: he became my computer clicker. I started making powerpoint presentations with our example problems and he would just click the arrow on my laptop to get to the next slide. That movement of being able to stand up and click the arrow and feeling like he was needed in the classroom made such a positive impact on his behavior in class, I could hardly believe it! However, he has some anger issues, and I couldn't do a lot for him when he cussed out and was defiant with another teacher, and he won't be back for the last few days of summer school. It breaks my heart because he was a student who needed to be in class and learning the material. He can still take the test next wednesday, but without those last few days of structured review, I can only hope that he will get the score he needs.

We have a three day weekend because of the Fourth of July, and it has been nice to simply relax today. Throughout the last four weeks I always try to have one day of free time when I don't do anything class related - and I think it has helped to keep me sane. Monday-Thursday I work about 16 hours a day and Friday and Sunday are about 10 hours a day. I need a totally free Saturday to remember that I am a real person still. Today I went to the World of Coca-Cola, where you learn about the history of Coke and you get to try Coke products from around the world. I tried some that I wish they sold in the U.S. and some that certainly made me aware of cultural differences in flavor preference. Afterwards, we went to the Georgia Aquarium, which is the largest aquarium in the world. It was so relaxing to just be able to stare at fish for a few hours.

After this weekend I only have 2 more days with my students before the test and I am not sure who is more nervous: me or them. I sent them home with a practice test to take this weekend, hopefully they will come back with it complete on Monday and with a better idea of how to take the test. Wish them luck!

"Nose to the Grindstone"

We are now more than halfway through Institute - which means there is only 1 week left for my students before they take their test that will determine if they are going to high school next year. It is a stressful time for me and them, and you can tell in our classroom that everybody is starting to become a lot more serious.

Last week I learned the importance of developing a partnership with the parents of my students. I had to make one phone call home because a student was misbehaving and then looked at all the numbers in front of me and started to wonder what would happen if I just called them all... (I only have 11 students, so it wasn't an unreasonable mission). The responses I got from parents just blew me away. When I told one mother that her son received the highest score in our class on his midterm assessment, she started crying and was so thankful. She was asking what else she could do to help him and make sure he was on the right track. A father told me that he makes his son study for at least an hour every night, so I needed to make sure he was taking notes in class. When I told another mother that her son was consistently late for class, she physically walked him to school holding his hand the next morning to make sure he was there on time. Since those first phone calls I have seen a renewed dedication from my students every day in class.

Last week we received the surprise "TFA Day" which stands for Totally Free Afternoon. We were able to leave our school when the students get out (usually we have sessions for about 3 1/2 hours after they leave) and come back to Georgia Tech. It was wonderful to have a free afternoon in the middle of the week to relax, regroup, and get to bed early.

I feel like I am starting to get the hang of this teaching thing, and that some of the life lessons I am trying to implement are sinking in too. Today when my students were working on an activity I saw one student trying to cheat off another student's already complete activity. When the second student saw this he said, "Man there is no need for you to cheat. Come on. I will show you how to do this." At which point he proceeded to work through several problems with the struggling student, and when I checked later the student who tried to cheat understood the concept. I was so proud of my helper.

This week is our "nose to the grindstone" week, meaning I give the students an extra 8 pages of homework that are actual questions taken from previous CRCT tests (this is the test they need to pass next week). We are now having a competition for who can bring in the most homework, which includes this extra homework, for a prize at the end of the school year - hopefully this will be a good enough incentive to ensure that they are all studying and practicing every night!

With one week left I am finding myself spending more and more time planning and trying to find creative ways to keep students engaged during my lessons. As I get to know each and every student better, I know exactly why they need to go to high school next year and why I need to push myself to ensure it happens. Hopefully it will be enough.

One week in.

I have now completed my first week as a teacher. My first three days suprsisingly went without very many problems, and then Thursday came along. The students were upset because one of their classmates had been expelled during an earlier block for confronting the teacher, and they were definitly in a defiant mode. By the time it was my turn to teach them they were so out of control that even when I was handing out warnings, phone calls home, etc. I felt like I was being a very ineffective teacher. Right before lunch I gave them a chewing out stating that their behavior was unacceptable in my classroom and that they had now lost all priviledges to sit and work in groups and when they got back the class was going to work in silence. This was my first time having to deal with major misbehaviors from the class and it was certainly a difficult situation. However, when they got back from lunch each student was silent and worked individually without too many issues, so I guess my speech did mean something to them.

Friday morning, the 3 partner teachers and I decided that we needed to do a total discipline crackdown. When the students walked in the classroom their desks were no longer put togther in groups, but they were in rows, facing forward. We then had each student write an essay answering the following questions: 1) why are you in summer school? 2) What do you want to accomplish at the end of the summer?) and 3) who do you want to be proud of you when you accomplish it? Our hope was that they would refocus and begin to understand how their behavior in the classroom is going to affect many things in total. The rest of the day showed that they had started to think about this concept, because we had very little misbehavior issues that day. I even had some time to re-teach a few of the concepts that they had missed out on yesterday.

All together, I am really proud of my students already. Even in the short week that I have been teaching them they have shown a ton a growth in their mathematic academics. There are a few students who will catch onto a new concept pretty quickly, and then are willing to help me by teaching it to the struggling students. There is one student who is more behind than the rest, which the class is very aware of. Yesterday, he answered a pretty difficult question correctly in front of the class and everybody turned around and congratulated him, one kid even gave him a high five. Their support for each other is amazing.

They all understand the importance of their hard work too. I have started handing out extra homework that I tell them I will not grade and it is not required, but then explain that it is extra practice and thus beneficial for them to pass the test. The next day, at least half of the students consistently bring it back to me, with questions on some problems that they need answered. Some of my students have even taken to showing up half an hour early in order to get individual tutoring help. Considering we have a full hour in the morning when we give individual tutoring, their dedication to get to school even earlier blows me away.

Next Wednesday they take their mid-term, this is going to give us a measure of how much they have already taken in of the objectives we have taught thus far. This makes me excited to see how far they have come, but also nervous to see how much farther they have to go. Each of my students has amazing goals for their lives, one wants to be an engineer, one a psychologist, another a teacher, etc. I have been working so hard to make sure they pass the test at the end of the summer and it scares me that I only have about 12 more days to teach them all that they need to know. Even though it means a lot of late nights for me, as I learn more about each student individually I challenge myself to work harder and harder to make them understand.

Ms. Koos - 8th Grade Math Teacher!

Yesterday was my first day of teaching! Aside from a few minor mishaps, the kids were relatively well behaved. I think I was moving through the material at a much quicker rate than they were expecting, which cut down on a lot of behavior issues. Of course, when I gave my assessment at the end it showed that maybe I went a little too fast for them, because they were only at 20% mastery of our skill, which was simplifying square roots using the Greatest Perfect Square Factor. However, I assured them that we would continue to review this topic the next day during all of our lessons.

Apparently, they needed a day to let the lesson simmer, because today as we were working on the division of square roots and whole numbers, they were all able to at least start to simplify their expressions and most of the students got it right! However, in the process of our lesson today, I realized that our students didn't really know what square roots were. This is basic math they should have learned a few years ago, so I took a step back for 10 minute and did a mini-square roots lesson, before I had to attempt to finish my lesson for the day.

For one hour in the morning the three other teachers who are teaching my class and myself are in the room with the students at the same time. During this hour, we split into ability groups to work on basic math skills using some fun math games. I sadly discovered that our students are lacking in some very important areas such as adding and subtracting time, ability to give change and how to calculate a percent. This certainly presents a challenge for me in my future lesson planning, as I push them forward to be able to pass their 8th grade math test I need to find creative ways to incorporate these basic math skill lessons also.

Speaking of lesson planning, I feel as though that is all I am doing nowadays. Because I am still new to the task, each lesson plan takes me a minimum of 3 hours to learn how to teach it, write a lesson plan, craft sample problems, homework, and an end of class assessment. This has lead to little sleep at night and a severe lack of communication to friends and family at home, for which I apologize. However, it is worth it as I see my students engage in the lesson, volunteer to write their answer the board to be analyzed by the class, and ask meaningful questions.

For the most part my class is relatively behaved. Granted, they are 8th graders so there will be a little squirelliness once in a while, which I have come to accept. We do have a few students who unofficially keep the class in check. After lunch the students have to walk in a straight and quiet line from the lunchroom back to the classroom. Before we can enter the class room one young lady in my class will stand and look at the line and wait for everybody to be straight and quiet. Once the line is acceptable to her she looks at me and says "We're ready." Meaning I should open the door and they are reading to begin class again. Surprisingly her critiques of them means more to my mostly male class than any instructions or warnings I give, so I let her police this part of the day. Additionally, once I give one student a warning he/she is always very eager to make sure that I am fair with my consequences and if they see something they think breaks the rules they say, "Ms. Koos, they should get a warning." It helps me out when my back is turned.

I am finding myself stating a lot of clique teacher phrases such as "Remember this is independent work. I want to see what you can do, not what your neighbor can do," or today when a female student was gently shoved by another student and I gave her a warning too, she complained that he shoved her and I told her "well, it wouldn't have happend if you weren't out of your seat." I had no idea how much you all were influencing me, but thank you to all of my Kaneland teachers, it is definitely working in my favor now.

Well I must get going if I am going to get any sleep tonight (I'm averaging between 4 and 5 hours a night). Let's see what the third day in the classroom will bring!

Tomorrow I lose my first name.

This past weekend was my first time to relax a bit this week. The Teach For America Corps in St. Louis already has a kickball league set up, and they are challenging us to a match when we get back. Obviously, we need to beat them so we spent a few hours brushing up on our kickball skills yesterday afternoon. I probably haven't played kickball in the last decade, but it was a lot of fun to get outside and exercise and be able to forget about lesson planning and calendaring and assessments for a little while.

Today is a beautiful day in Atlanta, perfect for another kickball game, yet I am preparing to be inside for most of it as I begin my transformation into Ms. Koos - 8th grade math teacher.

Tomorrow is my first day teaching students, and while I am very excited for it, I realize that I have a lot of work ahead of me. My objective that I am teaching tomorrow (simplifying square roots using the Greatest Perfect Square Factor) is a particularly challenging one for the students, as not a single person got it right on their diagnostic pre-test in the beginning of the summer. Additionally, the way the school schedule is set up my block for teaching is only 40 minutes, rather than 55 minutes like the rest of the teachers. Yet, I have to accomplish just as much during this time. I would like to rely on my ability to talk really fast - yet I don't think that will be the most effective considering I am teaching (they always told me to speak slow when public speaking) and I am in the South where people naturally speak a little slower. Drat. So I am spending my day trying to squeeze a minute here and there from 15 different places in my lesson. It is taking a lot of creativity and I plan on practicing it many times.

That is all for now - I am off to practice, practice, practice!

EK

I'm starting to feel like a teacher.

I arrived in Atlanta on Saturday with the caravan, stayed in a hotel and then headed over to Georgia Tech (where we will be training for the summer) on Sunday morning. This started my quick-speed "learn how to be a teacher" lesson. I have heard it compared to standing next to an open fire hydrant with your mouth open, there is no way you can take it all in. Thus far, I am doing okay, but we do have long days.

I have been assigned to work at Parks Middle School teaching 8th grade math to a class of 12 students who have to re-take the state test in order to make it to the 9th grade. I observed my class for the first time on Monday, which brought on the sudden realization that my work this summer will be affecting the rest of their lives. That's a lot of pressure for a first time teacher.

My days are filled with sessions. We have sessions on how to write lesson plans, how to interpret literacy differences in the classroom and incorporate literacy lessons into our math lessons, how to create assessments, and more. It has been a lot, but I am feeling more and more confident as I prepare to go into the classroom next week.

We are teaching in teams of 4 and are on a set schedule where we have 1 hour in the morning of homeroom, we call it Math/Lit Hour, where we can review topics and work with students on things they didn't understand the day before, go over homework etc. I am the third teacher to enter the classroom in a day and I will have 45 minutes to teach a lesson to my class. While it seems a little hectic, I am hopeful that my students are going to learn a lot this summer.

Don't forget to e-mail/message me! I would love to know more about what is going on back home!