March Madness

Any teacher knows, April doesn't cut it. March is the cruelest month. It's typically still cold, dark and dreary, and there are zero vacation days. The kids get, let's say, extremely squirrely. They get tired of rules, tired of tests, tired of sitting, tired of the weather, tired of school lunch, tired of behaving, tired of the rat race, and just - tired.

So do the teachers.

So we all start being crabby, and that's no way to run a classroom.

In order to remedy this situation, I have hit upon a few new strategies. One of them is a sort of mid-year redecoration. I'm having a good time putting up new signs about our rules, changing the bulletin board border, getting new baskets for the library, re-organizing the signs on the baskets (we're getting more sophisticated, instead of "Non-Fiction" now we have "Non-Fiction: Health and the Body" and "Non-Fiction: Earth Science," and the like. I also reorganized my supply closet. Gaze upon its beauty:

Then, because we had a Science Fair project to complete, and because I thought it might be more fun than watching stuff float in salt water, we did this:

That is correct, we made ice cream in class by jumping up and down, basically. Instructions for this little beauty are here: http://www.asliceofhomeschoolpie.com/2012/02/ice-cream-in-bag-science-experiment.html

And, finally, I have decided that while we are working on a non-fiction genre in reading and writing, we need a little levity. So we're reading all of the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle stories. If you don't know them, go look them up at your library. The first grade is in stitches - every single day.

And by these methods, we hope to claw our way through to spring, the sweet spring. Which technically is only another three days away.

Bzzzzzzzz!

Here's a nifty little energizer for anyone who works with children. When they get cranky and need to re-focus, this is a good one:

Do this with your hands:

Tap tap (on knees) Clap clap (repeat ad nauseum)

Say:

Flee (children repeat each line after you say it)
Flee fly
Flee fly flow
Flee - fly - flow - mosquito
Oh, no no no more mosquitos!
Itchy itchy scratchy scratchy
Oo! I got one down my backy!
Get that big bad bug with the bug spray.
Shhhhhhhhhhh (make bug spray noise)

A variation is available here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AY-KjQ0ebAo to get the general idea of how it's performed.

The Thin Pink Line

Elementary school teachers are supposed to be sweet. We're supposed to be kind. We're supposed to be mild-mannered. We wear pink. We hand out birthday pencils. We explain how rainbows work.

As the Powers-That-Be continue to rain down new requirements upon my children, I find myself getting less so by the minute.

No six year old should sit in his classroom weeping because the testing is stressing him out. Last month said PTB began demands to I test my children on things that are not even in our curriculum - the curriculum I was assigned, not one I chose.

More and more, I am the person standing between the educational policy makers and my children. More and more, I stridently insist that I will not disseminate this insanity to the first grade.

This, folks, is why I need tenure. Not just to protect me - to protect THEM.

Since When?

Hm. The Mayor says I'm in the bottom 20 percent of my college class and didn't go to a very good school.

Oberlin College, my Alma Mater, is consistently ranked in the top 25 in the country. So that's a no-go. My GPA was a 3.8. That's probably going to ruin his "fact" stating right there.

He also says if he could just fire half of us union-clinging liberals (well okay, I added the liberal part in), the school system would be...HEY PRESTO! Fixed. He would simply double the class sizes and put a GOOD teacher in there.

In all my conversations with my fellow educators, guess how many times I've heard someone say, "I want more money?"

Zero. Bagels. Big fat round hole in the middle doughnuts.

The old refrain? "I want my class size to be smaller. It's impossible to do my job really well with too many kids."

When will they ever learn.

Encore La Morte

One more day. Tomorrow is the LAST. DAY. OF. SCHOOL.

This time of year teachers get..well...tired. Students get tired. Everyone is over it.

But today I showed the fifth grade the end of Carmen, which we have been watching for the past few days. I admit it, I fast forwarded through quite a lot of Act III, most notably Micaela's aria. Let's face it: Sopranos got a raw deal in this opera. Everyone puts his head back and counts the lights in the ceiling when the first chords of Je dis float over the audience. We saw the Card Scene, talked about foreshadowing, saw the knife fight and moved on.

But the end, oh the end. I watched 100 fifth graders creep further and further towards the edge of their seats as Don Jose fell to his knees and pleaded with Carmen not to leave him (by the way, Roberto Alagna and Elina Garanca, you have no idea how much you rocked the world of a bunch of 10 year olds). They hissed in disbelief as he brought the knife down next to Carmen's head. They muttered "no way is he going to kill her!" as she shrugged free of him and tossed his ring contemptuously to the ground. They gasped in horror, "NOOOO!" as he dealt the coup de grace and she sank, lifeless, to the floor. "MISS CLARA HOW COULD HE DO THAT????

Because that, my children, is Art. Go forth and buy tickets.

Wider Still and Wider

Wow. Um. Yeah I know. Seven months later or so.

What a year.

When I sort it all out, I'll post it. For now:

So this week we had auditions for the annual talent show. One of my favorite students (yes, we do have our favorites, live with it), let's call him Ibrahim, decided to audition with his guitar. Which he has been "studying" for one week.

A little background: earlier this year Social Services visited his house because his "What I Did On My Summer Vacation" essay detailed how he went somewhere very private and learned how to shoot AK47's. With a name like Ibrahim, you can guess what conclusions were drawn.

And...this child...is a child of God. His sweet soul shines out of his face. When I played the opening chorus of the Bach "Magnificat" earlier in the year, he sat, transfixed. When it ended, he waved his hand madly in the air. "Miss Clara! THIS...This MUSIC...makes you FEEL things!" This kid could no more be a terrorist than the kittens on icanhascheezeburger. All year long he questions, "Miss Clara, why did King Henry do that? How did Mozart decide that? What did Beethoven do after that?" And nods thoughtfully after every answer - or responds eagerly to the question I ask back.

So up he gets on the stage and plays one note at a time: Dum..dummmmm...dum dum dum/dum...dummmmm....dum dum dum....

Miss Clara (to Principal): Um...is the terrorist playing "Havah Nagilah?

Principal: Uh...yep.

Four bars. Then he jumps up. "That's it!"

I pull him aside. Where did he learn that? Oh, he's been studying for a week with his Argentinian friend. Apparently, the friend is an Argentinian Jew.

In another month, I have to let Ibrahim go. I will watch him march solemnly down the aisle to the strains of "Pomp and Circumstance," and hand him one of two new honors awards this year - for Music Historian. I feel pretty good about him though. I did my job. That which the lyrics to Pomp and Circumstance are all about:

Wider still and wider shall thy bounds be set;
God, who made thee mighty, make thee mightier yet.

That's MAY I has more