How much more can I take

It’s funny. For many of my peers, this is their second year in front of students, or maybe  even their first, but for me, it’s my fourth – my seventh including my years as a religious educator. Over this span of time I have worked with countless educators, at all different levels and all different ages. I have been lucky. Most of my cooperating teachers have left me with some piece of knowledge, trained me to be the best I could be, inspired me to continue my studies, been the best thing that ever happened to me. Last semester, the Edge facilitators also served in this role. They were one of the nicest teams I had worked for. The responsibility I had gained from them was amazing. By the end of my fall experience, I was the lead teacher of my journalism class. I couldn’t wait to come back in the Spring, that was if I was allowed to. After several emails and several meetings, my placement was approved. I was more than excited.

Over the first few weeks here the light that shown from the Edge began to fade. It seemed as though the Edge facilitators turned their back on me. They were not there for me. It seemed like they no longer wanted me there. They were stressed because they had six SMC students, 2 on Monday and Wednesday, and 4 on Tuesday and Thursday. I believe they were being overstretched. Since I knew them and knew the system, I believe I bear much of the brunt of their stress. I am ignored in our office, left alone to figure things out. I have lessons cancelled on a moment’s notice. I have become a fly on the wall instead of an active intern. I no longer feel welcomed and this no longer feels like it is where I belong. Every Monday and Wednesday, it grows more and more difficult to go into school. I guess this is what it is like to work on a team that doesn’t see the importance of teamwork.

Things have got to change...

Things have not gotten any better at the Edge. I know the effective use of this blog is to reflect on what is right, but right now I need to vent on what is wrong. This will not be a normal blog or an eloquently written rant. To make this blog make sense, I am creating a chart of the crazy things I have witnessed at the Edge. This chart will probably be used as evidence in my case study -- that is if I can make it sound professional.

Negative Observations	Effect on the Students	Why it is wrong
Phil, one of the facilitators continues to pull a select number of students from classes to complete the building of the Edge sugar house. This is sometimes used for students who are having behavior or attention issues on the day of construction.	Like pulling out students for specialized instruction, pulling out students to work on the sugar house leaves gap in their study of specific content material. In the case of students who have IEPs or 504s, the time in the content classroom is extremely valuable and should not be infringed upon.	Students should only be pulled for construction, when content is not being taught or learned through practice. This may be through working during a study time, a recess, a free block, or afterschool. Students, especially those with disabilities should not be pulled from content learning environments.
In Elizabeth’s lit block, consisting of 12 students with moderate to severe disabilities, for the past few weeks have been working on a movie to promote the themes of the “Spread the Word to End the Word”. During its culminating week, students finished preparing for presentation during Lit Block on Monday, during Lit Block on Tuesday, and stayed after school on Tuesday. For almost the entirety of Wednesday’s school day, students traversed the schools giving presentation. To finish the week, students practiced for a district-wide common assessment on Thursday and went to a viewing of The Lorax at a local movie theater on Friday.	The students of Elizabeth’s lit block, some of the Edge Academy’s most vulnerable students, need the extra time of direct instruction to succeed in the classroom. Although it is great that the students were able to get involved in a national campaign, students lost almost, if not all, of an entire week’s worth of direct instruction time with a teacher, paraeducators, or student intern, which equals to more than 10 hours of loss instruction time.	Work on extra-curricular projects, such as the creation of the Spread the Word to End the Word Campaign should be saved for Project Time or entirely after school. The students in this class need all the instruction they can get and through taking several class periods to complete an extracurricular project, students are not given the education time afforded to them.
In January, students in Elizabeth’s Lit Block  began reading the book Popcorn Days and Buttermilk Nights. This book was read only once a week when student interns were there. As vacation came closer and the completion of a film project came to an end, the book was no longer read. As of 3/14 the book had not been read in 3 weeks. Starting the week of 3/19, Elizabeth would once again like to take up the book again in the classroom.	If a book is read only once a week, it becomes difficult for students to comprehend all of the literary elements that arise in the novel. These difficulties arise not only for students, but the teachers too. The comprehension challenges that arise from sporadic reading are especially inherent in students with moderate disabilities, such as the ones that form the population of Elizabeth’s lit block.	The reading of classroom texts should be done on a consistent basis to ensure comprehension. The reading of Popcorn Days and Buttermilk Nights should have occurred at least three times a week. Going forward, a review of the book must be done alone with a more consistent reading schedule.
Students in Phil and Lindsey’s lit blocks are tackling quite a bit during their short one hour class periods. In this one class, students are working on literature circles, preparation for a common assessment, participation in a technology survey, and participation in a special experiential learning partnership with a service coordinator in Ecuador.	Although it is wonderful that Edge facilitators are trying to give their students all the learning opportunities possible, it is difficult to achieve everything in one class at one time. The constant changing of topics may be difficult for some Edge learners to focus and complete all necessary tasks.	Curriculum opportunities should be better planned out with more space in-between. In order for students to focus on their work, curriculum focus must first come from the educators.

My Kids are Everything

This week at the Edge Academy showed the “roller coaster-esque” ride a teacher may take on any given week. With personal problems going on at home and at school, I was forced to grapple with creating a positive balance of my life and the lives of my students – putting them before myself. I could not let myself be distracted with what was going on with my friends and residents, but rather I had to focus on my student’s learning.

Monday started off with a train wreck. My car, the only car that Lexi and I have between the two of us was without a key, this it would not start. This was car number one. The car that I was able to borrow from my friend sounded like a wrench had been thrown into the engine, so Lexi and I decided to keep searching. This was car number two. Finally, Lexi was able to get aholf of her boyfriend and his car, so we were off to the school – 20 minutes later than we normally leave. Now this would still give us time to arrive before our kids, but our prep time would be limited. To make things worse, MBD, our supervisor, would be arriving to do an evaluation. Of course all of our cars would fail on this day. Some things turned around and the lesson went well – my kids were actually attentive and seemed eager to be in class. They definitely ate their Wheaties!

Wednesday was a hard day. By this time in the week, I was attempting to deal with triumph and tragedy. I had two residents taken to the hospital, both suffering from ailments due to their diabetes. 300 miles away, my mom sat in a hospital bed, awaiting word of why this was the fourth time in 5 months she had spent a week in the hospital. Tuesday brought the demise of my six month relationship with a girl I thought could be “the one”. Last but certainly not least, my assignments were slipping and my grades were showing it. I was stressed. I did not want to go to school. I did not want to drive 45 minutes, get disrespected by my co-teachers, fight with students to pay attention, and then drive home 45 minutes, just to have to sit through almost 7 hours of straight classes. Than I thought to myself, what if my teachers had done that to me as a kid. What if, when they were having a bad day, they didn’t come to school. I would be left behind. I would feel neglected. I would feel like they didn’t want to  be there. I had to go in. I had no choice. My kids depended on me. 

The Para Conundrum

What I am trying to teach

The Edge Academy’s curriculum is the perfect example of the benefits of project-based learning. Towards the beginning of the year, students begin to ask questions about themselves and about the world which will then be used to create the curriculum theme for the rest of the year or following months. When asking questions about the self and global society, students are given the opportunity to look deep within themselves and surrounding communities in order to create questions that are truly near and dear to the student. After these questions are formed, commonalities are formed. Within the commonalties, certain criteria must fall under the topic such as sustainability, the arts, etc. Students will then come up with possible project ideas and standard potentials. After designing a poster presentation of their ideas, student groups share their possible topics with the academy as a whole. Students then vote and one overreaching topic is chosen for the year. Next students will choose projects that both interest them and fall under the topic.H ere is where standards come into play with the linkage of content standards within the portfolios of student work. After projects are decided upon, the curriculum planning, for the most part, is done.

After months of working on their individual, or sometimes group projects, students present their projects during a special project night. I, alone with a co-intern from last semester and an intern from this intern that goes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, attended this year’s project fair. Immediately upon our arrival, students showed they were more than surprised that we came and were more than happy with our appearance. One student, Torie, commented, “You are the first student interns to ever show up.” I believe this broke any barriers that remained when it came to trust. As stated in a previous blog, I believe that more important than any lesson taught or any practice practiced, the building of strong trusting relationships between teacher and student is the basic building block of any positive learning environment. With just the simple act of attending my student’s project fair, students were able to see that I truly cared about them and what they are doing. I was so pleased with what the students accomplished and was blown away at some of their research and their products. 

Ladies and Gentlemen..Here is Mr. MIranda

Week four began with a quick lesson in the importance of a teacher’s ability to think on their feet. Due to a family emergency, Elizabeth was unable to get back to us about what she would like us to plan for the week. When Lexi and I arrived on Monday, Elizabeth approached me and asked if I would teach her class, so she could go home with her very sick child. Sensing the trust Elizabeth had for me, I stepped up to the plate and came up with an activity for the Monday and began to plan the Wednesday activity.

           We began the week with another exploration of ten vocabulary words. This time, however, students were asked to find their own words. To do this, I ripped a few sheets of scrap paper and handed a few “bookmarks” to each student. As we read in our semi-circle, students were asked to mark words that they did not know or words they thought everyone should know. This activity actually worked much better than I had predicted. Students enjoyed being able to bookmark words they did not know and were eager to go to the board and write them down once the reading was finished. All the words were then defined and a list was generated for all students to study for the impending Friday assessment.

           Wednesday brought forth one of my first opportunities to truly shine in the classroom. Students were given a worksheet that I had created based on an activity that I did with students during my first student teaching experience in Rhode Island. Each worksheet had a blank outline of a human head. Using the reading that had been completed over the past two weeks, students were asked to illustrate using words or images what they believe had been going on in the mind of Carley the main character. Students thought they were given an entire class to draw and color, but actually they were reflecting on what they had heard and summarizing using visuals. After they were finished, each student was more than excited to share using the Elmo what they had created. It was very interesting to see how each student interpreted the assignment differently.

           Week three provided me the opportunity to fully jump to the front of the classroom with both feet, of course with the assistance of my co-teacher Lexi. Nothing is better than witnessing students really become engaged and excited about what they are learning and completing in class. I hope to, over the coming weeks, to continue to tap into this energy that has begun to be fostered. I am curious to see what strategies work with different students and how I can use what I am learning in both my inclusive class and my literacy class in my classroom – only time will tell. 

Catching the Attention

Week 3 provided Lexi and our first experience of teaching our new class. It was our goal to introduce vocabulary and kick off the new book. Each class was 2 hours long, meaning we had to keep the attention of students with intellectual disabilities, many lacking an attention span of more than 10 or 15 minute. The task seemed daunting, but a task I observed Elizabeth complete just a week prior.

           We declared Monday “Vocabulary Day” and set forth on the task of teaching our students 10 new vocabulary words. These words varied in difficultly, but all came from the text that would be introduced on Wednesday. The normal Monday morning routine took about 45 minutes, a great cut in our learning time. The planned vocabulary went well until about the 5^th word. Attention was gone. Energy had fleeted. Lexi and I decided to stop and does some quick vocabulary exercise. For each word, an exercise was created that pertained to the number of letters in the word. For example, “Buttermilk” has ten letters in it, so students completed ten jumping jacks. This provided both an opportunity to get students out of their chairs, while also providing another learning opportunity.

           Wednesday began the reading of “Popcorn Days and Buttermilk Nights”. The students had already read the first three chapters of the book prior to our arrival, but stopped due to difficulty of the text. Elizabeth believed the students were now ready. We began with a book walk and predictions. Students were asked to predict what they believed would occur in the text relying only the front cover. This assignment really showed the varying levels of the students - some students wrote one sentence and others wrote short vignettes.

           It is funny how connected students and teachers can become in less than two weeks. I truly believe that my students, all twelve, trust me. As I assisted one with the editing of her autobiography, she told me I could be one of her “best friends”. This trust is vital for the progression of the classroom. If teachers want students to work hard, they must in turn work hard to build that trusting relationship. A student will never want to disappoint someone who they knew truly cares about them.

           After this week, I continue to struggle with the best practice of holding student attention spans. How can I get the best work from them? Where should I place breaks in the lessons? What should students do during these breaks? With time, I believe these questions will be answered to some extent, but the challenges will always remain.