Teacher in the middle

It's that time of year again...

2011-07-29T09:41:00.004-04:00

Well folks, here we are again...only about a week away from getting back into the swing of school. I spent the last day and a half planning a curriculum for my sixth grade GT students. I have to say that the ladies I worked with were very resourceful and extremely helpful and I really feel as though our curriculum is going to be SO MUCH BETTER this year! Not to mention that our Executive Director of Secondary Education Gifted and Talented (Grades 6-12), Mrs. M was very open and accepting of suggestions we made as the "experts" who have been teaching this for the last two years.

Most years I am very ready to go back to school...I get excited about meeting a new group of students and look forward to seeing my friends (teachers) who I don't get to see during the summer. I enjoy working with all these professionals and really love getting ideas from others. In years when I'm not so excited about going back to school, attending meetings like the ones I just did get me in the mood. I begin reconnecting with old friends, and often make new ones. And we have collegial conversations that are priceless. So, although I intend to thoroughly enjoy my last week (lots of time at the pool with my kiddos) I am ready to get back in the grind! :)

Happy back to school, everyone!

Ideas?

2011-04-26T13:17:00.002-04:00

Does anyone have any ideas on where I could find a really good Problem Based Learning curriculum for my gifted 6th grade math students? The GT curriculum we have right now is difficult to work with and I am getting frustrated, as are my students! HELP!

I'm teaching them how...

2011-04-07T13:55:00.003-04:00

The students in my GT Academy don't know it but the units of instruction I have been given for them just aren't really cutting the mustard. SO, the Media Specialist at my school made some recommendations for what we could do rather than me pulling my hair out and the kids hating me before the end of school. I'm not telling all of her ideas, because that would give it all away, but one of them was to teach the kids to create a blog or wiki, so I'm showing them on my Promethean Board how to do all this. They're sitting in the room, reading out loud, sounding quite ridiculous, but that is the life of a middle schooler, right? So I typed the first paragraph (above), then saved and showed them how to edit. TA DAAAAAAAAAAAA!

AFTER SCHOOL DETENTION

2011-02-09T12:03:00.004-05:00

This is what my classroom door looks like now.

My friend Kim hasn't yet explained to me how to make an image so that you can click on it and enlarge it (not that I've asked her...), so here's a close up of the Stop Sign.

And in case you still can't read the sign (because I'm not great at taking photos) it says this:

STOP

Do not even consider

stepping in this door

without your materials!!!

Thank you,

The Management

In the last week I have issued 24, YES, TWENTY FOUR...and if you're having trouble comprehending that number, count all your fingers, both thumbs, all your toes and four more fingers...After School Detentions for students coming to my class unprepared. What that means is that T-W-E-N-T-Y F-O-U-R times during the last week a student has interrupted my teaching to say they left something in their locker, at home, or just can't find it.

Do you think the sign will help?

This is really HARD!

2011-02-02T21:09:00.003-05:00

It's 9:09 on a Wednesday night. I have just gotten off the phone with one of my favorite students' mother. I had to call because *Melissa left her calculator in her locker for my class and had to ask if she could go get it. Of course she was allowed to get it, because she had to have it for class...but she also was given an After School Detention for having to go get it. Now, this is where it gets crazy...the fantastic, wonderful, beautiful, delightful child TOLD me that she left it in her locker, asked if she could go get it without a detention and even said "Mrs. Madden, it was on my mind...I told *Heath to bring his, but I just completely forgot to get it out of my locker!" I should have let her go get it without giving her a detention, right? I thought so too...

BUT, (you knew there would be a but, didn't you?) I have been working really hard at being a more consistent teacher. I have been known to overlook something because I considered the student who committed the grievous error (and said something like "Oh...it won't ever happen again"). Well, I've been called on it. Too many times to be comfortable. I don't like being accused of showing favoritism or being racist, because my job is hard enough without having to worry about that. For instance, when another one of my favorite students left her notebook in her locker (something that they need EVERY DAY!) and I gave her an ASD for leaving class to go get it, she was unaware that some other students had suffered the same consequences for the same or a similar behavior. When I called the home of *Brandy (who just happens to be African American) I was accused of being racist. Mind you, I LOVE *Brandy! She's smart, beautiful, flipping hilarious, respectful, kind...all the things you want your own children to be.

Another perfect example is *Stacy. She is a voracious reader. That is a great quality to have, especially in middle school. However, Stacy loves to read so much that if she's not taking notes from the board and should be listening to instruction or watching her MATH teacher do a "think aloud", she's reading...under her desk...with her book inside the pages of her notebook...or acting like she's tired with her head down and book in her lap reading. Then she wonders why she doesn't do her very best on tests and quizzes...too distracted by her reading. So in Stacy's class I made a rule...Ahem (in a very loud teacher voice) "Ladies and Gentlemen...from this day forward, if I see you with a book out reading...a book unrelated to math, and I have not expressly given you permission to read, like I might after a test or quiz, then you will receive and After School Detention!" Cut to the next day. *Jennifer, a fantastic, beautiful, sweet, smart student who makes straight A's in my class is reading her novel after she finishes her warm up. Rather than issue her an ASD I walk over and quietly whisper "put the book away...remember?" Now I want to make it clear that I do not remember ever having to ask Jennifer to stop reading and pay attention in class, AND she has not made a grade lower than an A all year. Anyway, now I'm unfair because I didn't give Jennifer an ASD. And to make it worse, Stacy is still reading under her desk top and I can't catch her, so the whole reason I made the rule just out-smarts me again!

See, here's the thing...I might give someone an after school detention that no one else knows about. So should I really make a spectacle out of it every time I give one, so that everyone is aware? Would that solve the problem? When I let *Kevin borrow my calculator, I didn't SAY "but you have an ASD" but maybe I gave one anyway. I had to call home and let his mom know, but Melissa, Jennifer, Brandy and Stacy didn't know that I did that...so they think I didn't. They now think I'm inconsistent and/or unfair.

This is REALLY hard! Being consistent. If they'd just remember their junk it wouldn't be so hard. If I didn't have to repeat the same thing 80 bobobbagazillion times, then I wouldn't have to make rules that seem so unfair. I wouldn't have to worry about being accused of being racist, or unfair, or weird, or WHATEVER! It wouldn't be so hard. By the way...Melissa's mom was the 14th mom I spoke to tonight. Does that make me unfair? I have 94-ish students...I issued over 10% of them an ASD. All I wanna do is have some fun...and teach some math while I'm doing that. HUMPH!

What does the word rigor mean to you?

2010-12-15T20:13:00.008-05:00

I've always been a decent student...rarely made all A's but worked hard and got mostly A's and B's. I made a few C's along the way and those are the grades that, when brought home, elicited a reaction from my parents, such that I didn't want to earn C's any more. In fact, the one that sticks out in my memory the most is the C earned in conduct the first grading period of first grade. I will never forget going into my mother's classroom at the high school, handing her my report card and WAITING for her to realize I had a C in conduct. Her face LIT up...she was so proud of me...I had earned A's in everything else! Then her eyes scanned over to the conduct column and all the joy just left her face immediately. She was devastated!

The point of this story is not to tell you that I was a talkative first grader and got a paddling every day during that school year...no, it's to explain that school was not easy for me. I had to work at it. It was rigorous...and satisfying for me to work hard at something and earn decent grades!

Since I've been teaching I've struggled with working hard to teach, and expecting my students to master what I've taught, but not feeling like I had a way to gauge that mastery. As fate would have it, the Superintendent in our district has set a goal for herself of seeing a common grading system in place in our district between middle and high schools. This goal led to the formation of a task-force of about 40 teachers from all the secondary schools in our district, who were charged with reviewing the current grading policy (which is very broad and open for interpretation) and fleshing it out so that it can be used by all teachers in order to be more fair when grading our students.

We worked for about a year, meeting approximately ten times to hash out items...it was not easy nor was it always fun, but it was always rigorous and led to lots and lots of communication and compromise from committee members. We were able to have good, solid collegial conversations about what we value for our students...and it turns out, we all value rigor for our students!

On Monday, December 13, I joined five other colleagues in making a presentation to our school board about our meetings and suggested changes we came up with. It was a very interesting meeting that you can read about right here.

I have read several books on rigor and have definitions that I like, but the one we used Monday night in our presentation is posted below...read this and tell me what you think. What does the word rigor (as it pertains to education) mean to you?

What is rigor?

•An environment where EACH student is expected to learn at high levels

•Complex, ambiguous, personally challenging

•Content mastery

•Applied skills and critical thinking

What is NOT rigor?

•Special program for select students

•Severity, inflexibility, or hardship

•A measure of quantity of content

•A measure of adherence to rules

The BIG birthday!!!!!!!

2010-10-12T21:46:00.009-04:00

My birthday was yesterday. I LOVE birthdays...mine and all those around me who have birthdays! I used to tell my students when my birthday was so they would at least say "Happy Birthday Mrs. Madden!" But the older I've gotten the less I tell them about my birthday...the kids keep getting younger and I...well, I keep having birthdays.

But this birthday was a big birthday with a zero hanging on the end. A fairly big "to do" has been made by those who I love and who love me about this birthday, with very intense verbal harrassment. My husband in particular (who happens to be five weeks younger than me) has reminded me quite often that I would be 40 before him. My dad fondly remembered the birthday card he got from his mother on his 40th birthday and vowed to get me a card that was just as vicious.

When I showed up to school on Monday I stopped by my friend Gina's office. Just as I was leaving her office, my teammate came up and started a conversation with Gina and myself. I didn't realize it at the time, but she was stalling. So eventually I was able to go into my classroom, and this is what I saw:

And a few minutes later, my teammate brought me a birthday hat. I wore it all day long...I forgot I had it on and then spent a lot of the day wondering why people were laughing at me.

It was a GREAT day!!!

Concert of Hope and Remembrance...

2010-09-28T21:39:00.004-04:00

Sometime back in the summer, the Cancer Association of Anderson decided they would remember my brother, Randy, at the Annual Concert of Hope and Remembrance. My dad is the director of the choir and orchestra. The Concert of Hope and Remembrance is a fund raiser for the Cancer Association of Anderson. They usually remember someone who has passed away due to cancer, but this year they blessed our "family system!" The concert was amazing...the music was outstanding and I got the impression that there was standing room only in the church sanctuary where the concert was held.

There were over 130 people singing in the choir.

My Dad was amazing at the concert! It's like watching a puppet master...he moves his pinky and people make beautiful music! I love this picture of him!

The music choice was Patriotic Music of America, and Music from other Countries too.

My sister, Becky, gave an extremely moving and very appropriate memorial speech about Randy. I wish that I had a recording of it to link here, but she has it posted on her blog. Please check it out at http://gritsandgossip.blogspot.com.

Randy would have been mortified that all this hoopla was made over him...but we enjoyed it and we got to miss him publicly. Great!

It's been a MONDAY...

2010-09-20T21:07:00.003-04:00

Well friends, today was a Monday ALL DAY LONG! It started out seemingly innocent and quickly went downhill! Here are a few of the things that happened that made this day seem like four days all rolled into one:
We were given a deadline by which to have grades in our state-wide grading program for mid-term reports. This deadline was AFTER the first deadline, which we passed because our district had to update the program the day before our first deadline, thus disabling the program.

I facilitated MAP testing for all my students, which is a big deal. They did well, but it was stressful.

I am hosting lunch study hall this nine weeks in my classroom. Lunch study hall was supposed to be pretty big today due to a re-test by another teacher, but I was administering MAP tests and couldn't get back to my classroom, so my poor teammate ended up having kids come to his room.

We had a curriculum meeting with our principal and instructional coach during planning, which has been scheduled for several weeks now. I made a stupid mistake and scheduled a parent conference during that meeting time. :(

When the parent arrived for the conference, another parent, who had canceled a meeting on Friday, showed up too, thinking that she would reschedule the meeting on her own, which would've been fine if we had not had the other parent in a meeting at the same time.

The conference lasted a little longer than I thought it would, so when I got outside to walk my student across the highway, she was already walking herself.

This is JUST the beginning. I'm not anywhere close to done with stuff that's important. I'm tired and want to go to bed. BUT, the saving grace is that I have a lot of great students this year and I love my job...and Saluda Trail is the best place to teach in the world. Did I mention that I love my job?

Independence...

2010-09-11T15:27:00.003-04:00

When we got back to school my principal asked us to complete a survey online. One of the things she asked us was what we wanted to work on to help meet our school goal of increasing rigor and achievement in academics. I said that I felt like I needed more guidance on how to use differentiation in my classroom. I know that differenting means that I will have students working on different concepts at various levels in the same class, but I'm having a hard time figuring out how to incorporate this into the middle school classroom. I think that part of the reason I'm struggling with this is that in my mind I will give up some control of exactly what's going on in my classroom. Another reason I struggle with this is that I feel like we don't have time to do anything other than give direct instruction and get it all covered.

Do any of my teacher friends have any suggestions? I'd like to try to go ahead and get started with this now since this is the coolest group of kids I've had in a very long time!

AAAAAAAAAAAAND We're OFF!!!

2010-09-04T09:30:00.003-04:00

I know it sounds like I'm at a race, and sometimes teaching feels like a race to me, but really, the title of this post is meant to indicate that school is well in session! In case it's been forever since you've talked to me, let me express to you once again, that I LOVE my job! Part of the reason for this is that I have taught at great schools. Part of the reason for this love is that I enjoy teaching math. Part of the reason for this is that I really enjoy teaching young adolescents. And part of the reason I love my job is because I have found my calling...what I should be doing with my life to make a difference in the world.

So this year is a pivotal year for me...I have a 6th grader in my house, who also goes to my school. I am enjoying taking him with me each day. I am frequently surprised when I round a corner in the building and run into him or look up from my desk and catch him walking into my room. I seem to forget that he's there, in my building, until I see him and my heart beats a little faster and I smile a little bigger every time he comes into my line of sight! The year that I was in 8th grade, and my mom taught 8th grade was the year that she quit teaching for several years. It seemed like she couldn't handle 8th graders with bad attitudes all day and then come home to an 8th grader with a bad attitude in the evening. So I'm hoping that my son and I don't experience anything like that this year. Overall, though, I think we've gotten off to a great start.

My students are really good kids this year. I teach roughly 100 students every day. By this time last year (and years prior) I had figured out exactly who's home I would be calling on a regular basis. I had already sent out several students with behavior reflection folders by now, and was fighting the urge to tell my husband that we had done our children a terrible disservice by bringing them into a world where they would have to live along side people like my students. I know, it sounds awful, but behavior problems in the classroom can really make a teacher feel beat down and can also cause him or her to lose faith in humanity. Well, this year I have not had to send out ANYONE with behavior reflection folders yet, and have only had to warn and/or isolate 2 boys (only for talking...not being nasty middle schoolers!). As selfish as this may sound, I am excited to think that this may be a year when I get to teach and care about my students, and just enjoy them! This kind of year is one of the things that keep teachers hanging on when we have four or five years of difficulty strung together.

I've had some funny moments, but none of them translate well into stories you can read, so I'll save the funny stories for my next post. Until then, I'm off to spend some time with my family and plan for doing the best job ever!

Way past time...

2010-06-19T18:18:00.002-04:00

I haven't posted since February. I profusely apologize to any poor, unfortunate soul who might read this blog, because it's just way past time for a post.

So much has happened since my last post...I'm really not sure where to begin. How about a basic run-down of each month:

March-my math teaching colleagues and I worked hard preparing our students for PASS testing. We were at the point of having to hurry so that we could cover it all. If you remember I also had an intern, Brittany, who was teaching full time by March. Brittany progressed very well throughout her internship. In March I was staying with her a lot, to help her "off the record".

April-an extremely busy month. Spring Break was at the beginning of April, which was very nice. We stayed home and enjoyed our time. Brittany was finishing up her internship at the end of April, so we had lots to do to get her completely finished and ready to graduate. The second week of April, when we got back to school, I had a horrible allergic reaction to something and broke out in hives all over my entire body. It was terrible, and I missed two days of school per doctor's orders. Brittany ended up having to teach for longer than we expected because of the reaction. PASS was bearing down on us, and we were in full swing of getting ready. We also played "The Price Is Right" one day at the end of our probability unit. We combined all our classes and had them play probability games we had designed and created based on some games from the T.V. gameshow. It was so much fun, and the students were able to demonstrate that they understood probability the way we taught it.

My brother and sister-in-law were expecting their first child at the end of April, and we were getting very excited about Bella's arrival. My daughter turned eight on April 26, which was a very happy day for my husband and I!!! Bella, (my neice) was scheduled to arrive on April 30 and I was so excited! My parents and step-parents made plans to go to Knoxville on April 30 to be there when Bella arrived. My own children were performing in the church children's choir musical that night, and I helped direct, so we were unable to go to Knoxville. Just at the end of the musical my husband came to get me...he had been called during the performance and notified that my OTHER brother was in a motorcycle accident in North Carolina. Randy did not survive the accident. As we began to process this devestating news, Ryan and Lindsey's precious baby came into our lives...the same day as Randy died, about 2 hours after his death.

There are so many things that happened during that first week after Randy's death, but there were a few things which made a DEEP and LONG LASTING impression on me...possibly even changed my life. First, when I had no idea what to do or how I could help my parents who were still in Tennessee, my sister Ashley, brother-in-law Kyle, and Ashley's dad Marty DROVE from our hometown to Knoxville AND BACK in one day, to pick up both my parents and drive their vehicles back so that they wouldn't have to do that. My other sister, Becky, demonstrated some amazing thoughtfulness in having people at the house when they arrived who would wrap them in love. She even called me to ask me if I could think of someone who could be there for my mom, as they were all coming back to my dad's house. My step-mom allowed (even encouraged) my mom and step-dad to stay in their house during those few days. This is an amazing family I have and am so grateful for them all!

May-a very blurred month! I do not remember much of what happened in May. Of course, the month began with the funeral for our precious Randy. I missed about one week of school after Randy's death. I know that my students and I completed PASS testing, which I was present for. We finished the year with a unit of study on Mt. Everest and took our students on a trip to Crowder's Mountain where they climbed the mountain (about as close to Everest as we get in these parts) and were able to see an amazing view at the top. The rest of the month was filled with cleaning out lockers, collecting textbooks, signing yearbooks, final exams and grade calculations.

June-just as quickly as we got into the swing of school back in August, we left school for our Summer Break. Two weeks have passed since the beginning of Summer and we are enjoying our break. I hope that this finds each of you who read (do I have any readers?) enjoying the warm weather too!

Sick Day

2010-02-16T12:13:00.002-05:00

I stayed home today for only the second day all year. This is so not like me, but I felt really horrible and would be of no use to anyone at my school! See, I love my job. I love teaching so much that today while I've been home I've maintained internet contact with my team, checking on students, notifying some parents of concerns I have about their child, planning for what Brittany and I will do next week. I can't turn it off.

I've had to make myself say no to some things school related this year. I didn't keep score for one single basketball game this season...I didn't even go to one single basketball game this season. My family needs me as much or more than my students. But I would be lying if I said I was good at being a wife and mom at the same time as I'm being a teacher.

Anyway, over the last few weeks I've been thinking about something really great I can post on here. I've decided that I'm going to share with you about my school. We're an IB-MYP school. It's a pretty cool concept for teaching. So if you want to know about IB-MYP before I can post more, google it and let me know what you find out. :)

Snow Day Projects

2010-02-01T22:45:00.008-05:00

Occassionally, in education, we encounter these things called "Snow Days". Now, generally, here where I live these are days that we miss due to bad weather...but not neccesarily snow...more likely ice, which is the case with us this weekend. So since I'm from the south, I don't attempt to even get outside when we have ice days like we have this weekend. So I made good use of the time I spent locked in my house...I pulled out the sewing machine and made new curtains for my bathroom. Please know that the frosted sticky paper I put on the windows will be removed and redone in the near future.

Since I had the machine out I went ahead and made a new cover for the head board. I had bought the fabric about a month ago when I was out with my mom one day and hadn't even tried to work on it. It was not nearly as difficult as I thought it was going to be and I feel so good about accomplishing this!

I will be shopping for a new comforter for the bed soon, but I just wanted to show the world that I can do something besides teach! :)

Introducing Brittany

2010-01-25T21:15:00.002-05:00

Last week I posted about having my second good intern. Brittany has really shown me what she's made of...she's still very quiet, but I think she will do really great when it's time for her to take my classes full time.

She's a beautiful girl who has allowed me to use a photo of her on here...please welcome Brittany to my classroom! :)

I'm doubly blessed

2010-01-16T18:39:00.002-05:00

So if you have been reading my blog for at least a year, you will remember that last year I had an intern named Shannon. Shannon and I had the best time teaching together. She was a wonderful teacher and I was so blessed to have her in my classroom, and to get to know her and be her friend. Shannon was so successful, and did get a job teaching, and is currently doing just that, and being a great mentor to her students!

This year I have another intern. Her name is Brittany. Brittany has been with me for two days, now. At first, Brittany appeared to be very quiet. But I have learned very quickly that she is not afraid to speak her mind...it's more like she only talks when she has something important to say. Not necessarily quiet, just thoughtful. On her first day with me, I told Brittany I was going to the restroom (SO nice to have an intern and finally be able to do that), and when I came back, she had already figured out how to use the flipchart I created for the lesson, and was encouraging the students to work the problems! She was using a really great teacher voice and was interacting with my students! Already! That is so awesome!

When we get back to school on Tuesday I will ask Brittany to write a letter introducing herself to the parents of our students, and she'll start doing other things like taking attendance, going over warm-ups, etc. The girl already graded 4 sets of papers! I'm telling you...I don't know how I've been so blessed to have two great interns, in two successive years!

I'm doubly blessed!

My head meets the wall...

2010-01-07T15:22:00.004-05:00

We've all said this at some point in our teaching career: "I feel like I'm beating my head against the wall!!! What more can I do to help them understand this concept?!" Well, this week I think this statement has become my theme. I have taught my students how to simplify fractions (which they learned well), how to convert improper fractions to mixed numbers in simplest form, and vice versa. Then I began teaching them to add and subtract fractions. That beginning was about 4 weeks ago. This week, I began the daily torture of waking up at 6:00 a.m., preparing myself for my job, dressing professionally, putting on a happy face, and coming into the school simply to endure the pain of my head meeting the wall for 60 minute periods, four consecutive periods a day! My students have an exam on these concepts...TOMORROW!!! I have taught these precious children a myriad of ways to solve these math problems. I have given them fraction burgers, fraction tiles, fraction circles and had them make their own fractional doolollies so that they can hold and maneuver the fractions we're working with. I have put interactive fraction games on my big Promethean board and had them play these games. I have given them homework, checked it, worked problems from it, brought apples into my classroom and cut them into fractions, had them count beans, had them color blocks...I think you understand what I've done in order to try to be sure that my precious students understand fractions.

Today, I gave them the last practice problems before the exam on a piece of paper. I told them to work on them on their own. I walked to my desk to begin grading some papers I have had stacked for about a month. One of my precious students raised his hand. I acknowledged him and he asked if he could come ask me a question. I said yes. He walked over to my desk with his practice problems and pencil in hand and said............................................................................

"Can you show me how I'm supposed to do this?"

Once again...my head and the wall have become good friends!

Twenty Ten

2010-01-01T16:52:00.003-05:00

I couldn't bring myself to write "Happy New Year" as my title. It's just a little too cliche for this hip woman. Tee Hee!

My family and I went to the home of some dear friends last night for a wonderful celebration of the bringing in of the New Year/New Decade. Honestly, I'm a little amazed at how many decades I've lived through. I wonder why it never struck me like this until this year? Who knows...maybe it's because when I was a child I never thought I'd live to see the 21st Century at all. I was not being morbid or thinking I would die young; it was just that it seemed impossible that I would ever be old enough to see this century (remember...this was when I was a child).

Now, on the other side of those thoughts, I'm certainly glad that I DID live through the first decade of the 21st Century, and hope that I live to see at least four more decades before I leave.

ANYWAY...I'm so excited to be a part of this world, doing what I'm doing for 2010. Just the thought that I have the opportunity (because of my profession) to change someone's life is overwhelming! I know lots of other teachers who are changing lives and I hope they know it and believe in what they're doing. Take my sister, Ashley. She teaches kindergarten in my hometown...she's in her 3rd year of teaching and she is AMAZING! I only wish that my children experience a teacher who loves them like Ashley loves her students. Or my sister-in-law, Lindsey. She teaches third grade in TN and is an amazing teacher...she writes grants, and touches those students in her class! Or my mom, Judy. She teaches math in a program here in our school district for students who need an alternative learning environment. Her students LOVE her...she gives them her phone number and you would be amazed at the number of calls she receives.

The only resolution I'm setting for 2010 is to be like one of these teachers I've mentioned above, to my students AND to my own children...a teacher who's students know beyond doubt that she loves them and believes in them and pushes them hard enough to get their very best!

Happy New Year!

Busy CHRISTmas Holiday!

2009-12-28T21:53:00.003-05:00

What a whirlwind Christmas break this has been...my children and I rode with my mom and step-dad down to Sterlington, La. to visit my family who live there (Mom's family who we rarely get to see). That was a really long drive and we stayed with my Uncle, Aunt, and Grandmother for 3 days, then drove home again. WHEW! We arrived home on Christmas Eve Day around 1:00.

My husband went and worked at the early Christmas Eve service, then the kids and I met him at the later Christmas Eve Service at church. It was beautiful and our family carried on our tradition (3rd year) of helping peal the bells at the end of the service...it's wonderful!

We stayed home on Christmas and got up early to see how good Santa was to us all, and also opened our gifts to and from each other. I cooked a big breakfast and then Mom and Woody came over and we shared a big dinner and watched a movie.

Mom and I got up and went shopping at 7:00 a.m. on the 26th (I know...I FELT like I was insane when the clock went off at 6:00) and I was able to finish up the shopping for Dad and that side of the family (sneaky, huh?). We left Rock Hill around 2:30 and went to Anderson to stay with Dad and Carla for a couple of days. We have just returned home from that Christmas celebration.

Dad is having knee replacement surgery on Wednesday morning on his right knee. I will be headed back there as soon as I can on Wednesday to be with him for the remainder of the day and try to be there for his first PT session. I would greatly appreciate your prayers for my dad...knee replacement patients are no longer put to sleep. Dad is very nervous about being awake for this...can you blame him? Anyway, please consider praying for him, his peace of mind, an easy procedure and quick recovery.

How about you all? How have you spent your Christmas break?

It's the MOST WONDERFUL TIME.............

2009-12-17T13:20:00.009-05:00

Many of you (do I have MANY readers?) may have read my last post where I quickly brought you up to date and explained that on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving my car was broken into and my school issued laptop was stolen. What I didn't explain in that post was that I had to file a claim with my home owners insurance and get reimbursed for the cost of the laptop minus the $500 deductible. To add insult to injury, I was required to pay the $500 deductible to my school in monthly installments, because the liability had to lie somewhere, and the computer was in my possession at the time of the theft.

I have been so upset about this. I know that my school district is only doing the "right" thing...but there are just some times when the "right" thing doesn't feel "right" at all and this is one of those times. I spoke to my principal about it, she called the head of the technology department at the school district, I spoke with the superintendent about it...even my mom got upset and called the district office (without my knowledge) to try to talk to the superintendent.

This morning when I got to school, my principal stuck her head in my room and said "Merry Christmas!" When I turned around I said "Merry Christmas" and smiled like my regular jovial self and wondered why she was doing that. Here is a written version of the conversation after that:
P: You haven't read your email yet, have you?
Me: No ma'am.
P: (Steps into room, HUGE smile on face) You don't have to pay any more money!!!
Me: (SCREAM) THANK YOU SO MUCH!!! WHY? HOW? WHO DO I NEED TO THANK?!!!
P: John (technology head) and Lisa (superintendent) and I have all been so bothered by this the whole time! Lisa went to John yesterday and said "This is really bothering me! It's not right!" and John said "It's bothering me too!!! It's not right! And I'm not going to make her pay that $500."
Me: OH MY GOSH!!! THIS IS THE BEST PLACE TO WORK!!!! YOU HAVE JUST MADE MY WHOLE HOLIDAY! I COULD CRY!!!! I will be sending thank you notes to those people today!!!

Just another example of why I love my job! The people in leadership positions here truly care about us! It is a wonderful place to work!

Merry Christmas!!!

2009-12-05T10:56:00.007-05:00

I know it's been way too long since I posted. I'm sorry...please don't be upset with me if you happened to be one of the four people who read my blog. Let's see...quick rundown of the last few months...we had H1N1 run through our school at the same time as a horrible stomach virus. Every computer in my school also had a terrible virus and had to be reimaged. Neither of my own children came down with H1N1, and neither did Greg or I! (Hallelujah!) Thanksgiving was eventful, as I left school on Tuesday, picked up the kids, then went straight to dinner and had my car window broken and my laptop and Sarah's backpack stolen. Now we're caught up to today. (sigh)

We have two weeks left until our "Winter Holiday" (as it's called by the district) which will be a nice two week break. The awesome teachers I work with in 6th grade this year have been awesome to plan with...we met yesterday and decided that we are going to try to get back to teaching with some "fun" stuff. We've gotten into the rut of lecture, practice, homework, lecture, practice, homework, etc. So I'm working a little bit this weekend to find some fun stuff!

I'm sure this post is kinda lame, so to spice it up a little bit, here's a picture of the kids last night while we were decorating the tree/house. Sarah had her Santa hat from about 5 years ago and Caleb was wearing Greg's hat! Funny stuff!

Illness...How are people your way?

2009-10-17T11:05:00.005-04:00

Our school has been HIT with illness. I don't mean a little tiny thump, or even a slap in the face. I mean a full on right/left...punch in the stomach, or kidney, or wherever it hurts the most. In one week I had five students (out of my 95) who were out for an entire week. Some of them had H1N1, but not all...some of them had a really nasty stomach virus that lasted for 48-72 hours. One of my teammates was out for four of the last five days, and other teachers are out sick too. I'm trying so hard to avoid getting sick (frequent and thorough hand washing, keeping covered when I sneeze or cough, and as awful as this sounds, asking students to keep their distance, especially if they have symptoms of illness). I'm trying to keep my own family well too, encouraging them to do all the same things.

How are folks where you live? Are you experiencing lots of illness in your area? Work, family, friends? Praying everyone stays well!

My Story (Part 3 and the most recent part...my story is still being written!)

2009-08-20T13:08:00.011-04:00

When I last posted I told you that my story got very interesting! It did...I was working in an office part time, which I also told you I detested! Well, God started talking to me. He told me that He had a plan for my life and it involved teaching. He even started asking me nagging little questions like "If you HAVE to work for your family's financial peace, why are you working out of the field you trained in? Didn't I take you where you went in college for a reason? Don't you believe that I know what's best for you? " I knew that God was telling me it was time for me to go back into teaching public school. I filled out an online application and went for my pre-screening interview.

Mrs. C called a couple of days later to say that I had done well in my interview and she would be calling me soon to set up interviews at schools. The really amazing thing is that by the time all this was done and I was able to go on interviews, school had already begun for that year. It was September of 2005. I waited for Mrs. C to call and set up interviews. One morning while I was out of the house she called and said "Robin, there are two interviews I'd like you to go on...one is an elementary teacher position at B Elementary. The other one is a long term sub position at CH Middle School, and it's a chorus position. Call me back as soon as you can." I called and was quickly ready to go on these interviews the next day. Before I left the next morning Mrs. C called again and explained that the middle school I taught music in before Sarah was born was about to begin interviews for two teaching positions in 8th grade. She wanted to know if I'd be interested in those interviews as well. Of course I was, so we set that interview up for the next day.

Have you ever actually HEARD God speak to you, or FELT Him guide you with his hands on your shoulders? That's what happened. God turned my shoulders in every direction He wanted me to go...He was sitting with me in every interview, told me what to say, spoke to me quietly and peacefully at the end of each interview. He said things like "This is not the job for you, but you need the experience of this interview." Or "You did great there...let's wait for a call." After the interview for the long term sub position I got home and there was a voicemail message from the principal, offering me the job. I did not return her call immediately because I was going to the interview for the 8th grade teachers at RR Middle School the next day.

I went to the interview and things went well. I waited...impatiently! Finally the next day I got the call offering me the full time position as an 8th grade math and language arts teacher at RR Middle School. I accepted, then called the other long term sub school to explain. I started on Caleb's birthday in 2005...it was a great day all around.

My first group of students in the 8th grade came to my classroom in October 2005. I was really nervous about teaching math, but as it turned out, it became my favorite thing to teach. I loved it! It was in April of 2006 that God led me to WU to pursue a Master's degree in Middle Level education. I graduated in December of 2008 with a Master's in Middle Level Math. I have been teaching math in middle school since 2005, and have just begun my 5th year there. Imagine that...after teaching music for 7 years, I'm a happy math teacher!

God has turned my "ho-hum" life into an amazing story. It may not seem that way when you read about it, but to live it...to have a career where you were relatively unhappy for so long and then have God physically lead you to the place where you are extremely happy...that is an amazing story! Now I can't wait to get to school every day! I work on school stuff pretty much all the time. I have a true love for my students and my subject and really know that I am working where God wants me and I will make a difference for someone!

So there's the most recent part of my story. Remember, it's still being written! Hope you've enjoyed it and I'm sorry it's been so long! :)

My Story (Part 2)

2009-04-27T16:19:00.009-04:00

I left teaching music to stay home and raise my boy. What a wonderful adventure this would be...but we ended up not being able to afford to live on one salary, so I went back to teaching music. I got an offer to teach Chorus at at large middle school in Rock Hill. I cried every night the two weeks before school knowing FOR SURE that middle schoolers were going to EAT ME ALIVE!

Sure enough, some major changes happened with elective classes the year I began teaching middle school and my classes were HUGE! I had 60 eighth grade students in one class and 60 eighth grade students in another class. Many of them didn't sign up for chorus, so their behavior was ridiculous. Anyway...that's a whole other story/post.

The important thing is that during that first year, I really fell in love with some middle school students and began to LOVE teaching this age group. I stayed at my school for three years, teaching chorus and general music. Then I found out I was expecting baby number 2.

This time I was going to stay home and make it work!!! That idea lasted for a very few months. I couldn't handle being at home all day every day with two babies...just needed adult interaction too badly, so I took a part time job at my church. I stayed in that job for two years, at which time I left (working at) the church to go work for a local real estate broker. Just working part time...doing odds and ends. A little bookkeeping, a little PR, a little errand running, etc. Well, guess what...I QUICKLY learned to D-E-T-E-S-T that job. I was miserable...more miserable than I think I had ever been in a job. There were so many reasons I was miserable, and I will not go into all of them, but please know that I'm not kidding I was miserable.

This point in my life/career is when God really got ahold of my heart and began working a miracle. I began to feel like I NEEDED, not wanted, but NEEDED to get back into the school district as a teacher. And although I love music and singing I really didn't care if I taught music or not. I have a certifcation in elementary education so I am a little more marketable than someone with just a music certification. God was working, not just in my heart, but in the hearts of others who would be instrumental in my getting back into education. This is where the story gets very interesting!

My Story (Part 1)

2009-04-18T15:59:00.014-04:00

Can you tell a story? Do you have a story to tell? I remember on one of the LOOOOOOOONNNNNGGGG trips from SC to my grandparents' home in Louisiana, I was telling my mom and brother about a movie I had seen...my mom interrupted my story and said "Robin, you're such a good story teller." That was all it took...I have "enhanced" every part of my life since that day with stories. I love to tell them...just ask my students. Sometimes they are very short and silly, and sometimes they are longer and more meaningful, just as the one I'm about to tell you. I won't keep you hanging any longer. Here's my story:

I was raised in a Christian home. I've known God since as long as I can remember. I remember that I publicly asked Jesus into my heart when I was six, but I knew LONG before then that He was the author of the way I wanted to live my life. No...I didn't use those words, because I was only six, but I knew Him and that I loved Him and He loved (loves) me and I wanted to live for Him. There were times throughout my life that I didn't do all the things God would have me do, and I didn't act the way God would have me act, but I ALWAYS knew God loved (loves) me and I have always come back to Him.

When people ask me (usually only at church and not very often) about my salvation I say something like "I don't really have an amazing, transforming story of my salvation because I've been a follower of Christ as long as I can remember." I know that in itself is a pretty fabulous story, but it doesn't make for a very intriguing story of salvation...if you are a Believer and have heard any amazing salvation stories, you know what I mean.

So, for most of my life...really until 2005, that was my story. God chose me before I was born, God provided an amazing family who are Believers who raised me to Believe. But in 2005, God did something in my life that was AMAZING to me and showed me, in real life, how much He loves me and how important I am to Him!

My father is a music professor...from a long line of musicians/teachers, and my mother is a math teacher, also from a long line of teachers. My mother is also musical...both sides of my family are well educated, musical, educators. My parents raised me to make my own decisions, including what I wanted to study in college and what I wanted to do for a living. I just happened to choose to study music (voice, particularly) and then He led me to teach music. Similar to my father, only I was not AT ALL interested in higher education to the extent required to teach on the college level. So I graduated from college with a pretty great foundation of music, voice, choir and choral music, and went to work...in an elementary school. My first teaching job started in January of 1994 at a very small elementary school in the Northwest corner of Greenville County. In order for me to be a full-time employee of the school district, I actually had to teach music to two different schools, which is not uncommon for those who teach a fine art in elementary school.

I taught music in two elementary schools for 3.5 years. I was MISERABLE in my work. This was NOT what I had worked so hard to do...why did I have to drive to two different places almost every day, to be a babysitter for teachers who only got one 40 minute planning period, three (maybe four) times/week. Please keep in mind that the period of time I used to drive from one school to the next was considered my planning time. In the 3.5 years I taught elementary school, I had one school that was considered my "home base" but I taught at three other elementary schools, and never had a real classroom at any of those three schools. My classroom was mobile and it was on a cart...I rolled to each classroom on my cart and we did a really bad class. Did I tell you already that I was MISERABLE???

In order to help myself escape the misery, I volunteered to lead an area rehearsal once each week during the Spring for a children's choir that performed in a large concert toward the end of the year. I did this for 3 years...it was somewhat of a relief, but still not able to do the really great choral music I learned while I was studying. But I did it anyway.

During these 3.5 years, I met and married my wonderful husband. He was GREAT! But he got really tired of hearing me complain about work....which I did a lot of because, if you don't already know, I WAS MISERABLE!!! The Spring after we married I went to him and said "Honey, I'm not sure what I'm gonna do, but I can't keep doing this. I'm miserable. I would rather answer the telephone for a doctor or attorney than to keep doing this!!!" He was extremely supportive and told me that he would do whatever he could to help me find a job I could tolerate, but that we couldn't afford for me to not work. During one of those after school, area rehearsals, I had the opportunity to talk to the district Fine Arts Director and just mentioned to him that I was planning to resign. I said that I had gotten stuck in the circle of elementary music, was no longer in the loop of the larger music world in my district and didn't have any idea if there was a high school job open. He asked me what it would take for me to stay, and I said "Get me a job in a high school, and then we'll talk." So he did...he contacted the principal of the high school with the Choral Director opening and set up the interview.

I got that job and didn't quit teaching. I taught at Berea High School for one school year and LOVED it! Greg had been transferred to the Charlotte area and was living in Rock Hill during the week (in a really bad rented room in a boarding house here) and coming back to Greenville on the weekends. It was really a great set up for us because I was able to devote as much after school time as needed to the choral program at the high school and didn't ever feel guilty about being away from home.

Then in January of 2008 we became pregnant with Caleb. I finished out the school year at Berea, but Greg's transfer to the Charlotte area was final and I resigned to move and to be a full-time mom. How exciting! God allowed me to have a wonderful year in the final year that I was going to teach...because now, as I had planned it, I would be home teaching the most important lessons I'd ever teach in my life!

Spring Break!!!

2009-04-16T15:30:00.003-04:00

WOOOO HOOOOO!!!! We're on Spring Break this week. BOY, did we all need it. The kids were getting tired of each other, and the teachers...and the teachers were getting tired of the kids and of each other. Hahaha! I hope this will get us through the next seven weeks!

We really don't have too long left at all if you put it in perspective like this: We have about 3 weeks or a month until the PASS test then only three weeks until school's over after PASS. It seems so much shorter when I say it that way.

My own children have already been scheduled for at least two weeks of the summer, with my oldest planning a week of "Uncle Randy Camp" (learning to play guitar), Grandpa camp (spending a week with my f-i-l), and trying to plan a week of Aunt Becky camp (a week with my step-sister in Washington D.C.). He's gonna keep me in the road, I'm afraid.

My youngest is still too young for me to let her go for that many weeks...I know, I need to cut the apron strings, but she's still my baby. Ah well...there will be plenty of time for me to let her go later! ;-)

A Big Move

2009-04-09T22:00:00.002-04:00

Well, it's time for contracts to come out and be signed. I have LOVED teaching at my school this year. So I was a bit upset today, when many other teachers in my building received an email saying "your contract is ready to be signed" and I didn't. Never fear...I did not lose my job, which is especially fantastic considering all the cuts school districts are experiencing right now. But my principal did call me in and tell me that I'm being moved from 7th grade to 6th grade.

I'm not super happy about it, but I will make the best of the situation and I feel sure that I will learn to love 6th graders just as much as I love 7th graders.

Please just keep me in your thoughts and prayers as I prepare for this change and move my classroom. That part is REALLY bothering me! :)

My Shanny...

2009-03-28T19:31:00.006-04:00

A while back I posted that I was going to have a full time student intern this semester. I shared some of my concerns about teaching her how to be a teacher, and my concern that she might not learn the good stuff from me.

Well, I've had her in my classroom now for about 2 months. Her name is Shannon and I like to call her Shanny...and you should be able to guess since I have a nickname for her that I like her. She's a great teacher! Shanny walked into my classroom and right into the hearts of my students (and my heart, for that matter). She quickly developed an easy relationship with most of my students, and experienced some of the same types of struggles that I experienced at the beginning of the year with these students.

Pretty quickly after Shannon started coming to my class, we planned what she would be teaching and when she'd begin and stop teaching. She will still be with me for three more weeks, four weeks if you figure that Spring Break comes while she's still with me, and I'm so excited to have seen her grow this semester. I know that I've been able to help her with some things that she has needed help with, but I've also learned from her. It's been more like a partnership of teachers than a mentor/mentee relationship. She's just great.

About three weeks ago Shanny said "I'm going to be so bored after I finish here." I promptly told her that I wasn't discussing that yet and that I want her to be able to get a job in my school. In all seriousness, I will be kind of bored when she finishes too. She has been great at making me see the good in my students at a time of the year when I begin to only see the bad in them. She also has a great since of humor that keeps me laughing! My students will miss her too...one of them proposed to her about 3 weeks into her internship. He's in seventh grade, remember! So anyway, if you read this blog, and you know of any open positions for really great middle school math or language arts teachers, please let me know. I know a really great middle school teacher who is certified in math and language arts and is looking for a job! :)

Shannon and her dog, Hank

Spring has SPRUNG

2009-03-20T15:38:00.006-04:00

If you've taught for more than one year you know exactly what I mean when I tell you that my students are acting foolish because Spring has begun! It's kind of like coming to school when there's a full moon outside...you go because you have to and you are getting paid to be there, but you really don't look forward to the foolishness you are about to encounter!

The "Happy Thought" is that there are only 3 more weeks of school before Spring Break starts, which we are all looking forward to. Please don't misunderstand me...I LOVE teaching and LOVE my students but we've all gotten to the point where we need a break from each other.

Let me brag on my students for a little bit here...we have had MAP testing this week. I love MAP testing for a couple of reasons...1) it's computerized so the kids don't have to spend hours bubbling, and 2) students have immediate feedback about how well they've done as their score pops onto the screen when they complete the test. I gave my students a sticky note with their fall score written on it and prior to the test I had given them all a pep talk about doing their absolute best on the test.

Well, I haven't done the math so the figures I'm about to spout are estimates, but my students kicked booty on these tests this week! My estimate is that around 80% of my students showed gains from fall to spring. Somewhere between 15 and 20 of my students had gains greater than 10 points (generally when a student has a "BIG" gain, it's about 5 points or so). And finally I had one child gain 20 POINTS!!!! Yes...I'm shouting! This child worked SO hard on this test and it really paid off!

Lots of people at my school have said things like "well, they gained so much because you've taught them so well" but I don't see it that way. My teammates and I talked to several of our students who showed significant gains. We asked them what made the difference for them...why they scored so much higher this spring, etc. A majority said "because my teachers care about me." How FANTASTIC is that? We care, and they know we care, and because we care and they know, they work harder! I'm really excited about this!!!!

So, if you have any opportunity to lift up a student, show them that you care, please do it. They notice...they may not act like they notice or care, but they do and they work harder!!!

Poker's Over

2009-02-01T09:27:00.004-05:00

Thank God!!! It was stressful. I'm not really sure that my students learned what I wanted them to learn by playing Poker. The other teacher who did this same lesson said the same thing..."Do you think the kids wanted to do the math that went along with the poker game? SHOOT NO!" I had the same experience, so we finished that and put the cards away. But I did take some photos of the kids playing and thought I'd post them for your viewing pleasure! :)

Probability and Poker

2009-01-24T10:23:00.004-05:00

My friend, and the math dept. chair at my school found a great lesson in the New York Times on teaching probability using the game of poker. She shared it with me and I loved it! So...off the the dollar store I went to purchase cards. Forget about the fact that I don't play poker and really don't have a clue on how to do so.

I printed the lesson for my intern and myself, then printed the article that goes with the lesson (a classroom set) so that my students could read it. Then also printed a classroom set of General Poker Rules so we could all go over them together.

On Thursday each student had a deck of cards and we discussed the number of the following in the deck:
suits
face cards
number cards
high cards
low cards
red cards
black cards

Then I had them shuffle their decks and deal three hands of five cards. We did some pretty cool figurin' on probability based on what they dealt. It was very fun.

Yesterday we went through the article and talked about reasons Poker is a good learning tool, so that when they had the discussion with their parents about what they are doing in math, they would actually be able to say that I am not teaching them to gamble.

Yesterday we also had a few house-keeping things to do before we started on that, and because none of my students work at the same rate, classes as a whole were cut to about 20 minutes (tops). So during my last two class periods I showed them a great card trick my dad taught me...spent some time fooling them all...then taught them the trick. I know...I know...that is not necessarily in the curriculum, however I do have a theory about just having fun in my classroom. There are very few teachers who would take 10-20 minutes to show them a card trick...but you see, what I'm doing when I have fun with my students, is building relationships. Each time I let my "teacher" persona take a rest, they realize they can trust me and it helps them realize that they truly have an advocate in me. Yes...it might semi-backfire every once in a while, so that my students think they can get away with stuff, but all it takes to bring that back in is for me to have a conversation with that particular student about the right time to get to work and the right time to have fun, and the problem is over.

Anyway, if anyone would like to give me hints on how to play Poker, I'm certainly open. I really think I should understand a little of it before I really use it as a teaching tool.

SNOW DAY!!!

2009-01-20T11:15:00.003-05:00

I am sitting in the comfort of my house enjoying watching a light snow fall. It's so beautiful...check out the photos at the end of this post. The kids went out first thing this morning, making snow angels and trying to throw snowballs at each other. The snow is so powdery that we can't get it to stick together.

The other amazing thing about today is that I am watching Barack Obama's inauguration on T.V. My dad and step-mom are IN Washington, D.C. with my step-sister. I got a text from my dad about an hour ago...he's roughly 100 feet from the Washington monument, watching the festivities on jumbotron. I wonder if they are planning to go to the South Carolina Inaugural Ball??? They haven't said...maybe I'll get another text!

Isn't this amazing? I am so proud to be an American today. The simple fact that our country has elected an African American is amazing. We are definitely blessed.

Enjoy your snow day!

Intern

2009-01-19T13:15:00.004-05:00

Back in the day when I was in college, when it was time for us to go into a classroom for our last semester of college and teach, we were called student teachers. Well, things have seriously changed and now those people are called interns. And guess what...I have one this semester! I've never had an intern...she's my first (she was the first intern for her mentor teacher last semester too!). She is going to be good...I can already tell! She has brought her planner everyday that she's been with me, so that's a great sign that she's organized.

I am filled with excitement about this adventure, but I'm also a little scared. I love teaching, and I know that I do a good job, however I'm not the most organized teacher on the planet (please insert extreme sarcasm here...I'm incredibly NOT organized). I am partially responsible for this young lady learning how to teach middle school math, and also partially responsible for her learning to love it. What if I totally screw it up for her! I don't want her to learn everything NOT to do from me.

So...part of my attitude now is to get my poop in a group and be sure I show my intern how wonderful this "job" can be! Wish me luck!

Half Done

2009-01-14T14:57:00.000-05:00

The last day of the first semester is tomorrow. We are giving semester exams to our students this week, and my team will have their math exam tomorrow. This is very nerve wracking for me and the kids! They are nervous that they are going to bomb the exam and I am nervous that they will not remember what I've taught them this year!

They've already had their Language Arts exam, and we had some who have had the nerve to say things like "I got bored and just filled in bubbles!" With that kind of attitude, how can we expect them to do well?

We've had a lot of interruptions and problems this week, especially today. I've had three students cry to me already today, and my teammates (as well as myself) are feeling frustrated too, so sensitive students and frustrated teachers are not always a great combination. We have a teacher workday on Friday and a holiday on Monday...both of these are much needed breaks!!!

So when we come back on Tuesday we are starting a new semester...we're halfway done with this school year. This is shocking to me...in some ways, it seems like I just met this group of kids, but in other ways, it seems like I've been teaching for three years with this particular group of kids. I'm trying to come up with a really good, fun, "let's start again" activity for them to do on Tuesday. I am thinking about having them write a "goal letter." When they do this, they pretend they are at the end of the school year, and write reasons why "this has been the best school year ever." This activity always gives kids a little focus and something to work for.

I'm open to suggestions if anyone has a suggestion...we all need a fresh, clean start, don't you agree???

Happy New Year!

2009-01-08T13:39:00.003-05:00

We're back in school now, having started on Monday, Jan. 5, 2009. I can't believe I'm writing the date 2009! I remember when I thought I'd be old in the year 2000 and here I am almost 10 years past that...am I really getting old?

In previous years in my school district we have finished the first semester with the last day of school before Christmas break. Well, last year and this year we have started school later, thus moving our semester end about two weeks after returning from Christmas break. This is very frustrating to me! I need schedules to make sense, and this just doesn't make sense to me.

Also, in previous years, the students who took semester exams at the middle school level were either in 8th grade or taking the Algebra I class. This year we are going to give exams to ALL middle school students....6th graders will take 9 weeks exams, and 7th graders will take semester exams. We will begin giving the semester exams next semester, but we (teachers) thought for a few days that we were going to give semester exams by next Thursday, so this has been a super crazy week. My team has decided to go ahead and give a semester test, but only count it as a test. SO...I will be working tonight and tomorrow to create a study guide for my precious kids to use over the next few days in preparation for the big semester test.

I really want to make a difference for these kids...I would feel this way, regardless of where I was teaching. Please say a little prayer that I will give a fair test and my students will be prepared to take the test.

Fun tag!

2008-12-21T09:49:00.004-05:00

Becky tagged me in this game. The instructions are to add the first thing that comes to mind when you read the starter.

*I am not ready for Christmas yet!
*I want Sarah to not give me a hard time about what to wear every day.
*I have absolutely everything I need.
*I miss my grandfather.
*I fear that something terrible will happen to one of my children.
*I hear Christmas music.
*I search for stuff I've misplaced in my house!
*I wonder if my children will grow up and marry and have their own families.
*I regret gaining so much weight.
*I love being a wife, mom, and teacher.
*I forgive my brother for ruining Santa, the Tooth Fairy, and Easter Bunny for me in one feld swoop...but I still remember that he did it!
*I ache for a full body massage.
*I always save my favorite item on my plate to eat last.
*I try to be proactive.
*I seem bossy and self-assured, but I'm really just impulsive.
*I know a lot about middle school kids.
*I feel like I'll never get caught up on the dang laundry.
*I dance with my children, in the kitchen while we laugh.
*I dream about being debt free and being able to help others who truly need help.
*I give my students money if they need it for lunch.
*I listen to all kinds of music.
*I sing a lot! Even make talking into music.
*I laugh at Asheid, CJ, Caleb, Sarah, Greg, BJ, Kelly, and lots of others!
*I can't stand mopping.
*I cry when I get really angry and I hate that about myself.
*I sleep like a dang ROCK.
*I am relieved to be finished with school.
*I see a messy house.
*I need to take my laundry to the laundry mat and have someone come clean the rest of my house while I'm there!
*I should start going to the gym again.

I tag Kim...love you girl and hope you don't hate me for tagging you! :)

I also wish everyone a very Merry Christmas!

The Door

2008-12-17T17:41:00.004-05:00

If you ever wondered how great of a job I have, let me give you a hint. I have one of the best teammates EVAR! This morning when I got to my classroom, this was on my door:

This TOTALLY made my day! She put little stars on the right end of the poster that have comments on them like...

*You did it!

*You finished!

*You are no longer a graduate student!

*You make more money now!

*You rock my face off!

*You can put all that on your business card!

*You are now a Master's Degree Holder!

*Whoa! WOW!

Who has the best job??? I do! I do!!!

Master

2008-12-12T08:54:00.000-05:00

So I don't even have a clue how long it's been since I updated this blog! But it's time.

I am still loving teaching. My team went on a field trip yesterday to Camp Thunderbird, where the counselors taught us about the soil, aquatic life and cultures. It rained ALL day and there was only one part of the day where we were inside. But the kids had a blast and we (the teachers) did too. I LOVE getting to be away from school with my students...it's way more relaxed and they get to really be themselves. It's amazing how well they always behave when we're away from school, especially considering that they often are NOT well behaved at school. I really enjoyed yesterday!

The other really big news is that, unless I really screwed up my exam, I will be graduating from Winthrop next Thursday, December 18. I will graduate with a Masters in Middle Level Math. I'm waiting to change my email signature until after graduation so that it will be official, but I get to put M.Ed. by my name! I'm a little excited about it if you can't tell.

My students

2008-11-08T17:46:00.004-05:00

I took some photos a while back of my students. They are really cool kids. Lots of them HATE having their pictures made, but they let me this once. I don't have pictures of ALL of them, but would like to get them posted before Christmas...I guess we'll see won't we?

They, along with my own children, have my heart! I love my job!

An exercise in patriotism

2008-11-04T16:07:00.003-05:00

Did you vote? Are you registered? I have many friends and family who LOVE talking politics, but I'm not one of them. However, I do believe that Americans have been given an amazing gift with our voting rights. We can go vote. We actually have a say.

I waited for an hour to vote today. Standing right around me in line were...a young family, mother expressing how she's on welfare but is trying really hard to get off, a man about my age who was obviously successful-he was on the phone a lot as he was waiting and from what I heard, it sounds like he has a landscape business, but I'm not sure. There was an African American doctor who was taking his lunch time to come vote. There was a lady there who is now an American citizen but who came here from the Philippines. Just behind me there was an African American lady who must be about my mom's age. She and I struck up a conversation and she was shocked that I teach, mother/wife, and go to grad school. She also was upset with the people who came to the wrong precinct to vote...I really thought she was funny!

My point is this...if you are registered and haven't voted, there's still 2 hours and 45 minutes until the polls close so get off your rear and go. If you are not registered to vote, but are of age to register, you need to be very careful if you decide to complain about our government...you have chosen not to participate in the process, which is your way to "have your say."

Go register...go vote! We need you!

I walked!

2008-10-27T22:10:00.003-04:00

Well, the Avon Breast Cancer Walk was this past weekend in Charlotte. I raised the $1800 and walked with my four teammates. It was so great! We had sore feet and tired legs pretty quickly, but wow, what a weekend. There were over 1300 people who walked this weekend, and together we raised 2.8 million dollars for breast cancer research. One lady who walked this weekend has walked 98 Avon Walks. She has single-handedly raised over $1 million for breast cancer research. She has also walked over 5000 miles. Can you believe that??? I'm whining about 32 and she's trucked over 5000. WOW!

I did go to work today and will still be going tomorrow...moving around at work helps with the stiffness. My students helped me raise the money, so they were pretty excited about what I did this weekend! I love my students!

I'll be posting some photos of the walk soon...visit again soon.

Finally settling in...

2008-10-06T20:15:00.003-04:00

Well, we have about two and a half weeks left in the first nine weeks and I feel like I'm finally settling in with my students. Is that bad? There are so many things that have come into play this year which seem to hamper the building of relationships with my students. That is one of the things I love about my job...getting to know these children...the precious, the not-so-precious, the smart, the popular, the struggling, the unparented, the unlovely...I truly enjoy getting to know them all. Our schedule this year is...in a word, UGH...so I don't have time to spend relating. I have also never taught math on a four person team...this means that I have about twice as many students as I've had before and it just takes me longer to get to know them.

Me having moved to a new school makes it a little different as well. I'm not only trying to develop relationships with new students, but new faculty/staff as well...sometimes the adult relationships are harder to develop than the student/teacher ones.

So almost seven weeks into this school year, I'm beginning to feel like some relationships are forming, and I'm finally feeling like a decent teacher again.

Disney Pics

2008-10-04T22:41:00.009-04:00

I mentioned yesterday that we had a great time at Disney World. For Greg and I, watching the kids have fun was just as much fun as doing the stuff ourselves! Caleb and Sarah both loved being there. Every time we rode a roller coaster, before we got to the end of the ride, they were both screaming "I wanna do it again!!!!"

We arrived around 2:00 a.m. on Wednesday the 17th. We slept in a bit and then left our hotel for Epcot.

We rode the bus from our hotel to Epcot...we had to stop into the gift shop at the hotel on the way to the bus, and the kids went crazy!!! They had some really great stuff in there...this is one of my favorite pics, and I took it on the first morning in the gift shop at All Star Movies Resort.

The next day we went to the Magic Kingdom. We did Space Mountain first...and second...and third! "Let's go again!" was definitely the phrase of the week. There were so many photo opportunities at Magic Kingdom but these are 3 of my favorites.

If you look VERY closely at this photo, right in front of the man in the red shirt is Sarah. She is in a white shirt...she HAD to have her picture taken at Cinderella's Castle!

Animal Kingdom was our third stop and it was my favorite! I know the kids loved it and I think Greg did too. Exhibition Everest is a fantastic roller coaster...it takes you very high, then fast for a bit, then backward, then forward again, really fast and take a HUGE drop!!! It's awesome!

The kids were waiting in line and Caleb was being silly...had to snap a picture!

The last full day was Caleb's 10th birthday! We went to Hollywood Studios to celebrate. We had a great time! One of the highlights of the day was our lunch at a drive in theatre...Sci-Fi theatre. We actually sat in a car to eat. Sarah's favorite was DEFINITELY Tower of Terror...I think she rode it three times!

Definitely a great time was had by all!!! Can't wait to go back!

Think PINK!!!

2008-10-03T19:51:00.004-04:00

Hi everyone! I know, it's been a long time since I updated and I'm sorry. I've been very busy! We had a blast at Disney and I have some really good pictures! I'll try to post some soon.

The biggest item on my radar lately has been fundraising for my Avon Breast Cancer Walk. I don't know how many of you remember this but I blogged about it several months ago. I will be joining several thousand people in Charlotte, NC on October 25 and 26 to walk a total of 39 miles. I'm on a team of five women and I've really enjoyed getting to know them through all this fundraising and getting prepared for the walk.

I'm much closer to my goal of $1800 than I was several months ago...I think I'm close to $1000. I really would like to be able to go to the walk for check in and have all my funds raised, rather than hope that someone will give me any extra they may have. At this point in the game, I only need 32 people to donate $25.00 and I will reach my goal!

Please visit my Avon Walk site and consider donating. It's very easy...just go to http://tinyurl.com/3xonrz. Once on the site you should be able to easily find the button that says "make a donation." Just click on that button and enter the information needed. You should receive a receipt via email for your tax purposes. I am so grateful for everyone who has already donated! You have no idea how much this means to me...after my step-mom's survival of breast cancer, and my scare last spring, the effort to find a cure is more critical to me than ever before.
The walk is fast approaching and any help I can get with fundraising would be fabulous!

Look out Disney...Here we come

2008-09-16T15:28:00.002-04:00

We're leaving this afternoon, as soon as I can get home from school. We will drive into the night and then get up tomorrow morning and hit the parks! This vacation has been a long time coming for our family and I think the kids are old enough to truly enjoy it!!!

I've had plenty of people ask if they could go with us...including a couple of students! :) However, our suitcases are STUFFED, so there's really no room!

I'll be trying to post some photos next week!

Have a great week!

We're headed out!!!

2008-09-15T12:36:00.002-04:00

So I'm here today and tomorrow but then I'm taking all my personal leave days at once and my family and I are going to Disney World. We haven't been as a family since Caleb was 9 months old! We are SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO excited!

Sarah hit the floor running this morning, jumped on my bed and screamed "WE'RE GOING TO DISNEY WORLD TOMORROW!" This is a perfect explanation of how we all feel!

Updated the Blog a bit

2008-09-07T19:30:00.002-04:00

I visited another blog that's absolutely beautiful and got the idea to change mine a bit. Hope it doesn't shock anyone too much! I love the colors. I think they suit me a little better than the milder greens and oranges I had previously.

I've photographed my students, but have to be sure their parents have signed off giving permission for their pictures to be published online. I really am growing to like these kids fast! Can't wait to show them to you all.

We're cruising into the third full week of school, which I think means that progress reports are going home soon. That's kinda bad because I don't have enough grades to send home. Gotta get crackin' on that!

Caleb will be 10 years old in less than 2 weeks!!!! I can't believe it. I don't feel like it's been 10 years since I met that precious boy! What's really cool about this birthday, though, is that we will be at DISNEY WORLD when he turns 10! What an awesome birthday party!!!!!!!!

Have a good week everyone!

Gotta update...

2008-09-01T17:45:00.002-04:00

I need to get a new photo of myself and put here...I may try to cut and paste one from my reunion. If you look closely at this one you'll see that the charm on my necklace is a Raider. That's the Rawlinson Road mascot and now I'm a Wildcat. Gotta find a good wildcat slide to wear on that silver necklace.

We have the day off today because of Labor Day, but my mind has been on school all day. I can't wait to get back tomorrow and really start teaching. I'm going to try to sweet talk Greg and see if he'll let me use his laptop to type up my plans. I've got to do some reassigning of seats on my power point I use for a seating chart, so I'll have to use his computer to do that.

I'm really struggling with my ADHD right now...I'm trying to figure how to raise money for the Breast Cancer walk at the same time I'm trying to come up with all these great lesson plans to share with my other 7th grade math teachers, while I'm planning my family vacation, while I'm trying to also spend quality time with our friends.

I will be taking my camera to school to take pictures this week. Hope I can get them posted!

We're feelin' the love!

2008-08-27T20:43:00.003-04:00

We've been in school now for a solid week. I usually have a bead on my students within a day or two and begin to form relationships with them quickly. I told Rolla the other day that I was frustrated..."I don't know if it's just this group of kids, or that it's a different school, or that I'm still out of sorts from moving, but I'm not gelling with these kids." She agreed. "I think it's the kids. They're very closed...difficult to read."

Well, we've been with them long enough to realize who can and can't be seated near each other, so that was what happened in all four of our classes yesterday...we moved students around. Then, BOOM! today. They opened up...one boy who has not said ONE SINGLE WORD, actually turned around and BEGAN a conversation with Rolla. A girl who has had nothing but disdain for me, sidled up to me and started talking to me, because I found out who her "crush" is. She even wrote a note...granted it was just her name written over and over with the crush's name, but it was something.

One girl who was a major pill was moved in 3 of the 4 rooms and has absolutely BLOSSOMED. She is actually doing the warm ups and I thought she was going to EXPLODE if I didn't call her name to answer a question.

I found out that one boy who has been giving us all a hard time has been being cared for by members of my church...now I have a little bit of leverage to talk to him. I did today...I asked him to help me carry some stuff to my room and told him what I know. I explained how I expected him to shape up...I know he can.

Well, today Rolla and I both said that we are much more content...seems like we generally have a good group of kids.

I LOVE MY JOB!!!!

First Friday!

2008-08-22T21:22:00.002-04:00

Well, we made it through the first three days of school. It's been so nice! Saluda Trail is a newer school (opened in 1999) and my classroom is so big! Generally my students have been very nice and seem eager to learn. I am, however, more exhausted than I've been in a very long time!

On the first day, in the first class, I had a student pull out a battery operated pencil sharpener and start sharpening his pencil while I was talking. I told him to stop and then thought to myself "is that for real? Did that really just happen?"

Then today, while my team mates and I were on lunch duty, a boy walked up to the canteen door to place his order. My team mate Lilli looked at him and said (REALLY LOUD) "Excuse me!!!!! Crack KILLS, so pull up those pants. My eyes are burning! I don't get paid enough to see that!" I almost spit my food all over the place! Maybe you had to be there, but I thought it was really funny!

Hope you're all having a good school year!

Just one more day

2008-08-19T09:51:00.003-04:00

I'm in my room today...planning to stay here all day! I have a bunch of stuff to do, not the least of which is to get stuff on the walls and assign seats for students who will be here tomorrow. Is it possible that I have let the summer get away from me like this?

Well, at least this one thing holds true...where ever I go, I can take Pavarotti with me! I can't wait to start answering questions about this one...it's posted right beside my desk.

I've already had one young lady ask me why I didn't take him down and put up someone more desirable. I know...I'm weird that way.

Please say a prayer that I don't implode before tomorrow morning. :)

##STRES!!!!##*

2008-08-17T21:23:00.004-04:00

This week is always difficult for me. Every single year I say something to Greg like "I really can't figure out why I'm so cranky this week, but everything is getting on my nerves and the kids are really driving me nuts!" To which he responds "You're like this every year. The week before school starts you're always cranky. You always say things like 'I can't figure out why I'm cranky' and beg me to just put you out of your misery." We had that conversation today...we went to the pool after church. I was sitting at the pool thinking of how many things I have to finish doing before Wednesday morning. I was feeling sorry for myself that this was the last day I was going to get to go sit out at the pool. I was irritated because I've fallen right back into the pattern of saving all the laundry for the weekend. I was remembering how I really don't have plans yet for the first three days of school and that although I'm totally comfortable teaching math, the beginning stuff really stresses me out!

That thought is what spurred the next thought...what if I can't teach them???? What if I forget everything I know and when I start talking they (the students) think that I am speaking Russian or something? How will I do this???? Why did I choose teaching? Why didn't I choose a career that DOESN'T have quite this impact on my tomorrow??? OH MY GOODNESS!

I hope this is the closest I ever get to implosion! I can't take it...I hate this last week before school! And EVERY SINGLE YEAR I say that I will have it all together before next year starts and will know exactly what I'm teaching those first few days. And every single year, I do this very same thing.

I'm in the place where I want another week to get ready, but I also just want it to get here already! UGH!

Back to school again...

2008-08-11T15:51:00.004-04:00

The kids and I went back to school shopping today. I spent about $100 on their supplies. I ran into one of my friends there. She asked me "Don't you ever wonder why we have to spend so much money on supplies for our kids when we send them to public school?!" She was obviously frustrated and I understand her frustration. I have to spend money on supplies for my public schoolers too.

The difference, though, between my friend and myself is that I am also in the public school but from the other side. I am a teacher who requests those supplies from parents, and here's the reason. I will have a budget of about $200 that I can use for any and all supplies that I need for my classroom this year. This includes buying my own copy paper and any other supplies I want to have for my students.

Please realize that as teachers, we are expected to be able to provide children with challenging, thought provoking, real life lessons. We are expected to provide them with lessons on how to behave at school, in public, at home. We are expected to practically raise some children. I will teach a total of about 100 students this year, for 36 weeks, on a budget of $200.

Please don't be upset. It is difficult to do all that we want to do with such a limited budget. Ask your public school teacher what might be on his/her wish list...more often than you might realize what they have on their wish list is as simple as a bottle of hand sanitizer or a multi-pack of kleenex. Occassionally they may ask for candy. They may ask for you to bake something and send in. This is only because we just can't do it all ourselves. We can't afford it, nor can we do it all as one person.

There's my mini-sermon for this week.

Have a great beginning of school! :)

The man, the car, and the kindness

2008-08-05T09:36:00.004-04:00

I have a story to tell you...please refrain from leaving a "lecture" comment until you read the entire story.

Yesterday I had a fairly crappy morning. I ran multiple errands with no makeup and hair that had been washed but not dried or brushed. If you know me, you know how big it is that I even considered leaving the house with no makeup and no hair-do.

So anyway, I was on my way from dropping Caleb off at baseball camp to my mom's to help her edit a paper Woody wrote. As I turned off of India Hook onto Ebinport I almost hit a car that was sitting right at the turn of the intersection. If you know anything about the traffic in RH you know that this particular intersection is pretty busy. This car was in a really, really bad place. And the man who was driving the car was out of the car with the hood up, the driver door open and kind of laying half in/half out the door looking under the dashboard.

I passed him, drove about 20 yards, and said to Sarah, "I need to help him, Sarah. But I really don't want to help him." See, I had been really griping and fussing about 30 seconds earlier about all the crap I had to do, etc. Anyway, I pulled into the school parking lot, made Sarah get out of her car seat and come lock the door and walked back to the man and his car.

I asked if he needed help. He stood up and said "She just quit on me. She's got a brand new batt'ry. The speedo dropped down, the 'lectric stopped, and she just quit on me right at the light." (You've got to say all that in a really fantastic British accent! Found out he's from the middle of England).

I suggested that he put his car in neutral and I help him push it into the school parking lot, to which he said "That might be a lovely idea...this is a rather bad spot to be seated." So we commence to push...easy pushing, I thought. We only pushed the car about 20 yards and into the school parking lot where he closed the door and stopped to catch his breath.

I asked if I could call someone for him. He said "Well, if you don't mind, you could give a lift to my destination. I drive a disabled lady and I'm on the way to her place. It's only down at the next light and take a left." So for a milli-second I freaked out. I'm female, in my nice car with my beautiful daughter and this man is asking for a ride. OH MY WORD!!! What do I do???? I say ok...that's what I do.

I call my mom and say "I've come upon a man who's car has died and I'm giving him a lift to his next stop. I should be there in about 15 minutes." My mom didn't know that I was on my way over...I just called her to let someone know. She got the hint.

So the man got in my car, I drove him less than one mile and dropped him at the place he was headed. He was a very kind gentleman, and extremely thankful for the ride, etc. He talked to Sarah while in the car, and we discussed possible reasons his car may have died...I'm fairly sure that his alternator is bad and the people where he bought his "batt'ry" should have tested it too, but didn't.

As soon as he got out of the car, Sarah and I had the following conversation:

S: That was REALLY nice of you, Mommy!

M: Yes, but I shouldn't have done that. I didn't think it through, Sarah.

S: Why? I'd want somebody to do that for us!

M: I know, Sarah, I would too, but I took a really big risk putting a stranger in my car, period. But then I did it with my beautiful daughter in the car too! I wasn't thinking. What I should've said was "Sir, I'm sorry your car is broken and please don't be upset by this, but I'm not comfortable driving you. I will be happy to call anyone for you...a taxi, a tow service, Triple A, and I'll wait with you if you'd like, but just not drive you anywhere."

I went on to say that when Sarah is able to drive she should NEVER, EVER do anything like that. It's not ok to drive strangers. We can be nice and helpful, but it really was not a smart thing that I did. Don't our children learn from our EXAMPLE? Actions speak louder than words, right??? Oh well, I guess I blew that lesson. Then I called mom to say we were on the way and fine.

Now, I know you think this story should be over, but I've more to say. It was 100 degrees in Rock Hill yesterday. When I decided to stop, it was because I could see that this man was at least my dad's age, and he would more than likely have been hurt. His car was in a terrible place so he was at risk of being hit and injured, then there was also the risk of heat related illness. During all of this, there were at least 50 people driving past us. Probably half of them were men younger than 45. Now, here's a man in his 60s, sweating, pushing a car, and a chick in flip flops and a pink t-shirt pushing too and not one other single person considered stopping!

I thought about writing a letter to the editor of our local paper expressing my disgust with people in our society, but I know that it probably won't change much, and it would just earn a name for me in my small community of some stupid woman who put her life and the life of her daughter at risk.

I really and truly believe in random acts of kindness! My day immediately got better! I was in such a great mood after helping that man! Really just listening to him talk made me happy, but doing what I did gave me a really great high. I am NOT soliciting nice comments, or any comments, really. I'm trying to get this message out....please be nice. Try being nice to everyone. We really need a better place to live...and I believe that just changing our attitudes about being nice and helpful and kind to the people we share the earth with will make it a better place to live!

Ok...now the story's over. Carry on! :)

Ed Brown's Rodeo

2008-08-04T22:49:00.013-04:00

Well, Saturday I took Sarah out to take pictures of her in her cowgirl outfit, on my mom's horse, Silly.

After this we set off to the rodeo.

We were SO excited...all of us, Mom, Woody, Sarah and I all were happy to be going. The rodeo was in Blacksburg...I do believe it was as far as it could be from Rock Hill. It seemed like it took us about 3 hours to get there, when in reality I think it was about 40 minutes! :) I snapped some pictures of Mom, Sarah, and Woody just as we got there.

So just about the time we decided to go pay our money and watch the rodeo, this is what we saw.

I did a little snooping around and discovered that the arena for the rodeo was a big, oval shaped field surrounded by large metal bleachers. The sky continued to look ominous and I called Greg and the Brians to have them turn the T.V. they were watching to the Weather Channel. They said that a severe thunderstorm was over Spartanburg, headed toward Blacksburg and should be passed after about another hour. We sat and contemplated what to do for quite a while. We finally decided not to stay after I caught this on camera.

We wanted to avoid sitting our rear ends on metal bleachers when this was going on around us. We were VERY disappointed and didn't make it home until after 10:00. We did have fun though, just driving there and back. We plan to try and go to the next one coming close to Rock Hill, which I think will be toward the end of August.

This is where we ended up when we came back to Rock Hill! It was a good plan B! :)

Oh well, maybe we'll get to see Ed Brown's Rodeo next year on its 41st anniversary!

Bathing Beauty

2008-08-03T14:24:00.005-04:00

So I've been saying that we spend copious amounts of time at the pool. Well, yesterday before the rodeo, Sarah and I went to meet up with her friend from school. After we'd been there about 3 hours Sarah was exhausted and wanted to go home. I'm reading a pretty good book and I wanted to finish the chapter I was reading so I asked her to lay on the chair beside me while I finished it. Snapped a couple of pictures. Remember, she's only six!

P.S. Pictures from the rodeo are coming...have several to download and a story to tell too!

RODEO

2008-08-02T10:08:00.003-04:00

If you live near me in Rock Hill or surrounding areas you know that my mom has bought a horse named Silly since she moved here. I think Mom has wanted a horse since she was about 2 years old and now that she's near retirement she got one. Anyway, she has gotten my sweet and precious daughter addicted to horses! This issue is one that I'm still not sure about...I'm happy Mom and Sarah have something they enjoy doing together, but Sarah has already fallen off a horse and the other day Mom said that they met a little girl about Sarah's size who does gymnastics on horse back. Sarah's eyes LIT UP! I just said "NO! That's it...I draw the line!"

Anyway, they've gone to several different rodeos in the last few months. Sarah BEGGED me to go with them tonight, so I plan on going. Sarah doesn't think I've been to a rodeo before but I have and really enjoyed it. I'm hoping to take my camera and take a lot of pictures to post...Mom bought Sarah a new rodeo outfit that goes with her red boots. It's adorable.

So, saddle up boys...the bulls are waitin'!

Trying something...

2008-08-01T19:22:00.004-04:00

Well, I read four or five other blogs on a regular basis and one of the things that happens regularly on really good blogs is labeling. My friend Kim labels, Nate Lawrenson labels, just good ones are careful to label, so I thought I'd try it. So this, I guess, is a test to see if I'm doing this right. Here goes!

Shameless advertisement...

2008-07-31T09:47:00.004-04:00

Hey everyone!

I am using my blog as a shameless advertisement space. We have bicycle issues at our house. We have lost 4 bicycles from our yard to theft and one bicycle from a neighbor's driveway to theft. Poor Caleb...he can't keep a bike he likes because people steal them from our yard. It's pretty pathetic. Anyway, we have discovered a way to keep the bikes safe, although it's not fun or convenient for any of us. So here's the deal:

We have 2 really nice bikes that we've been able to keep safe. The chopper was a Christmas gift for Caleb about 3 years ago...it's a great bike and he does like it, but it's more for pleasure riding than the kind of rough riding that our active 9 year old wants to do. It's rarely been ridden...maybe 10 times in 3 years. The Schwinn Falcon is a really nice 20" bike that was kindly "traded" for one we had earlier (the thief left this one when he/she took the last one that was stolen). We saw the Schwinn in Target the other day...exactly like the one we have and it was selling for $100. We'd like to sell them both for $125. Please look at the pictures and leave a comment if you're interested. We are willing to negotiate.

The beautiful Stingray

The nice "traded" Falcon

Pools, Castles, and sunny days

2008-07-30T11:15:00.005-04:00

We are really busy here, trying hard to enjoy the last couple of weeks of summer! We've been to the pool a lot. I'll try to get pictures of the kids at the pool and post if I can. Then yesterday we ended up spending the day at home and Caleb got motivated to complete a 3-D puzzle that has been sitting in his room for about a year. I do have some pictures of that...he worked on it all day it's beautiful!

Burnin' up the road

2008-07-15T23:01:00.003-04:00

Hey everybody! I'm sorry I've been AWOL for so long...things are really hopping in the Madden house. I know you remember I took a class at Winthrop. Well, I've finished that class (not without lots of swearing at the computer and griping about an online portfolio that will remain unnamed!) The last week of my class C spent the week with his grandfather, while S went with my mom to visit my grandmother. We (Greg and I) went to pick up C on July 3 and stayed for the July 4 fireworks there. We were home for about 5 days when C and I went to Anderson to meet S (who had been dropped off with my dad on her way back up from my grandmother's) and get fabric for a rocking chair I want to have recovered. We came back from Anderson on Saturday evening because I had computer at church on Sunday, then loaded up the car with me and both kids and drove to Atlanta to visit my bestie from college, Alisa.

Alisa has two children, C and D, and her two and my two are THOROUGHLY enjoying playing together, while I'm thoroughly enjoying hanging out with Alisa and Paul. We miss Greg, though!

When we get back home I will be finishing up laundry and getting C ready to go to his first ever week long camp. He's excited and I'm excited for him! He goes Sunday and while he's gone I am going to try (AGAIN) to get my stuff moved from RRMS to STMS. It's taking me a lot longer than I hoped but it's so hot in my room at RRMS that I don't feel like I can spend hours up there.

Anyway, I wanted to give you a quick update. Maybe I can post some pictures of us all soon! Hope everyone around is having a great summer!

Oh well...

2008-06-25T14:24:00.003-04:00

I know several of you have read the blog, but I guess no one has any ideas...that's ok. I have come up with some other ideas and I'm very excited about them. I am going to complete one lesson on tessellations and one on theoretical and experimental data. It should be good.

So how many of you know what a tessellation is? I didn't either until I started teaching 7th grade. A tessellation is a pattern created by a polygon which flips, inverts or slides so that the shape can cover the entire plane with no overlapping or gaps. Confusing? It was to me too. Some examples of tesselations that you are familiar with (but may not know it) are floor or wall tiles, a brick wall, etc. There is an artist who creates art from tessellations. You may be familiar with his work. I've posted a couple of the more famous examples of Escher's work for you to look at. I bet you'll say "OH! I didn't realize this was a tessellation!"

Suggestions please...

2008-06-22T22:22:00.005-04:00

In this class I'm taking the big project is to choose a children's book and read it to the class then develop two math lessons based on the book. I have chosen The Napping House as my book and now I'm trying to figure out what lessons to teach.

The lessons I teach have to be practical for my classroom...one of my standards has to do with sequencing which is a perfect lesson to teach from this book. The other lesson is the one giving me trouble...I'm having a hard time coming up with what to teach.

If there are any of you who:

1) know the book or have it and only have to read it,

2) can open the link for the SC Mathematics Standards and find the 7th grade standards (listed below), and

http://ed.sc.gov/agency/offices/cso/standards/math/documents/2007MathematicsStandards.doc

3) are very creative and willing to share ideas,

then please feel free to leave a comment under this post. I'll see if I can post some of what I actually do with the lessons soon. Let me warn you that the SC Mathematics Standards document is very long. The 7th grade standards start on page 54 of the document...you can just scroll down to there.

Thanks!

Yahoo!

2008-06-19T20:47:00.004-04:00

I'm taking this math class at Winthrop! It's really cool...we are doing some very hands on math activities every day and I LOVE it! I can't wait to teach my students some of the things we've learned in this class.

One of the coolest things we've learned is called chisombop. Are any of you familiar with this? I didn't know it was called chisombop...I just thought it was a 9s multiplication tables trick. It's when you number your fingers and thumbs from left to right...1-10. Then you fold down the finger that corresponds with the number you're multiplying by 9. The number of fingers up to the left of the folded finger is the tens and the number to the right of the folded finger is the ones.

Example:

In this picture, Sarah's fingers will be numbered 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10, from her left pinky all the way to her right pinky.

In this picture, Sarah's #3 finger is folded under. The multiplication problem would be 9x3. Look at the number of fingers unfolded to the left of her #3 and count them. You should see two. Now look at the number of fingers unfolded to the right of her #3 and count them. You should see seven. The fingers to the left of the #3 represent the tens and the fingers to the right of the #3 represent the ones, thus the solution to the multiplication problem 9x3 is 27.

This works with all the 9s multiples up to 10! How cool is that?

There's another one that I learned that's even cooler, but it's way more complicated and will take another post.

Thanks Dr. Mink!

Better understanding...

2008-06-19T07:56:00.003-04:00

When I posted yesterday about the mapping we had been doing in our district several things had slipped my mind. I said that I would find out more about it all before I got upset so I emailed my friend who is the Instructional Coach at RRMS and she refreshed my memory for me.

During the process, one of the things we did, or at least tried to do, was to determine if each indicator really fit with the standard under which it was written. Then we tried to develop a sequence for teaching these concepts. These were all brought to a meeting at the district office where teachers from each school met with the coordinator for their area. These representatives have come up with a sequence for teaching concepts in classrooms. I hope all this makes sense the way I'm saying it.

I had a good explanation of this from our IC and administrator back when we were doing this and all that info. just completely left my mind when I heard about this yesterday. Sorry for misleading anyone about that!

All this is to say that we work hard, but we often screw up (or at least I do). I try to be more careful about running my mouth before I know what I'm talking about, but often...VERY OFTEN I eat shoe for breakfast! :)

Maps

2008-06-18T20:54:00.002-04:00

For the last year or two we (teachers in our district) have been doing this thing called curriculum mapping. This has been very complicated...it's new to us and we have to work together in departments and grade levels...lots of give and take. Many "newer" teachers like myself often feel that we are struggling to find a balance between how we like to teach and the teaching methods of teachers who have been around for a while. It has been very difficult.

I heard today that our district is giving us a map they've developed for us. Now, I see the value of all our schools/grade levels/subjects teaching the same concept at the same time. My problem is this...if, and that's IF our district leaders intended to give us this map, why did they ask us to spend hours of difficult work doing this? I have to do some more research and find out how true this is for the math department (it could just be happening in Language Arts) before I get upset. I also need to see the proposed map before getting upset.

This is something I feel strongly about...I really love teaching. However, when copious amounts of time is spent working on something that most likely will not be used anyway, thereby leading me to feel that I've wasted my time, I get upset.

I will be finding out more about this before I really get upset.

I promised!!!!!

2008-06-16T17:46:00.003-04:00

Here's the updated post! Wow...this last couple of weeks has been crazy! I know I told you all that I would be going to Florida. I went and had a blast with my girls but it was way too short! I did rent a book on cd and listen to it on the way down and back, so that was a nice distraction, but it would've been nice to have stayed for about 3 more days!

I got back and both kids had some type of camp, so I spent about an hour each day in the car. We are spending a lot of time at the pool...it's good exercise for them and I get to keep my sanity! :)

Last weekend we went to Anderson. My youngest brother brought his girlfriend up from Dallas to meet the family, so mom and I went and "kidnapped" Lindsey to go shopping in Commerce on Saturday! The girl is a scream and she loves my brother. While we were there my kids asked if they could stay and visit Mammaw and Papaw for the week, so Dad, Carla, Ashley and Kyle are trading them off every day or two for the rest of the week. Nice to have that break.

After Ryan and Lindsey left Anderson they went to Gatlinburg where RYAN PROPOSED! I'm so excited that I'm going to have a sister-in-law!

Now I'm home and I started my summer course. It's a fun math class...it will end on July 3, so it's short (which is great) and after I finish that one I will only have ONE CLASS until I'm a Master of Education! Ha! I'm very excited about that too!

On another note, please continue to pray for the Lawrensons. Tricia has just been diagnosed with post transplant lymphoma, so there is another hurdle for them to clear. Thanks!

New Post coming soon...

2008-06-12T11:46:00.002-04:00

Hey...It's been crazy! School's out, whirl-wind trip to Florida, kids in camp, laundry piling up, DAMN CABLE MODEM GOING OUT AT LEAST ONCE/DAY! You get the idea, huh? I'll put up a better post soon! PROMISE!

Love ya!!!!!!!!!!!

Today's the day...

2008-06-05T09:22:00.003-04:00

"Today's the day! The sun is shining! The tank is clean!" My children woke up this morning shouting and jumping!!! "It's the LAST DAY OF SCHOOL!" The kids' last day is today and we have a work day tomorrow. But...a teacher workday is like a day off! :) I hope you all have a WONDERFUL summer!

10 bazillion happy days to anyone who can tell me the movie the first quote is from! :)

Fixed that thing...

2008-06-04T11:02:00.001-04:00

You know the weird letters that you have to verify if you want to post a comment to my blog? I disabled it, so I would love to hear from my 3 readers! :)

ONE MORE DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

TWO DAYS!!!!!

2008-06-03T19:42:00.002-04:00

That's how long I have with my students from this year. I will miss them, but for the most part we all need a break so badly, I think it will take us several weeks to start missing each other! :) We're doing things this week like taking all our text books to the book room and doaling out fines for damaged books. I've also almost finished grades which need to be exported tomorrow.

Anyone who has ever taught knows that the last day or two of school is a scramble to do fun things that will keep the students involved. We also have been watching every cool movie we can find. Today we watched "Akeelah and the Bee." One of my students said "I've never gotten so excited over listening to people spell." If you haven't seen this movie and you have kids (either yours or someone else's who you teach) I HIGHLY recommend it. It's a fantastic, feel good movie and very encouraging for kids.

Tomorrow we are making playdough in zip lock bags while they watch another movie...not sure what this one will be. Rhonda's bringing one for us to watch...then we're walking across the street to Burger King to eat junk, shoot the breeze, sign yearbooks and relax. I'm really looking forward to it!

Hope you all enjoy the rest of your week as much as I will! :)

TOTY....

2008-05-30T14:24:00.003-04:00

No not me. Do you remember the TOTY award? I learned the term from "Happy Days" in the later episodes when The Fonz was a teacher at a tech school and was up for the TOTY award. TOTY, in case you don't know stands for Teacher Of The Year. Anyway, I don't believe I'll ever be nominated or voted TOTY, but I did come across the blog of the NC TOTY today. It's really a nice one if you are interested in teacher's lives. I love it. If you want to visit her blog (Cindy Rigsbee is her name) the address is http://thedreamteacher.blogspot.com/. I'm also adding this to my list on the right of "other cool blogs".

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

The last....

2008-05-30T10:32:00.002-04:00

FRIDAY OF THE SCHOOL YEAR! The students get out on Thursday so we don't have any more Friday's. For the Friday song this morning I played "Let's Get It Started" by the Black-Eyed Peas.

WOO HOO!!!!!!

String Art

2008-05-25T12:40:00.007-04:00

For the last few days my students have been working on a string art project. It's very complicated and I don't want to bore anyone with the mathematical logistics, but let's just say that most adults probably can't tell you how to find the central angle of a circle, much less use angles of a circle to create a polygon! :) So if that confused you just a little bit, put yourself in 7th grade...way hard for them. ANYWAY...they did it. Some of them are still working on their projects, but I've seen the beginning of them all and they are going to be great. Here are just a few...I couldn't load them all at once. Aren't these GREAT?!?!?!?!?!

Leave the man alone!!!!

2008-05-22T21:15:00.003-04:00

This blog is devoted to issues I feel strongly about. Tonight's post is no exception. Periodically I have commented on Nate, Tricia and Gwyneth Lawrenson...I have been following their story for several months and I believe that two or three posts ago I mentioned that they are all home together. If you'd like to read this miraculous story you can click here to go to Nate's blog. Now on to my point...

Nate Lawrenson has so openly shared his family's story, giving God glory all the while. Today he posted a sweet story about what a fantastic role model Steven Curtis Chapman has been for him throughout his life. The Chapman family is suffering tremendous grief after one of their adopted children was accidently run over and killed by one of their biological children. Nate mentioned, just as I did, the word "adopted." Would you believe that he received an email from someone who was offended? Nate then went back, blogged an apology for offending.

What is wrong with us??? Why...WHY would anyone feel as though they need to email, or even comment if they were offended by his post? Throughout the whole time I've followed their story, Nate has demonstrated love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, and self-control. He has exhibited, in copious amounts, each of the fruits of the spirit. Nate has, more than once, felt that he had to defend his posts on HIS blog! It is not anyone's blog but Nate's and he has every right to share, or not share, what HE chooses.

So think....if you read Nate's blog and you don't like what he's said, scream into your pillow or write it on your own blog, or better yet, share whatever your issue is with God and ask him to clear it all up in your mind. But for Pete's sake, leave Nathan Lawrenson alone.

There's MY gripe on MY blog!

Tuesday and counting

2008-05-20T09:54:00.003-04:00

Here we are 11 school days from the end. We are still PACT testing this week. They are working hard, but I feel very sorry for the students. They tested like this three days last week. They're doing it three days this week. I know they're getting tired.

I am so excited about moving to STMS. I've already conferenced with some of the teachers over there and we are planning to start a group for girls where we teach them about personal hygiene, exercise, make-up, etiquette, etc. I am SO excited! I think the teachers there will be forward thinking and they have already been very kind to me.

On another note, here are more of my students...they are so ready for school to be over...and SO AM I!

It's been Monday all day...

2008-05-19T16:41:00.002-04:00

I am sick...I've been sick since Friday with a sore throat, stuffy/runny nose, cough, etc. So I woke up this morning sicker. I won't go into detail, but let's just say I was rotten. Anyway, I slog to the shower and get semi awake, do the make up, iron the clothes, get the kids out the door, etc. and get in the car to go to work. I decide to stop at McDonald's to get a drink. I sit the drink in my cup holder and as I pull out onto Cherry the drink falls over and spills all over my pants. UGH...too late to go home so I figure they'll dry and I'll be ok.

Get to school and go get the packs of protractors, compasses, rulers and so on to work on the string art project. I drop the whole box and plastic measuring devices go everywhere. After picking them up, I go over as much DRY AND BORING science as I can stomach and then move on to the project. As I am giving out the packs of measuring devices I realize I'm about 4 short!!! "Some of you will have to share" I say, and all the students grab their bags and act like it's food and they haven't eaten in about a year.

I explain and demonstrate and go and show again and then get everyone on the same page. And then I begin explaining how to divide the circles into equal angles and OH MY GOSH! It was really difficult for them to follow and understand and we all got frustrated.

Then I went to the dr. and found out that I do not have an infection and I have to let this stupid crud just work out. UGH! I went to the library to return books that my children checked out from the Book Mobile and had a book from their elementary school.

I'm with Kim on "one of those days." It's been one of those days...I'm ready to go to bed and start over tomorrow morning.

TGIF!

2008-05-16T12:26:00.002-04:00

I may have used that as a title once before, but seriously!!!! T.G.I.F.!!!!! We (all the teachers and all the students) are growing weary of coming here and working. We really need a summer break! I wake up my students more and more with each passing day. I often wonder what they would do if I put my head down and went to sleep! :)

I am working with them on some really cool math projects...one is string art. Many of you may remember doind string art when you were in school...it never really goes out of style. The other is creating a stained glass window design using slope. It's fun, but difficult and the students have a love/hate relationship with the project. I plan to take pictures and post them early next week...be on the lookout!

On another note, Nate, Tricia, and Gwyneth Lawrenson are finally experiencing "family time" at home! Gwyneth is the micro-preemie who was born just shy of 25 weeks gestation to a mother with advanced CF disease. God has blessed Tricia with new lungs (thanks to an organ donor) and has protected Gwyneth from major complications. Please join me in continuing to pray for them as they grow together as a family!

Have a great weekend!

Ugh

2008-05-14T10:07:00.002-04:00

We are PACT testing this week. We test on Tues., Wed., Thurs., make ups on Fri. Then again next week...Tues., Wed., Thurs., make ups on Fri. This is an incredibly boring week for me! I am praying that my students realize that they have the skills needed to complete the task before them. I told them yesterday before we started..."You may not have learned in my class every single thing you will see on this test, but you've been taught how to think it all through and be able to solve. Do your best and THINK, THINK, THINK!" I felt like a character from Disney's Winnie the Pooh and the Super Sleuths.

Anyway, I will try to take pics of the remainder of my students and get them posted today or tomorrow. They love this attention!

A few more...

2008-05-13T21:10:00.003-04:00

M...isn't she cute?
D, K, and D
J...aka "CarrotTop"
E...very pretty girl
M&M...not the candy
A which stands for "ain't I cute?"
R...she is precious!

More of my students

2008-05-12T21:25:00.004-04:00

Some of the rest of them were not nearly as camera shy as some of the first ones...

E...doing her BEST "Oh My GOD!" eye roll for me.

L...cutie pie

Thank you God...

2008-05-11T09:07:00.002-04:00

I want to take today to thank God for giving me these two beautiful reasons to celebrate Mother's Day.
I'm blessed! Thank you God!

Take me out to the ballgame!!!

2008-05-10T14:40:00.003-04:00

Many of you know that baseball is my FAVORITE game!!!! I really love it when I get to watch my favorite player, Caleb Madden. He's fantastic and I am a typical screaming mom!!! "Run, run, run...get the lead out!!!" "Get your head in the game!" "You got it...it's your now!" "RUN, RUN, RUN, RUN, RUN...DON'T LOOK AT THE BALL.....RUN!"

Here are some pics of what I get with my enthusiasm...he's much more calm than I am.

My students

2008-05-10T09:23:00.006-04:00

I have taken some pictures of my students and promised them I would put them on my blog...so here they are.

B, J, and B....cute, huh?

S...Can you say camera shy???

T...this is the position you can find her in the most often...however she knows her stuff!

There will be more later, taking a break! See you soon!

Priceless

2008-05-09T14:36:00.008-04:00

Load of freshly washed quarry rocks to fix the driveway..........$500

Hospital co-pay for stitches after getting hit with a rock........$100

The amount of fun they had playing on the rocks...........PRICELESS!

Seriously, nobody got hurt severely but they had a blast! You can see it on their faces.

I told them it looked they had gotten into war paint. This was a great day!!!!

Never Before

2008-05-08T13:47:00.002-04:00

Today during my fourth period class (it's the last core class they have before electives) I gave up on my students. After 2 hours of trying to explain things to them, I had enough of talking over them and just said "the test is on Monday...you can figure out what it's on." This has never happened before in my teaching career. I've never given up on an entire class. This has been a hell-uva week.

The cat....

2008-05-07T21:11:00.002-04:00

...is now out of the bag, so I can write more about it. I interviewed for a job teaching 7th grade math at another middle school in Rock Hill and got the job. I will be teaching on a four person team beginning next school year...7th grade (my favorite) math. Not a huge change from what I teach now but I won't be teaching science. It's still in the same district, so I will still see the same people from time to time. I've never taught anywhere other than RRMS since I came to Rock Hill, so I'm kind of sad to leave "home" but change is good. And God opened the door for me to go here...I don't think it's a good idea to say no to God! :)

Can't wait to learn more about STMS and write about it here.

Progress Reports

2008-05-06T09:50:00.002-04:00

Progress Reports go out today...mid-term grades for those of you who aren't familiar with educanese. So many of my students don't have all their grades done and have incompletes...they are VERY upset, mainly with me. Not my fault! But next week in the afternoons after PACT we will spend some time on make ups.

Job interview this afternoon! Wish me luck...more information to come later.

Exams (Part 2)

2008-05-04T15:46:00.000-04:00

Written, re-read, and submitted!!!! YEE HAW!

Exams...

2008-05-03T17:49:00.002-04:00

Any questions?

My Family

2008-05-02T10:46:00.012-04:00

Yesterday I posted a photo of Caleb for my friend Kim. She left a comment that said that Caleb looks exactly like me, which I agree with. But many, many people say that Sarah looks just like me. So here's what I think...Caleb has the same facial features that I do, but has darker coloring like Greg.

Sarah, on the other hand, has coloring more like mine (check out her eyes), but the features of Greg's face.

What do you think? I have had someone drive by my house and see Sarah playing, and ask me about it later...thinking that Sarah looks just like me, not knowing where I live prior to the 'drive by' and being able to tell she was my daughter. I just don't see it. Let me know what you all think about this...just fun for me! :)

What ARE we teaching them???

2008-05-01T12:01:00.003-04:00

This morning as I was getting ready for school I watched, as I always do, "Today on NBC." While I was watching I saw two things that really caught my attention. First was a story about a softball player who hit a homerun and then injured her knee on the way to first base. She couldn't run and it was against the rules for her teammates to carry her, so the opposing team carried her around the bases. Now I know that there are some people who maintain that she should've drug herself around the bases to score and not relied on anyone else...those people have the opinion that American's are too soft...we need to toughen up and "pick ourselves up by the boot straps and do it ourselves." I mean, after all, Kerri Strugg vaulted and landed without a hop, skip, or jump to clinch the gold medal for the American team in the 1996, and she had a broken foot, right?

What's wrong, though, with teaching our kids that it's ok to help someone? There's a saying that goes "It takes a village to raise a child"...well, I maintain that it takes a village just to survive. Our world is getting smaller and smaller and we are connected by the internet...why can't we go deeper than half-hearted communication and get involved with each other? Bravo to the girls who carried their opponent around the diamond! They just get it!

The second thing that caught my attention was this: A teenager (13 years old) was at home when two people broke into her house to burglarize it. The smart girl that she is decided that if the burglars were going to steel things they would go through the closet in her room, so she hid under the covers in her bed...I'm assuming that she has a big, fluffy comforter that could hide a person. Ok...I get that and I'm impressed that she thought about that. This is the part I don't get...rather than use her cell to call 911, she texts her mother...who is at work 15 minutes away. Why??? Why would she do that? I talked to my students about it because they are old enough to be at home alone now. I said "FIRST...be SURE all the doors are locked! SECOND...don't text your mom...call 911!" I explained that as a mother I would really want to know what was going on with my children, but that there were some instances that I'm not trained to help them in! I do not have a clue how to rescue my children from a fire safely, how to repair severly damaged body parts, or how to stop thieves or robbers from getting my stuff. I could ram their vehicle with mine...that's what this mom did...and I might even wrestle with someone, but I can't arrest them...I'm tough, but not that tough.

Please make sure you are talking to your kids about this stuff. It's a scary world we live in!

Kim...this one's for you!!!

2008-05-01T11:54:00.002-04:00

Just as we were leaving to go to school this morning, I realized Caleb had his "Go Eagles" shirt on for the Winthrop Eagles. So I grabbed my phone and snapped a pic to post here for Kim! Hope you enjoy it, Kim!!!
Robin

Breast Cancer Walk (Part 2)

2008-04-29T19:47:00.003-04:00

Apparently I put an incorrect link in my original post on how to get to my Avon Breast Cancer Walk page. The correct address is http://tinyurl.com/3xonrz. Please consider visiting and donating! Thanks so much!

Keeping the faith

2008-04-28T22:43:00.004-04:00

Tonight I was chatting online with the girl I really want my brother to marry...she's a teacher too, seeking her master's in educational administration. She didn't have a great day today. I didn't have a great day today either. I make my students take notes. And because I am teaching two subjects I keep the same class of students for about two hours. I always teach math first and then science. So today I say "Friday we talked about functions and relations. Today we're talking about graphing functions." Not 30 seconds later I have a student ask me if this is "math or science?"

L is frustrated with some parents. She has the right to be...lots of times we have a right to be upset with parents. These parents send their children to us every day, and often don't trust us to do our jobs well.

You know what the best part of this is, though? I STILL love my job! I can't wait to get there every day! Even if I get frustrated...extremely frustrated. I absolutely love it! I've got to keep the faith that God wouldn't let me do something for a living where I am miserable. I don't know anyone who doesn't get frustrated with their jobs, but I have faith that God has me where he needs me and where he can use me best!

It her birthday!

2008-04-26T08:57:00.004-04:00

Happy Birthday to my precious baby! We love you with all our hearts and we are so proud of the beautiful, smart young lady you are becoming!

Happy Birthday Sarah!

Love,
Mom and Dad

Avon Breast Cancer Walk

2008-04-25T08:42:00.004-04:00

I don't know how many people there are who read this blog, but it's at least worth it to try, right?

I have registered to walk in the Charlotte Avon Breast Cancer walk. It's a 39 mile walk. We go 26 miles (a marathon) the first day, sleep in tents and then walk 13 miles (half-marathon) the next day. In order to participate I have to raise $1800.00. All this money will go toward breast cancer research. We need to find a cure for this horrible disease.

About two months ago my doctor found a lump in my breast. I had already found one under my arm on the same side and she confirmed that it was there. I had to go for a mammogram and an ultrasound. There was a one week period of time between finding the lump and the diagnostic tests. That was one of the scariest weeks of my life...not knowing, and the constant thinking about it. I can't tell you how many times I felt my breast again while I was in the bathroom, trying to see if the lump was still there! Thank God that everything was absolutely gone when I had the mammogram and the ultrasound and I do not have breast cancer. Can you imagine what it would feel like for the radiologist to say "Mrs. (insert your name here), this is suspicious and we want to do a biopsy." Or worse yet..."No biopsy is necessary...I can see that you have cancer. We will schedule an appointment with an oncologist for you and you need to see him/her right away." I can't.

Please consider donating to my fund. You can either mail a check to me personally (add your phone number or personal email on the messages for this post and I'll contact you with my mailing address) or you can go to my personal web-page at http://tinyurl.com/3xonrz and donate there. It's very easy...just point and click! :) As always, if you even read my notes here, thank you. And thank you even more if you can and will support my efforts to help find a cure for breast cancer!

This is "For the Girls!"

Sarah

2008-04-24T17:45:00.002-04:00

Those of you who know me personally know that as much as I love teaching I love my family more! I've been blessed with a wonderful husband and two beautiful, healthy children. Well, my baby will be six on Saturday! If I really wanted to celebrate her exact birthdate and time, I would set my clock for 12:16 a.m. Saturday morning and go in Sarah's room and wake her up at 12:17 a.m. singing "Happy Birthday"! I won't do that...I don't like waking up in the middle of the night and neither does she.

The "Come See Me" finale is on Saturday night, so we are going to sit by Winthrop Lake and watch fireworks for her birthday. Sarah thinks that the city is celebrating her birthday (after all...everyone's life revolves around Sarah, ya know). I've just let her believe it and we are using that as her party. Our family is coming and most of her friends will be there anyway. It'll be a fun time.

Sarah has not stopped telling me lately that the next time she goes to children's choir, she'll be going to the same room with Caleb because she'll be in 1st grade. She tells me about 3 times/week that she's an almost 1st grader. Just today she said "Mom...in two days I'll be SIX!" Oh baby, I know!

I know exactly how fast you're growing up and away. I know that soon you won't call me in the middle of the night and say "Mommy will you snuggle up with me?" I know that soon Caleb won't be your hero anymore...he'll just be your brother. I know that sooner than I want to admit there will be a string of boys you bring home to eat with us because you really want to date them and that's Daddy's rule..."Any boy who wants to date MY daughter is going to sit at MY table and eat a meal with ME! And he better talk too!" (When you read that part, you have to puff up your chest, lower your eyebrows and make your voice all husky to get the real effect.)

I had similar emotions when Caleb turned six. I don't know what it is...I guess I realize that you're halfway to being a teenager or something, but I feel like my baby is gone. Well, Sarah, no matter how old and big you get, baby, you can always call me in the middle of the night to snuggle up with you and I always will! I love you!

I mean...for REAL!?!?!?!

2008-04-23T13:30:00.005-04:00

Tell me the truth...after you read this, isn't it obviously apparent that we have only six weeks left of school?

1) The kid I teach who has to blow his nose at least one time each class period...the one who sounds like Gonzo when he blows the little horn at the end of the "Muppet Show" introduction...yeah...that one. He has been stepping out into the hall at 9:20 and again at 10:30 for 158 days now (would be 159 but he was sick one day and stayed home) and blowing his nose. Seriously, I don't know how he avoids blowing a little bit of brain tissue out because he blows harder and louder than anyone I know (yes, Alisa, even louder than you!). Anyway, after 158 days of this occurrence, I have another teacher on my hall come to me YESTERDAY and say "Please tell him to go to the bathroom when he blows his nose. It's disturbing my classes." Is it ok that I found this remark incredibly funny and somewhat annoying at the same time? Honestly, is it necessary to blow one's nose so hard that a teacher 2 classrooms down the hall complains, and is it necessary to complain now about something that has happened for 158 of the last 159 days?

2) Sarah has been sick lately and we have to see a specialist. The only appt. I could get is tomorrow, so I will be out all day. Last week when she was sick and I stayed home with her, my students acted AWFUL, so I have been writing substitute plans all day today, while the students are taking an open book test that I spent way too long making out (mainly because it covers 2 chapters and I have to start getting some grades in the book). While I'm pouring over these plans, making sure they have more work than they could ever finish in even a week, one of my dear, precious, lovely young ladies walks up and here's the conversation:

Her: I have a question. Don't this word right here in number 22, whether, don't it s'poseda have a A in it?

Me: Huh?

Her: Dis word right here...whether...don't it sposeda have a A in it?

Me: No. It's the word whether, not weather.

Her: But it sposeda have a A in it.

Me: No it's not. It's not the word weather. It's whether.

Her: I don't git it.

Me: WHETHER....I can't tell WHETHER OR NOT YOU UNDERSTAND THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WHETHER AND WEATHER!

Her: OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHH....I git it. Thanks Miss. (notice...no Madden attached!)

I need summer...or a tall glass of something fruity and a back rub!

Long time...no post

2008-04-22T09:31:00.002-04:00

Been a while...life has been a bit overwhelming lately, so the blog is one of the last things on my mind. Thought it was time for an update.

Spring Break came and went and we're back in full force here. PACT is only around the corner so I'm trying to CRAM everything they need into their brains. You should see this classroom. These kids are always writing, working, asking questions...that's how I like it! We only have six and a half weeks left all together and I really need the break!!!

Most of my students who have been behavior problems have either decided they need to just finish the year, or they've decided that they want to just blow it out and are being so bad I have to put them out. I still want them to be in here and learn, so it's a bit of a struggle to deal with this type of behavior.

I came across this really cool blog...a girl I went to highschool with is the author. She seems to have so many things right! I'll be reading hers to get some ideas for mine, k?

Hope everyone out there is doing great. Hopefully it won't be so long between posts again.

Teacher in the middle

It's that time of year again...

Ideas?

I'm teaching them how...

AFTER SCHOOL DETENTION

This is really HARD!

What does the word rigor mean to you?

The BIG birthday!!!!!!!

Concert of Hope and Remembrance...

It's been a MONDAY...

Independence...

AAAAAAAAAAAAND We're OFF!!!

Way past time...

Sick Day

Snow Day Projects

Introducing Brittany

I'm doubly blessed

My head meets the wall...

Twenty Ten

Busy CHRISTmas Holiday!

It's the MOST WONDERFUL TIME.............

Merry Christmas!!!

Illness...How are people your way?

My Story (Part 3 and the most recent part...my story is still being written!)

My Story (Part 2)

My Story (Part 1)

Spring Break!!!

A Big Move

My Shanny...

Spring has SPRUNG

Poker's Over

Probability and Poker

SNOW DAY!!!

Intern

Half Done

Happy New Year!

Fun tag!

The Door

Master

My students

An exercise in patriotism

I walked!

Finally settling in...

Disney Pics

Think PINK!!!

Look out Disney...Here we come

We're headed out!!!

Updated the Blog a bit

Gotta update...

We're feelin' the love!

First Friday!

Just one more day

*#*#STRES!!!!*#*#*

Back to school again...

The man, the car, and the kindness

Ed Brown's Rodeo

Bathing Beauty

RODEO

Trying something...

Shameless advertisement...

Pools, Castles, and sunny days

Burnin' up the road

Oh well...

Suggestions please...

Yahoo!

Better understanding...

Maps

I promised!!!!!

New Post coming soon...

Today's the day...

Fixed that thing...

TWO DAYS!!!!!

TOTY....

The last....

String Art

Leave the man alone!!!!

Tuesday and counting

It's been Monday all day...

TGIF!

Ugh

##STRES!!!!##*