Creative Writing Project

I've been working on putting together an after-school writing project at my school. It's becoming quite tangible now and I'm getting quite excited. So far... grant money has been approved, an author has agreed to come for a final get-together at the end of the project, dates for the parent/student information meeting have been reserved on the "important dates calendar" at school, my wonderful niece translator has edited the Spanish version of a flyer for that meeting (MUCHAS GRACIAS!!! Leah). And now, as I type this blog, I am printing the flyers.

  Take a look:

Inviting students and parents to an information meeting. "During the project, you will write in Spanish at times, in English at times, and sometimes you will write in both languages."

London Bridge Is Falling Down

Who remembers this game from childhood?

London Bridge is falling down
Falling down
Falling down
London Bridge is falling down
My fair lady. 

Take the key and lock her up
Lock her up
Lock her up
Take the key and lock her up
My fair lady.

If you were the player caught in the arch formed by the two "bridge" players at the end of the rhyme, you had to pick which side of the bridge to be on by choosing between, say, oranges and apples. Was this our first contact with a multiple choice quiz that didn't include "all of the above"?

Somedays I feel like public education is a game of London Bridge, in which we have to make choices between which side of the bridge to stand behind. For example: caring about children's well-being or caring about students' performance/scores. Of course, ideally teachers, administrators, politicians, etc. care about both. But just like in the London Bridge game, sometimes folks have to choose which one to care about most. Just for the record, whenever that situation arches above me, I intend to choose children's well-being.

There are several theories regarding the origin of that school-yard song and game, which dates back to at least the seventeenth century. One is "that [it] refers to the burying, perhaps alive, of children in the foundations of the bridge ...  based around the idea that a bridge would collapse unless the body of a human sacrifice were buried in its foundations." Coincidentally, this is called the Child Sacrifice Theory!

Around the end of Volume 25

Volume 25, No. 4

About a year ago, I discovered what I'd been longing for in my teaching career: Rethinking Schools, a quarterly education journal, "for educators who want to enlist students in thinking deeply and critically about the world today". It includes inspiring articles written by a variety of educators, but of course not so inspiring if I bring it in from the mailbox and stash it on the bottom shelf of the coffee table.

What atrocious habits I have developed!

A couple of days ago, Rethinking Schools sent me a renewal notice. I see it laying unopened on the desk to the left of the computer where I am typing this blog entry. Not quite on the top of the pile, but close enough so I can see it still. The reason I haven't opened it and renewed the subscription yet is the same reason I haven't opened the latest issue of that journal... I have gotten into the habit of not having time for such things as READING during the long hectic weeks and months of the school year. Not that I don't read anything. In fact I do a lot of reading after work hours:

• teacher's guides, 
• students' essays, 
• articles required for professional development classes, 
• curriculum maps and pacing guides, 
• Colorado Department of Education standards website in search of acceptable reasons to include in grant proposals to justify my requests for money to purchase classroom books, 
• and I've spent many evenings and weekends in the company of leveled reading books from my classroom so I could stay ahead of my 7 year old students. 

A year ago, after an especially hectic and stressful school year, my very generously supportive husband suggested that we would not be suffering financially if I worked part-time. Last fall, I started the experiment to see what it would be like to work a 65% part-time position. Unfortunately I was assigned to a grade level I'd never taught, using a curriculum program I'd never used, in a language I hadn't taught in (all-English!) for more than a decade. I had a huge amount of homework that year. But it's now over and a new autumn has rolled around. I am back to a familiar teaching assignment (Bilingual Literacy Lab) and working half-time.

It seems, however, that I need a reminder from time to time that I can take a cleansing breath, relax, pick up a book or magazine and delve into reading something for pleasure, or even for inspiration. Such a reminder arrived yesterday in my mailbox... from Rethinking Schools. No, not another subscription renewal reminder, it was a donation request. Instead of sending it straight to the junk-mail trash bin, I read the following story excerpt from that letter, written by a young teacher.

"When I first entered my teacher education program...I wanted to change the world and love children. After reading [a book published by Rethinking Schools] I still wanted to change the world and love children, but I realized to do that, I needed to also be the thoughtful and conscious teacher who empowers children, advocates for their rights, and creates critical thinkers who understand that their voices count."

Words near and dear to my heart.

So, what's on my agenda today? Another cup of coffee, followed by renewing a journal subscription, then digging out its latest issue, Volume 27, No. 1 and settling into a pleasurably inspiring morning of reading on this Friday "comp-day" following the completion of a couple late evening Parent Teacher Conferences this past week.

      

Volume 27, No.1 , Fall 2012

                                                                                    Aaaaaah.
                                                                                              YES!!

Hope

Part 2 of Wondering What Would/Could Happen 
(see blog from Sept. 22, 2012)

Once you choose hope anything is possible                                                                                                ~ Christopher Reeve

I'm writing a grant proposal with high hopes...

One part of the writing project grant that I have now officially added, includes inviting a published author, Laura Resau, who will talk with the students about her journey as a writer and about her experiences in other countries that have inspired her stories. She is bilingual (or trilingual?), willing to present in either English or Spanish, lives within a short drive from where my school is located, even has some ideas on fundraising if we need that. Her stories seem to be a reflection of many of the students' lives at my school. This is getting exciting!!

Just waiting on some information I have requested, to put in the grant, and then I'm ready to send it off to the donor organization.