Thanksgiving with Zombies

I've stopped trying to stay ahead of them. However, periodically I realize I'm going to have to learn something new so I can at least try to keep from falling behind my students; slipping into the abyss of outdated technology savvy.

I'm truly thankful for these moments. Yesterday it came to me … I can no longer ignore zombies.

I teach a couple intervention groups of English Language Learners; thinking I had more knowledge about English and thus could stay on top of the content of my assignment. Really. After all, I've been teaching ELLs for 3 decades. My entire teaching career.

The students in my groups are lower than the average ELLs at my school, in which 90+% of our student population are eligible for "English as a Second Language" (ESL) services. I have some pretty good tools for sheltering instruction so they can access the curriculum when I send them back to their regular classroom.

For example, when I was dismantling my vegetable garden a few weeks ago, I discovered a caterpillar on the broccoli plant leaves. My first thought was I can take this fellow to school so my students can really experience the life cycle first hand! Thus it has been a fun time of getting reluctant speakers of English engaged in lively conversations and writing tasks.

Yesterday we read a book, entitled (something like…) "What do Plants and Animals Need?" Great photographs that show the meaning of the text; not too wordy, but informative information. After the read aloud, we chatted about each page focusing on what animals and plants were on each page and what we could learn about their habitat from the photos. Then brought the discussion back to the title's question. So … what do plants need? Water, sun, and dirt. Then I thought I could enlighten the students with the fact that there are some plants that grow in water.

One of the students, I'll call him Einstein, declared that Water Lilies grow in water. Then he proceeded to spout off lots of other plant facts. "Wow. You know a lot about plants, 'Einstein'! Where did you learn all this?"

"From plants versus zombies."

"What? What did you say?"

Plants vs. Zombies

After Einstein and the others returned to their regular classroom, I sought out the Science Lady (aka STEM coordinator) in the building. She's young. Really on top of all things technological, as well as science, math, and engineering. She must know what Einstein was talking about.

I found her in the teacher's lounge.

"Have you ever heard of 'Plants vs. Zombies'?"

She chuckled and replied, "Hmm. I didn't take you for someone into that." Ha, ha. Me into Zombies. Yes, kind of surprising, isn't it?! I'm just trying to keep up with my students, I explained.

She thought it might be an app or a game.

Sure enough. This morning I searched the App store on my iPhone, and there it was. For free. Not that I installed it, but I'm thinking I will. Maybe later, after I go shopping at Sprouts for a small turkey. Then when the family comes over for Thanksgiving dinner, I can offer turkey and entertainment! Although, chances are that my nephew's 5 year old son, who will be coming for dinner is already acquainted with Plants vs Zombies. Maybe, just maybe his not-quite-two-month old sister hasn't seen it yet, though!!

Fearlessly waiting for inspiration

(Blog post started 9/10/13, reread 10/12/13  Here's this unfinished piece that led to a new adventure... where did the last month go?! )

The invitation crept into my inbox. Then exploded in my imagination.

Mentoring at-risk students.

A one page summary of my qualifications and reasons for interest in this position is requested.

One page?

Maybe a lifetime of vignettes to illustrate my reasons and qualifications. I don't think that will fly.

I suppose the thing to do is to just start writing and hope it fits on one page...

"Relationships with Educators Accelerate Learning"

Why I want so much to be one of those Educators in the REAL program. Let me count the ways.

1. Mentoring a student one summer during Master's degree program (Major: Social, Multicultural, Bilingual, Equity Education)
2. Numerous home visits during my 18 year teaching career in public education
3. Diverse teaching positions including: 

• Bilingual classroom teacher of kindergartners, 1st graders, 2nd graders English (non bilingual) classroom teacher of 4th graders, 75% ELLs Bilingual Title 1 Literacy teacher ESL support for classroom teachers ESL teacher: Newcomers and Writing focus After-school Writing Project teacher 

Well, now the formatting is slaying me, so I need to stop struggling with it and compose in a Word document so I can focus on the content instead of bullets and margins.

What Lurks Beneath

There is a thick blanket of foliage covering an incline-garden near the playground around my school. During recess the students often investigate what is under the mulch. Sometimes there are mushrooms or worms, sometimes just sticks and bark. Last week, the first graders discovered a hole, which seemed to go a long way into the earth beneath.

Small groups of children would gather around this mysterious burrow. When the crowd grew large, I suggested they go back to their games of jump-rope or tag. Soon another little group would come investigate the tunnel. Finally I asked José what he thought was down inside that hole.

He confidently replied: "Smurfs."

I must have not heard correctly. "Did you say 'Smurfs'?"

"Yes," he replied with a what-else-could-it-possibly-be sort of look ... then he scampered off to the tether ball area as I stood with this extraordinary vision of the world as seen through the eyes of a six-year old.

Writing vs Basketball vs Influenza

The first meeting of the Writing Project was earlier this week, on Tuesday. All 12 students who had signed up came to that meeting. I was thrilled and the kids were enthusiastic.

The second meeting, 2 days later on Thursday was a different story. Seven students came. It turns out that 3 of them had also signed up for a Basketball class at that same time after school. Fortunately I became aware of this on Tuesday and so was able to talk to the students and their parents to let them know that they would need to choose which activity; the Writing Project lessons build on each other. By Thursday afternoon, 2 of the 3 decided to continue on with writing.

Basketball wasn't the only competitor, though. One of the writing students who came on Tuesday went to Student Leadership on Thursday. Sigh. Another student, who gets a ride home with the one in Student Leadership also didn't come because she thought she'd miss her ride so she rode the school bus home.

Another writing student had succumbed to the flu and was home in bed by Thursday.

And one other writing student just disappeared after school. I guess she forgot and went home. Really? You FORGOT? In some ways this was the most disheartening competitor situation of all.

I'd hoped to hook them all by the end of the first week... barely half of them made it to the second meeting. So, that's the class half-empty. But there is still the  half-full class.

E stopped me in the hallway earlier on Thursday and told me that he finished "the story" he began on Tuesday!
V began to dig into his long-ago history of when he attended kindergarten in Mexico during class on Thursday!
M and L huddled together over a discussion of where they've spent time during their lifetime in which mostly Spanish was spoken!
D took the reins at her table discussion and became the "scribe" for the other two members of her group... I hadn't pegged her as a leader. Nice surprise!
M2 (different M from the one above) enthusiastically persisted in working on his story map despite the distractions of J sitting next to him...
And J chose writing over basketball. What a surprise from this big energetic boy who can hardly sit still. Maybe his parents talked him into this, but I hope he had at least a little voice in the decision. I'll try my hardest to not let you down J!

Launching WP

The date of the Writing Project launching has arrived!!

A cart stocked with supplies sits ready to roll down the hallway to the school library at 3:30 this afternoon. The students' writing notebooks are standing ready in a plastic bin, name labels tucked inside. Various pens and pencils, sharpeners, sheets of brightly colored paper, a stapler, scissors, glue sticks and tape are all huddled together on top of the cart. 

Really? You don't use scissors and tape when you write?
        [Cut the colored paper in quarters, tape or staple one piece to the writing notebook's inside cover, 
        making a pocket to safely store homework reminders, writing prompts or other little slips of       
        paper containing assorted writerly ideas.]

If I just could have gotten a little more sleep, I'd feel completely ready; but at times like this the excitement pervades even a nightly suspension of consciousness. Not even a cat-nap in sight.