Education is the Mother of Leadership

Fifth Period's classroom newspaper!

Late last week, the students finished up on their newspaper articles. Mrs. D. and I have been working hard on editing and assembling the classroom newspapers (which took a long time to do). All this week, they have been asking to see the classroom newspapers. It's been hard to tell the students that we were still working on them, but I stayed late on Friday after school and finally finished compiling them! It's been one thing to read the students' articles and gather them into a classroom newspaper, but it's something completely different to see the finished product of the newspapers! On the left is a picture of fifth period's newspaper. It turned out to be seventeen pages! I have an activity planned on Wednesday for the students to go through their newspapers. I will also give students the chance to read their articles aloud. After completing a project like this, I think it's important for students to have the chance to share their work with the class.

Unfortunately, I was out of the classroom the first three days of the week. I felt sad to have missed school. Planning is one of the greatest parts of teaching. So when I had a great week of short story writing planned, it felt terrible to sit home for three days while Mrs. D. taught my plans. When I returned to school on Thursday, nearly fifty of my students asked where I had been and how I was doing. Mrs. D. told the students that I was in the hospital over the weekend, and my students explained that they were worried about me and had missed me. While it was terrible to miss class, it felt wonderful to be missed by my students. Mrs. D. even made a joke about my absence: The kids really missed you. They wouldn't stop asking about you. What am I? Chopped liver?It's interesting. As I'm writing this right now, I'm thinking of my students. It's Sunday afternoon, and I wish that it was already Monday and that I am in the classroom right now working with my students. I've been blessed with a really great group of students. Jokingly, the students told me that they thought I left them like their last student teacher (who, they say, I also happen to look like as well). The students then began talking about a surprise going away party for me at the end of the year. This almost brought tears to my eyes, the thought of leaving them. They asked if I was going to come back, and I assured the students of three things: 1) I'll technically be done and graduated by December 15th, but I'm going to finish out the last week in December and go into Winter Break with the students; 2) I plan to come back and work with the students on the spring musical (I already discussed this is Mrs. D.); and 3) I will absolutely, definitely, and surely be at their graduation in May. I have made these three promises to my students, and nothing is going to stop me from fulfilling them.

Here is a journal prompt I used to introduce character development:
Complete the following story: As Tom looked around at the creepy wax
figures surrounding him, he became aware that he had stumbled into a
restricted area of the wax museum. Suddenly, he heard a strange noise
 and saw... (Who?)

This week will be my eighth week as a teacher! In a week and a half, I will be filling the role of Head Teacher by taking over the two seventh grade classes in addition to my three eight grade classes. In regards to my writing projects, I want to take a look at where I've been and what I have planned through October:

• Energetic Paragraphs - students were assigned to look at and use some of the vivid language we've been studying and creating  
• Newspaper Articles - students did some exploring around Northwood and wrote a range of articles relating to interviews of school personnel, reviews of books and movies, articles, tips, and sports coverage
• Short Stories - students drafted, edited, and completed original short stories using short story elements, the five parts of a plot (exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution), and vivid language
• Veterans' Day writing - students will write poems and short stories in honor of the veterans who will come speak at our school during the first week of November
• Spooky writing - I'm not sure what I'm going to have the eighth graders do, but seventh grade students will be creating Halloween menus using descriptive writing to come up with Halloween haunts and scary recipes

I am looking forward to meeting some of my students' parents this week during parent-teacher conferences. I'm also blown away to realize that I am close to hitting the halfway mark of my student teaching experience. What a journey it's been!

Classroom Confidential: The 12 Secrets of Great Teachers

Chapter 11 - Great Teachers Speak in Tongues: Mastering Communication in the Information Age

Not only is communication with students important, but communication with parents adds tremendously to a student's success. The relationship between teacher, student, and parent(s) is crucial. Obviously, the student is the most important member of this group, but when each person participates, the student is then able to excel to the best of his ability.

Schmidt gives us the Ten Essentials of effective communication:

1. Proactive - It is important to get to know your students from day one. If you show an active interest in your students' lives, parents will take note of that and really see you for what you are: a great teacher.
2. Positive - By keeping a positive attitude, even in times of struggle, parents will be more prone to support your actions if you consistently have faith in their child. 
3. Frequent - Keep parents in the loop at all times. Send home assignments, updates, or newsletters regularly. By doing so, parents will be able to rely on you as a strong figure in students' lives. 
4. Clear - When communicating with parents, make sure to be clear in your speech and/or writings. Parents have busy lives, too. Make sure your correspondences with them do not bring about any additional stress or confusion. 
5. Basic - While it's important to keep parents in the loop, it's often impossible to let them know about everything that goes on in the classroom. However, remember the most important things that take place and be sure to keep them informed. 
6. Attention grabbing - Keep things exciting! 
7. Appealing - In addition to keeping things exciting, they must also be appealing. Send home notes, emails, and letters that are fun to look at. 
8. Inclusive - When communicating with parents, try to make your correspondences family friendly. A student is a part of a family, and that family should be brought into the loop about a student also.
9. Timely - Like I said, parents have busy lives. When communicating with them, be sure to be precise and brief. Parents know it's important to make time for their children, but try to inform them in a timely manner.
10. Error-free - As a teacher, you must be correct in your writings.

By reading this chapter, I feel that I am more prepared for parent-teacher conferences this week. I've come across a number of things in this chapter that I've never taken into consideration before. For example, at parent-teacher conferences this week, I'm going to have extra copies of our classroom newspapers available for parents to take home with them. I want them to be able to see how their student contributed to a classroom project.

I really, really enjoy how Schmidt discusses a Parent Preparation Packet. I've never thought of having students and parents filling out a survey about their lives. I feel that this will give the students an extra sense of  importance and belonging to know that we will not only be discussing their grades at the conferences, but also who they are as individuals.

Classroom Confidential: The 12 Secrets of Great Teachers

Chapter 3 - Great Teachers are Ringmasters: Nurturing Free-Range Students in a High-Stakes World

What have I learned about behavior from reading this chapter?

Schmidt explains that all behavior is motivated by one of two basic instincts:

1. To seek pleasure.
2. To avoid pain.

Further, she writes: "To drive for pleasure may not be apparent at first glance, since most classrooms are stark affairs with very few amenities. To most observers, pleasure doesn't live here. But the pleasure that free-range kids are seeking comes from being able to fit in by doing what the teacher expects - what other kids seem to do with ease. They employ odd, even annoying behaviors, in the hope that they, too, can experience satisfaction, recognition, and maybe even garner a little praise. They're making self-accommodations to gain their share of school's simple pleasures" (45-46). 

I have never looked at student behavior in this light before. While I believe that all students try to find their place in a teacher's life, I never took into account that students might act out to do so. Over the past six weeks that I've spent in the classroom, I've really gotten a taste of classroom management (and how lacking my skills are in it). But everyday, I take what I can from the teachers at Northwood by observing their behavior strategies and testing out the ones I feel would work for me. Here are two things I've tried with my students:

• Paperclips - I have a handful of students who talk excessively during each class period. In this situation, I have placed 3 paperclips on an index card and put it on a student's desk. Throughout the period, when this student talks, I walk over to his (or her) desk and remove one paperclip. By doing this silently, two things happen. First, the student knows that he has been talking when he shouldn't have. And second, I do not have to call this student out in front of the entire class. If the student has any paperclips left at the end of the period, I give him Pride dollars. But if the student doesn't have any paperclips left at the end of the period, he will receive a 30 minute detention with me either before or after school. Whenever I give the index cards out, I have no trouble with my students talking in class.
• Silence - Rather than trying to shout time and time again over my students, I simply stop talking when they are talking. The students soon see what is happening and quiet down. If this happens a couple of times, some of the students even grow annoyed with all of the talking and tell each other to quiet down. I tell students that I have all the time in the world to wait. While this is not 100% true, I do have an entire semester to teach the students what they need to know. 

I find that both strategies work, but I am in no way comfortable with managing students on my own. I intend to learn more about student behavior every day that I am in the classroom. 

We Learn By Teaching

Before

Well, what can I say? It's been another great week in Room 129. I'm still adjusting to running three eighth grade classes, but I can't complain. The kids continue to be wonderful, and we continue to form and strengthen our relationships every day (which I think is the best part of teaching). It's hard to believe that I'm just finishing up my fifth week of student teaching. Where is the time going?! I've seen my students enter my classroom on day one, and now I've seen all of the different activities they've become involved with (newspaper club, art club, football, volleyball, student council, etc.). Just as I feel myself growing, it's been great to see the students progress as the school year goes on.

After

On Monday, students took their Language Arts MAP tests. MAP tests are used by the district so that staff and teachers are able to assess student progress over time. The MAP tests look at both individual students and Northwood Middle School as a whole. While Mrs. D. took students to the computer lab to complete their tests, I spent the day in the classroom grading the students' binders. We require that students keep a binder in the classroom to hold their handouts, worksheets, etc. There are five major sections in the binders: journal writing, sentence patterns, spelling, DOL/grammar, and writing assignments. I graded their binders on a number of things, including the following: Were binders easily identifiable from the outside? Where are five sections (and all current assignments) included in the binders? Were student drawings, contracts, and song lyrics included at the front of the binders? Binder checks were out of 30 points. Many students receive full credit, but even after prompting students for over a week to have their binders completed and set up in a particular order, some students received low grades. After I graded their binders, I put them neatly on the shelf (as you can see in the Before photo). By Tuesday, this is what the shelf looked like (see the After photo). You can't even imagine what the shelf looked like by Friday!

A couple of weeks ago, the school principal, Mr. W., brought us news that because of high class volumes in the science and social studies areas, the district was willing to place a new teacher in the school to alleviate some of these numbers. You would think that everyone would be jumping for joy at the news, but along with the new teacher would come some major changes. The teachers took a vote, and the majority was in favor of bringing on the new teacher. But in order to make the necessary arrangements, each student would have to receive an entirely new schedule. Unfortunately, there was no easy way around this. The administrators were unable to simply pull a few students from this period and move them to that period. Being five weeks into the school year, I spent the first half of the week crying over this massive schedule change that was coming our way. I had already met my students, learned their names, and familiarized myself with their learning styles. We were forming relationships, learning about one another, sharing jokes. I was devastated to learn that I would be losing some of my students to other teachers.

Tuesday was the last day of our regular classes. Mrs. D. and I spent most of the day mourning the loss of our current classes, as did many of the students. While there was a handful of students who I became especially close to, I was extremely upset when I learned that one student in particular, Lauren, was moving to a different Language Arts class. Lauren walked into my first class on the first day of school shaking. She was new to Northwood and afraid of her new surroundings. Instantly, we connected. I explained to her that I was new as well and that it would take some time for us to adjust. Hesitantly, she put her trust in me, and within about a week, she had found her place at Northwood (just like I had). At the end of first period on Tuesday, I went over to Lauren and knelt beside her desk. I thanked her for being such a wonderful student and wished her luck in her new class. I explained to her that student teaching was a very important step in a new teacher's life and that I would never, ever forget the impact she had made in my life. As soon as the words left my mouth, she began sobbing, telling me that she didn't want to leave my class. I had never felt a connection like this with a student before, and for the first time in my life, I realized that I was capable of making a difference in students' lives. I consoled Lauren and assured her that we would see each other often. Toward the beginning of the school year, I learned that Lauren didn't know how to write in cursive, so I created a packet for her to begin working on writing out her name. On Wednesday, she came into my class and asked if we could meet during Skills Lab (study hall) to work on her cursive writing. Being thrilled at the idea, of course I said yes. So for the past three days, we've gone down to the library and begun working on her cursive writing. I told her to choose a book from the library, and we've also begun reading The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate by Jacqueline Kelly. At the end of the day on Friday, Mrs. D. told me that she didn't think Lauren wanted to meet with me to practice writing; rather, she just wanted to spend time with me. I can't think of any words to describe how this made me feel =)

Up until the day of the schedule change, I had been feeling pretty down about the whole ordeal. I was worried that the new students wouldn't like me. I was anxious about having to learn new names and reacquaint the new students with the way I ran the class. I was confused as to how I would get the students to take me seriously from day one - I already had the classes in my control, and I didn't want to lose that control simply because the kids weren't familiar with me being their teacher. I found a quote this week that really hit home in regards to this situation: "The optimist sees opportunity in every danger; and the pessimist sees danger in every opportunity." Rather than sulking around on Wednesday, I was glad to find that there were many benefits of this schedule change. For example, I was now given the opportunity to get to know and form relationships with my new students. After all, Northwood is only so big. I would see my previous students almost every day.

Classroom Confidential: The 12 Secrets of Great Teachers

Chapter 4 - Great Teachers are Curiosity Seekers: Fostering Success in Multicultural Classrooms

How has my understanding of culture enhanced or changed by my reading of Schmidt?

I'd like to begin by mentioning an astonishing statistic that Schmidt presents to readers: "An African American boy who was born in California in 1988 is three times as likely to be murdered than to be admitted to the University of California" (77). In this chapter, Schmidt also mentions one teacher named Rafe Esquith who puts the name of his students who complete college on the walls of his classroom. Some of these students, many of which who normally wouldn't attend any college at all, have graduated from schools including Harvard, Columbia, Penn, etc. One student even graduated from Yale Law School. It is a great accomplishment to graduate from any one of these schools. Schmidt's statistic mentions the University of California. While this is not a bad school, it is not one of the top-rated schools in the country. It shocks, hurts, and confuses me that an African America student - one who is the same exact age as me - is three times more likely to be murdered than simply accepted to a college. Being a student in the twenty-first century, I strongly believe that young people are more than capable of accomplishing anything they put their minds to. In today's world, we are given the rights to do what we want. I am close to obtaining my Bachelor's degree, but I intend continue my education for quite a long time. Now if I can do this, why can't an African American from California do the same? It is terrible to think that someone living in my own time is not given the same opportunities I am given because of his ethnicity and/or location.

Schmidt includes ten ways that educators can promote cultural awareness in the classroom:

1. Read aloud
2. Family interviews
3. Graphing Multicultural Overlapping
4. Venn diagrams
5. Home-grown literacy materials
6. Holistic reading vs. comprehension checks
7. News from...
8. Roots
9. Rewriting history
10. Cultural awareness through music

As a student at Trinity, I chose ESL to be one of my two minors. When I first sat down with the head of the Education Department, I had never really heard of ESL studies before. I was told that it would make me seem more marketable if I became qualified to teach ESL students, so I enrolled in the necessary classes. But since my first semester at Trinity, I learned that having the privilege to work with diverse students has nothing to do with money no matter the amount. Over the past three and a half years, I have had many experiences that showed me the importance of diversity. I traveled to Eisenhower high school to work with native Spanish-speaking adults who were taking night classes to learn English. I took a tour of the Pilsen neighborhood in Chicago to enjoy the city's culture and love of art. I also worked with a number of ESL classes during a couple different field placements. Currently, I am teaching in a school where over 40% of the students receive free or reduced lunches, come from single parent homes, and consist of many different cultures. And each time I find myself in multicultural learning environments, I encourage my students to celebrate diversity. It is one thing to view all people as equals, but it is something completely different (and wonderful!) to acknowledge one another for our differences and then do what we can to learn from and continuously respect each other for the gifts that we have all been given. What would the world be like if we all looked the same? Where would we be if we didn't revel in our uniqueness?

A wonderful group of students I had the pleasure of teaching in 2011. 

After reading this chapter, I feel that I have been informed of some valuable information that I will carry into my teaching with me. We all have different attitudes toward diversity, and I am grateful to have been able to see how Schmidt approaches it in her classroom. I've been able to take what I already know about multiculturalism and reflect upon it using her insights and classroom strategies.

A Teacher is Better Than Two Books

Okay, a teacher may be better than two books, but if it came to a hand-crafted library, I'm not sure I'd be up to challenge that. :)

How do I put my past week of teaching into words?

At the beginning of the week, I was starting to have some feelings of being the underdog. I am new, I am young, and I am training to do what many of these teachers have already been doing for many years. I don't want to say that I don't know what I'm doing, because I feel like I do, but I worry that the other teachers may think differently about this.

On Tuesday, I was teaching another lesson that Mrs. D. created, and when I teach lessons that are not my own, I feel like I am doing a disservice to the students because I'm not at my best when I'm teaching a lesson that was just handed to me ten minutes prior to the beginning of class. I also felt that the students picked up that I was not on top of my game because it took me more time to transition, ask questions, and present the lesson.

When students filed out of my classroom on Friday at 3:30, I struggled to prevent myself from laying in front of the door and keeping them for another seven hours! This week was one of the most exhilarating I've ever had in my life. I transitioned into taking over all three of the eighth grade classes, so I feel a strong sense of ownership now when planning, delivering, and reflecting on my classes. When the students see me in the hallway, they stop and chat with me. When I ask students to do something, they do it. (Mrs. D. says they do things for me, but not for her because they like me more. I deny this, but I must say that it feels great to hear Mrs. D. say that the students like me!)


The lesson planning has really picked up. It is overwhelming to have to write lesson plans and reflections for each class, but it is really rewarding when I complete them and tell myself that I planned and carried these lessons out! I really make use of the reflection sections because I like to think about what I would do to change these lessons in the future. I even take some of these suggestions and carry them into new lessons I create to teach different topics.

I've been taking plenty of time to write on my blog, but I've seriously been crunched this week because I am still learning how to manage everything. Now that I have taken over three classes, I have just been given a huge (and wonderful) responsibility. There are so many different things I need to give my attention to, and as I go into a new week, I intend to map out the many different areas that I need to stay conscious of as I learn to strengthen my teaching skills.

Classroom Confidential: The 12 Secrets of Great Teachers

Chapter 2 - Great Teachers are Power Brokers: Building a Culture of Eptness

What exactly is eptness?

Unfortunately, we are most used to using this term in the negative. Ineptness: without having the skill necessary to complete a given task; awkward or clumsy; absurd or foolish; unskillful.

Teachers aim to create a culture that trumps each of these given notions. Instead, they work toward EPTness. In the text, Schmidt discusses what this particular classroom might look like. On pages 24-25, she explains that in a culture of eptness, students:

• Expect to play the roles of learner and teacher. I already see this happening in my own classroom because of the way that Mrs. D. and I set up the classroom's culture. After we created a list of rules and consequences with the students, we explained the importance of respect. In our classroom, we are expected to respect the students just as they are expected to respect us. We also explained that even though we have been trained as teachers, we are not the only teachers in the classroom. From day one, we have invited each and every student to stand as teachers beside us. Mrs. D. and I are eager to learn and be taught just as much as the students are. 
• Share in making decisions about their learning and learning environment. Again, we have incorporated this aspect into our teaching by welcoming the students into sharing the classroom responsibilities and decisions so that each and every person has a place (and a comfortable one) within our classroom. 
• Draw on a wide variety of resources for knowledge.
• See problems as opportunities to feel smart. (I really, really like this and aim to stay consciously aware of including my students in events that call for problem solving.)
• Are willing to struggle to clarify their thinking and speaking.
• Understand the connections between their classroom and the real world. A day has not passed in my young teaching career when I have not asked students to make connections between what we discuss in the classroom and what is taking place outside of it. 
• Use real-world knowledge and skills in the classroom activities and vice versa. 
• Feel they are important to the welfare of their classmates and the community.

I believe that Mrs. D. and I are on the right path to building a culture of eptness. While this is my first time reading and studying about the benefits of eptness, it encourages me that I have already been taking the right steps toward working in a classroom like this. 

Schmidt also lists ten teacher behaviors that are thought to promote eptness in the classroom. The one behavior that really hit home with me has to do with encouragement. 

When I was five years old, my parents filed for divorced. It crushed my little heart and left me feeling unsure of myself. For years, I had done everything in my power to please those around me, to make them proud, but I felt like no one paid attention. I felt alone. 

No student should feel like nobody cares, ever. Encouragement is what drives us. It fuels the flames of our dreams, and oftentimes, it comes from others rather from within. One of the driving reasons I chose to become a teacher has to do with my desire to work with others to help them achieve their goals. Out of necessity, I feel that it is my job to spark the fires within my students, especially those who are having a hard time feeling that support so crucially related to encouragement. Every student deserves to be encouraged no matter what. 

In the words of Thomas Edison: "Genius is 99% perspiration and 1% inspiration." This past week as we discussed our journal responses relating to this quote, I explained to students that if they wanted to achieve their goals, it would undoubtedly take a lot of work, but all of that work had to stem from somewhere (even just a little bit of inspiration). I told them that all it takes is a spark. 

I like to think that I am that spark. 

To Teach is to Learn Twice

Go Warhawks!

The other day, Dr. Bill asked me how teaching was going. I think I responded with something like, "Uh...WONDERFUL!" What a silly question, Dr. Bill! Another week is down, and I'm feeling stronger and more encouraged as time passes. I cannot believe how fast my time at Northwood is going. We're already a couple of weeks into the school year, and I will be teaching three of my five classes full-time in just about a week or so. During my first week, I jumped right in and began co-teaching with Mrs. D. Since then, I've been teaching a class at least once a day, and it's great! Mrs. D decided that it would be good for her to teach first period and for me to model after her and teach the other two eighth grade classes by following what she did. This has been working really well for us. I find that as each period passes, both Mrs. D. and I find ways to strengthen and change our lessons as the day progresses. This is not to say that first period is at a loss; rather, it means that I am able to assess how Mrs. D. and/or I taught and then make changes so that the lesson becomes more meaningful, time efficient, and lasting for the students. The only downfall I find in modeling after Mrs. D. is that I am not given much time to prepare for what and how I am going to teach. Personally, I find it best to plan a couple of days in advance so that I know exactly what I am going to do with the students. Since I am not teaching full-time yet, I have not been planning ahead of time because Mrs. D. has been planning the classes. While I am not nervous to teach second and fifth periods, I feel that I am not one-hundred percent prepared, and that is not fair to the students. But ultimately, I am grateful that Mrs. D. has enough faith in me to allow me to take on two classes in such a short amount of time.

My lesson on there. I also taught their and they're
over the course of three separate days. 

In my last blog post, I explained the S.P.I.N. activities that I created to take place during Channel 1. With the death of Neil Armstrong last weekend, I felt it necessary to read about and discuss the great contributions he made to further space exploration. I had planned to talk about space exploration for only one day, intending to end the week with Woodstock news and the controversy over Lance Armstrong's use of steroids. But students showed such great interest in space that I pushed my intended plans aside and created two additional activities that focused on v space, the first relating to the Virgin Galactica (the first spaceship airplane that will take human tourists up to space in 2014) and the second relating to life on Mars by 2023 and it being televised as a reality show by 2033. In my post-instructional reflections, I wrote about how proud I was of myself for creating this sort of mini unit on space. It was also interesting to look at space from a number of perspectives (historical, tourism, and entertainment). As time progresses, I am also learning how to create my S.P.I.N. activities in ways that allows students to really succeed (i.e., allowing students more time to complete their written assignments without having to do it for homework, giving one main writing prompt rather than multiple shorter ones, etc.). The first writing unit that I will be teaching is on Narrative Writing, and Mrs. D. and I decided that instead of requiring students to complete one giant writing assignment, it would be better to have them complete 3-4 smaller writing assignments so that they are given multiple occasions to work on their narrative writing skills. The first writing assignment that students will be completing is a newspaper article, so by exposing students to how and why newspaper articles are written through our S.P.I.N. activities, students should be successful in writing their own newspaper articles. I then intend to have students submit their articles to the school newspaper which will give them an opportunity to have their work displayed and published for others to read.

The students signed our classroom rules
and consequences poster.

While it is one thing to learn about IEPs and 504s in a textbook, it is completely different to see them in action. I have about six students who have either an IEP or a 504, and it is both challenging and rewarding to work with and accommodate these students in class. On Thursday, it was brought to my attention that one of my students, Tom, was having a hard time keeping his hands to himself. A number of other teachers brought up this concern, which was surprising to me because I had not noticed this as being an issue. Tom is in my first period class, and he is a good student who completes his work and generally receives good grades. He is also new to Northwood, which makes this issue even harder because he is trying to find his place among the students. During our Team meeting period on Friday, we had Tom come in for an intervention type of meeting. Each of the teachers took turns, stating what they were noticing in Tom. We began with stating many positives we see in Tom - good work, participation, etc. Then we began discussing the issues. Mr. C. explained that one day, Tom is going to touch the wrong person and potentially end up in some trouble with the law. Mrs. P. explained that, unfortunately, there is a difference between girls and boys. Tom explained that he poked a couple of girls in the side because they poked him first. Mrs. P. explained that, while it is okay for a girl to poke a boy, it is not okay for a boy to poke a girl because girls do not take actions like that the way boys do. Mrs. H. then went on to explain that we all have bubbles of personal space around us. A boy's bubble may be relatively small, but a girl's bubble is extra large, especially in the region from the neck to the knees. After answering any of Tom's questions, we sent him back to class. He was very responsive, listened sincerely to our concerns, and promised that he would work better at keeping his hands to himself. I must admit, at the beginning of the meeting, I was somewhat afraid of how it would go. But since Tom was so cooperative, I think it was successful.

Ms. Noonan :)

And I suppose I'm officially a real teacher when I go through the drama of experiencing the first fire drill of the school year. Wow. It's hard to take attendance when the kids are celebrating to be out of the classroom and not paying attention to any single thing in particular. Of course, it doesn't help that I have over thirty students to keep track of. I'm also a real teacher, too, when I'm referred to as Ms. Noonan. Ms. Noonan, I want you to see us win a football game! Ms. Noonan, did we have homework last night? Ms. Noonan, can you help me with this assignment? :Happy sigh: I could get used to this. It has a nice ring to it, doesn't it?

Finally, I'm beginning to see how my personal life and my professional life blur together. During the first couple of weeks at Northwood, everything I thought about pertained to student teaching. But lately, if I don't get enough sleep, have an argument with a family member, or lose hours at work, my focus is taken away from teaching, which is currently my number one priority. One of my goals is to learn how to balance teaching, planning, working, and spending time with my family, and it's tough. Unfortunately, as much as I would like to keep my personal and professional lives separate so that I can completely focus on teaching, it is impossible to do so. I will continue to work at spreading my efforts and concentration evenly over the different areas of my life.

While I'm glad for the long weekend, I'm definitely looking forward to another week of teaching.

*Names of students have been changed in order to protect their privacy.