Interesting Tidbits

Today, we made necklaces of 30 fruit loops because it was the 30th day of school. One of my little boys tripped in the hallway and smashed off some of his fruit loops. At lunch, I asked how many he had lost, and he said he didn't know. I asked his to see if he could figure it out. With another little boy, he counted the fruit loops left on his necklace: 27. Without any help from me, and after quite a bit of figuring, they arrived at the correct answer, 3, by counting the fruit loops and then counting on to 30, touching K-'s necklace where the loops should have been. I was very impressed with their problem solving, so I shared it with the class, especially since it coincided with the beginning of our math unit on other ways to add and subtract.

It was a short day, so we had "professional development" in the afternoon -- really just time to work on our nine weeks tests and our intervention forms, except that we were required to be in the library so we couldn't use our computers. We did have an interesting conversation about paperwork, though, after our principal gave us the new rules for lesson plans: turned in 2 weeks ahead of time, with indications of the students who will be receiving additional help each day and an indication of any other remediation or enrichment that will be taking place. A teacher who used to work at the penitentiary compared the paperwork with the paperwork she had to do there. "There is so much paperwork," she said, "That you spend all your time writing and then you don't have any time to do what you're writing about." I agree with the sentiment. Lesson plans and interventions' primary function should be a planning aid for the teacher, instead of what they have become, which is a way to cover your behind and "prove" that you taught what you were supposed to in appropriate ways and that you remediated with students who you will later refer for special education.

NOTE: PLEASE CONSIDER SUPPORTING THE 4TH GRADE IN MY DISTRICT BY BUYING A SHELBY FEST T-SHIRT (SEE BELOW.)