like christmas

Last spring the teachers at my school were told that they had less than 24 hours to spend $100 on classroom supplies. Any time a teacher is told that they have money to spend on their classroom is reason for celebration. However, with the end of school year craziness, state testing, field days, moving up ceremonies, etc. etc. etc., these supplies were ordered and then moved to a little back corner in our minds and covered with cobwebs. Today however, those cobwebs were cleared away. At the end of the day an announcement was made for us to go and pick up those magical supplies. It was really a little like Christmas. 

I went down to our secondary book storage room and was handed my materials. I now have three centers ready to go for literacy development. Two of the center kits will be used to bring my little learners that are below level up to level. One of the kits will be used to push the brighter kiddos in my class to the next level so that they are ready to blow their first grade teacher's socks of next year. I am beyond excited. I came back to my room and began cutting cellophane wrappers off, pulling cardboard protectors out of spiral bindings, and assembling pieces. Yes, I realize that it is still the first week of school and some of the materials will not be used for some time, but, as I mentioned, I am excited. I love learning tools and I cannot wait to use them in my classroom!

Also, I finished my baseline assessments today, so I have even more reason to celebrate. I can now begin to go about a normal daily routine. I also found out that I will not need to proctor some of the assessments that kindergarteners are required to complete, so I will not be pulled out of my classroom for endless hours during the coming weeks. I think that that deserves a whoop for joy!

Even with all of this excitement I will admit that this first week of school is leaving me exhausted. I was struggling well before 7PM last night and that was only after two days. I feel a little better today, but man, these kinders are zapping my energy! I am full of it when they are in the classroom, but as soon as the last one says goodbye at the end of the day it feels like my battery has suddenly died. I'll get used to it though (of course, next week grad school starts back up so I'll have a whole other kind of adjusting to do), it'll just take some time for me to reestablish that sense of balance.

baseline

The dreaded baseline assessment

Last year I did not know any better. This year I do, but wish that I did not. I spent a bulk of my day today administering baseline assessments for language arts. Having 15 kindergarten students sit through a 40 question test is not exactly fun. You get to read the same question over and over again and hope that someone circles an answer. You have students shouting out answers because they do not understand the concept of keeping their thoughts to themselves. You have to figure out how to navigate a group of different abilities so that those who need it have the extra time to process questions, and those that are quick as whips do not get bored by waiting for their peers to answer something that took them less than a second to do. It's a task, and it is exhausting.

But, this dreaded task comes with some perks. I missed out on these last year. By taking the time to assess my students' abilities during this first week of school I am prepared to begin interventions early on and I know which students I need to make sure I challenge so that they do not spend their time causing trouble. A lot of this information is evident through simple observation, but this way I know what exactly I need to work on with the students. This should help them to all learn at a rate that is applicable to them and that addresses their individual needs. Will this take a lot of time? Sure, but I teach so that the students can succeed; therefore, I'll take the time to help them in whatever way possible.

As I mentioned, I spent most of the day doing the language arts assessment. That means I still have one more to go. Tomorrow I'll address math (which is thankfully 25 questions shorter so I should be able to do some teaching that is actually engaging during the day) and then there are a myriad of other assessments that will come up over the next couple of weeks: DIBELS, PPVT, Discovery Ed. If those terms are making your head spin, consider it a good thing. Even though I know what the acronyms stand for, the tests that they represent are time consuming, tedious, and in a lot of ways annoying. However, they all have the same perks as those listed above. My head will be spinning for the next couple of weeks, but my students will benefit, so I'll deal with it.