Rotation Day

Ok...so we are all feeling the pressure of tested standards.  I feel like every word I speak has to be connected to one of my state standards.  It is hard to want to do other activities with my students, but have to tell myself...I don't teach that in 4th grade.

Due to these high expectations, we have completely taken the fun, crafty activities out of the upper grades...but we do still teach children, right?

My wonderful team came up with a solution to this...and joined it together with holiday fun...and got around that pesky "no holiday party"rule.

We call it Rotation Day.  Each teacher, we have 5, plans a fun activity that corresponds with that holiday.  We have 30 - 45 minutes for each class to rotate around to each other teacher.  It is such a nice break for the kids.  It is also a nice break for the teachers.  It is so easy to plan one activity and do it 5 times in that day.  It is a great opportunity to catch up on grading/cleaning/organizing/planning/anythingelsethatyouneverhavetimetodo.

Now, this is a privilege, so you can lose the right to Rotation Day.  We only have recess 2 days per week (gasp, right).  If you go to study hall, you earn a letter toward a word and when you spell the word, you lose rotation day.  The amount of study halls determines the word.  Our words so far this year have been, Halloween, Turkey, and Noel.

Angels...they are really angels.

As I've bragged before, I have the best class in the world. Not only are they well behaved and motivated to learn, but they are so SWEET!

Example...one of my little girls, Heaven, works really hard and is in all advanced classes, but made a B on her report card. This kept her off 1st honors.

A different little girl, Angel, is a new student to our school, is in RTI, and works really hard to stay afloat in her on grade level classes...but she ALWAYS ASKS QUESTIONS. Got straight A's...and was the only one in the whole class...actually in the whole grade level.

heaven says to angel "oh, my gosh angel, that's so awesome! You must've worked really hard to do that! And you a the only one! That'S so great!"

Angel replies: "thanks, but I couldn't have done it without you. You always help me when I need some help."

So sweet!

I'm a good teacher...on PAPER TOO!!

So...I know I am a good teacher. I even find some level of enjoyment out of teaching the crap text books that my county shoves down my throat...but I recently found out that I'm a good teacher on paper too!

My state test scores were really good and my first evaluation was better than expected too...this was a little bright spot in my stressed life right now!

Shoo...Who else is stressed!

I can't quite put my finger on this, but IM FEELING STRESSED!!!! Who's with me? Our school implemented online lesson plans this year...no big deal. I know I'm lucky to have gone this long without turning my lesson plans in. The our state implemented a new evaluation system (read: ridiculous set of standards no one can meet)...s'ok. I can say the right things when people are in my room to see how fabulous I am.

What I cannot handle are people messing with my TECHNOLOGY!!!! I'm sorry mr. Computer technician, but you being able to remote access my computer does not trump UPDATING MY SOFTWARE!

These people (who must have been sent from the devil) have taken away my ability to do anything to my computer...as if technology does not pose its own unique problems in a classroom, I don't need anyone making it worse!

Ahhhhhhhh...I feel a little better now.
Love, the ringmaster