Making Friends With Failure | Edutopia

Making Friends With Failure | Edutopia

I feel this sooooo deeply.  My students fail so often that even though we do everything we possibly can to try and build them up and help them to understand their disability, they still feel that they are stupid.  I watch them in regular class and even in fun learning games, they often don't participate.  I try not to get the teachers to give them the super obvious very easy answers.  They do so much better if they struggle and learn to ask for a little help or accept help from their team and friends.  I encourage a room of acceptance and support.  I demand that they accept each other and support each other and do not put each other down.  The world will put them down enough without them doing it to their friends.  We also discuss the fact that you don't have to like everyone you know and that you do not put people down just because you do not like them.

I have no idea what day this is . . . calendar math here we come

 Soooooo . . . today I was going through some math for today with my kids.  And I realized that I don't think I can keep them on track with EVERYTHING that is going on in their classrooms, because I can't keep up with it.  Not to mention the fact that not all the teachers in the school are as organized as I am (though I am NOWHERE near where I would like to be).  I want the kids to see the things that they are doing in the classroom, but many of my kids can't keep up.  I need to keep them on track as much as possible with the classroom, but I need to boost up their deficits.  By helping them with their deficits, I can give them everything they need.

Now if only I could figure out their schedule.  As for the title, I realized that they need a little calendar math to help practice our daily skills.  (Plus without doing calendar math I can't seem to remember the day or date!) This would be easier, IF I had a working sympodium or airliner smartboard.  Please Lord let IT get that up and running.  I am sooo ready to do calendar math.  I am ready to have a running routine in my room like I did in my kindergarte room.  And I realize that I may never have a 100% routine like I want, but we can get something done.  At least a little more than what we are doing now.  We are working hard, but it is not nearly as focused as I would like!

Now if only I could figure out their schedule . . . lol

I made something!  Daily Calendar Math Sheet.  I think it will be a success.  Now I need to figure out what to put on the back, because no need to waste paper.

Ok!  I can't figure out how to link a document!  Ugh!!

School and School

I feel like I am struggling right now.  And I mean I really really feel like I am struggling.  I have so much that I want and need to do in my classroom and yet I have so much homework that I need to do.  Maybe taking a class right now was not a good idea.  It's just I know that once I get going everything will fall into place a little bit better than what it is.  I am soooo tired of everything that is going on right now.  I started seeing students the second day of school, but I need to be assessing and testing so the students have been expecting awesome teaching and . . . I am not feeling it.  This is not how I wanted to start and I am frustrated!

seminar

So for the last two days, we have been in a seminar.  I really and truly don't mind sitting around learning things that are really interesting or that I did not know and that could help me. . . The last two days were anything but that.  And they told us another lie that all the supervisors heard the same information and will communicate that to us.  All in good time.  Now there might be some things that are not clear about me.  One I am extremely organized, two I am extremely analytical and three I am a kinesthetic visual learner.  It makes my life cuss at times, but what are you gonna do, you are who you are.  Now the last two days did nothing for me as learner.  I sat there bored, fidgeting and trying not to text or sing or get up and walk around.  If I have nothing to do, I will find something!  Well, I guess I fudged a little . . . out of eight hours of seminar I did learn some questions to ask when I participate in a job interview.  The rest could have been sent to me in an email.  Today was a complete waste of time as it gave me information that would have been more helpful last semester.  And then to top it all off the most helpful information was shoved in at the end when we only had half the time that was originally allotted for this information.  Sigh.