Browse by Tags
All Tags »
frustration (RSS)
How’s that for an appetizing post title? But that was my day, in a nutshell. I figured out why this year has been so hard, and is going to be hard for a while longer: my students are the least-prepared group I have taught in years. They are not traumatized,
Read More...
On the one hand, spending a morning with preschoolers can be lovely and simple. Read stories, play, follow routines, talk, play outside, learn about interesting things. On the other hand, spending a morning with preschoolers can be made frustrating and
Read More...
I work in a pretty great school. We have a warm, supportive environment, and our school is welcoming to adults and children. I don’t have any plans to leave, and that wasn’t true of the first three schools I worked in. On the other hand, we have our flaws.
Read More...
Everyone is aware of the teacher’s strike taking place in Chicago, but I wonder if I am alone in feeling frustrated by the media coverage. Everything I read about it contradicts something else I read , and not one article has given me the whole story.
Read More...
I need to be at work in 25 minutes, but I am still on my couch, in my pajamas. I’m foggy, tired, and full of random thoughts. Do I still remember how to do this? Did I plan enough things to fill the morning? I wish we hadn’t had a homework/organization
Read More...
But Open House is tomorrow! Now check out the current state of my classroom, and tell me how on earth I will be ready by then?! It didn’t help that I was in trainings all day long, and had only an hour during my lunch break and an hour and a half at the
Read More...
Could you please check your child’s backpack weekly, if you can’t manage daily? Do you remember back in October when we met at your parent conference and I asked you politely to keep checking your child’s backpack? It makes me sad when I see your child’s
Read More...
Two of my new students are now gone, just like that. To be honest, my life is easier without them, but still. ARGH. Why would you put your child in a preschool class for a month, and then pull him/her out without even saying goodbye? One family pulled
Read More...
I believe that I am a very good teacher, and that classroom management (behavior, organization, community-building, routines, etc.) is one of my strengths. And that is largely true. I start off the year by teaching the children all of our routines, hold
Read More...
I haven’t posted much lately. I think it’s because usually my posts about my year and my class tell a story, and this year, the narrative keeps getting botched up. Three years in a row I had an awesome class. Last year’s bunch mostly had two parents at
Read More...
….to be getting new students. One little boy started a few weeks ago, and this is his first experience in school. He is doing pretty well, actually. He learned how to walk in a line, how to sit in the meeting area, and how to keep his hands to himself,
Read More...
Yesterday our bus driver, an immigrant man who is great with the kids and delightful to talk to each day, reported that on Thursday, when he got to my new student’s stop, there was no one there to collect him. The bus driver waited for ten minutes until
Read More...
It hit me at breakfast this morning. My classroom is a well-oiled machine. It runs smoothly, calmly, and happily. That is my normal. But in the last few weeks, with Crow struggling and Little One totally falling apart, my classroom is not running smoothly.
Read More...
Little One is struggling, and we are struggling right along with her. For about two weeks now, she has gone way backward in terms of her behavior. She comes in sad, or manically happy, which soon veers into tears or yelling. She desperately wants the
Read More...
One of my developmentally delayed sweethearts is a little boy who knows all the letters, and a lot of sounds. He knows numbers, colors, shapes, and that sort of thing. It’s obvious that he has difficulty with verbal communication — he will repeat what
Read More...