Teacher Talk Thursday - Show & Tell

Today over at Snyder Stories, Abby wants us to just talk about ANYTHING teacher related. She said it could be a great lesson, a cool project, a funny story, ANYTHING.

I am going to go with a funny story. Being an elementary teacher means I have plenty of funny stories to tell, but there is one that tops them all. The best part is, when I was interviewing for my fourth grade job here in CT, the interview committee asked me to share a funny story. I shared this same story with them. I warned them that it was inappropriate, so now you have also been warned. So here it goes...

It was my second year teaching. I was teaching 2nd grade at an inner city school in Lexington, KY. It was the second or third day of school. I had all the students gathered on the floor around chart paper during Reading. We were reviewing blends. We started with "sl" and students were raising their hands giving me words that started with that blend. I would then write the word on the chart paper and once we had a good list, I read each word and the students repeated after me. We then moved onto a different blend and repeated the process.

Our final blend was "bl". Students were doing a great job coming up with "bl" words. Then little Austin (I still remember his name) raised his hand and said, "balloon". I told him balloon started with "b" but not "bl". A few words later, Austin raised his hand again and again gave an incorrect word. The third time he raised his hand, I was a little hesitant to call on him, but I wanted him to get it right. This is how the conversation (and my thoughts) went:

Me: Yes, Austin?

Austin: Blowjob.

(At this point my eyes probably bugged out of my head, but I was able to keep my composure. I also had an aide in my my room. She was sitting behind all the students writing in a notebook and immediately looked up).

Me: Austin, do you mean blowdryer? Like what girls use to dry their hair?

(I was proud of my quick thinking!)

Austin: No. Blowjob.

Me: Austin, I think you mean blowdryer. It's how girls dry their hair.

Austin: Yeah. That's what I meant.

I don't know why he ended up going with my suggestion, but I was glad he did. And yes, this was a 2nd grader! I ended up adding blowdryer to our list of "bl" words. As I read the list out loud and had the students repeat each word, it was so hard not to laugh as I got closer to reading "blowdryer".

By lunchtime, the story had made its way through all the teachers in our building. I did end up talking with our school counselor to check on his home situation. I wasn't sure why a 2nd grader would even know that word. It turned out that he lived with just his dad and an older brother, so we assumed he just heard it somewhere.

But at least he finally a "bl" blend right!

Can you believe I shared this story during a job interview?!?! I had already been working at the school as a long-term sub and was interviewing for a full-time position, so I knew all the staff. I don't think I would've shared the same story if I wasn't already familiar with all of them. But I did get the job!

Teacher Talk Thursday - Organization

Today is a very exciting day for Abby over at Snyder Stories. She is hosting her very first blog link up for Teacher Talk Thursday! Today's theme is organization! Even though I am not in the classroom anymore, I love me some organization, so I thought I'd share a little bit. (I already get excited about how I will organize things I will do with Brennan as he gets older).

To encourage student organization, some days after school, the "clean desk fairy" came to my classroom and left a little reward for students who had clean and organized desks. The reward varied based on the grade-level I was currently teaching, but usually something as simple as a sticker was enough to motivate most students to keep their desks clean. This just a took a few minutes one day each week to quickly scan the desks and leave the reward. 

Also, my students usually had morning work on their desks when they first came into the classroom on Monday-Thursday. However, Friday mornings the assignment was usually to clean your desk. If your desk was already clean, you could read a book.
I liked for the students to have clean desks because 1.) I didn't like looking at papers and junk sticking out everywhere and 2.) It made transitions easier because students could actually find what they were looking for. 

As I teacher (I will still call myself that even though I am not working right now), I am a huge believer that if I am organized then my students will be more likely to be organized too. For me, this was probably my biggest organizational tool.

They can be quite pricey, but I was lucky enough to be given one of these by a friend. 

At my school, we were lucky because we didn't have a limit on the number of copies we could make each year. I used the drawers to store my copies for the upcoming week. The top five drawers were for Monday-Friday and the bottom five were more for miscellaneous stuff. Or if I was really on top of it and was making copies further out, then they would go down there. 

Within in drawer, I clipped all the same copies together and then placed them in the order I would use them throughout the day. So when I was ready to pass a copy out, it was right on top of that day's drawer. 

Speaking of copies, once I moved to Connecticut, I taught in a very different school environment than I did when I was in Kentucky. My school in CT had tons of a parent volunteers and it was amazing! If you are lucky enough to be in a school where parents are willing to help, I highly recommend having a "copy mom" (or dad). I had never even thought of or heard of one before I moved up here. My first year at Jack Jackter, a parent volunteered specifically for that job and I had one every year after that. It was great for several reasons:

• I could spend my planning period (up here they say "prep") actually planning instead of copying. 
• My volunteer would usually come during class time, so the copiers weren't nearly as busy; she could get more done is less time.
• It required me to be ready on Copy Day; the day of the week changed each year based on the availability of my volunteer, but I always tried to have the majority of what I needed copied for the next week ready and marked for her in my copy basket.

Your volunteer might require a little training on the copier, but trust me, it is well worth it. I dreaded nothing more than getting an email from my copy mom saying she couldn't make it in that week. Although even in those rare cases, I had everything ready in to be copied in my copy basket, so it still made my job easier (and more organized)!

Now I am off to play with my son. Even if I was teaching I'd be off, we have a snow day today. This area has been hit hard by snow this winter. Kyle is even off work today because of the snow!