SOLO PROFESSORA!

My first two days of solo teaching the 8^th graders has gone beautifully...much better than I imagined really. Every teaching in the middle grades hates the 8B class, but I think I might love them. They talk a lot, but sometimes teachers who are annoyed or are tired of dealing with kids in general forget what it's like to have students who just sit there & look at you (2^nd period 11^th grade honors last semester...grrrr) instead of want to talk, even if it is at the same time, about what we're talking about in class. That's what's so cool about them, they are REEEEALLY interested in what we're learning, they want to know more. Yesterday the 8As who I also like a lot but so does everyone got through everything I planned- The intro of myself, the unit, chalk talk, & a little info about the origins of “The American Dream.” The 8Bs however only got through the unit intro because they were being so inquisitive: What is diabetes? What is your camp called? Are you a hippy? What's your sister's name? What's your cousin's name? It was cool & new....they were actually interested in what I was telling them. Then when we moved to the unit intro, that transcended to the next issue: Who wrote this play? Are we going to go outside? Can we watch videos? Can we do group work? They were actually investing in what I asked them to do: Make expectations for me & for their unit. I'm impressed really & also a little worried about why all the teacher hate their class if I have started loving them individually & as a group, especially the kid that teachers hate the most: Ricardo. Ricardo volunteered to read, to answer, he asked questions, he offeredn any previous knowledge he had, he said yes ma'am...it was cool. I really love it here & being here makes me realize that I am most definitely supposed to be a teacher & I really like these younger kids. I remember last semester I was really excited to have 11^th graders, but I ended up liking my 9^th graders way more. I also think I like these kids so much because half the time they are explaining things to each other in Spanish so they can understand better & they are very humble about what they have left to learn. Yesterday I heard some of the teachers bitching about how these kids are so spoiled & hard to deal with. I want to ask these teachers the last time they taught American students. I'm almost positive the answer will either be “5 years” or “never.” I don't care how Ecuadorian rich these kids are, they are so not spoiled compared to the little shit heads that I taught at Apalachee. They were suucchhh shit heads compared to these kids who are not only eager to learn but RESPECT you as a teacher (I know, respect, seems crazy right?). I have yet to figure out what grade or types of kids I will be teaching in the future, but if it's 8^th grade ESL kids forever, that will be awesome.

I can also feel my optimism & excitement about the 8^th graders annoying my MT who really hates them. She, however, makes them sit in their desks, face the front & listen to her for 45 or 90 minutes. I would be mean to her, too. After class I asked them how it could go better, what they liked, etc. & one two of the girls that are pretty talkative said “class was awesome & fun today!”, “Let's do our journals at the beginning, but I liked this prompt,” “Those videos were cool.” I smiles :]

So here's what we did...

At the beginning of class, we picked up where we left off yesterday with chalk talk about “The American Dream.” They wrote some pretty funny stuff: “America” (duh), “The Simpsons” (the kid that wrote this said that The Simpsons was what he wrote because they're a family with jobs), “McDonalds”, “hamburgers” (two girls wrote these & they said that people with American Dream have food & that McDonalds did so well in American that now it's everywhere), “Money” (someone in both classes wrote money), “Broadway” (this kid said he wrote that because people who've reached the American Dream live in NY & go to plays), and “dog” (everyone in America has dogs, right). After talking about why we put this, we broke into two groups (there are only 13 kids in this class, 2 were absent, so two groups was fine) & they either watched a prezi on the Civil Rights Movement or played "2 truths and a lie" about Lorraine Hansberry. Afterwards, we watched a video made by a senior about the Civil Rights Movement. They got really into this, asked a lot of "why" questions that a lot of their peers tried to answer. 

After re-joining as a class, the kids shared what they found interesting, cool, or disturbing about what they had learned in their groups with the other group. It went really well & we even had time left in the first half so we listened to Nina Simone's "Young, Gifted, and Black" & they read the lyrics. They made some god connections (trying to inspire & tell other that they can be black & taleneted, etc.) so I was really excited about the next half of the period. 

After their break, I showed them a prezi that was basically a bunch of youtube videos about different elements of a play & how to read it. They got really into it (link to prezi). In other words, class was great for the 8Bers & the 8Aers were OK too even though they only got to do the first half of the lesson. I'm excited for this unit of learning!