Monday, September 22, 2014

Overwhelmed

Today is the last day of summer, although for most of us we consider summer to be over when we head back to school. The last time I felt this submerged in September was when I was on bed rest with my youngest. She turns 19 tomorrow. She is our last one at home, and it is often just the two of us, or her and hubby. They share many interests and a quick sense of humor. Both bring so much joy to my life. That is critical this year.

Last spring, I agreed to go "over contract" to be able to be an inclusion classroom. I have taught inclusion eighteen of my twenty years in fifth grade. I don't know if I can want to teach without my partner.

Our contract reduces the students in an inclusion classroom by two. When I got my class list this summer, I was nervous. I knew my list was stacked. Besides my alphabet kids, many of my students are from broken homes, or are at risk. I will get any new students, although we are all at capacity because I also have a full time aide. Last week, we interviewed for the aide to help ease my burden. With my large, needy group, I am overwhelmed with remaking things I usually use, for differentiation. I have barely had time to grade papers. I am hoping things fall into routine soon.

I have a few pictures to share of some things we have been doing.

We have been reading, lots of reading. When it was hot, our benches and milk crate stools were favorites.





 Sunday, September 21st was International Peace Day. Our school made 500 pinwheels to mark the occasion. They were rained on Saturday night, but the display looked good for a while.



A favorite
-this student had art lessons outside of school.

We stacked Oreo cookies for O.R.E.O. Project by Jen Wagner. She has been hosting this project for more that ten years. I think I only missed the first two. We love to do this activity as it gives us a Math in Real Life activity. We also stack the Oreos with our K-Buddies. It makes for a great intro activity. We stacked an average of 19 cookies. You can see in the last picture, my friend is still stacking. I think she got 25 or 26 cookies. Our best stack was thirty! 



I hope to be back on a more regular blogging schedule soon.
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