Since I have moved here, there have been seven deaths in the village. Five happened in the past month. Three in one day when a boat carrying three young men and their freshly caught moose capsized in rough seas. They left behind eleven children, some of whom go to Togiak School.
Before this, after the death of an elder in January, it was decided that the respectful thing to do would be to close school on funeral days so that as many of the staff who wanted to attend could do so without having to use a personal day. Then we would make up the day on a Saturday. Admin was very enthusiastic about this idea and, in my opinion, kind of rail-roaded and shamed the less vocal into agreeing to it. The proposal was brought to the CSC, who also enthusiastically agreed and sent a recommendation to the District.
Then the boat capsized and another funeral planned. Because of various scheduling issues having to do with living in a town with no morgue and religious organizations who appear to object to having funerals on weekends, the funeral for the three men was set for the Friday before our first Saturday school was to be held to make up for the funeral of the elder. Keeping up? Then you are doing better than I was at the time. Basically, we had a four day school week, a funeral day, another day of school, Sunday off, Monday to start a full week.
It was brutal. The kids were as confused as the rest of us, their little bodies trying to cope with massive schedule changes. The funeral for the three men was held at school because it was known that it would be heavily attended and there is nowhere in the village large enough to hold such a gathering. I went to show my respect, although I did not know any of the men. One was the cousin of a colleague, and the brother in law of one of my students, but in a village this size, everyone was related to at least one of the men.
The service itself was beautiful and heart-wrenching. Watching as a mother held her toddler as she kissed her father goodbye, laying in his casket. Hearing speaker after speaker unable to continue when the grief at losing a son, a friend, a fellow hunter became too great. Many cried, including myself. The service took three hours and by the end, I was drained and didn't attend the potluck. I am not sure if this was bad form or understandable. Going to school the next day to work seemed impossible.
But the next day, work was work. Except that it wasn't. All the kids had a kind of crazed energy about them. Their bodies told them it was a weekday, a day set aside for play and movement. Their teachers told them to sit down and get to work. I treated my class like it was a regular school day but tried to turn a blind eye to random misbehaviors. This was helped by the fact that half of my class wasn't there. A few straight up didn't come to school. The others are on the middle school basketball team and a tournament was happening that day.
Yes, you read that correctly. A basketball tournament was held the same day as Saturday School. I guess the powers that be decided that to help keep our attendance numbers up, Sat School would be right in the midst of team visits by two other village schools. All day, basketball games were going on, starting before the elementary day began. We were encouraged to keep to a regular morning schedule but after lunch we were free to come to the gym and help support our teams. By the time lunch was over, I had a total of three students left. We went to the gym, watched some games, got bored, went back to the classroom and while I graded mountains of paperwork, my remaining students played Stratego on the floor. If it was chess, I might have been able to justify it academically but in my mind, the day was a wash.
At our next staff meeting, two days before our second scheduled Sat School, an item was added at the last minute to the agenda (at the insistence of teachers) to discuss the impact of Sat School. We had 6 minutes, not nearly enough time to go over this, while being mindful that the parents of one of the drowned men were sitting in the room with us. It is hard to be respectful, culturally aware and sensitive in 6 minutes. Especially when the admin was quick to point out, repeatedly, that five deaths in a month is an anomaly. Any discussion of how Sat School affects students, older teachers who literally need the rest of two days off for medical reasons, any of it was met with "Five deaths in a month is an anomaly." I didn't bother to raise any objections, since it was clear that this was not going to be the time to be heard. But I feel strongly that we are sending the absolutely wrong message to students when we schedule Sat School on tournament days. "Come to school but you don't have to do school." "School is important, but only in terms of attendance, we don't care what you do when you get here." "Athletics do trump academics after all."
Not the message I want to send.
Monday, February 22, 2016
Friday, February 19, 2016
Mid terms
This week was the midterm for third quarter of school. As my mom put it, I am in the home stretch. I realized last night as I was patting myself on the back for making it nearly through ¾ of my very first for real renewable contract after over 15 years as an educator of one type or another, that in six months, I need to be in Dillingham for Teacher In-service for the 2016-17 school year.
That is, if I get asked to return. I signed my Letter of Intent to Return within minutes of getting it from Sam. All signs point to being asked to come back. I regularly use phrases like "next year, I want to…" and "I can’t wait to try out (insert ridiculous new teaching strategy) with my class in the fall." As of yet, no one has given me that look which says, "Oh Honey, don’t you know? You aren’t coming back" that I have seen on the faces of principals, secretaries and colleagues over the years.
And after years of being laid off every single year, I am cautious. I heard today that this time last year, contracts had been offered already. As far as I know the union is still in negotiations for the new contract to start in the fall. We get exactly zero feedback from either admin or the union reps about how it is going. Here, unlike Oregon, you do not have to belong to the union to teach. In Portland, it was either join the union and pay your dues, or be a "fair share" member and pay the same dues but have no say. I did both over the years, and all I got for it was told that, due to seniority rules, I was ineligible to apply for jobs. I did look into joining the union here but once I found out that it was voluntary, not obligatory and that it would cost me a cool thousand dollars to participate, I backed slowly away from the table. No thanks, I'd rather go home for Christmas.
It’s not that I don’t think I will be asked back, exactly. But the past has taught me, finally, to never count my contract until it is signed. And sealed. And delivered-in the form of my first paycheck of the new school year. Until then, anything can happen.
That is, if I get asked to return. I signed my Letter of Intent to Return within minutes of getting it from Sam. All signs point to being asked to come back. I regularly use phrases like "next year, I want to…" and "I can’t wait to try out (insert ridiculous new teaching strategy) with my class in the fall." As of yet, no one has given me that look which says, "Oh Honey, don’t you know? You aren’t coming back" that I have seen on the faces of principals, secretaries and colleagues over the years.
And after years of being laid off every single year, I am cautious. I heard today that this time last year, contracts had been offered already. As far as I know the union is still in negotiations for the new contract to start in the fall. We get exactly zero feedback from either admin or the union reps about how it is going. Here, unlike Oregon, you do not have to belong to the union to teach. In Portland, it was either join the union and pay your dues, or be a "fair share" member and pay the same dues but have no say. I did both over the years, and all I got for it was told that, due to seniority rules, I was ineligible to apply for jobs. I did look into joining the union here but once I found out that it was voluntary, not obligatory and that it would cost me a cool thousand dollars to participate, I backed slowly away from the table. No thanks, I'd rather go home for Christmas.
It’s not that I don’t think I will be asked back, exactly. But the past has taught me, finally, to never count my contract until it is signed. And sealed. And delivered-in the form of my first paycheck of the new school year. Until then, anything can happen.
Thursday, February 18, 2016
Ball Chairs
I first saw ball chairs in a 6th grade classroom taught by the finest teacher I know, my former grad school cohort member, later my endorsement mentor, and my friend Lindsay. She said it would help the squirrely kids have a way to get their wiggles out without becoming that regular pain in the ass every class has. About that same time, I saw an article in the paper about a teacher at the school where I used to be a librarian who was using ball chairs also in her 4th grade class. She claimed it cut down on classroom management problems by a huge degree.
So when I realized that my Open Gym money would cover at least half of the cost of getting a set of Physio ball chairs for my small class, I decided to take the plunge. I talked to Lindsay to find out what kind of chairs she got, did more research on Amazon, read reviews and placed an order. The chairs ran about $40 each so it was a pretty tidy sum but that made me more determined to make it work, even if it didn’t.
About the same time, I thought "in for a penny, in for a pound" and wrote up a Donors Choose request for the same chairs. Donors Choose is a website where teachers can write requests for classroom equipment and anyone from around the world can decide to be a nice person and donate money for the request. It’s like a world funded grant site with fewer restrictions than most grants. I figured if I got the chairs funded, I could cancel my Amazon order and use my Open Gym money for something else and pay back my out of pocket expenses. Or set them aside for next year when my class size is expected to double.
The Amazon order came in first. I considered presenting the chairs to the kids as a kind of classroom Christmas present but then worried that they might think they owned the chairs and would get to take them home at the end of the school year. So I waited until returning from Winter Break to blow them up and had them waiting for the kids to start off the New Year. Thankfully, the school has an air compressor for gym equipment that I appropriated to blow up the chairs. Good thing, it took nearly twenty minutes per chair! And they all needed an extra push of air over the coming week, as they got used to being full.
When I presented the chairs to the class, I delighted to see that their eyes got bigger than I had ever seen, and grins wider than ever. I carefully explained the rules of the chairs (three bounces only, pick up your chair by the sides-not the little legs, use only your own chair) and they even added one: if you fall off your chair three times, you go back to a flat chair. And every once in a while, there will be a snigger when someone complains that someone else is "sitting on my ball." I am always sure to follow that up with a stern "Stay on your own chair, please" which usually cuts it off at the pass. If not and the laughing gets to be too much, I call out "C'mon (insert kid's name) wasn't talking about testicles. Were you talking about testicles So and So?" That shuts them all up.
We have had the chairs for 6 weeks now, and I would call it a near success. No one has had their chair taken away for more than half a day. Few classes are done with students working in the traditional manner sitting up in their desks; more often they are sprawled all over the room rolling atop the ball or stretched out catlike if they have reading to do. But I am increasing the number of minutes per day dedicated to independent work to prepare them for true middle school next year, so there is very little time spent listening to traditional lecture-style teaching.
Any visitor to our room seems shocked to see kids lolling all over the room in various relaxed poses, but work output has definitely increased. Those visitors look twice and see students who are engaged, actively working and getting assignments done. Classroom management has been much more positive since kids who used to get in trouble for not paying attention or distracting others no longer have as hard a time staying focused.
One day, Sam the principal wandered in to do a walk through observation. He came in before the kids arrived for the day so I had a chance to explain the benefits of the chairs. With his trademark grin, he asked if he could try one out. He gingerly sat down, rolled a bit and settled in. The grin grew and he told me that I could charge the school the cost of the chairs. I had been hoping for this all along but it was a vague, "wouldn’t it be nice" kind of hope, based on my experiences in every other school district where if a teacher wants to try something innovative, they are welcome to do so out of their own pocket with no expectation of reimbursement. Here, innovation, once proven, is rewarded. What a concept!
About the same time, I thought "in for a penny, in for a pound" and wrote up a Donors Choose request for the same chairs. Donors Choose is a website where teachers can write requests for classroom equipment and anyone from around the world can decide to be a nice person and donate money for the request. It’s like a world funded grant site with fewer restrictions than most grants. I figured if I got the chairs funded, I could cancel my Amazon order and use my Open Gym money for something else and pay back my out of pocket expenses. Or set them aside for next year when my class size is expected to double.
The Amazon order came in first. I considered presenting the chairs to the kids as a kind of classroom Christmas present but then worried that they might think they owned the chairs and would get to take them home at the end of the school year. So I waited until returning from Winter Break to blow them up and had them waiting for the kids to start off the New Year. Thankfully, the school has an air compressor for gym equipment that I appropriated to blow up the chairs. Good thing, it took nearly twenty minutes per chair! And they all needed an extra push of air over the coming week, as they got used to being full.
When I presented the chairs to the class, I delighted to see that their eyes got bigger than I had ever seen, and grins wider than ever. I carefully explained the rules of the chairs (three bounces only, pick up your chair by the sides-not the little legs, use only your own chair) and they even added one: if you fall off your chair three times, you go back to a flat chair. And every once in a while, there will be a snigger when someone complains that someone else is "sitting on my ball." I am always sure to follow that up with a stern "Stay on your own chair, please" which usually cuts it off at the pass. If not and the laughing gets to be too much, I call out "C'mon (insert kid's name) wasn't talking about testicles. Were you talking about testicles So and So?" That shuts them all up.
We have had the chairs for 6 weeks now, and I would call it a near success. No one has had their chair taken away for more than half a day. Few classes are done with students working in the traditional manner sitting up in their desks; more often they are sprawled all over the room rolling atop the ball or stretched out catlike if they have reading to do. But I am increasing the number of minutes per day dedicated to independent work to prepare them for true middle school next year, so there is very little time spent listening to traditional lecture-style teaching.
Any visitor to our room seems shocked to see kids lolling all over the room in various relaxed poses, but work output has definitely increased. Those visitors look twice and see students who are engaged, actively working and getting assignments done. Classroom management has been much more positive since kids who used to get in trouble for not paying attention or distracting others no longer have as hard a time staying focused.
One day, Sam the principal wandered in to do a walk through observation. He came in before the kids arrived for the day so I had a chance to explain the benefits of the chairs. With his trademark grin, he asked if he could try one out. He gingerly sat down, rolled a bit and settled in. The grin grew and he told me that I could charge the school the cost of the chairs. I had been hoping for this all along but it was a vague, "wouldn’t it be nice" kind of hope, based on my experiences in every other school district where if a teacher wants to try something innovative, they are welcome to do so out of their own pocket with no expectation of reimbursement. Here, innovation, once proven, is rewarded. What a concept!
Saturday, February 13, 2016
Fear in the big city.
Two weeks ago, I was trying to fall asleep in an Anchorage hotel room when a major earthquake struck. 7.1 counts as major, and it lasted long enough for me to think, amidst my paralyzing fear, "Wow, this is really going on a long time." I had been in Anchorage for an education conference and, thank all the gods, was able to convince my best friend to come up for the weekend with me. So I wasn’t alone in the room when it was over.
Earthquakes are my single biggest fear, besides the loss of my daughter. Luckily, Bestie is wonderful in a bad situation. Once the swaying stopped, she saw that there was no real damage to our room and took care to calm me down before getting on her phone to find out details of what happened. There was no major damage, a testament to current earthquake-proofing of buildings, though I did hear stories later of those on higher floors who had tvs fall off the walls and bathroom doors slam shut. People were shook up but no one was injured.
But the thing that struck me was when Bestie pointed out that "our" earthquake was of a higher magnitude than the one that totally devastated Haiti in 2010. All of their infrastructure was destroyed, many died, and some are still recovering from that disaster.
As I flew home two days later, in the bumpiest flight I have ever had, in the tiny little plane to get home, I had the thought "Well, if the earthquake didn’t kill me, the wind certainly won’t." It didn’t assuage my fear any but it did make me aware that fear is something I can consciously acknowledge now in a way I couldn’t before. I know there is the Fight or Flight response that is our instinctual way to protect ourselves but I have added an additional reaction: paralysis. I felt like if I didn’t move on the bumpy plane rides, it would help the plane stay up. If I lay in the bed with my pillow over my head, it would keep the building from crumbling around me.
Fear is designed to save us. If I embrace my fear, it won’t take away the cause but it may make it more manageable.
Earthquakes are my single biggest fear, besides the loss of my daughter. Luckily, Bestie is wonderful in a bad situation. Once the swaying stopped, she saw that there was no real damage to our room and took care to calm me down before getting on her phone to find out details of what happened. There was no major damage, a testament to current earthquake-proofing of buildings, though I did hear stories later of those on higher floors who had tvs fall off the walls and bathroom doors slam shut. People were shook up but no one was injured.
But the thing that struck me was when Bestie pointed out that "our" earthquake was of a higher magnitude than the one that totally devastated Haiti in 2010. All of their infrastructure was destroyed, many died, and some are still recovering from that disaster.
As I flew home two days later, in the bumpiest flight I have ever had, in the tiny little plane to get home, I had the thought "Well, if the earthquake didn’t kill me, the wind certainly won’t." It didn’t assuage my fear any but it did make me aware that fear is something I can consciously acknowledge now in a way I couldn’t before. I know there is the Fight or Flight response that is our instinctual way to protect ourselves but I have added an additional reaction: paralysis. I felt like if I didn’t move on the bumpy plane rides, it would help the plane stay up. If I lay in the bed with my pillow over my head, it would keep the building from crumbling around me.
Fear is designed to save us. If I embrace my fear, it won’t take away the cause but it may make it more manageable.
Friday, February 12, 2016
Valentine's Duh
My least favorite day of the school year is Valentine’s Day. It is supposed to be a day of love and friendship but inevitably turns into a day of sugar highs, worse sugar crashes, meanness, name calling and exclusion. Someone always cries. Not always, that someone is me.
The fact that Valentine’s Day is on a Sunday this year makes no difference. It only stretches the holiday over more days. Today, we have a party in the afternoon, the only party of the year when I will allow students to have candy in class. Some of them will get soda after school-I do draw the line at cans of sugar in the classroom-from their crushes who pay 2 bucks to send a can of soda to them, usually anonymously so what’s the point really?
After school, we have a Parent’s Night function that was added mid-year to the teacher workload with nary a peep from the staff who suddenly have to work an extra 6 hours per school year (there are 3 of these nights planned). In Portland there would have been an immediate outcry and union protest. Here, staff just thought it was a great way to pull parents up the hill to meet their children’s teachers, many for the first time. We are serving ice cream, opening the gym to all, showing a family friendly movie and insisting that kids cannot attend unless their parent or guardian is with them. No free ice cream this time, kidlets!
I am running the coloring table. I have pages of hearts and butterflies and a million ways to spell "love" in addition to pages copied from the Art Masterpieces of the World coloring book and from the snowflake coloring book my mom gave me for Christmas. I thought about including some from my new Game of Thrones or Harry Potter coloring books but, selfishly worried that photocopying them would destroy the bindings too much.
From my classroom supplies stash, I gather that the former teacher, Miss Jill enjoyed doing art because she has more than one huge pack of markers and top of the line coloring pencil sets. I considered bringing scissors and some of the construction paper she squirrelled away so we could do folded and cut paper art as well, then considered the mess I would have to clean up later and decided, again selfishly, to keep it simple.
I took up coloring myself last summer as a way to kill time waiting for outdoor plays to start. It has evolved into a full time hobby. I have more so-called adult coloring books than I care to admit. I got three for Christmas this year. I have spent what I consider a considerable sum, for me, on pencil sets and cool markers now that I have a steady job in a place where a hobby in the long winter is a good investment to keep from going crazy. My dear friend Ruby took me to one side before I came back to Togiak to make sure I understood the gravity of having a creative hobby in February and March.
In Portland, they have adult coloring nights in bars with great music and fancy cocktails. I am super curious to see if any adults join me tonight to color. Maybe it’ll become a "thing" here too. I can see adding a coloring table to Open Gym, providing papers and crayons. Maybe once basketball season is over and I can do Open Gym again, I will.
Update: I would call Parent Night a success. From before the official start time, I had kids at my table coloring, and a fairly good crowd turned out. Too bad the bus hired by the school to ferry people up the hill was so late, the people on the bus only had about 30 minutes to enjoy the party. The game of the night was clearly the 100 cup stacking challenge. Students were given 100 cups to place in a tower, a prize given to the student who built the tallest one. The winning tower was over 3 meters tall!
Among the colorers last night, were a few parents who bashfully asked if they could color too, seeing that I was happily working away on a heart-mosaic piece that came out pretty well, if I do say so myself. I brought my personal coloring set in the cool wooden box that turned out to be a fascinating hit with the kids, even though the materials inside were less than stellar. (I'm thinking of writing a scathing revue of it on Amazon-the crayons are mostly wax and the oil pastels have no oil in them but are the same as the crayons. So cheap!) But in talking with the adults, I think I may be right that a coloring club might be a good addition to Open Gym.
The fact that Valentine’s Day is on a Sunday this year makes no difference. It only stretches the holiday over more days. Today, we have a party in the afternoon, the only party of the year when I will allow students to have candy in class. Some of them will get soda after school-I do draw the line at cans of sugar in the classroom-from their crushes who pay 2 bucks to send a can of soda to them, usually anonymously so what’s the point really?
After school, we have a Parent’s Night function that was added mid-year to the teacher workload with nary a peep from the staff who suddenly have to work an extra 6 hours per school year (there are 3 of these nights planned). In Portland there would have been an immediate outcry and union protest. Here, staff just thought it was a great way to pull parents up the hill to meet their children’s teachers, many for the first time. We are serving ice cream, opening the gym to all, showing a family friendly movie and insisting that kids cannot attend unless their parent or guardian is with them. No free ice cream this time, kidlets!
I am running the coloring table. I have pages of hearts and butterflies and a million ways to spell "love" in addition to pages copied from the Art Masterpieces of the World coloring book and from the snowflake coloring book my mom gave me for Christmas. I thought about including some from my new Game of Thrones or Harry Potter coloring books but, selfishly worried that photocopying them would destroy the bindings too much.
From my classroom supplies stash, I gather that the former teacher, Miss Jill enjoyed doing art because she has more than one huge pack of markers and top of the line coloring pencil sets. I considered bringing scissors and some of the construction paper she squirrelled away so we could do folded and cut paper art as well, then considered the mess I would have to clean up later and decided, again selfishly, to keep it simple.
I took up coloring myself last summer as a way to kill time waiting for outdoor plays to start. It has evolved into a full time hobby. I have more so-called adult coloring books than I care to admit. I got three for Christmas this year. I have spent what I consider a considerable sum, for me, on pencil sets and cool markers now that I have a steady job in a place where a hobby in the long winter is a good investment to keep from going crazy. My dear friend Ruby took me to one side before I came back to Togiak to make sure I understood the gravity of having a creative hobby in February and March.
In Portland, they have adult coloring nights in bars with great music and fancy cocktails. I am super curious to see if any adults join me tonight to color. Maybe it’ll become a "thing" here too. I can see adding a coloring table to Open Gym, providing papers and crayons. Maybe once basketball season is over and I can do Open Gym again, I will.
Update: I would call Parent Night a success. From before the official start time, I had kids at my table coloring, and a fairly good crowd turned out. Too bad the bus hired by the school to ferry people up the hill was so late, the people on the bus only had about 30 minutes to enjoy the party. The game of the night was clearly the 100 cup stacking challenge. Students were given 100 cups to place in a tower, a prize given to the student who built the tallest one. The winning tower was over 3 meters tall!
Among the colorers last night, were a few parents who bashfully asked if they could color too, seeing that I was happily working away on a heart-mosaic piece that came out pretty well, if I do say so myself. I brought my personal coloring set in the cool wooden box that turned out to be a fascinating hit with the kids, even though the materials inside were less than stellar. (I'm thinking of writing a scathing revue of it on Amazon-the crayons are mostly wax and the oil pastels have no oil in them but are the same as the crayons. So cheap!) But in talking with the adults, I think I may be right that a coloring club might be a good addition to Open Gym.
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