Not as good the second time

I didn't like fires in the bathroom at the middle school near as much as I did at the high school. Does that mean kids won't light fires in the bathroom of the middle school I am transferring to? Cause they tore them up at Dunbar!

Reading this book really just reminded me of how little control I had in my classroom this past year. Not really all my classes, mostly just my 1st period. Which is strange considering they were probably the best behaved kids I had, and super smart. There was just something about how chatty they were! It irked me. So now I'm almost even more nervous, cause I realize the students at Deal are going to be super super smart and also well behaved. But Linda seems to think I'll soar at Deal, and she's never steered me wrong.

Anyway, more about the book and less about me. Though that may be hard to do considering the whole time I read this book I thought about myself in those middle years. I really remember close to nothing about the educational aspect of middle school, and judging by the responses in the book I think that is totally normal.

Now I feel even more challenged to create exciting and eager projects with active lesson plans built around them. I want to follow unit guides designed with standards more than usual, while actually tricking my students into mastering those standards. I want to maintain such great control with little classroom routine, as to strengthen the element of surprise in my classroom. To keep kids eager to come through my doors each day.

Other than that, there is little I learned from these students. Their advice was contradictory and confusing; it felt like reading a very unreliable narrator. Makes sense though if you think about it.

Teacher Improvement

It's that time. The time I start cramming in a bunch of teacher books to get me geared up for a new school year. Yesterday I blazed through two that I'm hoping to sell back to a college book store. I've had each of these for almost a year, but never read either till I realized I could sell them back and make a profit since they were both free.

Failure is NOT an Option was to be a joint read at Dunbar. I believe the idea was headed up by Ms Exum. I'm sure she had read it and gained much from it's suggestions. But that's just it, I believe it is more for school administrators, not everyday classroom teachers. It would have been good to read as an entire staff, but as the book itself points out. It is hard to get teachers in failing schools on board with another "reform approach." After they've tried so many they begin to just roll their eyes at the next one.

I still worry about the fate of Dunbar. I do believe the bulk of the remaining teachers want the school to change and are more than willing to aide the leaders as they strive to do so. I just worry those Bedford guys have kept them too far out of the loop and maybe got their hopes up a little too high. I'll be very interested to see/hear about the buildings summer infrastructure changes. I hope they were a success.

There really were a lot of things to learn in here, but I'd have rather heard it through Professional Development with the author or another school Principal who had put those six strategies to use. Then what you really need is a professional to monitor and make sure the school authenticates those strategies instead of just copying them out of the book and calling them their own.

Schools of Fish was next. That was a birthday gift from Sam. She liked the Business version so she let me in on the fun. I love the idea of basing any work place after the guys in Seattle's Fish Market. I was only in the 5th grade when I traveled there (well, 4th really) and that is still one of my most vivid memories of the city. They really found so much joy in their job and at the time I didn't even realize how strenuous that had to be to get up at the break of dawn, stand on your feet all day while continually bending over and tossing 40 lb fish around. But they just made it so entertaining. They attract people from all over the world just to come watch them work. Impressive.

And since the book is all cheery about having the right attitude I think it was a good end of summer read. The reason I'm willing to turn around and re-sale it is simply that there weren't a whole lot of classroom strategies. More like simple tips and happy ending stories. So sure it was a good pick me up, just not something I'd need to keep around and refer to from time to time. Let's see, do I remember what FISH! stands for? Be There, ?, Choose Your Attitude, Make Their Day -- hmm, not bad. Especially considering I only remember one of the six principles of not failing, wait two. Mission Vision blah blah and Community/Parent Involvement. I'm sure Collaboration was one as well. So maybe I retained more than I thought after all.