Diamonds in the Ruff

     I've never been good at training puppies.  Now, after a whole week with my Pre-K babies, that is exactly what it feels like I am doing.  My pockets are filled with stickers and fruit snacks as I have learned it is more effective to reward good behavior than scold those who constantly do the opposite of what I ask them to do.  I don't sit down at all and am always watching who is where and counting heads.  And I am tired.  Not stressed out like I was the night before school started.  I am exhausted... plum tuckered out.  My co-workers chuckled when I passed them in the hallways, whispering to them that I have never worked so hard in my life!
     For three weeks prior to school starting, I prepared for the exciting First Day.  Our classroom is big and bright and colorful with lots of room for learning and playing.  All the paperwork was in order,  bulletin boards were done, centers and shelves were labeled and lesson plans were ready.  I woke up at 5:00 am excited but not really knowing what to expect.  And then the Little Ones showed up.  Most recognized me from the home visits, but still there were four criers and seven who speak no English.  Three parents insisted on staying and going to class with us after breakfast, which didn't help with the criers.  I finally got them all out by 9:00 and all but one child had stopped crying by 10:00.  My wonderful aide and I managed to keep the group contained on The Rug so we could talk about classroom rules, but then it was time to let them play.  It took less than one minute for the Blocks and Dramatic Play areas to be completely wrecked.

     For a minute or so I just stood there and watched and listened.  The delighted squeals from the girls as they discovered the dress-up clothes and dolls made me so happy.  I had spent money I didn't have yet to buy babies and dishes and a friend had cleaned out her daughter's play house to donate to ours.  As I stood there I was reminded that we are all blessed with what we have and blessed again when we experience the pleasure of giving.

        My boys separated into the Blocks and Dinosaurs centers and were making their own joyful noise.  The crashing of trucks into block towers was occasionally drowned by the huge roars of the pterodactyl slaughtering tyrannosaurus rex.  There is so much room to play and so many different activities to do over there that not one argument or tug-of-war broke out.  Never has chaos made such perfect sense!
     Lunchtime for Little Ones comes early so I managed to get everyone's attention and tell them that it was time to clean up.  That's when the miracle happened.   They cleaned up.  No, really.  They cleaned up....all the cardboard blocks started stacking up against the wall and the wood blocks were getting put in their case while the dinosaurs marched back onto their shelves.  Over in the housekeeping sections the girls were literally cleaning house.  All the girls there on the first day were Hispanic and I had been to their homes which is why I noticed how they were picking up.  Their real homes were very tidy...all toys were put away and nothing was on the floor.  So when they cleaned up the play house area there was nothing on the floor.  All the dresses were crammed into their cubbies and all the food and dishes and pots and pans and babies were in the refrigerator...but there was nothing on the floor!   They had done what I asked them to do so out came the stickers.  It is amazing what kids do for tokens like that.

     The rest of the day involved getting to and from lunch and the playground without losing anyone,  settling down for nap time and having everyone brush their teeth.  Several years ago I had purchased a large model of a mouth and a giant toothbrush when I managed a Health Education grant for my school.  I used the model to show the proper way to track down and evict the Cavity Creeps and then we brushed teeth two at a time.  I wish I could have recorded some of that. The kids were so serious about getting way in the back where those Cavity Creeps live and then opening their mouths to have me see if they were running out.  There was toothpaste and spit everywhere!  I forget how literal the Little Ones are at their age.
     We have a way to go with walking in line and remembering to use our napkin at lunch, but I think the first five days have gone well.  By Friday morning, the parents that did not send their kids on the bus were taking them to the cafeteria and leaving.  There were no tears or wet pants on Friday, either, and one of my non-English babies was calling me Mama.  We haven't really done much that I put on the lesson plan because I had unrealistic expectations about that.  But we have learned to share princess dresses, take turns with the pterodactyl, that the slide is for going down, not up and that only one silly person is allowed in the bathroom at a time.  (I still don't understand what is so fun about the potty.)
     Our class is fortunate to have only one pincher/hitter, one tattletale and two Special Ones that have no boundaries and need constant redirection.  We are also extremely blessed to have an amazing paraprofessional who anticipates needs and plans for what is next and has helped me get an effective routine going.  The little bit of Spanish that I know combined with the commands "Stop," "Sit" and "Stay" are enough to help the non-English Little Ones (Chiquitos) assimilate.  Overall, we are making progress.  I hope that in a couple of weeks we will look less like a litter of puppies covered in stickers with a barking mama and more like a functioning Pre-K class with a teacher who really knows what she is doing.

"No One Rises to Low Expectations"

     I am rarely motivated by motivational speakers.  I usually just sit there appreciating their comments but wondering if they really buy their own spiel.  This morning Stephen G. Peters changed that.  Maybe it is because he gave it to us straight, without fancy words or pompous attitude.  (I actually had to Google a word used by the assistant superintendent when she welcomed us.) Maybe it is because his humble beginnings and career in education made his message authentic.   Or maybe it is because for the first time one of these school district-sponsored programs directly related to my job.  For fifteen years I have listened to professional development programs on reading, differentiated instruction, instructional strategies for higher math...you name it.  There wasn't much offered for the lowly art teacher.  But today I listened as a "new teacher"...one who will have my first class of 20 students who have no idea what to expect of me and I in return am not quite as confident as they need me to be.

     I took away a lot of important concepts from Dr. Peters' message, but the line that stuck in my head is the one at the top of this post.  He addressed the burnt-out teachers and acknowledged that today's kids are nothing like the ones they taught 30 years ago.  But he stressed that teachers have to adapt their methods in order to reach this new generation and inspire them to aim high and try to reach their goals.   A lot of teachers give up and decide that these kids don't want to learn so they aren't going to expect much of them.  If the expectation is a low as their current level, then what is there to gain?  Each generation needs to be greater than the last and if we don't train these kids to think ahead, want to be smarter and work harder then we as a species get weaker.  OK, he didn't say species but that is what he was talking about.

     When I went into the community and visited my students last week, I looked into a lot of bright and beautiful eyeballs filled with wonder and realized that I have been charged with an enormous task.  Not only do I have to teach them to write their name, hold a fork, learn to share and wait their turn, but I have to show them that knowledge is good and inspire them to want to learn more and more.  This is their first step into the world of education and I need to make sure that it is jam packed with one positive experience after another.  I have had a bad teacher or two in my educational history and I remember them as much as the countless wonderful ones.  I won't allow myself to be in that category.  These kids are going to be hugging Miss Boykin in the grocery store for years!

     Teaching is a relationship.  I learned this in my art classroom.  I didn't have much trouble with the "bad" kids because I had a relaxed atmosphere and treated them like kids instead of the thugs that some of them pretended to be. Apparently they appreciated that.  My Little Ones are coming to me as blank slates....they have no reputation or behavioral history that I need to be aware of, therefore I shall treat them thusly.   Everyone will begin as a distinguished scholar and add to their list of accomplishments by Graduation time in May.  This first year I might not cover everything in the curriculum in the order in which it is intended and I may screw up the lunch and attendance reports on occasion, but gosh-darnit these kids are going to be learning something good everyday.  And they will know their teacher believes in them.  Having seen where some of these babies come from, that alone will take them farther than we can imagine.

Attitude Adjustment

     I was a child of wealth and privilege, a spoiled rotten little white girl.  Of course I never knew that until I went out into the community in which I work and visited the homes of my new students.  Over three days I met with twenty families to do the staggering amount of paperwork required to enroll their children in Pre-K before school starts next week.  By the end of the first day I was a roiling bucket of emotions, humbled and feeling incredibly blessed to have been raised in a safe and loving home with everything I needed and a good bit of stuff I wanted.  I was also angry at some mamas, sad for some children and disgusted with a system that rewards and perpetuates ignorance and laziness.  I learned a lot about the different cultures coexisting in that small community and that stereotypes don't apply to everyone.

     My first stop was at a nice new brick home outside of town where a single mother and her son live alone.  She works nights so her mother and aunt pitch in to help with him.  Her mother is a teacher and she has an uncle who is a firefighter and they are a hard-working bunch of folks who take care of their children and teach them to take care of their things.  The little boy was well-behaved and talkative and I left feeling quite good about things and glad to know the kids I work with are valued in their homes and taught to behave despite what they have shown me in school over the past fifteen years.  The next stop changed my mind.

     I have known the older children of the next family for several years.  They are a pitiful bunch since they are all in Special Education and their classroom teachers have had to do everything from feeding to clothing them since they started school.  I have smelled them and heard rumors of their living conditions but had never seen their home.  Home is too nice a word.  It is nothing short of a hovel.  And I have been in dog kennels that were cleaner.

      This photo is one I snagged elsewhere since I cannot post my students' homes on a personal page, but it is an accurate representation of this family's dwelling place.  I saw a lot of low-income homes that day, but this is the only one that I would call filthy.  I got so angry.  The mother made half my salary just on the kids' disability income and this mobile home was so old that any mortgage would have been paid off twenty years ago.  So why couldn't they have replaced the broken front door, gotten some floor covering that wasn't rotten from water leaking somewhere and plugged the holes around the windows to keep the air conditioning in and the insects out?  Or how about buying some clothes that fit the children and some kitchen items?  The middle child was sipping ice water from a peanut butter jar while the semi-nude youngest was sloshing a soda out of the can and onto anything in his path.
     Poverty and filth do not go hand-in hand.  There are many people who have lower incomes than the aforementioned household, but their homes are spotless.  Pride doesn't cost a thing.  The Hispanic migrant families I visited had very little in the way of furniture and some had used bungee cords to turn sheets into makeshift curtains, but their homes were tidy and their children were clean and well-behaved.  This sense of pride shows in the type of students these children become.

      I won't dwell on the dwellings because I saw a common thread running through all of these homes.  All of my Little Ones were smiling.  They hugged me and are excited to come to school.  They don't know if they are getting the short end of the stick or not and I certainly won't tell them.  I am going to try really hard to not think about where they sleep at night but focus on what I can give to them.  Each of these kids deserves the same amount of love, praise, structure and education as the next.  I wasn't really a spoiled wealthy child in the material sense, but I was (and still am) loved, valued and special to my parents.  I can give that back...along with cupcakes on their birthdays.

They Moved My Cheese!

     The anxiety monster has reared its ugly head again.  Today I went to the Pre-K office to pick up "the box" as directed.  In it was a bunch of things for my classroom like tissue and hand soap and the kids' toothbrushes.  It also contained The Roster.  Twenty little names that will probably never escape my memory of this first year in a new department.  In addition to knowing absolutely nothing about the curriculum or how my room should be set up, I now get to figure out how to wrangle sixteen little boys and four little girls every day.  Sixteen boys.  My goodness.  Sam has a friend over for a few days and I have barely survived the first twenty-four hours of two boys' combined energy.  I cannot imagine what sixteen is going to sound like.
     I have taught Visual Arts at Greensboro for fifteen years and am so grateful that I am not having to change schools like some other teachers are.  Due to financial cut-backs, Art and Music have been removed from the elementary schools in Gadsden county.  Most teachers of those subjects are on annual contract so we are being re-assigned to others areas in which we hold certification, which is how I got to be the new Pre-K teacher.  Our school is a wonderful place to work and learn and we have received our fourth rating of "A" in a row.  Enrollment is to capacity so we have finally qualified to have a second Pre-K class.
     My principal has agreed to let me keep my fabulous art room rather than assign me to the dumpy old portable closer to our other Pre-K class.  Another blessing that I am truly grateful for.  I think he got concerned after my freak-out when he mentioned that he might be moving me.  He referred to my classroom as my ecosystem because I am so attached to it!  It is huge space with four floor-to-ceiling windows, a walk-in closet, a large office and a restroom.  There is also a gigantic storage room with a washer and dryer and utility sink.  The room was originally built for the high school Home Economics class so it also has four kitchens with sinks, cabinets and tons of counter space.  It is a dream room for a teacher with a penchant for saving things!  It was perfect for making banners and the hundreds of May Day costumes I have done over the years and it will be fabulous for a class of twenty small, energetic children.
     This week I will have a couple of workshops and a parent orientation and tonight I will read through all the documents from The Box so that I will at least be familiar with the lingo.  The staff at the Pre-K office are really nice and want to be helpful so that will make it easier when I start calling them with questions every half hour.  My teacher friends are very encouraging and have no doubt I will be fine and I know that after I adjust I will be very happy.  I don't handle change well, but have gotten used to the idea.  I will have an aide and the kids get nap-time after lunch so it is not like it is going to be a tough gig.  I have just been spoiled by having a kid-free lunch break, no worries about anyone missing the bus and a different group of kids every forty-five minutes.
     The "Who Moved My Cheese?" story reminds us that we can't just sit back and watch our lives happen.  We must constantly change and adapt to what life throws us.  The older I get the more I like to sit, but now I have twenty more mice moving the cheese around!