Like A Boss

Hi friends! Happy National Boss' Day! I didn't even know we had such a day. Regardless, the staff at IH put together a really cute banner and even brought cake to celebrate! Gosh, cake seriously makes everything better. Mmm, cake... Anyways, I feel really fortunate to have Mr. D as my boss. Don't worry, my principal doesn't read my blog so I'm not trying to score points or anything when I say this, but I mean it. It's not often that teachers get the kind of freedom that I have with my classroom, especially as a first year teacher. I love that Mr. D has trusted me to teach what I want to teach and more importantly how I want to teach. It's given me so many opportunities to succeed and fail this year, both of which have resulted in wonderfully meaningful teaching moments. I'm not guaranteed a job next year, so I hope I can make the most of this privilege and make every moment count toward refining my practice as a teacher and pushing myself one step closer to becoming a Pokemon master, I mean master teacher!

As a side rant, I often ponder if I am good at anything. Like, what is my talent? Do I even have one? Needless to say, I've come to the conclusion that I don't in fact have a talent and I'm not particularly skilled in any one thing either. I will say this though, I know what I like and I really enjoy the things I like. For instance, I really like writing. People ask me all the time how I manage to keep a blog going during my first year of teaching. Well, the truth is I love to write and this gives me a chance to do what I love and share it with other people. It's a lot like my approach to teaching.

Yesterday I was talking to my student's mom after school and she told me that Brad Pitt (that's a pseudonym for my student, in case you were wondering :P) loves to talk, but between his two older sisters he hardly gets a word in when he's home. I've noticed that he likes to talk from observing him in our classroom and I do my best to incorporate things like pair shares throughout the day, but I still felt bad that I couldn't give him more opportunities to tell his stories. I decided to change that and asked Brad Pitt to come in during lunch for 5-10 minutes. Just to talk. Today he was super excited to tell me a story about a grasshopper he had caught the day before. I laughed, asked him questions, and better yet, I just listened and let him talk.

After listening to Brad Pitt's story I asked him if he wanted to write it down. He was hesitant at first, but obliged. Quick! Let's do some math! Love of kindergarten + my love of writing = love of kindergarten writing. There's something about the way kinders hear and transcribe letters that just warms my heart up and makes me smile. Here's Brad's story. My hope is that Brad will channel his fondness for talking into his writing. My philosophy on teaching writing has always been if you can talk, you can write. I love my job!!!

Finally, it's my last day of being 21. Everyone's so shocked when they find out how "old" I am. I'm really proud of the things I was able to accomplish in my 21st year on this planet we call Earth and I'm looking forward to what my 22nd year has to offer. Enjoy your week and happy teaching!