Sibling Love

This is one of my favorite pictures from my brother's wedding this weekend!

More to come later...

Rambles

The last 10 days with only 7 children has been fabulous! I'm team teaching with another Kindergarten teacher; she is doing Reading in the mornings, i'm doing Math in the afternoons.

I have to admit, i'm such a one-on-one, small group gal.

These children who are my "struggling" students completely shocked me at how well they did on Friday (our first small group day). They felt special because they were the only ones there, they had no one to compare themselves too or distract them from instruction, and I could see skills being mastered that I never knew they were capable of in the first place. Refreshing!

Moving on to other areas of my life....

I have been in a complete funk for about 3 weeks now and i'm not sure why or where it came from. My poor family probably wants to send me packin' because I sure haven't been loving or kind to them.

When I get home in the evenings i'm so worn out and ready to crash; the last thing I want to do is more work. But you can bet on certain days that i'll make time to go for a 3 mile run. Twisted. That's what that is.

I finally made myself clean out my car last night just so I could say that I did something productive with my evening.

Here are the remains of my car:

15 jackets

6 shirts

5 pairs of shoes

2 scarfs

1 backpack

1 purse

1 comforter

And a tub full of teaching supplies.

All that was missing was some food and water and I could've called it my home. Good gracious, you would have thought I was living in there.

Tell me why my classroom is organized yet i'm blind to my bedroom and car? It's tragic.

Out of the Mouths of Babes

It's not everyday you hear about Jesus in public school.

But boy do I soak it up when they bring His name into that building! My kids were singing while they were doing a math activity today. I snuck the camera over and got their innocent voices.

They can try to take 'under God' out of our pledge and prayer out of schools, but He will still find a way to show up!

Many are the plans of a man's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails.

Proverbs 19:21

Encouragement

Yesterday afternoon as we were having our class party my secretary called me out of my class, "Miss Kilgore, can we speak with you for a moment?"

A mother wanted to talk to me about her child.

I stepped into the hallway and had a little "conference" with her and then went back to my party.

My secretary (whom is a very close friend) poked her head back into my room with tears in her eyes.

"You did so good. That was perfect. (grabs my face) Don't you ever for a second doubt that this is where the Lord wants you. Oh my gosh, that was great!"

My eyes filled up with tears as I admitted that i'd never had a parent conference before in my entire life.

Later on that day my secretary told me that this same mother told her that she'd seen so much progress in her child since I took over.

:)

That'll make you want to keep going for quite a while!

God is so good!

Lord, I thank You for how You carried me through this past month of teaching. You've opened my eyes to learn through my weaknesses instead of being hard on myself. I want so bad to be able to differentiate for all of the students in my future class. Keep me aware of the needs of my students and how they are each so different, but give me the wisdom and patience to do what needs to be done for each of them to succeed. You are good.

Last Days

Y'all. I never watch television, much less the intensity that is Grey's, but tonight when I walked in it was on and I found myself stuck there. for two hours. stuck there. for two whole hours.

And it could have been because my body was in shock and completely frozen in my chair... the most intense show i've watched in a while.

Today was our "last" day of school. Summer began at 3 o' clock for students who passed all of the requirements to move on to the next grade level. Those who are either retainees (that's not even a real word - ha) or would benefit from one-on-one instruction were asked to stay for the last 10 days.

I cannot believe that it's almost over.

Graduation went well. I remembered my speech. I spoke slow and well. I didn't forget any kids names and I didn't even have a list. Yes.

I did almost lose my big toe when a child decided to step into my bubble and completely stomp the mess out of it with her dress shoe. Okay, so she didn't mean to, but my toe didn't care if it was on purpose or not in that moment. It stinkin' hurt. My reflexes shot out and wanted to squeeze something, so I very loudly told her to get far away from me before I got too angry. haha. Oh my goodness... it hurt so bad.

Don't worry. After five minutes when the dent in my toe leveled out and I knew that I could speak kindly to her I resolved everything. And let her know she was loved, but to please next time wait until i'm ready. ah.... hurt.

I have a knot. no lie.

So there you have it. My brain is tired and this is the most ridiculous post i've ever written so i'm going to bed. I have a very cool story to tell you guys... later.

Here's to a better post tomorrow, and a wonderful free-from-lesson-planning evening!!

I'm A Drama Queen

My brother is getting married in 13 days.

Today we went to Crockett, where my brother and his fiance live, for a wedding shower. It kind of made the reality of the whole event become more, well, real.

They got lots of great things for their kitchen and we played some fun games. Here is Stacy in her toilet paper wedding dress. Casie and I won the contest - just sayin'.

We like to cram into one chair at home too.

I miss my brother. I love my brother. I just cried.

... soon to be Mr. and Mrs. Brandon Kilgore.

Going Green

In the elementary school system we have something called a behavior chart. Most of the classrooms that you walk into will have some kind of color system - green, yellow, and red. The obvious color to avoid being red.

There are also teachers who have a "Bad List" on the board. I'm sure you can recall a teacher who added students names to the board when they did something unacceptable.

Children who act out do so for a reason. They want (and possibly need) attention. When we call them out in front of the class, ask them to go move their stick to red, or plaster their name to the white-board for all of their peers to see, we've given them that attention. You might as well pull back the curtain and let them have center stage.

Then you have the almost perfect student who never gets in trouble and makes straight A's, but you never seem to pay him/her any attention. Do you notice how backwards we do things? It makes more sense to point out a students positive behavior and display their name on the board so that their choices can be brought into focus.

Think about it.

When a child makes a scene in class all of the other students' heads turn and they place their attention on him/her; the negative behavior. But if we were to instead continually be enthusiastic about those who are making the right choice, heads would then turn and the focus would be on the positive behavior that we are seeking.

Sure, it makes it very challenging on a teacher. It's so easy to ignore the good kid who makes straight A's and is never a disruption in your class while giving all of your time to the one kid whose actions do not deserve your attention. But challenges are fun! They bring an opportunity for growth.

A teacher who reverses her behavior system and makes students earn their way to green is going to have to learn how to begin looking for the positive. That is going to take time, but I think it's worth it in the big scheme of things.

Could their quite possibly be a biblical parallel here?