Here Comes Spring!

For all you Hoosier folks, spring is on the way! At least here in Tennessee. Hopefully yours is not far behind! (Of course the weather people are calling for a wintry mix on Wednesday, but let's enjoy today.)

Check out the temp on the way home from the store today!

Last year only one of these bloomed, but today I have six!

It has been a fantastic weekend! We drove down to Auburn to see Smarty on Saturday. It is full-on spring there. We went out to eat lunch and then walked to Toomer's Drug Store for some fresh-squeezed lemonade (you have to try it it you're ever in town) and then walked around in the glorious weather. When we got home we found that Marvelous had hitched a ride to Chattanooga and was there for the night. We had steak on the grill for lunch and then went to get ice cream and walk around the park this afternoon, before Hubby drove her back to school. So excited to see both my girls in one weekend!

And the Work Goes On...and On and On

The floor is coming along. The only room left to do is the breakfast area. Here is the progress so far.

I have a vision for the dining room. No one else sees it but me. It will be fabulous.

Matching the flooring up as it came out of the dining room and foyer was a major feat for Hubby. It turned out perfect. We decided to leave the kitchen in tile. I still have some beadboard work to do on the walls.

I have always wanted a coat rack and I finally got one!!! We still need to put some quarter round down along the baseboard in the foyer.

From the Mouths of Babes

I can't resist putting up another one of my students' "All About" books. When they were brainstorming ideas, this student insisted that he wanted to write about Life. I tried to get him to narrow it down a bit. After seeing the final product, I'm glad that he persisted with his original idea. One note about this student: he has a very hard time with fine motor skills and writing in particular. It takes a loooooong time to write any letters or numbers, so spelling is not something he is focused on. I corrected spelling on post-its, but he hasn't finished editing. I'll "translate".

"Life"

"Sometimes you feel lonely. If a bully hits you, walk away and say 'Leave me alone.'"

"A word of advice. If you're close or something, never stop trying."

"Never panic, unless it costs 5 million. But in that case, save up."

"Life is not fair. It could be bad. It could be good."

"Life is hard. You gotta control it." Captions read: "Phase 1", "Phase 2" He wanted to add that Phase 1 was not under control and angry and that Phase 2 was under control and happy. I thought that would be too much writing in the picture.

 

 

 

 

 

Maybe you're not impressed, but these are the moments that keep me going.

Too Cute

No matter what else you think about Lizzie, you have to admit that she's a cutie! Her new favorite activity is chasing the bubbles that Mr. C likes to blow. If he doesn't even have the bubbles and he blows at her, she meows like she's expecting the bubbles to come out of his mouth. Funny!

This is What I Need For Emergencies

If you don't have time to watch all eight minutes, just skip to minutes 4:00-6:00 and you'll see why this would be a great vehicle for all the weather we've had this winter.

The View From Here

Since I can't drive around and take pictures, here is the view of what I saw on an early morning walk today. It is absolutely lovely!

10 inches. Not a drift. This is in the middle of the backyard.

My backyard

My front yard

Dogwood

It is so pretty, but the trees are really weighted down. Luckily, we weren't one of the thousands of homes in this area who lost power due to fallen trees and power lines.

I wonder if we'll get mail today. It is supposed to be 43 later, so this will probably be gone soon. The best kind of snow!

I walked all the way over to check on the car. It is right where we left it last night. There is a Bug attached to its rear end, but it is in one piece. Yay!

Walking back to the house. It is just a Winter Wonderland!

This is the way you would go if you wanted to get to the pool or tennis courts. Hmmm. Probably not today.

The back deck looks so puffy and pretty. I think it would be a little wet to try to sit and enjoy it from here though.

The sun is out now. The snow is falling in mini-avalanches from the tree branches. I imagine by tonight this will all be a memory.

Big, Beautiful...Oh, ***

Car tracks from when we left, foot tracks from walking home

The snow started falling in big, beautiful flakes during dinner. Hubby had just got home and said the roads were fine, so we decided to go downtown to take some pictures. Apparently in the time it took us to wolf down our food the roads deteriorated rapidly. We decided halfway down our hill, as the car started driving itself, that maybe we should go back home. This meant getting back uphill. We drove around the block to the other entrance because there was no way to reverse up the hill. We ended up making it half-way home and then walked the rest of the way. The car is "parked" precariously in front of someone's house. At least we didn't demolish any mailboxes or bushes, like the people in the van in front of us.

I am now saving up for a Range Rover. They run around $100,000, but boy it'd be worth it!

This is "Low"

According to all the standardized yardsticks that I am supposed to measure my kids with, this is one of my "lowest" students. This student currently reads on a level D (first grade should begin on level D and end on level J) and is in math RTI (response to intervention is for students who score low on testing). However, this student has a thirst for learning, is excited to be at school, and is so proud of every accomplishment. Back in my day this student would have been an exemplary student, not a low student. [In our current unit we are writing "All About" books, that teach something. The students had access to a variety of non-fiction texts to use for research material if they first wanted to learn more about a topic. This is a wonderful writing program (Lucy Calkins) that is student centered.] This is a sample of this student's latest writing project.

While this page doesn't seem to be informational, the student is referring to the fact that the mamas and daddies take turns caring for the egg and hatchling.

The student is referencing that there are different species of penguins. Again, this is on a first grade level, not high school.

The only spelling that the student fixed were the words "eat" and "different". The writing program stresses that the students figure out which words need to be fixed with minimal teacher intrusion. They are given tools to use, such as word walls and dictionaries, and then check their work against these. On the first page I simply said, "I think there might be a misspelled word on this page." The student immediately pointed to "eta" and I confirmed that was it. Then the student walked over to our classroom word wall and fixed the spelling. For the word "different" the student copied it from an anchor chart hanging in the room that was covering "How things are the same/ different". They learn to look for  ways to help themselves.

Two points that I could go back and talk to this student about are 1) Have you checked that the word "penguins" is spelled the same all the way through your book? 2) In the word "share", what makes the letter a say it's name? (missing silent e) So you see there is still room for editing and correcting. 

When we give our High Stakes Tests we cover up everything in the room and take away all the tools they are used to having at their disposal. Guess how well they do on the tests.

It's a snow day here. I brought home lots of planning material and hope to get bunches done today!

A Very Tough Week

Mother Teresa's Anyway Poem
People are often unreasonable, illogical and self centered;
Forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives;
Be kind anyway.
 If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies
Succeed anyway.
If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you;
Be honest and frank anyway.
What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight;
Build anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous;
Be happy anyway.
The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow;
Do good anyway.
Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough;
Give the world the best you've got anyway.
You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and your God;
It was never between you and them anyway.

Last week was very tough. Nights when I came home physically shaking because of what I went through during the day. A near-death experience for one of my little sweethearts, and I was the only one there to step in and administer the necessary medication. An emotionally disturbed student who will do anything to get out of class, including sticking his hand down the classroom AC/heating unit and beating on my personal computer. A defiant student who thinks he knows more than I do and that he can do anything, anytime he wants, who runs around the classroom yelling that he has ADHD and needs medication. A student who probably does have undiagnosed ADHD who sits in his own little world making airplane motions with his hands and accompanying mouth noises (parent conference coming next week). A student who is sooooo far behind everyone else, frequently in tears and no strategies seem to help (special ed testing later this month for this one). A very stubborn student who says "Nu-uh" whenever I teach him anything new ("The e on the end is silent. It doesn't make a sound." "Nu-uh. You're trickin' me!" Crosses arms and looks away.)

I keep Mother Teresa's Anyway poem posted behind my desk. I had to refer to it several times this week. I have to remember that there are 20 of them and the majority of them are sweet angels, anxious to learn. And those who do give me problems usually do it "tag-team" style. For some reason last week they all converged on me at the same time. 

Hoping and praying for a better week ahead!