Kindergarten.

All I really Need To Know I Learned in Kindergarten

by Robert Fulghum

All I really need

To know about how to live

And what to do and how to be

I learned in kindergarten.

These are the things I learned:

Share everything.

Play fair.

Don't hit people.

Put things back where you found them

Clean up your own mess.

Don't take things that aren't yours.

Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody.

Wash your hands before you eat.

Flush.

Live a balanced life-

Learn some and think some

And draw and paint and sing and dance

And play and work everyday some.

When you go out into the world, Watch out for traffic,

Hold hands and stick together.

Everything you need to know is in there somewhere.

Take any of those items and put it into

sophisticated adult terms and apply it to your

family life or your work or your government or

your world and it holds true and clear and firm.

Think what a better world it would be if

the whole world, all governments

had a basic policy to always put things back where

they found them and to clean up their own mess.

And it is still true, no matter how old you

are- when you go out into the world, it is best

to hold hands and stick together.

So proud to have been part of this magical year for 22 students.

Speak Up, You're Brilliant

When Obama was 10 he told his class that he wanted to become the President of the United States.

It always amazes me how much of an impact our words have. There's a little girl in our class who has been referred to as a 'wild cat'. She was disengaged, unmotivated, and clearly did not enjoy school. She was that kid who sings to herself in the middle of lessons, sprawls around the room and crawls around when her classmates are sitting. I am ashamed to say that in the beginning, I would respond to her nagging with "Stop being lazy, I know you know your sounds so sound the words out." (god i don't even want to think about the potential damage my language had). Fortunately, realizing the lack of investment I had in her translated to her own lack of investment when it came to her education. I pulled her aside and told her how smart she was and how disappointed I was that she constantly was wasting her learning time. I asked her what she needed from her teachers to enjoy learning. She did not respond. I told her that she needed to think about that and I would come back to her in five minutes, expecting an answer. Two minutes later she taps me on the shoulder and says "Ms. Yuen, I decided I want to get smarter."

Since then, she has been engaged, writes complete sentences, and follows directions.

These kids have the potential to be brilliant, all we need to do is tell them.

Highlight of the day: Our ADHD girl's behavior specialist came in today. He asked one of my collab members, 'where's she teaching', my collab member replies, 'Philly, why?' he responds saying 'because she's a damn good teacher'. :)

It's week five,

The very last week of summer school.

This means it's assessment time.

Kids, please show progress because your teachers have been working very hard!

My Haven

For the first time in my life I understand the importance of having a space where you can be completely relaxed. I've never really felt like I've had my very own room until now. Yea, in college I had the luxury of not having to share my room with anyone, but since I only had each space for a year I could never invest in making my a true haven. It's taken a while, but my room now makes me so happy that when I come home from Institute on the weekends its hard to get me to leave. I'm looking for a new bedspread and possibly some wall pieces, but it feels complete, at least for now. My momma surprised me one weekend with the window panel and matching hooks!

Nowhere to go but up!

The only great thing about bad days is that the next day can't be any worst.

I came to school this morning pissed off and determined.

I knew I had to get myself together, which I did, in order to get my kids back in line...

and back in that line they went (:

Little things my kids did this week that made me smile

• Little J during our 'doggy doggy where's your bone game' (speaking to herself) "I don't know where the bone is because I wasn't paying attention."
• Receiving "best teacher" pictures from Little T
• Beiber dance party
• Giving our fish a last name, with 20 boys of course poor Alvin now has the last name 'Spiderman'
• Skipping dinner for happy hour after yesterday's not so fun-filled day
• Making word family crowns, and one of our kids wrote the sentence "My mom was late for my date" - BOO YEA what a success, he has truly learned his "-ate" words

Last but not least, something shameful I did this week (but resulted in a GOOD laugh). In hopes of investing our students in their education and going to college, each of us has been sharing photos and stories of our families and college experiences. All of our kids were excited about going to college except one of our girls who doesn't think going to college will be fun or necessary to her pursuit of being a hair dresser. I said, in college we have TONS of fun. We have this thing called SPRING BREAK. I told them that they could go on a cruise or go to Disneyland. Of course, all my students got giddy and excited but Little J still was not convinced. Then I said to her, Think about the most fun you've ever had in your life and times that by ten, because that's what Spring Break is like. gawwwwdddd i should be so ashamed ahaha.

Mental Meltdown

Some highlights of my day:

• Kids hopped up on pop tarts
• A boy kicked a chair across my room
• My behavior coach came in with a camera man (who had an obnoxiously large camera)
• More 10 people observing me today at the same time
• A debrief with my behavior coach where, of course, was talked into things I don't agree with
• Fun Foam
• Heat wave
• More mice
• Finding out every other corp member had a half-day except my school
• Finding out that tomorrow is a heat day for every other corp member except my school

and of course the cherry on top of this day: fire drill in the middle of my shower because some dumbass thought it would be funny

SPIN

Kids do weird things, weird things that make my day!

Although we are supposed to be achieving 100% compliance 100% of the time, I have yet to see this happen (and yes, I know that as teachers, when our students aren't engaged that's on us and not them). We have however come pretty damn close. Yesterday morning we had student engagement that brought a smile to my face. Then, I see one of our little boys head banging like he's at a rock concert and a little girl (who wants to be a hairdresser when she grows up (: ) who was hitting herself like she belongs on a step team. We asked one of our summer mentors why our kids do this weird crazy stuff (among many other behaviors, another being lying on the carpet sprawled out like a cat right in the middle of a lesson). She says something on the lines of...You know that feeling you get when you're drunk and about to do something super weird but you do it anyway? That's the feeling they are trying to get. Remember when you were little and spun around to get dizzy? It's kind of like that.

YES I DO REMEMBER, and it was the best!

So, I urge you, if you want to remember what it was like to be a 6 year old who doesn't want to be in school, just go spin.

Families of all shapes and sizes

On my very first day two little boys came up to me and told me their daddy's were dead without any prompting whatsoever. Today, after sharing photos of my family with my students, the tiniest girl in my class asked me why my papa was only in some of my photos. I told her it's because I don't see him much since he doesn't live with us all the time. She smiled at me and said "my papa doesn't live with me either, he's in jail." Later in the day I suggested she bring some of her stories to her papa the next time she visits him because her stories are so wonderful. She said it takes her more than a day to travel to her father's prison, so she doesn't get to go too often. She looks to me and says "Ms. Yuen, my papa is going to be in jail for the rest of his life because he did a real bad thing, he took someone's life."

She then went on to finish her story.

The Beginning...

...of a beautiful friendship (:

ALSO, if you're looking for Water Ice in Philly, forget about Rita's. John's is the BEST.

"TFA's my pimp and I'm their Goodies" - a mentor who will not be named

They may be bad, but they're incredible!

Again, kids say the darndest things. I had the most incredible day today, and it is all thanks to The Rainbow Fish! I promise you, this is the MOST magical children's book EVER. Without too much behavior narration or prompting, my kids were abnormally quiet and engaged. They were able to identify the problem and solution of the book, even the low kids.

We were mandated to survey our kids about why they come to school, their teachers, etc., and let me tell you, do not ever underestimate the honesty of children! I have taken a few responses (my favorites) from some of the characters of my class and posted them below (:

"They like me because I'm funny and I look like Gary Coleman" ... if you want to know what this kid looks like, google a picture of Gary Coleman and I swear it's him (:

"I want to be a teacher a dancer and a singer. In order to do that I need to learn how to dance and how to sing" ... apparently you don't need to learn how to be a good teacher. great.

"I want to be a ninja and I have to listen to all the things my master tells me to do" ... too much karate kid?

"When I grow up I want to have a job, be smart and have a lot of money. I'm going to come to kindergarten every day, grow up, go to teenage school, go to college and go to work" ... right now all he cares about is snack, at least we know he wants to go to college!

"I'm going to be a regular worker and I'll have to have patience for customers. I'm going to go to college and live there, as long as the dorms don't have elevators." ... this kid better make it to college, he's too smart not to

"I want to be a rose princess. I need to learn how to listen to the teachers and my mom will teach me how to do that. I come to school to see (K). The kids in our class are like butterflies, they are mean and also nasty." ... as you can imagine this little girl is a joy to have in class... (:

"I want to be a princess and a cheerleader. I have to go to big kid school to learn about princesses and cheerleaders." ... of course, because that's what you go to school to learn ahaha

Happy Thursday to all!

Happy TFA Day!

Today's afternoon session was titled : ARC- Intro to Acronyms

Of course, like any other major organization, TFA has it's own language, so of course as employees we are expected to be able to communicate in such a way.

First Acronym: TFA

Teach For America, and whatever it is you believe stands behind those words.

Little did we know that for the day, TFA stood for TOTALLY FREE AFTERNOON

(of course I was a little slow to catch on but once I saw people jumping, screaming, and even a few with tears rolling down

their face...I knew it was Christmas in July)

Instead of getting ahead with some work, I passed out and took the best nap of my life. I don't care what I missed out on, it was the best nap of my life (:

TFA day propaganda

First Day of Teaching celebration

Monday, Sweet Monday

There's nothing more magical than waking up at 5 am on a Monday morning...

There IS something magical about having a child say "I don't like doing procedures, it's getting in the way of my learning!" in response to having to model behavioral expectations because of a few unruly students.

Progress is progress regardless of how long it takes (:

Love your kids no matter what

Kids will remember you for your love over the consequences you give them (even if it means getting sent to the calm down corner five times a day and they cry each time). With all the violence and aggression they are exposed to, a little love can go a long way. Today was a perfect illustration of this.

We have a little girl who has so much love to share and a disability (which cannot be mentioned here) that causes behavioral problems. Today was a particularly rough day for her, she couldn't even complete her short term goals of 5 minute tasks. We found out at the end of the day that her rough day was a result of not being medicated in the morning. She only has enough medication for two days, and there are still more than 10 days left before she can fill her prescription. Hearing this reinforced why I'm here.

Terrible Tuesday

• A mouse ran through my classroom at 7:30 am
• My class arrives an hour later, mind you half the kids from yesterday aren't present and more than ten new students show up
• Of these students, only a third are girls and two are hyperactive
• Since 30% of the student body lives at a homeless shelter, they complain of hunger all morning
• At lunch they ate chilli cheese fries, and they each only got 3-5 fries
• They're angry because they're still hungry and tired from not sleeping

High of the Day: I'm pretty sure that the mouse left our room after lunch

Why do you want to learn?

"To go to jail" - a response I got from one of my rising first graders. The fact that this is a funny prospect is incredibly frightening and took me completely off guard. In preparation for summer school to start, I continuously asked myself how it was possible that the achievement gap existed at such a young age. Today, receiving this response, I now see that while the children from my home think it is normal to go to college and become a professional, my children here view jail as not so farfetched.

On a happier note, kids say the darndest things. Some snippets from today (:

Scenario 1

Little K: Ms. Pollock, are those two teachers sisters?

Ms. P: No they aren’t but they’re both Asian

Little K: HUH?!

Ms. P: You know, they’re from the continent Asia. You’re black, I’m white and they’re Asian

Little K: You white?!

Scenario 2

My name is _____

I’m here to learn

I like mac n’ cheese

And we’ll have fun

N: helllllzzzz yea