Year Long Planning

I'm rather proud of myself this year. It's 17 days before the first day of school and I have a LOT done!

1. My classroom is basically set up. I still need to figure out what goes on the bulletin boards and straighten 1 or two edges.

2. My desks are all set up. They're just waiting for names now.

3. I basically have my year-long planning done. I'm still working on Language Arts, but that's cool. At least Social Studies and Science are planned out. We're doing day-by-day planning as a team in Math and Language Arts is pretty simplistic because I follow the scope-and-sequence of our basal when it comes to skills.

4. All my cabinets are organized and ready for anything I can throw at them. My goal is to KEEP it that way!

Praxis II : Priciples of Learning and Teaching K-6

I took a test today because some of the Arizona schools are giving me flack for not having it done. It was the Praxis II : Principles of Learning and Teaching K-6.

First- my general impressions.
The test covered basically what I expected it to. There was nothing on the particular researchers which rather bumed me out for spending time on it. However, the test was a lot longer than I expected. The practice test only provided two essay questions and 26 multiple-choice. The actual test had four essay and 26ish multiple choice. The essays were a case study followed by three short-answer questions. However, these were not the typical short-answer where one expects no more than three sentences. These were detailed in depth answers that required at least two paragraphs for each answer. This totaled 24 full paragraphs written in long-hand. If I had been typing I would have had no difficulty in finishing within the two hour time limit, but because it was written I really struggled. It was not that the content was difficult, but that there was so limited time. When I took the Elementary Content Knowledge exam the two hours was more than sufficient because it was all multiple choice. When it comes to essays there is a lot more evaluative thought that goes into completing the section correctly.

Thankfully, I do know some good test taking strategies. I tackled the multiple choice first, then the essays. If I had not I would have spent too much time on the essays and not had enough time to finish the multiple choice. As it was I barely had time to go back through and reevaluate my answers on the multiple choice.

Now, more specifics.
I'm not allowed to discuss particular content of the test or test questions so I'll cover it generally and hopefully I'll get my answer across. The question dealt with a child who may or may not have a behavior disorder and what the next step was. However, the teacher had not identified the problem, nor had a custodian parent. So, what does the teacher do? It's really bothering me that I don't know the answer and I'm struggling to quantify it so that I can figure out what the answer is. I was torn between what is Legal and what is equitable for the child. In the end I went with what seemed to be the legal option.

Maybe once the test is released I might be able to get the answer. Or if I ask the question as if it related to a student who I had in my classroom? Hum. How do I find out the answer to my question without breeching the security of ETS and endangering my test?

Benchmark Tests

I'm sitting here scratching my head. Today was a good day all told. My twins didn't test my patience, my students (for the most part) did their best work and all went well.

Except I cannot figure out the test. We took our math benchmark. It was suppose to cover double digit addition and subtraction (with regrouping), area, non-standard units of measure, length (when given something to measure with like 1cm blocks), money and paired additive lists.

I spent some time on everything. (Less on Area because I figured (and rightly so) that at this age they're going to draw in the squares and the kids will just have to count it). But I spent the MOST of this six weeks on Addition and Subtraction. When I saw last years test it covered everything, but hit the adding and subtraction the hardest. I was feeling REALLY good about how my students would do, and... then this test came.

Bless their hearts, the students that really focused and read the directions and questions did JUST FINE. I'm the kind of teacher that when things don't go well for my students I tend to blame myself, but some of the mistakes I'm thinking to myself- what else could I have done? One little girl that struggled though Absolutely everything in math this six weeks aced the test. How? Because she PAID ATTENTION to the questions. This was the first time the test was not read aloud to the students and some of them were REALLY hurt by this. Others... I just don't know.

I could have spent more time on things, I really could have. But those kids who had it, they HAD it. And it was a majority that did have it. 1 student failed because he refused to check his answers and actually do the work. (I hate to blame it on him, but when I point at a question and ask him to show his work and he will NOT do it then what room do I have to say otherwise? He knows how to do the math, but if you won't actually do the calculations you're going to fail.) Another is an English Language Learner who probably would have aced the test if it had been read to him. Another is a new student as of two weeks ago. She'd never taken a test like this before. My last student that did not do well was able to explain her work in words when talking to me, but when it came to getting the right answer just didn't follow that same line of reasoning. (I'm not going to go into it for testing confidentiality but...) As for my last student... I have no idea.

I just... don't understand. If the students paid attention to the questions asked, they got it. If they didn't... they didn't. I feel like I should be frustrated because of that 1/4 (basically) of my class that got below a C. But... I don't know. One question I absolutely didn't teach them. Then again, none of my materials that I was teaching from went into that depth so I honestly didn't have any chance of being able to teach that to them. Apparently I'm suppose to have been able to know that anyway... but I didn't. I even asked my teacher what else I should teach on the topic and she gave suggestions that I followed.

How should I feel? Am I allowed to beat myself up about this, or should I just shrug my shoulders, reteach that one thing that I didn't teach before and move on? I mean, I feel like I ought to be able to beat myself up at least a little bit.

I guess I need to plan for tomorrow. I don't know what benchmark they have in the morning (It's either reading, writing, science or social studies). So I'm not sure how long it'll take.

I hate feeling confused. x.x I love my children. They deserve the best education that I can give them, and thank goodness that 3/4 of them did read the questions and pay attention. They exceeded what I expected of them (just because I prepared them for a test they didn't get. I'm glad they did get the content when I taught it and were able to take it another step farther.) I'm really, really, really proud of them altogether. Today could have been crazy (because my teacher was gone) but they really did their best and I cannot be more proud of them.

There, that's the emotion I'll feel. Pride in those kids who put their all into the test.

Lesson 3: Estimation

I did my third lesson in my addition unit today. My biggest problem with Estimation is the definition of 'estimate'. Everyone I've talked to have defined estimation as an educated 'guess'. To the kids, they learned that a 'guess' really is anything that's out there. A guess cannot be right or wrong. But now they have me in front of them telling them that what they learned isn't exactly right, that there are 'rules' to estimation. There are ways to make estimation more exact, but they're not really easy to explain. However, I did the best that I could. For once, I taught the lesson a lot like it was explained in EnVision math. I put the lesson plan into my own words though (for the TWS!).

Anyway-
Well
The students were able to identify their tens and ones.

Not Well-
I had to redirect them quite a bit.
I didn't have enough time.
The technology did /not/ work.
The students didn't have contact with the technology.

Anyway. I am not satisfied with this lesson, but I'm not sure HOW I could teach it better. Frankly, I'm thinking I'll have to leave this particular subject alone, having introduced it. On the benchmark tests they will simply add the two numbers together to see if they have enough money to buy the object. As they get more sophisticated in their estimation skills they will learn how to estimate better.

A Case in Contrasts

I would like to present you with two cases.

A) Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (aka, Texas State Standards)
(See: Scroll to Bottom, Open 4th Grade, find Social Studies Core 4th Grade p. 18)

B) Utah State Core Curriculum
(See: Social Studies Core 4th Grade p. 13)

Now, your assignment. Look at both cores. Tell me how they are the same. Tell me how they are different. Now, tell me which one you would like to use to plan your curriculum. (Hint, the answer isn't Texas.)

Why do they have such a ridiculous core? Seriously? It makes NO sense.