Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Off to a good start...

Today was our first official day of the new semester. Monday was a workday/recover from jetlag/catch up with all the peeps/prepare for the week. Oh how I love this community I work in. It is truly like a family, which makes it hard to be productive in the classroom and try to catch up on what we've been up to during the past three weeks. Nevertheless, the kiddos came today and reality has begun again. Plans for the week include beginning Maniac Magee and writing persuasive essays in Language Arts, multiplying and dividing fractions in Math, and understanding the parts of plant and animal cells in science. In Bible today, we spent most of the time sharing what we did over Christmas Break, but we also came up with some goals for our last semester of 5th grade. We talked about New Year's Resolutions and their purpose, then came up with personal goals. We put them up in the classroom, so that we can help keep each other accountable. Although my perfectionistic ways have mellowed a bit, I still tend to get a little carried away with wanting things in my classroom to run smoothly and in the process leave out that oh-so-important element of compassion. So, I decided that my goal for the last semester of this 5th grade class was going to be to each day remember specific reasons why my 5th graders are the best. In other words, intentionally recognizing the ways that they blow me away each day. Tomorrow, we will be coming up with classroom goals that we can aim for collectively. I am anxious to see what they come up with:)
It is so good to be back...back in Indonesia, back in a routine, and back in my classroom!

1 comment:

Laurie in Flag said...

Good for you for jumping right in there with the new year's resolutions together with your students. I love how you are making individual goals as well as collective goals, and that you are holding each other accountable. We all need each other, don't we! I'm praying that the rest of this week continues to go well and that you will keep being refreshed and energized as you serve the children in your care. Miss you!