Math TAKS Retake Day...

Today was the day... the day that we will see if all of the interventions (after school, Saturday school, Wednesday half-days, and most recently - during class) paid off. My students who did not pass the initial math TAKS (Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skill) test had their retake test today. I have a pretty good feeling about my students. I don't want to jinx it, but I think I will have at least 3-5 more students pass it this time. For some of these students, that means a ticket out of summer school so it is really important they do well.

Since it was a state testing day, I was unable to be in the room with my students and again found myself teaching science lab (my old "job") for the day. It is a nice break from 5th grade to get to spend time with the youngest students at our school and experience their innocence (and cuteness). Below, a student drew a picture and told me, "Look Mr. Shorts (yes... I think most of the K and PK students call me "shorts" or "sports" haha) it is me and you going to the store..." then she just looked at me... waited... and said... "I love you" and gave me a hug. After dealing with 5th graders who like to talk back and "flick me off" from time to time, I was a little caught off guard. I replied, "Thanks," and went on teaching.

The students were very well behaved today, which made for a pretty relaxing day of school. Look at how nice all of the kindergartners are sitting during the short video they watched today... I was impressed.

With tutorials and clubs complete for the school year, I was able to arrive home a little earlier than normal and made some "real food" for supper. The pictures below are of my BBQ chicken (no relation to my last post...) that I had for supper and plan on having for lunch and supper tomorrow.

I hope everyone is doing well!

- Joe

Field Trip - Massacre

When I was turning the eggs at the end of the day on Thursday I noticed that one of them had a crack in it! I was pretty excited, my chickens were finally hatching. I knew that it would take awhile for the chicks to actually emerge so I left for home, looking forward to coming back to school on Friday to see my baby chicks.

I arrived at school early on Friday (about 6:45am) in order to check on the chicks and get ready for our field trip that we were taking to the Legacy Land Trust in North Houston. One chick had completely hatched and the others were well on their way.

My students were very excited about the chickens and some were hesitant to go on the field trip. Before we left for our trip, I sent out an email inviting the other teachers to take their classes on a tour to see the chicken being born. I really wanted to be there, but knew that the chickens would all be hatched by Monday so if I wanted to share the experience with the school I needed to let them observe when I was gone.



The bus ride was long and hot. The district provided us with one school bus (for 68 students and 6 chaperone's). We were very crowded and the air conditioning barely worked. When we got to the land trust it was about 90 degrees out and sunny. After spending all day outdoors and in the sun, my students were pretty quiet on the bus ride home. While at the land trust my students went on a nature walk, identified insects and other animals, used GPS to find their way in the woods, and found the oxygenation of water. Although the day was long, I feel the kids had a lot of good takeaways and it was a good opportunity to be outdoors, away from the city.

When we were on our field trip I received a call from another teacher at my school telling me that she thought my chickens were dying. I asked her what the temperature was in the incubator and she told me it was over 120 degrees. The incubator was set at 95 degrees when I left in the morning and had been consistently there for the last 21 days. While we were away a student must have played with the thermostat, drastically increasing the temperature for the chicks and unhatched eggs. I told the teacher how to fix the problem, but it was too late. My chicken, along with all of the chicks that were in the process of hatching had been killed.

I am very disappointed in the students of my school, but more importantly the teachers who brought their kids through to see the chicks and did not closely supervise their students. If the teacher had been watching their kids, there is no way that the thermostat could have been adjusted over 25 degree.

When my students got back to school there was a mixture of emotions. Some of the students were very sad, while others were very mad. My students were mad at me for sharing "our chicks" with the rest of the school. They told me that it was dumb of me to share and that that is what happens when you let other people use your stuff... they break it. Unfortunately, these are not the takeaways I want my students to learn at school, but today, I tended to agree with their findings. I am pretty sad that after taking care of these eggs for 21 days that someone could kill the chicks in the few hours that I shared them with the school.

Instead of having the gardening club help take care of the chicks after school like I planned, we ended up having a funeral.

International Festival!

I arrived back in Houston on Sunday. It was nice to be home and see all of my friends over my trip back to Minnesota for my friend Zach's wedding. (The wedding was very fun by the way. It is weird that one of my best friends is married now, but I am really excited that he has found someone and glad to see him as happy as he is).

I arrived in Minneapolis on Wednesday evening and had some free time on Thursday to take a trip back around campus. A lot has changed on the University of Minnesota campus since I was last there. Many of the construction projects that were just being started when I was graduating are completed, which means the campus has a few new landmarks. Other than the obvious new football stadium I was able to see the beautiful building that replaced the old "warehouse," I mean... "Science Classroom Building" (yes, that was its actual name).

While on campus I stopped by my old office in Carlson (Carlson School of Management - the U of M's business school). It was nice to see a lot of the people I used to work with, catch up, and share a few quick stories. Some of them actually read my blog from time to time... so "Hi! Carlson people!"

Since I have been back teaching... my schedule and days have been all over the place. It is currently "International Week" at my school (which actually lasts a week and a half - maybe it is things like this that confuse my students in math...) On top of "International Week" I have been trying to do interventions for the students who did not pass the first administration of the math test and have the rest of my students work on a self-driven project. (Basically my school wants the students who didn't pass to just focus on what they did not do well on - Math TAKS, Reading TAKS, or both instead of moving forward with instruction). It has been really hard to stay on schedule and to keep my students working hard while teaching two classes in the same room at the same time, the end of the school year nearing, and "International Festival" stealing precious time from the school day.

Don't get me wrong... I really like "International Festival" and the concepts behind it. I think the students really like it to. I just think it is at a bad time in the school year. So far I have remembered to take pictures (on my phone so not the best quality) during the kindergarten and first grade celebrations.


1st grade's country was Venezuela. They preformed traditional Venezuelan dances, spoke about history, provided the teachers with food, among other things.





Kindergarten had Mexico. The performed some adorable Mexican dances, sang songes, played games with the older students, provided the teachers with food, and did other events that represented Mexico. (Kindergarten went first - my pictures just didn't upload right... and I am too tired to switch them)

2nd Grade was Ireland today... unfortionately I was preoccupied with behavior problems with a few of my students and was unable to take any pictures...

Tomorrow 3rd grade has India as their country

Monday 4th grade has... somewhere in Africa I think?

Tuesday 5th grade will wrap up the world tour with Australia. I hope things go well. I will try to remember to take some pictures. Have a good weekend! Tomorrow is FRIDAY.

and yes, I STILL have Saturday school (with the students that did not pass the Math and Reading TAKS)