Kindness is King

Our second graders have battled germs all week, and I thought I would come out unscathed, but I got sick, too! So, I had to call out sick yesterday. I woke up yesterday morning at my house in Newtown around 7 am. I finished my lesson plans for next week and began to think about a reflection paper all beginning teachers need to write for the state of Connecticut. When 9 am rolled around, my heart dropped into my stomach and it has been there ever since.  I happily bobbed through the halls of those lovely Newtown schools as a first grader on through high school graduation. I learned much about the craft of teaching through my internships and student teaching from the wonderful teachers in those classrooms. My town, in minutes, was shattered by this really unfathomable atrocity.

As I stood in Sandy Hook last night at a vigil--and all day, really--I couldn't help but think about our second graders. Our smart, funny, clever, wonderful second graders, and how thankful I am that they are safe. I put my hand over my mouth and hung my head low when I empathized with the teachers and students at Sandy Hook yesterday morning and just could not, not, not imagine having to go through that. It hit too close to home. It is my home. But now that I have your 16 second graders in tow, my heart broke all the harder.

So on this Saturday morning, I am thinking about all the beliefs I hold dear as a teacher and all the qualities I hold dear in your children. I think about the words I speak to them and the culture of caring we work to establish. I think about the fact that though in the moment the kind words we speak in our room can be short and easy to say and might not seem to matter, their echos are endless. And though I might not bear the fruits of our tireless work of scaffolding kindness in our kids years down the road, I know that our second graders are good people at their core. And I rest assured that they do know--and will continue to know--that our world is a good place. And that they are safe. And cared for. So here's to our students today, who will grow up to make our world a better place and know that sorrow and evil doesn't win, but that kindness is king.

Second Grade Readers in Action

 Since I have just wrapped up completion of our first term report cards, I have been thinking a lot about where our second graders were when they entered 2B in August and where they are now, in December. I happily typed comments for all of our second graders about the growth they each have made in reading, and I feel that I owe it to our second graders to publicly applaud their progress on our blog.

Our students are engaged with all kinds of texts throughout the day--our Morning Message, big books during reading minilessons, read alouds, mentor texts for writing, independent reading books, guided reading books during group work, text on the SMART Board--the list goes on. I like to snap quick pics of our second graders during our reading blocks and throughout the past couple of weeks, I've caught lots of great moments on camera. Here are a few. The blurbs under each will allow you a glimpse into recent focuses in reading instruction. 

Our students read texts on their instructional level each week in guided reading groups. It was exciting to overhear these students animatedly practice our comprehension strategy-asking questions about what we read to dig deeper into nonfiction. They were enthralled by their book about wolves and had many interesting questions, like "why do wolves howl?" and "why don't wolves live everywhere in the world?" These students were even running their own focused book group discussion without adult prompting at all. 

Moments that make my heart happy with such appreciation of our students' abilities.

 Something that I have really stressed with students is the importance of building stamina as readers. We have recently had our first go-round with setting goals for ourselves as readers. This time, they were stamina goals, or the amount of time we can stay focused in a book during independent reading. I think This photo and the photo below are students who we absolutely caught "staying in their book" and living/breathing "focused reading" and "real reading" (as opposed to "fake reading," or just looking the part but not deeply reading and thinking).

In second grade, a greater emphasis begins to be placed on student abilities to respond to texts in writing than in previous years. This lays a foundation for years to come, where students will need to be able to respond to text with increasingly more depth and complexity. This photo captures us "writing about our reading" in thinking through questions the text has raised for us as readers and then putting that question into print on paper.

Sometimes during our reading block, our students visit "word work." This student said to me "take a picture of THIS!" and brought me over to proudly show off his work. He had been reading and then writing spelling words from previous units. There are many choices for students at this station, like working with spelling words as this student did, but also building words out of a set of letters, choosing a beginning consonant blend to generate words with, play phonics games with other students, work with magnet and foam letters, etc.

Enjoy reading with your second grader; they are totally blooming as readers, open to the world of information and enjoyment that books offer us.

Gobble, Gobble!

 Thank you, Arantza and Marisabel!

This year, I feel like I have more to be thankful for than ever, ever, ever before. I am graced each day by the presence of 16 lively, bright, unique students with special gifts to offer me and every other class member. I am humbled by a lovely, welcoming parent community who is willing to give and give. I am lucky to work in a kind, wonderful professional climate.

I think our second graders said it best in response to my question on the Morning Message "What's one thing you're thankful for in school?" Responses were mostly along the lines of: we're kind to each other, we are welcoming, we are nice, we are friendly, we have fun. Life is good in 2B.

In this spirit of Thanksgiving, Marisabel (Arantza's creative mom!) volunteered to facilitate an ADORABLE Thanksgiving craft for our second graders this week. She enabled our students to be festive and start their day off with some Thanksgiving fun. It was clear that her (and Arantza) has spent quite some time carefully preparing the tiny turkey feet, pairs of googly eyes, colorful neat feathers, and little orange beaks so that each student could make their own fun bird. They are complete with clothespin stands glued on the back to make a fun decoration for a Thanksgiving table, or what have you. On the back of their turkey's body, each student wrote one thing they were thankful for. I got a kick out of "I'm thankful for video games" and was warmed by many "I am thankful for my family and friends because they love me"s.

 Happy Thanksgiving!

 Some silly turkeys, for sure.

Solids, Liquids, and Parents

This week marked the start of our first science unit on States of Matter: Solids, Liquids and Gas and it quickly became clear that 2B is crazy for science!  Students are revved up about their investigations, observations, working in cooperative learning groups where everyone plays an important role, and making new discoveries about our natural world.

I loved the moment when Kaelan raised his hand this week and said "I just know this is gonna be a fun day!" And it was. On Wednesday, we had the special opportunity to involve our parent and family community in our science lesson for Parent Visitation Day. Our mission? To apply what we observed the previous day about various properties of solids to THE TOWER CHALLENGE! The students morphed into engineers and were responsible for constructing towers while also being able to articulate why certain objects made a "good base" or a "good top of the tower." What I liked best, though, was that our parent community was invited to take the challenge with their student, as well in a shared investigation. As I drank in the picture of parents twirling aluminum foil and wires and manipulating cloth squares and plastic containers, I thought that my classroom just felt 'right' at that moment. 

Our students were proud and deeply engaged in their work as engineers and I ended the day feeling confident that our parents got a healthy dose of what life in 2B feels like, looks like, and sounds like: the electric energy of active children (and teachers!!), various solid manipulatives strewn across desks with notebooks open to charts and tables, and the busy hum of thinking brains filling the pale blue walls.

Vote for SOMEBODY!

On the morning of November 6, I woke up giddy and wide-eyed at 5:00 am (a whole 45 minutes earlier than I usually rise!). I couldn't wait to exercise one of my most favorite freedoms, the right to vote. Admittedly, it's only my second time voting in a presidential election! As much as I couldn't wait to vote,  I really couldn't wait to share some Election Day learning with our second graders and was ecstatic at the questions and buzz in Room 2B about Election Day leading up to it. I was impressed and proud of how aware and informed our students are at such a young age.

As I walked out of my local middle school, ballot cast, I felt tears well up in my eyes. I don't know if it's because now-this year, for the first time-I have an audience of 16 in front of me, learning and growing before my eyes, and I felt like there was just so much I wanted to share with them....
-about democracy and our freedoms
-what it FEELS like to be able to vote
-what makes our country exceptional
-that we have the right in this country to disagree and hold strong beliefs and stand up for them and talk about them!
-the aspirations and accomplishments that they have to look forward to as our future leaders

So, after we tallied up our predictions on our Morning Message about which candidate we believed might win (Obama had more tallies), we greeted each other as follows: "Good Morning, Future President ________" (student last name). Our second graders giggled and scoffed playfully at this greeting, but I stopped them for a second. The room got quiet. And then I told them we are greeting each other like this today because I want you to know that you CAN be our nation's leader one day, and that's one of the beautiful things about our country, and I have no qualms that you are each brilliant and capable. We were pensive and silent for a moment. I watched the students drink this in. Still giggles during the greeting, though, which was rather fun.

Next, we quietly took our seats in front of our SMART Board and watched this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVkfNUxRh7g

Throughout the day, students participated in a mock election (Obama won it) and students voiced questions and wonderings about the election. Trying to explain the electoral college in response to Karsten's question of: "what if there's a tie?" was quite interesting! Then, students learned more about the election process with a read aloud: Duck for President by Doreen Cronin, complete with a duck puppet!

All day, students tried to figure out who I voted for. I explained the importance of listening closely to both candidates, asking and researching questions, thinking about what beliefs we each personally hold most dear, and keeping votes private-especially as their teacher. Still, Eli came up to me at the end of the day and said "Ms. Baier, I think I've got you figured out..." and to this I sang, "I'll never tell!"

Ms. Baier is Missing

After a totally wacky week, why not making it wackier by hosting a guest teacher!? The evil substitute from Harry Allard's acclaimed picture book, Miss Nelson is Missing actually APPEARED in Room 2B on Thursday morning. When Ms. Baier inconspicuously disappeared after music and before Read Aloud time, none of the students thought anything of it! Mrs. Fraser cracked open Miss Nelson is Missing; our second graders love this series of woeful days at school with an evil "sub." Students laughed and screamed at the parts when Miss Viola Swamp, the dark, hideous substitute appeared. But never did they think that she was lurking just outside the classroom, waiting to storm in.

Miss Viola Swamp thought she would be greeted with terrified screams when instead, she was greeted by shrieking giggles and surprised stares. Miss Swamp stormed in the room and demanded attention in a gravelly voice, cloaked in all black with witch-like leather heels, black lipstick and eyeshadow, and a vampiress wig the color the midnight.

Her alibi? That Ms. Baier had to leave suddenly, terribly sick. Her job? To introduce students to their Reader Response journals, teach them the expected format, and give them their first formal assignment in it: How is the Viola Swamp in your classroom similar to the Viola Swamp in the book Miss Nelson is Missing? How is she different?

A sample of a student response:
"The Viola Swamp in our room and the Viola Swamp in the book are both creepy. They both wear black and they both YELLLLLLL!!!! The Viola Swamp in our classroom is different from the one in the book because she is bad on the outside but good on the inside, because she's Ms. Baier."

I thought I'd have them FOOLED more than I did!!! (Couldn't help but smile at the expressions on their faces; it gave me away!) Alas, they saw through the facade. Still, it was tons of fun to dive into character in the spirit of Halloween, a favorite read, and the beauty of bringing books to life.

Effort and Ease

At 10:15 each Sunday morning, I walk into a wonderfully peaceful yoga studio with a kind and inspirational instructor, Natasha, for an hour and fifteen minutes of re-centering, inner peace, and quiet thought. Natasha engages in this interesting stream-of-consciousness type thought, an offering for feeding her students' minds and bodies. What she says sticks with me many days, but today particularly, one small phrase stuck...and for the rest of the practice, I let my own thoughts draw parallels between my yoga practice, my teaching practice, and our second grade students' learning. 

In regards to the pose we were doing at the moment, the words Natasha used were:

We're searching for effort and ease.

Effort and ease.

I said them over and over to myself, a mantra. What I then began to think about was this:

Since my first day with our second graders, in the classroom, I have been searching for effort and ease there. I have been hoping for effort and ease on the part of my students, for myself, and for our class to collectively feel. I just wasn't able to so eloquently state it.

As a new teacher, I am searching for this balance of effort and ease in my teaching practice. I am putting forth immense effort--effort in planning each lesson for each day, wrapping my head around the essential questions and enduring understandings for each unit for each content area, studying the curriculum, growing by reading professional publications, providing thoughtful written feedback to students, setting professional goals, contributing on a professional level with my colleagues, collaborating with parents--the list goes on. In the midst of all this, though, I began to recognize that I am feeling at ease in many ways, too--ease in feeling comfortable in my own skin as a teacher, feeling at ease in the fact that though I'm putting forth my best effort every single day, teaching is imperfect (and that's actually, contrary to my inner perfectionist, okay!!). I'm recognizing ease in the fact that I know my students quite well already and I will continue to get to know them better as learners and thinkers and individuals, ease in the fact that our parent and family community in 2B is wonderful in so many ways, ease in the fact that I insist on kindness, on a culture of learning, on a community of trust.

Effort in conferring on writing personal narratives, ease in knowing I'm meeting student needs in this moment

Effort in planning SMART Board lessons, ease in engaging students (sparking as well as witnessing many smiles while learning)

Somewhere in between the spine series and balance series in this Sunday morning class, my focus shifted away from what this phrase meant for me as a teacher to ponder what it might mean for our students. For our second graders, I thought about the ways effort manifests itself in our students' written response to reading and in Writer's Workshop, verbal responses in classroom discussions, justification of thinking in math, creative thinking, interpersonal problem solving, practicing self-control, responsibility, respect in Morning Meeting and throughout our day. I thought about my hopes that these efforts are in fact made possible by the ease our students feel--ease in the fact that they exist in a safe, respectful classroom that accepts them fully as an individual and values them uniquely, ease in feeling comfortable to take risks (whether it be raising a hand or sharing news from their personal life or asking for help when they feel like they need it), ease in the fact that they are learning and growing in a room where we make learning fun yet push each other to try new things and think in new ways and gain new understanding every single day.

Effort in creative writing, ease in quiet independence

Effort in collaborative group work, ease in the freedom to be themselves

At about this time, my brain was quietly humming with these very active thoughts, but Natasha's far away voice told us it was time for shavasana, or final relaxation. This was my cue to quiet my mind and just be still. The thing was, though, that it was one of those days where I couldn't quiet my brain, not at all. Because this new mantra--the search for a striking a balance between effort and ease--as it applies to our life in Room 2B was buzzing in my brain, and I was thrilled that I had a new way to frame my goals for myself and our students. I couldn't wait to write about it.

Meticulous Measurers

2B has been buzzing each day at 1:00. Sometimes, learning is loud...it's loud in a fluttering-with-activity kind of way. It's loud with a sense of urgent movements as students parade around fitted with rulers, metersticks, and yardsticks. It's loud with a "oh!! Let's see how many meters long the SMART Board is!" kind of way. So, while personally I am a proponent of calm and quiet focus, I can still appreciate the messy, somewhat raucous-but meaningful-thinking, talking, and doing that has gone down in 2B over the past two weeks.

On Friday, students were addressed in the Morning Message as "Meticulous Measurers." They read on to learn that the word "meticulous" means "careful." We have measured objects in our room--and a few at home--in inches, feet, yards, meters, and centimeters. Students are learning the business of careful measuring. They are learning to slow themselves down and appreciate the precision required in actually measuring as well as the reasonableness that a good estimate should have. Students are showing evidence of visualizing units of measurement in their head.

I know this because I ask them to estimate before they measure anything and then, they can bet that I'll ask "why does that estimate make sense?" or "how do you know that's a good estimate?" I gently nod and offer a smile as I watch the wheels turning in their head, putting together an explanation of the fact that they visualized "what a ruler looks like" to help them make a thoughtful guess. These kinds of justifications of mathematical thinking are challenging for our second graders to work through and verbalize, but they are making gains in doing so.

Enjoy some pictures of our busy classroom during math!

 Fitted with a meter-long link belt and a ninja meter stick

 Visualizing and solidifying understanding of how long a meter really is using links

Discovery: 1 meter is 30 links long

Post-measuring bonanza

(They had just captured me and added to their list "Ms. Baier: About 2 meters tall")

SMART Board Unveiled

In September, we welcomed our long awaited, much anticipated SMART Board! Leading up to its appearance, the students regularly posted sticky notes on our parking lot that said "when is the SMART Board coming?" and "how do we use a SMART Board?" and "what is a SMART Board?" Our parking lot is a place where students can post questions that are floating in their brain and that can't be answered right at that moment. At some point later on that day or week, I always get around to discussing parking lot questions. Anyway, one afternoon, two burly men appeared in our classroom after school hours and installed our SMART Board. I was so excited they were there; I even took pictures of the installation process to show the students. Yay!!!

So, what is a SMART Board anyway? It is an interactive white board with a touch screen. It has a sturdy steel back and is connected to one of our classroom computers. I have all of the SMART Board software downloaded to my school and personal computers to work with from home and plan lessons. It is a highly engaging learning tool that we can write on (in all different ways...with our fingers, with the special pens, using calligraphic ink, using magic disappearing ink...the list goes on and on). Many interactive lesson plans are already uploaded to an incredible, safe site called SMART Exchange and are aligned with Common Core State Standards. I can create our own SMART Board lessons, which I do from time to time, but the resources we have available to us that are already made and ready to rock are amazing. Two students can interact with the board at a time. I usually pull popsicle sticks for students to come to the board. So far, we have used it for all subject areas and will continue to do so throughout the year.

This technology was new to our second grade youngsters, but I wasn't at all surprised that within 10 minutes of using it, our students were itching to explore with it...no cold feet in our room! Our students and their generation have been coined "digital natives" and rightfully so; our second graders are savvy with this unique tool and though we have just dipped our toes in the huge ocean of SMART technology, our students are acclimated and comfortable with it. 

What have we done on the SMART Board so far? 

-Interactively graphed how many teeth we have lost in 2B and interpreted our data

-Shared-writing journaling about fall: different students come up and add a sentence to a whole-class journal entry using our 5 senses (to be continued this week)

-Watched kid-friendly videos to help the even/odd digits stick in our brains

-Learned about Viking clothing, occupations, homes, and locations

-Written story problems using a gumball machine with digital manipulative gumballs

-Worked with money by filling up digital coin purses and writing corresponding number sentences

-Watched Ms. Baier model the art of journaling about fall topics

...and much more to come this week (and the next, and the next!)

Here is a photo sampling. I took some screen shots of our SMART Notebook files to give you a taste of what our work together has looked like. It doesn't exactly do it justice, as the uber cool interactive piece is missing, but at least you get an idea of what this is all about!

I began our lesson about creating and interpreting bar graphs by setting the purpose with this silly slide!

We dragged our pictures to the appropriate bars on the graph to create and interpret a class graph about teeth lost in 2B!

I wrote this entry in front of the students to model the process of journaling and living a writerly life.

Stay tuned for more SMART updates!

My Cup Runneth Over

"We cannot tell the precise moment when friendship formed. As in filling a vessel drop by drop, there is at last a drop which makes it run over; so in a series of kindness there is at last one which makes the heart run over. "

Dr. Samuel Johnson (1709-1784)

In Room 108, I have been quietly and reflectively looking out for and observing the acts of kindness in our room grow and grow. As I drove home the other night, I thought to myself about which qualities I love most about humanity. It almost always comes back to kindness for me. As our second graders forge new friendships, strengthen old ones, and grow into unique individuals, one of my many hopes is that they value and embody kindness. It's a tall order, but in our short time together, a few glimmering acts of kindness have shown themselves. I know there are far more to come.

Catching Kindness

One day, our literacy tutor, Mrs. Fraser, came up to me during reading and said "I've got to tell you something" with excited urgency. She had approached two students during our independent reading time to quiet them, since she heard murmurs, but had stopped herself, because she realized that in this pair of students, one was compassionately helping the other to read with understanding (one is a strong reader and the other is a reader who is working hard to grow stronger). At the end of this lovely moment, the student who had asked for a little help said to the other "will you play with me at recess today?" The other, though usually engulfed in a running game that the former student is not a part of, approached the peer group who plays the running game and said "is it okay if (student) joins our team at recess today?" My heart melted. This was totally unprompted by us onlooking, spectating adults, I might add. In this second grade world of kids who speak the language of friends, peers, and recess games, both students--the student who was helping the other to read smoother and the student who was being supported--took considerable social risks. It was a moment of pure kindness, the kind that makes your heart swell, your voice shake, and your eyes water. It was a tiny occurrence in the scope of our day or our year, but one that I tucked away to remember, and one that captures-in our second grade way-the eloquence of the quotation I shared above.

Birthday Butterflies

In 2B, we celebrate birthdays in a way that I think is new to our students. I know cupcakes and sprinkles and frosting and cakes are fun, but it really is not so easy to have food into the classroom anymore, what with food allergy concerns, etc. So, we have a birthday ritual that involves singing a VERY fun, out-of-the-ordinary song, then we acknowledge the birthday on our Morning Message, and then we give each child a small token...a wish bag. Each student writes one wish for the birthday boy or girl and then deposits it into the student's wish bag. I staple the bag shut so that the element of surprise is kept alive and the student can look forward to reading the wishes after school. When we celebrated our first birthday, the wish bag didn't have as much mystique with the students as I thought it would. However, now that we are on our third birthday, I watch happily as the birthday student excitedly chatters about the wishes they'll receive and begs me to open the bag "nowwwww." In writing a personalized wish for each classmate, I'm noticing the other students really taking their time to write their wish, employing the best penmanship I've seen yet (I wish they'd write like that on everything!), and carefully slipping their wish into the bags with adorable smiles. When we sing our birthday song, I hear all voices resound loudly and clearly, with joy and with kindness in their eyes as they look happily at the birthday boy or girl. This is the kind of kindness that gives the receiver of it butterflies in their stomach. :)

Miss You Routine

On Friday, we said farewell to Domanic as he moves to a new school. We made a book for him of photos we have taken in our class up to this point. I wrote a letter to him from all of us, and we each signed it in a fancy felt tip pen. Students took this very seriously--keeping it a secret all week so that he would be happily surprised, and writing "miss you" all over his card. On his last day with us, we focused on him in our Morning Meeting (and Eli, because it was his birthday that day!). When we presented his book, all students smiled gently and looked at him intently. I was taken back by the quiet poignancy our second graders were capable of achieving. The book was called "Domanic's Miss You Book" because we have a little "Miss You" routine or tradition that the students really enjoy.

Any time a classmate is absent, during Morning Meeting, I ask the students "who are we missing from our class today?" Students pick up who we are missing like rapid fire. In fact, they know who is missing before Morning Meeting starts, because they know we will give them a "Miss you" during our meeting. They know what to do next, and they love it. I see 15 pairs of arms lift up to their own shoulders, cross their body, and rock back and forth (like they are holding something close to their heart) and say "Miss you, (name)." Our second graders LOVE this routine. I can't be sure, but I have a sneaky feeling that most of the reason they love it so much is that when the day comes that they are absent, while they are sick in bed or at an appointment, they can envision us in our Morning Meeting, giving them a "Miss you." And they'll smile to themselves, knowing that we really do miss them.

We The Kids of 2B

Constitution Day, the fateful day in 1787 that our country 'tis of thee became governed as we know it (more or less),  was Monday, September 17th. In 2B, we celebrated with the following...

Read Aloud: We The Kids by David Catrow
This whimsically illustrated book holds a phrase of the Preamble to the Constitution on each page. Using the beautiful and fun pictures as clues, we fleshed out what these phrases EVEN MEANT! I mean, what were these men hundreds of years ago even talking about!? From there, we came up with some kid-friendly definitions for the phrases in the Preamble.

In the afternoon, we made the Preamble come to life with an old favorite, a clip from Schoolhouse Rock about the Preamble and the Constitution.

Post viewing, each pair of students was assigned one phrase from the Preamble and using our kid-friendly definitions, they set to work interpreting that phrase in collaborative partnerships.

 Last, as writers and illustrators do, we published and celebrated our work. Look for our published piece near the library on the wall at WPS!
 :)