As if 2020 wasn't already the weirdest year ever....

This summer just seems odd. Usually my summers are so full. Trips, professional development workshops and lots of relaxation in between.

This summer was supposed to be similar. I had a big writing workshop I was going to be part of that was 6 weeks long. I was supposed to finish up my SIOP trainer training and lead our final PD on that. Instead, all of that has been pushed back and/or flat out canceled because the pandemic is not nearly over.

It's surreal. This summer I have been working on the first class toward my principal license and doing a lot of reading. We still really don't go anywhere because it's not really safe. (Too many people continue to disregard masks and social distancing.)

My husband and I are supposed to head up north for his birthday in a couple of weeks and I'm hopeful it is still safe to do that. We really just need to get out of the area and relax for a bit.

It's just been a weird summer. No one knows what will really occur for fall 2020 (although there is a ton of speculation). No one really knows if we will be able to STAY on the plan they make anyway because things seem to change at random.

We just need to keep pushing forward and taking it one day at a time, even if it is incredibly weird to do so.

Today was the day.

I made the 45 minute drive to my elementary school to begin the very weird and sad process of closing the room out for the summer.

I knew it would be weird. I knew it would be hard. This was a very weird year. I left a job I'd known for 13 years where I knew a huge percentage of the staff, all the rules, policies, etc and went to a job where everything was new and I didn't know very many people at all. That, in and of itself, was a big change.

Then to have the pandemic hit and uproot us right in the "sweet spot" of the year was tough. That "sweet spot" is that time when everyone is really in the groove -- the students know the expectations and routines and you can really show some real progress. (I've often noted that most of the real progress my kids make is between February and May.)

Again, I knew it would be hard. I just didn't expect it to be as hard as it was. I walked into my room and it was seriously like being in a time warp. EVERYTHING, except for one small box that had been moved so they could vacuum, was exactly as I left it. There were even papers on the tech stand where I was quickly writing out lesson plans before the pandemic smacked into us here in Michigan.

It was surreal and weird and I did not enjoy it at all.

I spent about 90 minutes there. If I had really wanted to, I could have spent another 30 minutes and really called that room done. But I will be back tomorrow and will spend time finally cleaning out the filing cabinets that I didn't do this fall when I started. It was too overwhelming.

What I did today was spend the first hour cleaning out the closets from all the crap left over from the previous occupant (and entire rolling cabinet full of junk plus several boxes were left for the custodians to haul away) and then about a half hour putting my own things in the newly cleaned out closets. I've labeled my small group table and rocking chair because I don't want to be hauling them home (where would I even put them?!) and organized the other cabinet area.

Tomorrow I will clean up the technology stand, finish with my desk and tackle the filing cabinets (which will take forever, I think). By the time I leave there tomorrow, however, I will be turning in my key and closing the door on that school for this year.

(We are still "in session" until next Wednesday but as I won't be back in my school again before August, it's still closing the year.)

Wednesday I'll be home because I have a couple of meetings to attend and my own daughter has to take her things up to her school to close out HER year. Thursday I think I will be finally tackling my middle school room. *sigh*

This is definitely not how I was expecting this year to end and the raw emotions I have about it -- on top of all of the chaos in our country right now -- just hurts.

It's so weird to consider that it's almost the end of the school year. I think it just feels unbelievable because we've been home for so long with much less interaction with our students than normal.

I have put off going into my classrooms. My middle school room will be a breeze to clean up. I was told they aren't moving my room so that really means I can just pack everything into the cabinet, label my personal table so they can take it out for cleaning and that's that. I don't even have to take anything off the walls. I can probably finish that room in 2-3 hours.

My elementary room, however, is going to take longer. There is a ton of junk in there that was left by the previous occupant that I just wasn't in the mood to deal with in August (I mean I dealt with a lot but I also put a ton of it into the closets and called it a life). That room is going to be so weird because my calendar still says "March" and by the time I set foot in there again, it will be June.

So weird. As of this moment, I think I will have 3 schools next year (two elementary and the middle school). As the elementary I had this year is absorbing another building, I think that both of my elementary schools may have their reading block in the morning. That would make it awesome for my schedule because I could be at the middle school in the morning and my elementaries in the afternoon and only have to worry about working around encores which is much easier than trying to work around a 90 minute block that can't be interrupted.

Of course, it's all up in the air because we have no idea what school is going to look like. Of course it would be amazing if we could go back to 100% in person instruction....but the likelihood of that, right now, is small, at least for the fall.

So as I pack up my rooms, I will have to contend with the fact that I have NO IDEA what the fall will bring and what may or may not happen between now and then.

What a weird school year!

Yesterday, I got an email from my local teacher's union about our contract extension. I'm a union girl through and through -- partly because I've seen what it is like for folks who don't have one and partly because I've seen how much the union really works for the folks who deserve it (I'm not just talking for teachers).

My husband works for the phone company and I have seen their union really fight for them for years and years. It is amazing to me what they can accomplish with that support behind them. While I don't claim to agree with every choice made by unions, I get it's quite political and you have to fight for fair conditions.

That being said, I don't have a single word of criticism for the union negotiation team in my district because I wasn't there to hear their process. I wasn't there to know the reasons behind the changes they have proposed. I do know some folks aren't happy with the changes but it is a 1-year contract extension and since not a single person knows what will happen this fall with COVID-19, I don't think we should really be griping at all. Just my opinion.

What I am quite intrigued about, however, is that they are considering switching the elementary and secondary start time. This means the elementary students would begin at 7:45 and get out at 2:50 while the secondary students would start at 8:35 and get out at 3:35. 

I know some people are adamantly opposed to this and I can see how, for secondary, it will really mess with 6th period for sports, but I am quite curious to see how it works out. Fortunately for me, since I am across K-8, I get to make my own schedule and thus I can follow the same schedule I had before (which is now the elementary schedule).

We had planned for my ESL class at the middle school to be 1st hour this coming year. We had it 6th hour this year because none of us knew, logistically, how things would really work out with the new SFA reading program in the elementary schools. It just seemed to make more sense. But going forward, my mentor and I agreed that 1st hour is really the place to have it - get them while they are fresh!

I do not know right now how this will affect the schedule at the elementary school level because the contract is not yet ratified, but assuming this goes through, I would still be able to end my day at 2:50 like I normally would (well 3:00 when teachers are allowed to leave). Depending upon how the scheduling actually falls, it might be wise to spend my mornings at the middle school and my afternoons in my elementary schools (I'll have two instead of one this coming year). That would make leaving at 3 not a weird thing because the other staff would be leaving as well.

I think it will come down to lunch schedules and stuff before I can decide (and since no one, again, has a clue what school will actually look like this fall with COVID-19, everything I "plan" is simply speculation because it could all go right out the window!), but it would be kind of nice if I could schedule myself to be at my middle school through the first three periods of the day and then at my elementary schools in the afternoon (three days at one school and two days at the other).

I also really wonder how this will work for the secondary kids. I couldn't believe how many kids I would see sleeping in 1st or 2nd hour because it's just so early -- it will be interesting to see if the later start time actually helps with attendance and behavior.

I'm all about change and innovation. I know many folks are upset at the change, but I think change is hard no matter what. You can't possibly please everyone. I guess I look at it this way: it's a one year extension so we can look at is as a sort of experiment. If it doesn't work out, we don't do it again the following year. But who knows, it could radically change our performance levels and be the best decision ever made. Only time will tell.

I'm not going to lie, it is pretty terrible to be an online ESL teacher. I hate it.

There. I said it.

I miss the interaction with my kids. I miss nagging them (gently of course) to do their best and focus in class (especially first hour math, oy!). Believe it or not, I even miss the sass those middles would give me because they were exhausted by 6th hour and couldn't deal with my Perky Polly-ness.

It is so incredibly difficult to help students with their English acquisition from afar. We are doing the best we can, but man, it is not easy.

Alas, one of the most important things I have realized is that my connections with my students and my team are vital. They are the only thing really pulling me through. Each week the ESL team meets to discuss our students, our struggles, how to support our families who are struggling, etc. There are only three of us and the other two have worked together for 18-plus years. I am definitely "the new kid." It's all good though because they are amazing and have welcomed me like I've always been there. They are exceptional educators and I am more than blessed to be able to call them colleagues and friends.

This week one of the things we talked about is how incredibly important it is for us to differentiate for our ELs. This morning as I was looking through some completed work, I got a stark example of this.

These two examples are both 7th graders.

Exhibit A
3.5-4.5 range on WIDA which is between Developing and Expanding)

Exhibit B
1.5-2.2 Range on WIDA which is between Entering and Emerging (this student is a Newcomer to America)

Student A got 100% on this assignment. While there are some grammatical issues and it's not "formal" writing, this student met the criteria for the assignment and answered it completely.

Student B, who wrote significantly less than Student A, still earned a 75% which is a "pass" grade in our school's grading policy. As a newcomer who is still acquiring English, the fact that this student was able to write this and answer both prompt questions is sufficient for the level they are working at. Had Student A submitted this particular writing, they would have received a 50% because they are at a different level and more capable of adding more details to support their thinking.


I think this is what makes online teaching tough. Imagine if you're a brand new teacher and you really don't know that much about differentiation (I would hope colleges are teaching it, but we all know that most of what we learned about teaching, we learned from being in front of students). My biggest fear is that my ELs are not being given any grace on grading based upon their language needs. This is really only an issue because I really learned this year most of my colleagues don't really know what is appropriate as an accommodation for an EL (and I don't fault them on that -- it's a systemic issue way bigger than them).

If there is anything at all good coming from this pandemic, it is that people are seeing teachers as the heroes they are. We have never been the problem -- the systems we are tied to are the problem. Additionally, I know for myself personally, I am really seeing gaps in how our ELs have been supported and I'm making plans for the fall when (hopefully) we are back together in person so I can make sure every student I work with and every parent I work with knows how to get ahold of me, what supports I can and will offer and how to access those resources.

We can't expect online learning to replace the classroom. But we can learn from and grow from the lack of choices we have right now in order to make better choices in the future to ensure we are serving our kids the best we can and meeting their needs along the way as we move forward.

It's been a bit since I posted.

Quite honestly, I was gung-ho to compile tons of resources for families and teachers for remote learning when I wrote my last post. I never came back and put in a compiled list of resources, however, because everyone and their cousin has been sharing them and I found it overwhelming. Too many voices, not enough stability.

This is an unprecedented time for us all. We are all learning how to teach remotely and still engage our students and be there for them emotionally. Much of the resources I've seen shared over the past few weeks are busy-work style activities that don't really do much except fill time. I didn't want to add to that noise (and I'm sincerely not shaming those who have shared those types of things).

I get it. Anxieties are high, people are scared, students are uncertain of their future. It's quite troubling. My little family has followed our governor's stay-at-home directive. My husband is "essential" (utility worker) so he goes to work every day but my girls and I are home. We leave the house to walk the dog a couple times a day and we spend some time in the backyard on the warmer days (thankful for a huge backyard that gives us room to roam without being near others). My husband tries to do most of the shopping since he's out anyway.

But I am disheartened when I see people ignoring social distancing guidelines. Yes, it sucks for us all, but the sooner we get our collective butts in gear, the sooner we can get back to "normal" (I say "normal" because I am confident we will have a new "normal" from here on out).

My older daughter lives about 30 minutes away with her husband and son. I haven't seen them, except in video chats, for a month now. Do I miss them? Deeply. Do I wish we could visit? Absolutely. But we don't because it's just not safe. (I would hate myself forever if I was an unknown carrier and made them sick.) My grandson's fourth birthday is tomorrow and we are having his "party" via video chat because we can't be together. It SUCKS, but we are doing it.

We all need to do our part. I'm sure it's hard for those with  young kids at home and I am tremendously grateful that is not my situation. But even if it was, I would do what I needed to do to keep my kids safe and away from other people to protect my kids AND those other people.

We need to be better as humans. I keep saying this, but I know it's hard and it is really difficult to be stuck in the house when it's getting nicer outside. But this will go on so much longer than it should if we all don't do our part to flatten that curve.

#STAYHOME

We are in an unprecedented time in America. Schools are closing down for 4-6 weeks. People are hoarding toilet paper and other supplies. I heard a pundit on television say "everyone should be panicking." (Um, no, they should not.)

These are scary times. Students and staff are scared. They are unsure what is going to happen. For food insecure families, closing schools might mean they won't eat well until schools reopen. Parents may lose their jobs because the job closes down for the next several weeks (especially those in restaurants and similar). Parents may not have daycare during this time and aren't sure what to do with their children. Add on top of all of this uncertainty the media's reaction and you could have a recipe for disaster.

I'm as nervous as the next person, especially because I do not understand how our government could have denied the severity of this virus for so long. But I am not panicking. I know staying home might not be that fun, but it's worth it to not become a carrier for this virus and pass it on to people I care about.

Teachers across the country have stepped it up and with little notice have provided packets, online learning opportunities and other ways to stay connected with their students during these times. I think this is important to note because we are going above and beyond because that's what teachers do. It's what we have always done, now it's just in the spotlight and people are noticing it more.

My district was proactive and sent our students home with their chromebooks on Friday. Each student from grades 3-12 will have connections with their teachers via Google Classroom or Schoology. I have provided my students will my phone number (a Google Voice number so not my personal one) so they can call or text me if they are needing an adult to talk to. It's only been the weekend and I've had three different students already reach out to me. Relationships mean a lot!

My own kids' district hasn't been as proactive. It makes me sad. I don't want my kids sitting home for a month. If I wasn't an educator myself, I wouldn't necessarily know what I could steer them toward. As it happens, I AM an educator and have a wealth of information at my fingertips but I worry for folks who don't have that.

Over the next few days I will be compiling what I've seen available and sharing it in the hopes that others will share it too so that parents who need a guide in the right direction have it.

Let me be very clear before I begin: I am not complaining! This is just so odd to me and my experience as a teacher.

This February has been wild so far. For ESL teachers (or EL Specialists as someone recently said), February and March are generally testing months. In Michigan, we are part of the WIDA consortium so that is what my focus is for February.

That focus has been disrupted a couple of times already this year! February 10 we had a snow day. Except for 2019, when Michigan experienced a polar vortex situation and then an ice storm that shut us down for almost two straight weeks (we literally had an entire week off school, two days of school the next week and then three more days off -- unheard of!), snow days have been a relatively rare experience in my career. My old district was pretty notorious for being the only district in our county open and then our enrollment was so low, it counted as a snow day anyway. This always annoyed me to death because a) I was driving past multiple closed districts knowing full well the day wasn't going to count anyway and b) I was risking my safety being out on roads everyone else deemed too dangerous to be out on.

So the unexpected snow day in my new district -- our first one this year -- was really quite nice. [It was even better because my own kids didn't have one and were insanely jealous; I just reminded them of all of the times they had snow days when I didn't. I live 45 minutes away from work now and my new district is along the lake shore in Michigan so the weather there is worse than it is more inland.] The only bad thing about snow days on Mondays is it makes me feel off the next day; I always feel like it should be Monday but its Tuesday ;) Alas, we made it happen. I tested all day Tuesday and Wednesday with my saving grace being my one dedicated 6th hour class because I got to end my day teaching instead of testing. Always a bonus.

Somehow, I had the foresight to bring my backpack home with me on Wednesday, full of the stuff I needed to do. I was pretty confident I wouldn't work on it at home (I rarely do; I just really utilize my time at work to get it done there) but I knew I would have some time Thursday morning between my test sessions to look at it and that's what I planned to do. Well low and behold, Wednesday evening we got an email saying the superintendent was cancelling school for Thursday because we've had excessive illnesses both with students and staff and they wanted to extra sanitize and clean everything. This is a huge deal because we already had Friday and Monday off for mid-winter break (my first one ever as it isn't something my old district has). So I unexpectedly had a 5 day weekend.

As I have spent most of February already testing and prepping for testing and making up testing, the extra days off were super nice. I won't complain!!

I have learned in the last several months to really slow down (a big deal because it isn't something I've ever really been very good at). I no longer feel the need to be on the go 24/7. I've spent a lot of the days off just working on my crochet projects and spending time with my family -- definitely a break! Plus the sun has been shining the last few days which is also pretty rare in Michigan for February so it has been truly wonderful.

Again, I will never complain about an unexpected break, but this one really could  not have come at a better time. I'm so, so grateful to my new district for really thinking of staff and student health and giving us all a chance to get healthy and go back to school on the 18th refreshed and ready to go.

This past summer, right after I got home from Uganda, I went to a SIOP training. SIOP stands for Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol. It is a set of strategies that were designed to make learning more accessible for English Learners (ELs; previously they had often been referred to as English Language Learners or ELLs).

I had taken a SIOP training way back in 2007 when I was a new teacher and had taken my first contracted job at a school that served predominantly students of Hispanic backgrounds. At that time, I was a 2nd year teacher and my principal not only signed me up to participate in the SIOP workshop, but also encouraged me to get my Master's in TESOL instead of Reading. I'm forever grateful that he did because a) I have so much passion for working with my ELs and b) it gave me job security when there was still a lack of job security in teaching. Having the ESL endorsement really ensured I would never be laid off.

As I have worked in a general education classroom for 13 of my 14 years of teaching, I certainly used the SIOP strategies, especially because for 12 of those 13 years, most of my students were classified as ELs. (In fact, last year, of my 29 students, only TWO were not bilingual but ALL of them had at least one parent who was of Hispanic heritage.) However, as I was transitioning from a self-contained elementary classroom where I had the same students throughout the day to a position as an ESL teacher, I knew I wanted to brush up on my SIOP training.

The very first training I did was one afternoon. You could classify it was a very brief overview (sometimes I say it was a "fly by night" type of training because it was so brief). This past summer, however, the training was much more in-depth. It was 3 full days full of learning, engagement and provided me with so much more to bring into my new role as an ESL teacher.

Earlier this fall, as I was settling into my new role, my ESL team in our district (there are three of us) were invited to join a local EL Connect network. We meet four times per year with other ESL teachers in the area to connect, share stories, get some professional learning around supporting our ELs and network. Most recently they announced an opportunity to become a SIOP Trainer. I was very excited about the possibility because there hasn't been much SIOP work in my district and having someone who can train our staff would be hugely beneficial.

I got a letter of recommendation from my principal, our EL Connect Coordinator and completed the application. Applications were due last Friday and today I got an email telling me that I was accepted for the program! I am so excited about it!

I LOVE providing professional development for my fellow educators and I am super excited to have this opportunity. I will spend two days in March in Lansing at the training and then one day in April there as well. Some time this summer, I will have an opportunity to complete the training by helping to facilitate a SIOP training in one of our regional ISDs.

I'm super grateful because I do have so much passion for supporting my EL students and having an opportunity to bring this work into my district in a professional way is really exciting!

Wow!

I just realized I have not posted here at all in 2020. Oops. Time flies when you're having fun? :)

January felt about 2000 years long, but then it usually does, at least here in Michigan, because the sun barely shines and those gray days just blend into each other.

We have officially entered the second half of the school year, which is crazy to me. This year has been flying by! I have chuckled a little that I'm finally in a groove and then the WIDA testing season shows up and throws a wrench into that groove.

With the arrival of February, we are in WIDA season, which means most of my responsibilities for the next month will surround testing/proctoring. Not the most exciting thing to do, but I AM excited to see where the students make the most growth. If I was a bettin' gal, I'd bet my elementary students will make a ton more progress than my middles. I say this because I've certainly had reluctant learners in my career, but never this many.

It's quite sad actually because it signals to me that somewhere along the way the system has really failed these students. (To be clear, I am not saying my specific district has failed these students, I am saying the system as a whole which has not always provided monies to support these students has failed them. These systems can include trainings and other supports for every adult working with ELs...when those monies aren't there and budget cuts have to happen, these supports are often the first to go and that is a state issue.)

I've done what I can to be supportive and teenagers are known for being fickle beings so even though they complain, I know they secretly like that they have someone there cheering them on and nagging them. If they really hated it, they wouldn't follow my advice, and they do; they just don't want me to think that I'm having an impact because that wouldn't be "cool." (Ahh the teenage mind.)

Despite all of that, I do think my elementary friends are more likely to try to "please" and as I have spent time actually discussing this test with them (I have no idea if my predecessor did or not), I'm curious to see how they grow compared to the middles.

The bad news is, one of our EL colleagues is supporting in a classroom for a new teacher so my mentor and I have to cover her buildings for testing. It's not "bad" necessarily, just throws a wrench in things. If I was only testing my own schools, I'd be done by our mid-winter break (Feb 14) if everyone is present and tests on time. As I am supporting my colleague, I have two extra weeks of testing to do to help her. I don't mind helping at all (that's what we do!), but it saddens me that I won't get to see my own groups during those other weeks.

Testing can be incredibly tedious because you're not supposed to do anything except actively monitor the students as they test. This is so necessary but not mentally stimulating (especially when you're me and you're a pretty animated person who is bouncing all over the room all day). My saving grace will be my 6th hour class.

The good news is, despite my schedule change to support testing in the other schools, I still get to work with my dedicated class every day. That makes me so happy because it's the very end of the day and will give me something stimulating to do before the day is over. We are focusing on novel studies this quarter so that's fun too because I'm a reader (even if they aren't!) and being able to talk about the book with the students and finally see them engage in discussions is quite lovely.

I'm hopeful my schedule goes off without a hitch and that we don't have to spend a ton of time on makeup testing because I am eager to get back to my regular schedule and see my groups. They are excited for that as well. Makes going to work a big pleasure.