This Week At School

This week at school I...

-  FINALLY, sent students outside for recess!  Not every day... but some of the days... so it's starting to warm up!

- Learned how to play Ode to Joy on the metallophone (and then I taught some students how to do it too)

-  Watched a presentation from a storm chaser (his name escapes me at the moment but he has a show on Discovery).  I learned that tornadoes don't travel in a southern direction for very long (so if you are south of the tornado you will likely be safe) and that in the southern hemisphere they spin in the opposite direction from the northern hemisphere.

-  Was a guest reader for I Love to Read Month at a school (I read Alexanders Horrible No Good Very Bad Day and The Legend of Rock, Paper, Scissors.

-  I was at a school that I hadn't been at yet this school year (and left my information so that I can go back)

-  Did some valentine art

Heart Art

-  And finally I had a half day turn into a full day AGAIN.  Unfortunately this time I wasn't close enough to home to come back to grab a lunch so I had to make due with some Tim Hortens.

Hope we all had a wonderful Valentine's Day in our classrooms... did you do anything special for your students?

Here's one very Valentine's Day-y bulletin board I saw in a school

This Week At School

Our deep freeze continued into this week with temperatures reaching below -50 with the windchill! Of course this was also the week that I had booked Monday-Thursday outside of the city for work and of course school was cancelled on both Tuesday and Wednesday due to it being too cold.

On Monday I was at the school of 9 so it was a fairly easy day (especially since they had guitar lessons in the afternoon which meant I got to read a book for a while.

Tuesday I was only supposed to work in the afternoon so I waited until 11am before making myself available to work in the city for that afternoon (because my rural job was cancelled). I was pretty sure there would be an abundance of jobs but I guess by 11 most schools had decided they could manage with the teachers that made it in and the students that were there that day. Surprisingly, I did see some jobs still available to be worked at in the morning but I decided they likely didn't actually want someone to show up for 45min of work and get paid for the entire half day so I didn't take any of them. Instead I stayed inside where it was warm and made some cookies.

I found out Tuesday evening that the PD that the teacher I was suppose to go in for on Wednesday was getting cancelled and so I was able to make myself available in the city Tuesday evening. It was probably about 30 seconds after I made myself available that I started getting phone calls for where I could work and I accepted a job that was close to where I live in a grade 1/2/3 classroom.

It was the right job to accept as I got to go on a field trip with the class. We went to see a Julie B. Jones musical at a high school nearby. This ended up taking most of our morning and they had gym and choice time in the afternoon which meant the only class they had to really do work in was when we did some printing practice. The musical was great and I got to see it for work which I think is pretty cool.

By Thursday it had warmed up enough that school was [just barely] back in session for the rural division I sub in so it was off to the colony for me for the day. I wish I could say that after 2 days off the kids were all eager to learn... they were alright.

Friday was the only day this week I hadn't booked in advance. One of the divisions I work in didn't actually have classes which meant there were only 2 divisions that I had left to work in... I ended up having the day off.

O'Canada

At one the schools I teach at the entire school (which consists of 9 students) meets in the morning in one of the classrooms where they will go over any announcements, sing O'Canada and say the Lord's prayer.  O'Canada is always played in the form of a Youtube video

Well, the last time I was at this school they watched this video for their O'Canada

At the end of it one of the students pipes up

"those guys all look like twins!"

Not everyone can catch on quite so quickly that it is actually the same person singing all 4 parts.

This Week At School

Another full week teaching grade 8. 

It was mostly just a continuation of everything we were doing last week. 

In math we were talking about Pythagorean’s theorem 

In ELA we were reading Half Brother (and we also did an Orange Shirt Day activity, a listening test, and some writing activities). 

In Music Education kids continued making their mix tapes. I had them colour a photocopy of a tape to go with their themes and write in the songs for one of their sides… here are some of their tapes 

In Social Studies they handed in their family trees or timeline assignments and we moved on to some textbook work.

And nearly all week my homeroom begged for me to take them outside (because I had taken my other math class outside to measure triangles earlier in the week) but it was such a crumby week outside that I decided they could do the activity with their regular teacher (today it was even snowing on and off throughout the day!)

I must admit... I'm going to miss this class.


And I know they're going to miss me too.

It's been a swell 2 weeks.

Rappers

There are 2 "rappers" at my school.

I don't recall what both of their names are but I do know that one goes by the name "Lil' Clorox" (I know the other one goes by another cleaning supply... I want to say it's either Borax or Bleach.  

At any rate when they asked me if they knew who was who I managed to guess correctly and boy were they excited claiming "everybody knows" (who they are that is).

They then rapped... not for me as they assumed I was no longer listening but who could resist a good rap (am I right?) and part of it went...

"I'm not much of a rapper but I am a big crapper"

To which I responded..."I'm sorry, you're a big what?"

Needless to say the student turned red and the rap was over.

Guitar Class

There have been a number of times when I've been in a position to teach something that I don't have a hot clue about... a high school computer class, French music class, and even a violin class but it hasn't happened in a long, long time!  I guess being around for so long and having my name in at so many schools means I can be a bit more selective about what I'm teaching nowadays.

That is until you end up at a school with a grand total of 2.5 teachers (one only works in the afternoons).  When you're in a school with only 1 other full time teacher you pretty well just do it all... and this includes guitar class. 

Do I play guitar?
Absolutely not.
Did I learn the first couple of lines of "Petit Jean" on the guitar.
You better believe I did!

You see, I've often found that the best way to teach something you don't know is to have the class teach you instead.  In this guitar class I was lucky and only had 4 students which meant I could fiddle around on the guitar to my hearts content pretty well as we were just a small circle of guitar players.

This Week At School

No pictures for this week... mostly because between play practice and a talent show we didn't get too much accomplished (I feel).

Musical/play practice has been taking up most of our mornings.  Anyone who has a speaking role in the play or has something to do with a speaking role (like making sure a light is on them) is gone until first recess.  This means I'm left with maybe 10 kids in my class (which is quite nice except we don't do much because why teach them something when most of my class is missing).  On Friday I made them do a spelling test, a math sheet, and then told them we were going to the library to each pick out a book and we would read outside.  I had a blanket in my car that the girls and myself sat on and the 2 boys decided to read on the monkey bars.

In English Language Arts we have been writing letters to take part in "The Great Canadian Mail Race".  My students all picked schools to send them to and addressed their envelopes.  I now have a stack of letters to mail at some point today.  I still have to get the prize (the person to get the first letter back in my classroom is winning a $5 Tims card).

In science we are learning about the human body.  Before we left on Friday we set up an experiment that we will check in on Tuesday.  We are learning about how our bodies break down different kinds of food using enzymes.  I bought the cheapest sandwich meat I could find and some meat tenderizer for the experiment.  Apparently it should be so tenderized that we should be able to paint with that meat in a couple of days.  

In social studies we are learning about WW1.  I'm not exactly sure how much we are going to get done now to the end of the year... I'm reserving some decades projects for the students to do in June though.

We are almost done fractions in math!  I'm so happy that I started my guided math groups - we somehow got through fractions in 3 weeks (well, it will likely be closer to 4 but I'm losing a lot of math periods because of play practice).

In art we are making water colour zebras.  It was a really relaxing art class for once so even I started drawing one out.  Here is what mine looks like so far.  I'm really excited to see the finished products!

We FINALLY get our double art period back Friday afternoon (our play is on Thursday) so I'm hoping we can get them all painted in that time.

Other then that, I've almost got all the costumes for the play put together... I just need some cat ears and a tail.  Our play is on Thursday next week and we have a final round of our talent show for the community Friday evening.  Looks like I'll be spending some extra time at school this coming week!

Once again, I didn't have to bring home any school work with me.. 

*sigh* if only it could ALWAYS be like this.

This Week At School

T'was the day after Easter and all through the school

Not many creatures were stirring since it was Easter Monday

So Miss Penner in her cardigan

and no one else to help her : (

Set up a scavenger hunt..

Claiming it to be "Eastery" since you know... Easter egg hunts

This week at school I learned something.

If you want your students to take good science notes make it a scavenger hunt!  

I'm assuming this works for other subjects as well.

Basically I printed off questions that they had to answer and then the answers were all on numbered yellow pieces of paper hidden around the room.

Some of them were easy to find but a bunch of them required clues that I wrote out on the board so that they would find them.

In the end everyone had all the notes written out and everyone learned a bunch of new and interesting things about the human body.

And those that didn't make it to school for our lovely scavenger hunt?

Too bad, so sad.

We also got our aboriginal dot art up in the hallway (it's been getting rave reviews)

Before spring break we FINALLY finished reading The Westing Game (my students LOVED it) and I put up their wanted posters for the characters that I had given them at the beginning of the novel study (not all of them are up because these things apparently take time).

In math we started guided math groups and it is like the storm cloud that had been hanging over my math class lifted and a bunch of sun shine has just been shining down on us.  It's been lovely.   Here is the website that I went to for information on them (I believe I actually googled "how to teach math in a split class" and this came up).  It was a HUGE help and it isn't nearly as daunting as I thought it would be.

Our grade 4-6 play is in less than 2 weeks!  

I'm incharge of costumes... please tell me these look like fish... sort of?

This is going to be Pinochino's nose (size medium - I still have to figure out how to get something to stick onto it so that it can be bigger yet).

I'm not sure I told you all about this lovely little box.

I was getting so many grievances after recess' that I was going insane.

So I glued wrapping paper around a cracker box and told them to put their problems in here and I would deal with them later... it has been empty since we came back from spring break!

My favourite thing about this week?

I didn't bring a single school thing home with me!

Instruments

The final project in our science unit on Sound was for the students to make their own musical instruments.

Here was the criteria we came up with together as a class:

-  Does it make a sound?

-  Is it a percussion, wind, or string instrument? (student must be able to tell us)

-  Can the pitch or notes change?

-  Did you make it yourself?

-  Is it creative?

We had a lot of maracas on the day of the presentations (well, I was told we had a lot of maracas... I was at a meeting the day they presented most of their instruments).  This tells me a lot of my students didn't quite grasp the idea of pitch.  They thought that shaking their maracas slow gave off a low pitch and shaking it fast made it a high pitch.

Since I wasn't there they graded each others instruments using the above criteria.

On the 2nd day of presentations (the day I was there) I had them play hot cross buns on their instruments (because it is a simple tune and they had already learned how to play it on their recorders)... I imagine the maraca players may have finally understood that their instruments could not play that song and therefore the couldn't play different notes like they were earlier claiming they could.

Anywho, I was really impressed with the instruments they made (I think we had a lot of parent/older sibling involvement).

banjo

maraca

harp?

rain stick

xylephone

drums?

guitar

guitar

There was apparently a really impressive guitar on the first day of presentations but that student took it home with her that same day... so I never saw it.

Music in the Classroom

.. But not music class

Another teacher at my school sent out a link to Focus at Will

You have to create an account (they have a free trial which as far as I can tell lasts for ever just with limitations) to be able to access the music but apparently it is supposed to help you (or your students) sharpen your focus on whatever task you are doing and keep you on task longer.

I haven't used it much in my classroom (only when my grade 8's are requesting music and then groan when I turn this on because it isn't the radio).  So I can't say how well it works but the research seems to be legitimate.  I'm going to make more of an effort to use it in my classes over the next couple of weeks and report back with more thoughts.

With the free trial you get 60 minutes of listening time.  I think after those 60 minutes you just have to restart it and it will no longer be new music (so basically it will be a repeat) but classes generally aren't much longer than 60 minutes anyways AND they have about 10 options under the free trial so if you have the same students all morning (like I do with my grade 4's) you could just play a different theme.

Others should try it too and report back their thoughts.  You could also use it at home (the teacher who used it at my school used it while she was writing report cards and says it seemed to help her) but it is suggested that you don't use it as background music while you are eating dinner or chatting with friends for example because that is not what it is intended for.

What are your thoughts on Focus at Will?

French Music

In one of the school divisions that I regularly sub for I once somehow labelled myself as the go to girl for a French Music sub. I'm not quite sure how I did it. I guess I accepted one too many subbing jobs for that area. But yes, I Christine, became a hot commodity when it came to not only a music sub but a French one at that.

Now there is something you should know about this. At this point in my subbing career I had yet to take any French classes (other than from when I was in grade 9 which was my last year of French). I've also never been particularly great at music (I was in band until grade 12 - but let's face it, I knew enough to get great grades and was in it for the trips to Valley Fair and Canada's Wonderland).

So, what does the substitute that has little knowledge of French and music do when she goes subbing in that exact class?

We play games.

There is this one janitor game that the kids love. basically everyone stands still and the janitor tries to catch the 'statues' moving.

Bingo with prizes is always a hit.

Then someone always suggest I just play the piano and they will move to the music.

Errm... I cannot play the piano beyond "Hot Cross Buns" and that chopsticks song... and by song I mean I just know the part where you play with your knuckles.

Luckily, the kids always like it when I pick a well behaved boy or girl from the crowd (at this point they are probably more like a mob shouting "we want you to play the piano, play it now or we will light pitch forks on fire, do it, Do It, DO IT!!" it's a scary situation). Anyways, I pick a boy or girl from the crowd hand them a tambourine and tell them to go to town.

The angry mob dies down and we have a pretty successful French music class where not a lick of French was spoken (unless it's by the students OR the students as me if I even know French which is when I pull our my favourite saying "un petite peu" translation: a little bit - learn that phrase if you are going to be doing French.

Sidenote: Never, and I repeat NEVER, resort to pulling out the recorders unless you have a good pair of ear plugs.

Violin Instructor

Have I ever told you about the time I became the go to sub for violin classes?

No?

Well buckle up because you are in for a great read.

First I should start off by saying I do not play violin. I have no idea how to hold one properly let alone play it.

But I went in regularly for this one teacher who shared a classroom with the violin instructor. Naturally, with my easy going personality and charisma me and the violin instructor became the best of friends (as in we occasionally talked when we weren't teaching).

One day he asks me if I play violin and would I like to sub for him one day?

"Well" I reply "I don't play violin but I do believe I could fake it until I make it"... maybe I didn't say exactly that probably more likely "I don't play violin, but if you don't mind me not being able to play I'm sure I could manage the class and watch them play"

He apparently thought this was good enough and told me he would be booking me soon.

Violin instructors do not lie when they say they will book you. It wasn't long before I found myself signing in at the office as the violin instructors sub.

How did the day go?

Well, with the grade 6's we watched Ice Age (grade 6's are just in music class not violin so we were listening for the different instruments in the movie - kind of lame but it's what I was told they would do).

Then with the grade 7's and 8's we were breaking out the violins and getting down to the nitty gritty (erm.. we were playing them).

I am going to let you in on a little secret. This works probably 9 times out of 10. When you don't know the answer to something or how to do something get them to show you (or get them to look it up for you).

So here is what I did:

"Hey classes, I don't have a hot clue how to play this instrument or even how to hold it but you all do. So how's about we get out this song that you are learning and break into groups to practice it. I'll come around and you can each take turns teaching me how to play some of it"

Works like a charm.

They claimed "Happy Birthday" was the easiest one they had learned (what ever happened to "Hot Cross Buns"?) so that was the one I was taught. Was I good at it? Not a chance. But did I survive my day as a violin instructor? You bet I did. It even led to more days subbing in that very class.

Recorders

Remember recorders? When I was in elementary school we purchased our first recorder in grade 4 for the ultra low price of $10 I believe. It was a great time. Holding that creamy coloured piece of instrument while walking down the halls announced "Yes I am in grade 4 and we get to play the recorder nah, nah, nah, nah, boo, boo we are better than you grade 3's". But I digress... this is a blog about subbing not reliving my elementary school days.

There will likely come a time in your subbing career that if you decide to accept music positions and you will run into some very unfabulous recorder playing. It is terrible, your ear drums will feel like they are about to explode, and you will feel like you have gone deaf for at least the next 15 minutes after the class is over. Seriously, bring your whistle on recorder days or stand by the light switch because no one can hear anything over that racket.

Obviously, I have been the unlucky recipient of a recorder day in music (and obviously it was a French music class because clearly they are my favourite).

There isn't much you can do in this situation unless you decide to toss the teachers instructions out the window and pop in a movie instead. But by doing this you run the risk of the teacher not really caring for you and not being invited back. Therefore, I do not do this, because I am an awesome substitute teacher.

I am still working on the best technique to solve the problem of the squealing recorder sounds. Perhaps only letting a few students practice at once would solve the problem (but then what would everyone else do - they would likely turn against you and tie you in your chair if they have nothing else to do), you could tell them only the best recorder players get to play today because you want to hear what the music is supposed to sound like (but then you single out all the sucky players and they will likely cry about it). Or you can just suck it up and let them break into partners (or maybe groups of three) to practice the song for 10 minutes so that each partner (or group) can play it for you afterwards.

If you choose to follow my lead (which I am by no means endorsing as the best way) here are some tips:

1) stand near the back of the room and not the front. Often times music rooms are designed (shockingly enough) as music rooms. This means the sound travels to the front of the room. Which means you will feel like your ears are bleeding within the first 2 minutes probably.

2) If you are not satisfied with the back of the room open the door and stand half in the room and half out. Send the students who didn't bring their recorders out to the hall so it looks like you are just keeping your eye on them. Everyone has their recorder? Hide 2 of their recorders so that there will be students out there. Just Kidding... calm down. Tell them everyone will practice but you need 2 volunteers to do something for you. It doesn't matter what you need them to do. Tell them you need a picture of a famous musician drawn and coloured for above your fireplace (they won't know you don't have a fireplace). OR if you are near an entrance to the school and they have double doors send a couple students to practice there and keep an eye on them from the doorway of the music room.

3) You can always use ear plugs if you brought some.

4) Get them to just finger along with their partner for parts of it (when you need a break from all the noise)

5) Fake an illness and get yourself out of there ASAP... bonus points if it requires an ambulance ride to the hospital (this is likely not the best option but if all else fails...)

Hopefully you are feeling a little more confident about your next subbing day in a music classroom during recorder season (which FYI happens sometimes after Christmas break - probably around Easter).