The Week in Review

14 Class Days Left

The only class where I still have some work to do for the end of the year is my Advanced Class. And I actually have it worked out in my head that they are going to do something using Imacs and Ivideo/IDVD to create an introductory video for the Newcomer's Center for next year. I need to sit down tonight and do the planning for that, but I currently just have a vague image of what I want done in my head and not a clear rubric for the kids. My goals are to get them to do some thinking about all that they've learned this year, learn some new computer skills, and have a fun way to close out the school year. I've got the laptops reserved. I need to pull together the necessary cameras. But first I really need to get their assignment in order... tonight. 

10.5 mile run day

It's the longest run I've done since Ironman, so I'm happy with it no matter how much slower than the speed of light that I went today. I met several new four-legged friends. And I really enjoyed my time out there. I LOVE Jelly Belly's Sports Beans, but I save them for long runs, so today was a nice treat. I've got only about four weeks until the annual Sunburst half marathon up in South Bend, so I've got to get in some more of these long runs between now and then.

Now Hiring

We're trying to hire my replacement at work, and it's not going well so far. If you're an ESL teacher looking for an interesting challenge, you might want to check us out. E-mail me for details, but it's a good job with good people and plenty of red tape. We interviewed someone this week, but I can't say how it went for confidentiality reasons and all. I'm hoping that a colleague of mine will get the chance to transfer in from another school, but it's hard to tell what to expect when personnel issues are in play. 

Baby Hats--My new obsession

So I've got three pregnant colleagues, and I spent yesterday working on making baby hats for two of them. One, I know, will have a boy. The other, I know, will have a girl. The results were fun to see--I got to learn a couple of new knitting tricks. And I'll put a picture of the hats in with this post. I wish I could figure out a way to make a little extra money off the baby hat business--it's relatively quick (5-6 hours of knitting for a hat) and inexpensive (maybe $12.00 for yarn for the ones I made today), and I really enjoy it. I clearly couldn't charge for my time, but I actually enjoy knitting for the therapeutic side of things, so I'd just be knitting for the fun of it and the money would be extra. Then again, I have so many projects I want to do!

New Teacher Orientation and me

While out on my run today, I spent some time thinking about what I'll say when I get a chance to speak at New Teacher Orientation this fall. My principal volunteered me, and I'm excited. I think I'll speak less about what it's like to be a new teacher  (since I'm not) and more about working with international students. Gotta start making a list.

Enough for now...this is the most random-though post I've done in a while. Check out my cute hats!

After twelve years in education...

I am no longer an intern. Thank goodness. For crying out loud. Geesh.

It's been a two-year saga. I knew that going from a career in private schools and higher education would mean that I'd need to jump through some hoops to get to teach in public education. But, as I've said before, I never thought that every time I made it through a hoop, they would make the next hoop smaller and light it on fire. 

I have a MATESL degree from a well-respected program at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. I spent a year teaching overseas in a k-12 environment. I came home to spend a year working as an intern at Utah State University in their intensive English Language Institute. From there, I moved to NW Indiana to a private high school where I taught ESL for three years and then worked in the student leadership program for three years. From there, I moved to Kentucky for an ill-fated job at an experiential learning place. From there, I moved to another part of Kentucky to take a job teaching ESL at the middle school level. BUT...the public school requires a pedigree that I didn't have, so I needed to get to work.

After much wrangling, many phone calls, and several strings being pulled by people above me in the system (to whom I am forever going to be grateful), I found out that I would only need to do a portfolio demonstrating my teaching experience and compliance with the New Teacher Standards for the state of Kentucky. Upon successful submission of that portfolio, I would be able to take several tests and then, I thought, I would have the necessary pedigree to teach ESL. Prior to the wrangling, phone calls, and string pulling, I was actually told that in order to be eligible to teach in Kentucky Public Schools, I would need to complete a second bachelor's degree or, alternatively, get another Master's degree in an area that I'm not remotely interested in and spend a year teaching in that area. I was grateful for the string-pulling. 

So I spent a full six months of the last school year compiling a teaching portfolio with sample teaching units, reflective pieces, and other documentation (references, notes from students, student work samples) to try to accurately reflect my ability to teach English and English as a Second Language (because Kentucky is just starting to offer the option of English as a Second Language as a standalone certificate, I needed to get my teaching certificate in another area first and then get the ESL endorsement). I was quite proud of my 127 page teaching portfolio and even more pleased when I finally submitted it and it was accepted.

The next step was to spend $435.00 on Praxis tests over English Literature, Teaching Methods, ESL, and the like. That was another two months of studying--I had to review works of literature I hadn't looked at in 10 years. Most people take these tests immediately upon graduation from their programs--I've been out of school since 1997. It was fun to do all that reading, but with a wedding about to happen last June, I would have liked to have had the time for other things! I took (and passed) my last Praxis test the weekend before our wedding last June. I was all set! (Or so I thought).

When we started school this last August, a teacher whom I admire and respect in my building came to me and said, "Kim, I'm going to be your resource teacher for this year. You're my intern!" I smiled in that polite, "I have no clue what you are talking about" kind of a way and said I'd look forward to that. Then I stopped and said, "Wait. Intern?" That conversation began a whole other round of wrangling and resume-submission and argument with everyone from the superintendent on up through the head of the department of education. It turns out that anyone coming into the state of Kentucky with less than three years of teaching experience is required to go through an intern year. 

Wait. I have three years experience. 

Ay, there's the rub. Those three years experience have to be following certification. 

But I got my certification based on my experience. [Imagine three different phone calls with this line being said by me followed by silence on the other end of the line]. 

We filed protest after protest, but they all fell on deaf ears. Regardless of the lack of logic of it all, I ended up an intern after twelve years of teaching. And an intern position meant another portfolio, 70 hours of conferencing, meetings, observations... sigh. And, it meant that I still didn't actually have my teaching certificate--I just had my intern certificate.

Fortunately, it's been a good year. I've gone through some more hoops (although not as many as some had to go through!), and I've just today completed the internship. When I got home, I paid the $35.00 via ePay for my teaching certificate, and I will hope to see it in the mail in the next few weeks. Phew.

But seriously. All this drama. I consider myself highly qualified to teach, honestly. And I had to spend two years proving it before the state would officially let me have a classroom. I can understand why people who don't take a traditional route to education can get discouraged by the process. I was also very lucky to have incredibly strong advocates in my principal and the superintendent of schools. Still, it was such a lot of work that a lot of people had to do when someone with their finger on the right button in Frankfort just needed to say, "Stop the madness!" 

Now, I'll write about my position on tenure in another post (don't think it should exist), but I do wish that more people would have to prove themselves as qualified to KEEP their classroom in public education. They should have to go through what I had to go through just to get a classroom. But it's amazing how much work it all was. I'm glad that it's over. (We did have a celebratory DQ blizzard on the way home!)

Coughing and running and wishing

Cough, cough, hack, hack, ahem, ahem...

I've been floating through this week. I came back from a weekend visit with my best buddy in Indiana, and I was flat out on the couch as soon as I walked in the door. I actually wasn't feeling all that well in the car on the way home and stopped at the rest stop to take a quick nap, but I didn't realize what was to come. By Monday morning, I was really in the thick of it. And it's been three days of just yuck. It's a miracle, really, that I haven't gotten sick sooner with all the germ carriers that I work with, but I hoped that with Spring coming I'd make it all the way to summer without the hiccup of an illness. I'll try again next year. 

Running

See above. Not much of it happening this week. One of my favorite runs in the world is around Lake Maxinkuckee in Culver, Indiana. It's a nice 10-mile loop, and it's where I got my start. I had hoped for the chance to run it with my best friend last weekend, but a) I wasn't ready and b)the weather wasn't cooperating. I honestly think I could have struggled through a ten-miler by myself, but I didn't want to put Jen through the torture of running such a slow pace with me--I'm embarrassed about my current state in a lot of ways. I'll work back from it, but I'm also very hard on myself, and right now I need to be hard on myself. 

House

After nearly two years of our house sitting on the market...empty...I'd think that the stress would even out. In some ways it has. It's a low-grade stress that is constantly there. Right now, it is slightly lessened by the fact that we have a trustworthy tenant in the house for the next month and a half, but then the house will go back to sitting empty if we don't sell it. And we don't have any prospects even considering the place at this point. I just don't   know   what  to  do. 

I have prayed. I have tried to earn karma points. I have put my time in living in a run-down farmhouse that is so small and falling apart that we have to put out no fewer than five buckets or trash cans each time it rains to catch the water from the leaking roof. Our wedding gifts are now coming up on their one-year anniversary in my father-in-law's basement along with 80 percent of my belongings, and looking at them makes me want to cry. I dream of having friends over for dinner, of living in a place where all the burners on the stove work, of having a dryer (yes, we have no dryer because we have no place to hook it up). I can't wait to cut my commute (currently 1 hour and 15 minutes each way each day). Yet it's been almost two years, and it's starting to feel like it's just never going to happen. It's felt like that for a long time. I just don't know what we can do. 

We are lucky. We aren't like the folks caught not being able to pay their mortgage. I just happened to leave my job at a time when the housing market was about to take a dive. And without going into too much detail, there's a story behind leaving that job that makes this all even more sad... and there's a level of unfairness about that whole situation that I just have to let go of. The boss I had at that job ran her tornado through the lives of me and my coworkers, and while we ultimately found a recourse for that, it was not without a heavy cost to me and my friends. 

So selling that house for me will be finally closing a chapter that I've been working to close for two years. And it will mean a new start for my husband and me. But we're doing alright. Just...wishing. 

ESL

We start standardized testing on Monday, and that will run for the next nine school days. Every morning. Kids will be tested in Math, Reading, Science, History, Social Studies, Arts and Humanities. And our school will get its funding based on their performance on these tests. The thing about it is, though, that there's no motivation for the kids to do well. I'd like to think that their sense of responsibility and community would be enough to make them want to do well, but at the middle school level, the world is all about them. And for a middle schooler to really want to do something just because it's the right thing to do is often a tough sell. 

I had a conversation with another teacher that went something like this:

Me: I just don't understand why we don't tie their CATS tests into something for the kids--hold them accountable for their performance on the tests.

Other teacher: I TOTALLY agree. And we had an expert on testing come in here, and he said that we just can't hold the kids accountable for their scores on these tests.

Me: But aren't we held accountable for how the kids are doing on their tests?

OT: Yes, we are.

Me: So you mean we are held accountable for the performance of kids whom we are not allowed to hold accountable? 

OT: Yes.

Me: [dumbfounded silence]

OT: Yes. 

Me: One other thing, are we also held accountable as a school for the improvement of our students or for the actual level of the students?

OT: The actual level of the students.

Me: So you are saying that if a kid came in here at the beginning of the year, and they were a novice, and they have moved up to apprentice (seemingly as a result of our instruction), that doesn't matter because they aren't proficient?

OT: Right. 

Me: So no matter what we do, if the kid actual shows outstanding improvement, we don't get recognition for that as long as they don't meet that "proficient" standard?

OT: Yep.

Me: [dumbfounded silence]

Annie needs to go out. I've gotta take her. 

Last, lazy Sunday

ESL
Classes start again tomorrow after a long break. We have about two weeks of classes until our two-week period of standardized testing called the CATS tests begins. We're going to use a program called "Read and Write Gold" as text-reader software for the kids for the test. I'm not sure what to expect, but I know that last year I had to do a lot of reading for several students, and I wasn't able to do as much reading as would have been helpful because I was so stretched. This might be better for them. We're practicing with it right now.

I have to admit that CATS testing is truly a time of discouragement for me and for my students. They are routinely asked to do tasks that they can't do because NCLB requires them to--reminding them that they are children who are behind. I totally agree with the need for accountability. However, I argue that we need appropriate accountability for ESL students. The very students whom NCLB is meant to support are not able to show their abilities because of the inappropriateness of the testing.

Running
I'm headed out for a quick four miler after I finish writing this post. I'm embarrassed at how small my running base is, and I have plenty of excuses to offer up for it, but the best way to remedy it is to just run. Sometimes, though, life just gets in the way of what you have planned.
The New Balance commercials on television right now really speak to me. I need to find a link to those somewhere online.

Annie
Miss Annie is trying out her crate for the first time since the operation, and there has been a bit of pouting about it, but she seems to be doing pretty well. This surprises me a little bit as she has historically broken out of every crate I've ever put her in to. It may have something to do with the fact that I'm still in the same room as she is in. She's pouting. And I'm sad about it. Two weeks since the accident, and she has four weeks of recovery left. Last night at about 3:30 a.m., I woke up to the saddest sound--Annie had rolled over on her bad leg and gotten it tangled up underneath her. She couldn't get it out. It was kind of like an overstretched rubberband. So she was panicking. And Guinness was on the floor trying to help (useless). And I was SOooooo sleepy. Four more weeks. Did I mention that one of her teats is swollen and the vet thinks she may need surgery? (The picture above is of Annie in the bathtub at my old house. She loved to sit in the bathtub).

Teaching reading...New socks...a new adventure...

Annie has been the focus of this blog for the last week, but I've quickly realized that I have a lot on my plate. And I'm not sure if I'm going to have a multi-directional blog here.

ESL Newcomer's Center
I spent part of my trip to Michigan pulling together some materials for the ESL Newcomer's Center. In particular, I found a text by Mary Cappellini called Balancing Reading and Language Learning that is about working with developing readers while they are also developing reading skills. This is a challenge for me. In my MATESL studies, we spent quite some time looking at teaching reading in English, but I don't recall any focus on teaching reading to people who can't already read, and many of my middle schoolers are below grade level in their reading. Some are illiterate. So I'm looking forward to digging into this text. DH had to actually remind me that I am on vacation as I was reading and underlining in the text as soon as I got it home.

I'm now searching for some resources on Learning Centers. I'm excited to spend some time this summer pulling together my new classroom. Did I mention it has three windows? And two doors to the outside world?

Running
10 miler on Saturday. So I'm headed out for an easy six today. I have to admit that there is a certain amount of shame and guilt when I fall off the running wagon. I love running. I love triathlon. I love cycling. I love swimming. But now and again, I can't get myself going to do any of them and then I feel guilty. And now I'm signed up for some races, and I'm feeling unprepared. And even signing up for races doesn't make me feel motivated.

Ironman training took a lot out of me last summer and fall, and it's been really hard for me to get back into a rhythm. Quite frankly, I don't mind going to races underprepared. I just kind of run my own run and get done and quietly head on my way home. But I've signed up for running a half marathon with my best friend in a week. And I'm embarrassed at my lack of preparation in the way that you get embarrassed when someone comes over and your house isn't as clean as you'd like it to be. I've got to deal with the guilt.

The crafty knitty side of me
I'm posting a pic of my latest project--my first pair of socks. It's a pattern from Blackberry Ridge. This is some of their gorgeous hand-dyed yarn, and I bought it on a trip to Wisconsin with my mom several years back, but I'm finally getting around to knitting them. If all goes well, I'll be making socks for everyone in DH's family for Christmas. Last year, we really tried to do as many homemade gifts as possible, and I think we're going to try that again this year. The dog in the picture of this one, incidentally, is our other black lab mutt--Guinness. She's nutty in her own special way. But she's the perfect backdrop for the start of the socks.

Annie's back! and Spring Break begins...

The Annie-dog is laying on the dog bed here in the living room...sigh. She has a four-inch long scar on her right hip, and she currently has no ball in the ball-and-joint-socket; they shaved the top of her femur off and are planning on six weeks of immobility bringing about enough scar tissue to act as a ball for her bone. But that means trying to keep her still for six weeks. Have you met this dog? She doesn't know she's injured.

I started Spring Break today for Annie. I'm staying home with her tomorrow to keep an eye on her. The vet wants her in a crate. For Annie, though, a crate is much more stressful and likely to cause injury than any other kind of containment. If we had a doggie day care option, we'd be taking her there. But our directions for now are strictly for her to go outside to go to the bathroom and then go back in the house--nothing more. I doubt that Annie will be interested in this. 

The rest of my school starts Spring Break tomorrow at 3:00. I teach three different groups of students over the course of the day, and I like them all differently for different reasons, but I like one of the groups much less than the others. Honestly, I think my liking a class is in direct proportion to how well I think I'm teaching them, and I'm not doing as well with one group as I am doing with the two others. 

Next year, I will only be teaching beginners to English--students for whom the most basic of English is a challenge. And I will be teaching that group all day long. That will be a challenge for me, as well. My one hour of planning will certainly be full of administrivia as we get this newcomer center up and running, but the reward of working with students who are generally highly motivated is an awesome thing to anticipate. It's also easy to see progress. I think it's at least once a week when I look at my students and say, "Man, do you know how much you've learned already?" So I guess the change is partially for them and partially for me. I can't wait!