It's Saturday

And I have only been away from my first graders for 2 days, and I won't see them for another 4 days. But I miss them! I have such an amazing class. I miss them so much when I am not at school with them. I can't wait to go back to school on Wednesday and see them. :)

Career Day, Valentines Day, Class Pets, Computer Class, Field Trip, and Tattle Tales!

I know, I know, It has been a REALLY long time since I last posted. Trying to make time for blogging in between class, work, and teaching is just unrealistic at this point in the year. Seriously, I have no life. And If I have time for a life, I sleep. Anyways...

Career Day!

We had career day at my school, which means my students and I got to listen to 3 different presentations from  parents about what they do for a living (and how they make more money than I ever will...). Our first presentation was from a students mom who is a nurse in the neuro part of the major hospital on island. She taught our students about CPR, admitting our mistakes, and Stroke! She even had this cute song to go along with the symptoms of stroke that my kids absolutely loved.

Stroke Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHgJtTNfKPE

The next session we went to was one of my students grandpas who is an Entomologist (he studies bugs). He helps keep only native bugs in Hawaii, and he helps HPD with crimes scenes to tell how long a body has been deceased, and how it happened. He told the kids it was like CSI, but none of them had ever heard of that. He showed them so really cool gross bugs!

(Different sizes of butterflies)

(Tarantulas, scorpions, and centipedes)

The final session we went to was one of my students' dads who is a firefighter! He talked about fire safety, fire dogs, and showed the students all the protective clothing he had to wear.

Valentines Day!

I was surprised at how not celebrated valentines day was at my school. I remember having parties, and everyone would bring in valentines. At my school, most of the teachers completely ignored valentines day until the last 10 minutes of school. Then, those that brought valentines (maybe 5 kids..) were allowed to pass out their valentines, and then take them home. I made ADORABLE valentines for my kids. I plan on having some very fun valentines day parties when I have my own classroom.

(Glow Sticks "You make my heard glow! Love, Ms. Mullen)

Class Pets!

My mentor teachers' niece decided that she didn't want her pets anymore, so they came to live in our classroom. Meet our new salamanders:

I am absolutely terrified of these things. Every time someone walks over to them, they start slashing in the water. My mentor has the student of the day feed them. The other day, one of the students was feeding them, and one jumped to grab the food out of the tweezers, and ended up biting the student! Now most of the students want nothing to do with them, and neither do I! I will have a nice and cuddly classroom pet someday... or maybe just fish.

Computer Class!

My students are working on this huge career project in library and computer class. In library, they researched the career that they think they want. Then, in computer class, they are designing an artistic powerpoint about that career. They are turning out so cute, so I had to share them. Here are some of my students examples:

(Pilot)

(Animal Care Taker)

Field Trip!

My whole school went on a field trip to see Oklahoma at the local high school. I used to LOVE field trips as a student, but I HATE them as a teacher. Their were so many little ones and not nearly enough adults and it would have been so easy to lose someone! Plus, the school is right on a major road, and we had to walk along said road to get to the performing arts center, and the kids were playing in line, and I was so scared that one of them would fall into traffic. It was absolutely terrifying. But, all my students made it there and back in one piece. The play was a bit long for them, and it went completely over their heads. None of my first graders understood it. But, they had fun getting out of the classroom for a day! My mentor said that she could tell I am going to be a good teacher, because I was watching the kids the whole time, not the play! :)

(Cast of Oklahoma)

Tattle Tales!

1st grade must be the grade of constant tattle tales because I am having to listen to it all day. We have talked about the different between tattling and being helpful, but these kids just don't get it. My mentor went over some examples with the students, and they all got it right! Not ten minutes later, one student goes, "Ms. Mullen, _______ won't stop sticking his tongue out!" in the middle of me teaching! So, I made a sign, and I am working on designing a lesson that goes more in depth with this topic... because boy do my students need it! I think I'm going to create a box, and any time the students need to tell me something about another student, they can write it down and put it in the box. Then, when I have some time (ha!), I will review them, and address the important ones.

Well, that is all for now! :) On to a weekend of lesson planning and working....

Primary Teacher and MLK

The past few weeks in field have been so much fun! My mentor teacher has let me take over teaching for a majority of the day, One day, she was just like, “Do you want to teach math today?” and I was like, “Sure!” and from that day on, I teach math on the days that I am there, and teach random other subjects during the day as well. Last week, I was teaching 2 of the 3 blocks during the day, handling all the transitions (recess, lunch, end of the day), and helping my mentor grade/write feedback to students for their assignments. During some of the time, my mentor will just leave the classroom to do some of the other things she needs to get done. She said that she wouldn’t have left me if she hadn’t thought that I could handle it. And even when she leaves, the kids continue to behave!

The children in this classroom are so incredibly well behaved. You can tell that my mentor teacher put in the time at the beginning of the year to make sure that they know how to behave appropriately in class. They are respectful, they stay on task, they listen when you ask them to… it’s wonderful! I come home from field so happy now. Some of my other classes would exhaust me during the day, and I would come home tired and cranky. I still come home tired, but I always want to tell all my friends about my awesome day in field.

On Thursday, one of the other first grade teachers called in sick. The school couldn’t find a sub, so they split her class between my class and another 1^st grade class. Instead of having 18 students, I had 28! We had to make desks out of nothing, and have students sitting in very odd places in the room. It was definitely crowded, but those students were very well behaved as well!

Thursday was also my first formal observation with the entire class. Normally, I do small group lessons for my formal, but for this one, I did all 18 28 kids. I did a Martin Luther King Jr. lesson, where I read them a story about MLK, and then had them write about their own dream. In their writing, they had to answer: what was MLK’s dream, what is your dream, why is it your dream, and how can you make your dream come true. I got some really funny answers, and detailed drawings! Here are some of the students’ writings-and my example so that you know what it should look like and my translations so that you know what they say:

The binder cover I made:

My Example:

(Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream was for a world without prejudice, hate, and violence. My dream is for all children to have a loving home. This is my dream because there are some kids that don't have a home. I can make my dream come true by volunteering to help some of the kids that don't have a home.)

Student A's Response:

(Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream is for brown people and white people to get along. My dream is to help kids that don't have toys so I will give toys to little kids that dont have toys. It is my dream because for can have fun (?). I can give toys to them, that is how I will make my dream come true.)

Student B's Response:

(Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream was for a world without prejudice, hate, and violence. My dream is for kids to have clothes. This is my dream because I see people on the road with no clothes. I can make my dream come true by joining friends for change.) 

*Friends for change is a program on Disney Channel that is a pro social "green" initiative.

Student C's Response:

 (This one is BY FAR my favorite... shhhhhh! Don't tell the kids!)

(My dream is for everyone to stop playing videogames because then everybodys brain will be better. I can make it come true by praying to God. Martin Luther King Jr.'s dream was to make everything equal and fair. No matter what color peoples skin was, it had to be fair.)


Those were just a few of the responses... they were all pretty cute, and/or funny!

I discovered today that I will be in my 1st grade class on Valentines Day... so now I must come up with a cute valentine to give out to my students. Time to start checking pinterest! 


I love being in this class, and I can’t wait to go back this week! :)

My New Class!

This week was our first week back in school after winter break, which means I got a new student teaching placement! I am at the same school as I was last semester-Ahuimanu Elementary (which is about 45 minutes from where I live). I love the school, the location, the teachers, and the feeling of community, so I am thrilled to be back there.

Now, I am in a general education 1st grade class. I love this age group! They are a tad bit younger then my dream grade (2nd) but they are absolutely wonderful. My mentor teacher has incredible behavior management in her classroom. The kids are quite, they listen when she is talking, and they behave the same when she is not around! I can't wait to try out some lessons with these kids, that way I can take advantage of their good behavior. I will be in this placement until the end of the school year (approx. 16 weeks).

On Wednesday, I spent most of the day observing the students and taking notes. I tried to get a good feel for the way the classroom was run, and which students could potentially use a little extra help. On Thursday, my mentor teacher let me jump right on. I tested a bunch of kids on their sight words (words that they can read without having to sound them out) and grades some quizes from the day before (report cards were due today-Friday, so my mentor teacher needed some assistance with assessments). I also got to go through and read/grade all of their journal entires, and write little notes back to them. First graders choose the most random things to write about!

I think I am going to use this semester to try out some of the concepts of "Whole Brain Teaching" which is something that I would really like to incorporate in my own classroom some day. The teacher whose videos I watch about this method teaches first grade, so it will give me a chance to try out exactly what I have seen her done in her videos. My mentor teacher is all about me trying whatever I want. She said that now is the time to find out what works and what doesn't because no one will ever know that it failed!

Here is the link to the first whole brain teaching video that I watched:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aaweXw03kQI
I can't wait to try out some of these concepts in my class!