Freestyling

Its been a while since the last post...I'm constantly thinking of post ideas, but then never feeling like I have time to write. So incidentally, when I have a paper due tomorrow and a bunch of lessons to plan, I find the time. Go figure.

Its been two weeks since we started school back up again. The first two weeks were GOLDEN. They were so quiet when they came back. Veteran teachers had said something about a difference after break, but I guess I didn't believe it--calming down after break? But it was true, my students entered and sat down in their seats and started doing their work without too much prodding. It was great--until today. Something clicked over the weekend and it was back to testing limits.

Some highlights from the last two weeks:
An Assembly--The first week back we had an assembly to kick off a tutoring program getting students reading for the ISATs (Big HUGE standardized test in March). They brought in a DJ from WGCI, one of Chicago's main R and B stations, a state congresswoman and some other influential people to speak. They played educational games, gave great talks about working hard in school, and then, had a freestyling contest. I remember assemblies being full of homemade constumes, celebrating a day from the "holiday of the month" club, or hearing my principal babble on. There was definately no freestyling going on. But here, they didn't even tell the kids why they were calling them up, they picked some students at random, gave them a topic, and they ran with it. Or at least most of them. A few of them reacted the way I would, take the microphone and put it as far from your mouth as possible and hope that if you were a persistent mumber, they'd leave you alone. But most were excited, and honestly, pretty good. It blew me away.

Paperclips- great documentary about how a small town learns about the Holocaust. Great movie and inspiring, especially if you're in education. A must see.

Okay folks, that's all for now....