Over Christmas Break, the weirdest thing happened: my brain shut off. Completely. I spent day after day, reading, crocheting, and watching ridiculous amounts of reality TV. (Ask me ANYTHING about the Real Housewives. Anything! For starters, Theresa is finally in prison, Lisa opened Pump, Kandi bought her mom a house, NeNe is considering Broadway, and Cynthia totally rocked the runway again!) I didn't plan, and I certainly didn't grade. It was awesome. Now that my brain has switched back on, I'd love to find that happy medium between a Housewives marathon and obsessing over adjectives...which is what I'm currently doing.
Honestly, if you'd asked me what topics would be simple for kids to grasp, I would probably have mentioned adjectives. They are easy. They are fun. They are super. They are fantastic. (See what I did there?)
Unfortunately, something went wonky (my new favorite word) today. I saw actual looks of terror on my Pre-AP kiddos' faces when they were given some sentences to analyze. I realize that part of the issue is that sometimes I forget how young they are, and fail to explain things sufficiently. The biggest issue today, though, was that the textbooks we have just don't cut it. They are nice to look at, but not nice for the kids. It's hard to explain, but I almost feel like the authors included 2-3 "exceptions to the rule" in every exercise they wrote. When kids are first learning a concept, there's no need to trip them (or the teacher!) up. I knew better than to use the books, but it's just so tempting! I mean, shouldn't I use the English books to teach English? Le sigh. It's back to the drawing board for today's lesson.
All in all (for lack of a better concluding transition), this year is definitely stretching me. The new 2 hour schedule, added planning, and having a very low class is fairly draining at times. There's a part of me that wishes I had the same job title as last year so that I could simply refine and reuse my lessons. Then there's the part of me that knows that all that extra free time would result in a 37 scarves and Bachelor re-runs. Busy is better!
-Mrs. Combs
Before you go...
#wisewords
