Within the last 3 weeks my class finally found their niche, their routine, their compromise to my expectations. It is as if something clicked in everyone's minds. My troubled student and I had several chats and heart-to-hearts and he is a changed man...it is like night and day and my colleagues can't believe that he is no longer on my radar. I find him trying to impress me now and working to show me he CAN do it. I love it!!!
I just braved our district's testing site to see if our data was in and...drumroll, stomach butterfly moment, or perhaps a stomach dropping moment later...there it was! My kids are doing well! What a relief and a reason to celebrate. All that work that I felt was not working is.
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There have been moments where I have been so behind in our lessons that I thought I was completely letting them down. We had to work so hard on getting transitions down to less than 30 seconds instead of 5 minutes, going over and reviewing our classroom rule and expectations, stopping to address things like, "He took my pencil," "She shortcutted me in line," etc., that I honestly did not think my kids would be able to pass our benchmark tests. As the gifted cluster class, my students and I are normally ahead of everyone else and we work at a much faster pace, so this was a tough and confusing quarter for me. I was thrown off my game over and over again.
Did I do a good job this quarter though? No, I could have done so much better. Will I be able to do better for my students next quarter...heck yes! I know exactly what I need to do to help them achieve and become even better learners. There is still so much work ahead of us, but at least I know they are reacting to my expectations and truly rising to the occasion.
So, I am relieved to say the least. I am celebrating!...with some gifs!
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So, how about you? What are you celebrating?
