Undivided Attention...

Amazing... one of his lesser-known poems- but it does take your breath away...

Pink Gumboots... adapting to your environment without losing your identity

If I've had the pleasure of meeting you- you will know if humanly possible I'll be wearing pink shoes. They make me smile. They make the kids smile. Really- what more could you want? Well, with the recent rain I've discovered you could want gumboots. For those cold days where the rain just keeps going, gumboots are a very useful adaptation to the school environment. And today I was able to find... yes... you guessed it... pink gumboots. It made my day. It made the checkout lady smile. And it made me think... how much of "me" do I get to keep when I teach?

I think that's really a challenge for us Supply Teachers- balancing between adapting to our ever-changing environment and staying true to ourselves. As much as we adopt the behavior management plans of the different schools we teach in, we all have our own personal philosophy about discipline. Every day do our best to work within a different set of school values, different moral frameworks and different learning environments- but we really do need to make sure we don't lose ourselves. It's not really about pink shoes at all- it's about the right express our own identity. Without getting too deep I'd hope that as teaching professionals we are able to work in a way that aligns with our personal teaching philosophy. I think I'm lucky enough to have found schools that allow me to do that... and I hope you do too.

PS- I think my gumboots will also remind me to make the best of whatever comes my way... because now even on a rainy day I can have a reason to smile. And yes... that is a part of my personal teaching philosophy!

Three Choices...

Today I gave my class (year 6) three choices... they could be awesome, terrific or wonderful. There were no other choices. Each child got a certificate with tick-boxes for each choice- to take home or show their teacher. Some kids told me that a certificate like that was a guaranteed dessert, or control of the TV remote at home that night. Others kept theirs at school to show off to their teacher tomorrow. I've put a copy of the certificate in the downloads section... but it's easy enough to make your own.

But it got me thinking about the choices we give ourselves as Supply Teachers. Do we assume that a challenging school is going to be, well too challenging- thus removing the "great day" option from our own list of possibilities for the day? How many bad days have we had simply because we don't give ourselves the chance to have a good day? Like today, tomorrow I've got a lovely class at a lovely school- and I'm simply not going to give myself the option of having anything other than an "awesome, terrific or wonderful" day- it worked for the kids today so I don't see why it can't work for me too!

Back to work...

It's back to work time again and I hope that everyone has had a great break. If you are working this week, you may want to work through some old NAPLAN tests with your kids... you can find old tests here. I also fixed my link from last week (my bad)... here it is again. And on that note I'm taking my tired little "I can't believe I'm back at work already" self off to bed for an early night!

Links

Yes it's holidays- and yes, we are lucky not to spend our holidays planning and preparing for next term as classroom teachers do. But sometimes a moment of preparation can be very helpful- and with that in mind I give you this little something to get your teeth into before we go back to school.

As with most of the things I share here- this is neither my discovery (thanks Kim) nor my invention (Jenny Ether is a genius). Need to guide a class through writing a poem? It's here- along with all the scaffolding you could ever need for twelve other text types. There are examples, templates and hints- all available at the click of a mouse. And for those of us without internet access at school- you can download the templates into microsoft word and save them for later use.

Thanks again Kim for your great link- and if anyone else has some helpful links to share please let me know so I can publish them here for us all to use. Remember- it's not just internet links that are useful to us, I find that it's the links between people that really count.

**note- link now fixed- make sure you take a look at http://www.writingfun.com/ - it really is a great site.

Holidays!

Yes, it's holidays. No, we don't get paid. Well we can't have it all- but we can make the most of what we do have. Really- it's what we do as Supply Teachers- make the most of what we have and be sure to smile while doing so!

Take a moment to join the Union Shopper to take advantage of a range of discounts to make your hard-earned money go a little further this holiday. This holiday break I'm working on some exciting PD opportunities for us all... more news to come soon.

Wednesday Indulgence

Take a moment to remember just how lucky we are as Supply Teachers. Why? Well we literally have a moment to take. Look in any classroom and you'll find a regular class teacher hard at work. It's that time of year again, where regular class teachers are all wrapped up in parent-teacher interviews, marking, moderating and all of that hard work that we manage to avoid. Leaving before 3.30 is an indulgence. Not getting to school until 8.15 is even more of an indulgence. Taking a moment... well that's just unheard of at the end of term. And having the time to play with something like this.... well that's just something that no classroom teacher has the time to indulge in right now. So make the most of it and time the time to puzzle a supply day away. Get an early finisher to put the weekly spelling words into a crossword and print a copy. Grab a roll and do a find-a-word with names. Enjoy.