A Classroom Sneak Peak

My classroom is no where near complete, I keep saying I have until after Labor Day like that's a lifetime away...when in reality I will have babies in my room on Wednesday, like that's six days away! Six still seems like a decent amount of prep time, but do to the waxing of floors and other such things, the school isn't open most of the weekend... So I actually have Friday and Tuesday, which is stressing me out just thinking about it.  I keep hoping when I stop by my room quickly in the morning before our trainings, that little teaching/interior decorating fairies decided to organize, decorate and clean up my room for me, so far I have not been that lucky -___- 

BUT I have accomplished a couple things that make me feel better about being ready when kiddos walk through my door, and I'm actually falling in love with my classroom! Last year I had a new room in a new school and didn't get keys until 2 days before kids walked through the door, so functionality was the top priority and I hated my room, I mean literally hated being in my ugly, unorganized room. This year, having some time over the summer and coming in a week before meetings started, allowed me to start creating a room that I love. 

A couple things that I've accomplished so far that I love: 

My bulletin board that shows kids how a heading looks in my class (History) on assignments and in their Social Studies Notebook (ie. composition book)

My room is old school, red, black and white chalkboard theme, hence the color scheme of the board.  But I LOVE my glittery clothes pins that I'm using to hang the sample notebook pages.  I will also be using these as a means to hang student work, which will allow me to change work more frequently since I don't have to staple and remove staples all the time... Here's a closer look at these fabulous clothespins! 

I bought a 25 pack of clothespins at Target for $0.99.  I then applied a coat of glitter modge podge to the flat sides of the pins, one coat was not sufficiently glittery and fabulous for my liking so I applied two coats ( ps. If you are not familiar with modge podge, specifically the glitter modge podge you are missing out on a life experience, like it might be the 8th wonder of the world!) I finished them off by hot gluing a silver push-pin to the back so I can stick them in the wall anywhere and hang stuff, they might be my favorite little addition to my room :) 

The last little thing that makes me happy is my W on my teacher board.  I have an "about me" board behind my desk.  On that board I traditionally have photos of myself and my family & friends, concert & sporting event ticket stubs, UW (University of Washington) memorabilia, a Seahawks jersey, etc.  This year I found a thin, wooden W from Michaels ( a craft store), applied a couple coats of my glittery modge podge, and hot glued some fabulous polka dot and ABCs ribbon to have a cute little monogram behind my desk! 

In case your curious, that is fabric and not butcher paper that in covering my bulletin boards, if you haven't thought about it, it's great! It is a little more expensive, (I bought mine at JoAnn fabrics every time I had coupons.  It did take a couple trips but there is one right by the Target I go to, and if you're like me, Target trips are a very common occurrence) BUT it lasts all year, and even multiple years, it doesn't fade like paper and best of all it doesn't rip! 

I hope you like the sneak peak of a few of my favorite things that I've created and put up in my room so far, stay tuned for a full classroom tour soon :) 

-Karissa 

 

Meetings, Trainings & More Meetings...

Today marked day 3 of our four day "teacher university", which is really a creative way of saying beginning of the new school year staff meetings and trainings.  It was another long, 7 hours in the school Library listening to various speakers, BUT I will say there was a lot of good information that was covered and elaborated on as well as some interesting ways to look at concepts and challenges through a different lens so to speak.  One of those teacher activities was based around a short story,  from a teaching book, simply titled A Parable.  For those that aren't familiar, you can read it here, but it's about a village of people that found bodies floating down the river day after day.  Some of the bodies were dead, some were very sick and some ended up being just fine.  Ultimately the village set up elaborate measures to help the people who floated down from upstream.

After we read the story our VP (vice principal) asked us what could the people of the village done better, one fellow educator suggested that they could have gone up river to see why people were dying/ending up in the river daily.  This was my first thought... What?! Are you insane?? I wouldn't go up the river, haven't you seen horror movies? Someone hears a weird sound, so what does the person do, goes to check it out and gets killed by an axe murderer… you go up river you'll find a man eating dragon, an army of livestock sized spiders, a serial killer convention, who knows but I sure as hell don't want to find out!

Thankfully my teacher brain kicked in (figures I would be the random teacher they called on to share out how the story applies to the kiddos at our school); but really, the story did have a good point!  If you don't know the root of the problem you can't fix it, change it or otherwise help find a more desirable outcome; which in this case would be less dead bodies, and ultimately no dead bodies floating down the river… just like with my students, if my kiddos can't do something we need to find out, in the most basic form, what it is they don't have in order to do that particular thing.  You might be thinking well duh, if a kid can't do something you need to figure out where the concept falls apart in their brain, BUT it's a good reminder that this applies to social, emotional and behavior skills too; maybe that kid that can't stay in his seat doesn't have the tools in his tool box to deal with anxiety, frustration, nervous energy, etc in a more productive or more desirable way... Lets be honest as you read this a specific kid popped into your head that just couldn't seem to figure out how to keep his bottom in the chair.... Yes, that still happens in Middle School....  

Enough food for thought for one day, classroom decor and bulletin board pictures coming next so stay tuned 

-Karissa

Hello & Welcome!

This blog is a long time coming... More on that but I suppose I should introduce myself! Hello there and thanks for taking time out of your crazy busy day to read, especially those of you that are so intrigued you put your work day on hold just to read what I felt like sharing today :) I'm Karissa to my friends and Ms. Willhite (or Ms. Dub) to my students. I teach 7th and 8th grade history in Seattle at an amazing school that serves an exceptional diverse student population.  I absolutely LOVE my job, like most teacher's, duh... Nature of the job haha. Anyway... In addition to teaching, I'm an avid reader, while I do enjoy my Hemingway, I love some good (and by good I mean totally predictable and trashy) chic lit ie. 50 Shades of Grey.  I love to cook, paint, anything creative, changing up my classroom decor, hiking, sports in general and am a HUGE Seahawks fan!

Enough about me, I'm sure y'all will get to know me more than you care to as I keep writing.  Like I said this blog is long time coming, I've been planning on writing a teaching blog for the past 3 years (since I started teaching), but teaching is a crazy, hectic, chaotic and amazing profession in which my to-do list seems to perpetually grow no matter how many items I cross off and I just couldn't seem to find time to start one.  Now that I have a few years of teaching under my belt, I feel like I have a pretty good handle on the start of the year, as good as you can anyway, and decided now is the time!

 I've found there is a plethora of elementary blogs, don't get wrong I love them, read way too many of them and sometimes find ways to make their fun holiday art projects middle school relevant and appropriate, but there is a serious of shortage of Secondary blogs.  Of the Middle School or High School teacher blogs I've found, most of them are a little dry, great information, I'm sure they are fabulous teachers but still a little dry.  Therefore I decided it was my duty to write an (hopefully) entertaining blog about teaching Middle School.  Well, now it's time for me to do the homework assigned by my principal for staff training this week, school in Seattle doesn't start until after Labor Day, stay tuned for more and a classroom tour soon :)  

Karissa