Day 31: Math and Orientation

We handed out a worksheet of multiplication problems to the 4th grade today. They were mostly double by double problems and quite a few multiplying by 10's. I was surprised at how many students didn't understand why or how it worked. Every single student got 14 x 15 wrong. They didn't even know how to get started on how to solve it. For me, it was very frustrating. Especially since this is a skill normally learned in 3rd grade in the United States.

I have also realized that in my classroom I want it to be as student oriented as possible. I want the students to be able to help themselves as much as possible. If that means getting their own counters to help with a problem or finding a pencil. My students need to know where everything is and know when they can use things. 

I realized today when a student sat with her hand raised for 5 minutes just to get some dice, that I needed my students to be independent. The teacher said she could have got the dice herself, but the girl didn't know that. Every time previously she had had dice given to her. I want my students to learn independence. 

Day 30: S'mores

Today, my students had s'mores and I am once again the best teacher in the school.
Norway doesn't have graham crackers, but Hilde and I found some biscuits (cookies) that worked out really well.
During the last hour we went outside in the pouring rain to the fire shack. Trude had already started a fire for us and I instructed everyone to get a skinny long stick. It took a little while, but they got them. Then I showed them how to make a s'more.
First you make sure you have two biscuits, two pieces of chocolate and one marshmallow. The I showed them how to roast the marshmallow to perfection. After it was done I held my stick between my legs, and squished the marshmallow between the two biscuits with chocolate and pulled it off the stick. There were noises of amazement all around the fire. When I took a bite and the marshmallow squished out all over my face, the "ohhh!" sounded in unison. Then I passed out all of the ingredients and the kids started making their s'mores.
Hilde and Trude tried them as well. When I asked them what they thought Hilde said "It was okay." Then Trude interrupted and said "Okay? That was delicious!"
S'more day... success!

Passing out ingredients

How to make a s'more 

Lots of sticks!

Everyone was very patient... for 4th graders

Look at that delicious gooeyness

squish

Everyone loved the s'mores

Day 29: Singing

I love singing. I got to sing with the 5th graders again, only for a few minutes, but the time doesn't matter. I was just glad we got to sing.
When we sang "Da Moose, Da Moose." I don't think the teacher in there had heard it before. He was laughing so hard, and had to video the song so he could watch it again.

On an unrelated note, I am getting very good at knitting! It is amazing how quickly I can do it now! I have already made 5 hand warmers, or 2 and half sets of hand warmers. I am pretty proud of myself! Now I just need to make sure I can get them done by the time Christmas rolls around.

Day 28: Religion

Religion.
This is something that is labeled as "better safe than sorry." So most teachers just don't teach this. But here in Norway they do teach it. They have two hours of religion a week where they learn about different religions.
Today I got to teach about my religion. I got to tell the students all about what I believe, when I go to church, where I go to church and other things like this. I was not teaching them to convert them, but rather to inform them. The more students know the smarter they are. The more they understand the better they will be able to accept other people they meet who may have different views.
The study of religion is one thing I wish the United States would adopt. But I guess I will have to keep to the casual mention rather than an entire lesson.

For English today I did mad-libs with the students. It was how to talk like a pirate. This is the story we ended up with:
"Ye can always pretend to be a bloodthirsty DESK, threatening everyone by waving yer CRAZY sword in the air, but until ye learn to GO like a pirate, ye'll never e UNDER accepted as an authentic LADY. So here's what ye do: Cleverly work into yer daily conversations BLACK pirate phrases such as "Ahoy there, PIRATES," "Avast, ye GIRLS," and "Shiver me SANTAS." Remember to drop all yer gs when ye say such words as sailin', spittin', and fightin'. This will give ye an ARM start to being recognized as a swashbuckln' baby wipe. Once ye have the lingo down pat, it helps to wear a three-cornered MAN on yer head, stash a LIVER in yer pants, and keep a NOSE perched atop yer EAR. Aye, now ye be a real pirate."
One student asked me "What does swashbucklin' mean?" that was an interesting question to answer.

In the lunch room the sun was in my eyes. I said "Look! I can see the sun!"
One of the other teachers looked up suddenly and said "Something must be wrong."

Day 27: Interview with a Celebrity

Ronny asked me if I would be willing to let the 5th graders interview me in English today. I told him I should and asked him if he wanted me to dress up at all. His suggestion... was great!

Me as Anna and the 5th grade class

Ronny had told the kids that they were going to get to interview a celebrity straight from Hollywood. When I walked into the classroom, you should have seen the kids faces. They knew it was me, but they couldn't really get past the fact that I was also Anna from Frozen (or Frost as it is known here). They asked me all sorts of questions, and I answered them as Anna. This lesson was really good for the students because they wanted to ask the questions. They had to come up with the questions first and then ask them, and nearly everyone asked the questions.

This is something that I want to have in my classroom. I want to have different characters, fictional or real, come into my classroom. So I am going to need a lot of different people willing to help me with this. My mom has already said she was willing to help me. When I was little my mom had a friend who would dress up as different people for my birthday parties. I loved having her come. We could all dress up with her and we loved it. 

I also taught the 7th graders about adverbs. Once again, I found a very annoying song to help them remember what an adverb was. Then we made a anchor chart of adverbs so they could remember them later. 

Day 26: Thanksgiving

Today marks the first Thanksgiving I have ever spent away from my family. It also marks the first time in a nearly 10 years my family is having Thanksgiving at my Grandma's house. Needless to say, I am feeling the 4,744 miles it is between Norway and Utah.

However, being in a country that does not celebrate Thanksgiving gives me an excellent opportunity to teach other people about my culture and tradition. So I created a small slideshow and presented it to my 4th grade class. They were interested in the Indians and Pilgrims. But they were VERY interested in all of the food. They really enjoyed learning about it, I think. I wish I had the forethought to make some of the foods for them so they could try them. Maybe I can make at least one of them next week. Perhaps a banana cream pie? Or stuffing...

I am increasing my knitting skills. Hilde taught me how last week and I finished my first hand warmer... it is a little lumpy and obviously not as perfect has hers are, but overall I thought it went well. I started my second one that I think it is going to turn out very good! Maybe I can give these for Christmas presents! It might not come from Norway but it certainly was inspired by Norway!

Day 25: Add to my Toolbelt

Hilde and I were talking about things I want to bring to my classroom and we had some pretty good ideas.

1. Parent Communication
I want to call 2 or 3 parents every weekend and tell them something good their student did that week. I got this idea from my first cooperating teacher and it seems like such a fabulous idea that I had to add it to my toolbelt.

2. Student Best Work
Save the student's best work to show off at parent teacher conferences. Hilde said a week before the conferences she goes through all of the work with the student and they pick their best work for each of the subject areas. My idea was to have a best work folder, the students pick their best work from each subject area that week and put it in. Then right before conferences they go through all of their "best work" and pick their favorites from those. Then there is not an entire semester's worth of assignments in there but the student is not sad about having thrown something away a long time ago.

3. Parent Teacher Conferences
I want to have student lead conferences, not matter what grade I am in. But I am not sure how I am going to do that if I am in a younger grader.

4. Brag Board
Have a board where students can brag about something nice their friends did. This board would need to have correct spelling and punctuation, but we would have 5 minutes after lunch to fill it out each day.

5. Spot the Mistake
Have a spot the mistake board where I find articles or books that have mistakes and early finishers get to go and try and find the mistakes.

6. Early Finishers
I would like to have a file of early finishers work. They can go over to this file when they are done, pick the subject we are doing and then do the activity. This could be something as simple as a worksheet or even a project that spans over a few days. Whatever it is, many students may want to participate it and so will work to finish their work.