It is amazing the spectrum of emotion that a 10 year old can show in the space of 5 hours. The students start off the day one way, and five minutes later they are something totally different. It is amazing.
My teacher runs a very tight schedule. At the end of the day the students have 4 minutes to clean up their desks, do a job, get their backpacks ready and then be ready on the carpet for a read aloud. So far today was the first day they made it, but I can see the improvement.
There is also a nearly no-talking policy. During most of the day they are not allowed to speak at all. I am not sure how I feel about it, but it does make the transitions easier. And faster. I wonder how I will do the transitions in my classroom. But I guess if I have as much to do in a day as she does... I would probably do the same thing.
At the end of the day there was a boy who had been having trouble getting things done all day and he didn't want to wait to see what he was missing at the end of the day. He was starting to have a tantrum and it was looking to be a big one. But my teacher didn't drop her smile, she told him to take a deep breath. He wouldn't do it, and was doing this crazy angry thing. "You keep breathing and I'll help these two then we can talk" she told him. She helped the last two students, and while she did that he started taking deep breaths. When she came back to him he was able to have a pretty decent conversation. They resolved the problem, made a plan for tomorrow, and he was on his way with a high five. It was impressive.
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