first days with my kids

well, what can i say? my first days back have been completely awesome. my new school is so much fun, especially considering that i am coworking with my previous spanish teachers and we are all on the same hallway.

the very first day, i was just the same as i was last year: very strict, straight to business, with only 1 or 2 small little jokes that the students didnt really think were funny anyway (at first, its a good thing to have your students think that your an old fogey with lame jokes)...however after those initial house keeping days, i blew the roof off

my personality was allowed to come out and interact with these kids mainly because they knew when it was ok to play around, and then when it was time for business. the best part about my students? they WANT to learn spanish. already i have had about 10 students drop my class after the first 2 days because it was obvious to them that we were gonna be going balls to the wall spanish and that that wasnt something they were really looking forward to. the students that have remained with me though are primarily excited each day as they come into the class.

one girl in particular, each day she comes in, sits on the edge of her desk, and looks up to at the front of the class with a big ole goofy grin on her face and her eyes as wide as platters. now granted this might be because i am the hott new spanish teacher (sarcasm aside of course) but i like to think that she is just really excited about learning spanish and is really liking my class

so, fortunately i have been able to open up and have more open conversation in my classes. the other biggest change is that i dont have "rules"...i have "expectations"....and they are labeled on my posted rules poster as such...expectations because as i told my students, i shouldnt have to make rules to come down on yall with, rather, i have expectation of them because by now they know what a healthy learning environment looks like and what they need to do in order to make that happen

lastly, my other change is that im doing tickets as a positive consequence and the kids love it! they are very eager to volunteer and get mad at the other person who had their hand up. i will ever be confused by the attitude and motivation of students that do not live more than 10 miles away from each other. i guess, as we have stressed, it all starts at home.