Life is Beautiful

I love October... better yet, the FALL--beautiful weather, my anniversary month, Fall Break, and Halloween! We went for a little walk in the canyon last weekend, and it was so pretty.


Also on the bright side, things have been looking up with my job recently. I don't wake up SO excited to go and teach all day (not a morning person), but I don't wake up dreading it anymore. Part of the beauty of it is having a classroom aide. I'm so grateful for her help every day. Even if she just does copies, records grades, and goes out for recess duty, that's HUGE for me. She has made my teaching life so much more manageable. I only wish I could have her all day, but 3 hours is soo nice. She's also going to sub for me while I'm gone 2 days for Angie and Dane's wedding next week (another great thing for October)!

I did have a little breakthrough with one student today. So far, all he's done is annoy me because he doesn't try, he doesn't get anything, and his behavior and attitude are not good. It's so hard to have patience with him. Anyway, for 20 min. a day, we work in leveled math groups. He's working on mastering multiplication, and for the past week, he hasn't passed the 4's page in 1 min. If they don't pass it, they're supposed to work on practice pages with only that number. He was doing just that, and I stepped away for awhile. A few minutes later, I looked back and noticed he was glancing nervously at the clock and trying so hard to finish his practice page of 4's. I had never seen him try like that, and it seriously almost brought me to tears. Poor kid. He knows he's way behind (the rest of the class is on 9's), and he was trying his hardest to practice for the next day. Of course, I had to praise him profusely for putting forth such a great effort. He even got a tiny dum dum. =) The point is, for the first time, I could say I liked him and wanted to help him succeed (true confessions of a 6th grade teacher). I really am liking my kids more and more, even if some of them get in fights or write cuss words on the bathroom wall. The latter was the most recent issue, and that girl will be in ISS for a week and lunch detention for a month! I think she'll think twice next time...
Bottom line--I have a lot of great kids, and I'm trying to focus on their strengths so I can be a positive force in their lives.