Aesop’s Fable Podcast 1

the-lion-and-the-mouse-worksheet.doc

the-lion-and-the-mouse.mp3

This Podcast is a reading of The Lion and the Mouse one of Aesop’s fables.  I love the lessons that Aesop’s fables provide and think they are a great lesson for any age.  You will also find a printable worksheet to go along with the podcast. 

Please, let me know what you think of the podcast and the worksheet.  If you have a request for a specific fable I will try to use it in an upcoming post.  Do you like fables?  Why or why not?

The Lion Photo Credit:  Jelleprins from Flickr, Creative Commons License

The Mouse Photo Credit:  Braydawg from Flickr, Creative Commons License

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This is a question I’ve asked myself repeatedly. As a teacher mentor it was my job to take a new teacher and teach him or her everything he didn’t learn in teacher school and that was usually a lot. I’ve tried for years to perfect my teacher burnout radar so I can step in and offer more help before I lose them completely. Unfortunately, the warning signs are sometimes hard to spot but there are a few things that always make my radar go Beep! Beep! Beep!

• If a teacher says she has all of the problem children
o Well this is just never true, but if the teacher in question thinks it is there is a problem. Usually this means she needs to be taught classroom management skills or I will lose her.

• If a teacher says she is grading papers all weekend
o No one is going to last long if they are working all week and then bringing home more stuff and working for free. Yes, I said for free. Any time a teacher is devoting outside of her school hours she does for free and this eventually causes resentment. When I hear about this free work I know it is time to step in and help rework the way she is grading. If she can’t do it during work hours something needs to change. No free time is a sure way to burn out.

• If students love or hate a teacher
o I’ve noticed that if there are excessive amounts of either emotion with a brand new teacher then it is because they are becoming too personally involved with the students. This is bad on so many levels and usually leads to the teacher feeling overwhelmed because she is focusing on a personal connection instead of teaching. Yes, I know personal connections are necessary but you’ll have to trust me when I say there needs to be a line between personal and professional.

• A lot of parent conferences
o It doesn’t matter if they’ve been requested by the parent or the teacher. If a teacher is in a conference every week then something is wrong. This is almost always a communication problem. There are many reasons for this one and it usually takes a little digging to get to the bottom of it.

At one point or another I’ve been through all of these phases which is one of the reasons they ring bells for me. How do you know if you, or a colleague, is in danger of burning out?

If you feel you are burning out and want to continue teaching, tell me what your specific concerns are and I’ll try to help!

Photo Credit:  Brian - Progressive Spin’s, from Flickr, Creative Commons License

John McCain wants better schools, much like Clinton and Obama.  There are differences, however.  For instance he thinks that No Child Left Behind was a ‘good start’ to improve education.  He wants to change it but not replace it.  It sounds like anything that would be good for students he is for, but again very little real examples.  

I like that John McCain acknowledges that No Child Left Behind has flaws.  If he has a way to really change it and make it better I am certainly open to learning more about it! 

I’m sure many of you have noticed I’m not a fan of No Child Left Behind, and from the way all of the candidates are saying they want to fix or remove it I’m guessing that most of America agrees with me.  Education in our country must be improved and I hope that the new administration will be able to effect that change.

What do you think of John McCain?  What about No Child Left Behind?  Do you think the program should be reworked or removed?

I’ve just recently found the most wonderful Books for Kids Blog.  It is written by a retired librarian and it completely rocks!  I thought I had an extensive classroom collection of books for my students and a not too shabby home library but she has some reviews for books I’ve never heard of.  That is a wonderful thing!  Not only are there many titles I don’t know but also many that I am now dying to go buy. 

Recently she reviewed Do The Math! Each Orange Had 8 Slices by Paul Giganti.  I have a little hang up when it comes to math and have avoided it at all costs.  However, this book looks like so much fun I can’t wait to be able to read it with my son.  Reading to learn about math, I love it! 

I really like a lot of what Hillary Clinton has to say about education reforms but I’m not sure how she plans to accomplish all of her goals.  However, that isn’t the point at the moment.  I’m sure once the democrats have settled who is going to be their candidate more program specifics will be forthcoming.  Here are a few of her ideas for how to reform education.

Early Childhood Education

• Programs to help develop the parenting skills of new parents.
  • I’ve said for the longest time I thought children should come with manuals so this might be a good thing.  At the same time I’m not sure how I feel about the government telling me how to raise my children.  I suppose it will depend on the details.
• Pre-Kindergarten for all four year olds.
  • This is nice, especially for parents who are either having trouble affording daycare or who can’t afford a nice preschool.

K-12

• She wants to end No Child Left Behind
  • Love that, but again I wonder what it will be replaced with.  You know the old saying the devil you know…
• Create "green schools"
  • I think it would be great for all new schools to be built with green technology.  I have visions of solar power, gardens on the roof, and compost piles.  Will be interesting to see if my imagination and reality are similar.
• She has a variety of ways to help students who aren’t successful in a traditional setting.  For example - early college high schools, multiple ways to graduate, internships, and job programs.
  • Love this.  Part of my problem with NCLB is that it doesn’t really help students who just don’t do well in school.  I’d love for those students to have alternative ways to be successful.

College

• $3500 tax credit
  • Sounds helpful
• Increase the maximum Pell Grant
  • I used this grant when I was in college and it was very helpful.  However, I lived in an area that had relatively inexpensive college classes and I’m not sure it would have been enough if I’d been at a larger university.
• Increase money for AmeriCorps participants
  • We’ve had AmeriCorps volunteers at most of the schools I’ve been at and they are great.  I think this would be a wonderful way to recruit more people to the program.

If you are interested in more of Hillary Clinton’s policies on education you can read about them here.

What do you think about the proposed education changes?  What do you think about Hillary Clinton?  I’m still trying to decide who to vote for and welcome any information or opinions you have that might help me make my decision!

Everyone has heard that reading to your baby from an early age is great for his or her development.  I’ve found several little cloth covered books and picture books that are great for the baby but perhaps not as much fun for mom.  The Little Big Book for Moms was full of great things to read with my son and a lot of fun for me to read as well.  I love the way the book is put together. 

My Favorites From Each Category

• Fairy Tales
• The Ugly Duckling
• The Three Little Pigs
• Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
• Activities
• Hand Puppets
• Indoor Gardening
• Homemade Music
• Poetry
• Life Doesn’t Frighten Me
• Wynken, Blynken, and Nod
• A Visit From St. Nicholas
• Nursery Rhymes
• Sing a Song of Sixpence
• Humpty Dumpty
• Old King Cole
• Songs
• Hush, Little Baby
• Mulberry Bush
• Old MacDonald
• Stories and Essays
• Mortal Terrors and Motherhood
• Operating Instructions
• The Old Man Who Said "Why"
• Finger Games
• Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes!
• The Wheels on the Bus
• Eentsy, Weentsy, Spider
• Recipes
• Apple Crumb Pie
• Classic Cookies
• Banana Bread

If you were to read the book straight through you’d see that the categories are intermingled throughout along with some lovely artwork.  However, that isn’t how I wanted to read it and I found the Contents area to be very helpful because the different topics are listed by category there. 

What I really like about this book is that it is such a great resource for traditional childhood stories (of all kinds) and it exposes children to different story telling formats.  While the games and recipes won’t help develop reading skills the games are fun and the recipes delicious.

The songs and stories brought back a lot of memories that I don’t think I would have remembered without some prodding.  I love the traditional elements in this book and think it is a great alternative to some of the ‘newer/better/faster’ items I’ve seen for children.

Have you read this book and if so what did you think of it?  What do you like to read to your young children? 

You may be asking yourself what a furry little critter or a piece of baseball equipment has to do with classroom management. The answer is, absolutely nothing! BAT is an acronym I came up with for Bell Assignment Today. A bell assignment is something that the children know to do as soon as they come into the classroom without even having to be told. The information for the BAT is always in the same place and is there every day. The assignment you use can be tailored to the subject you teach.
As a history teacher I used definitions from the back of the textbook for the BAT. I had a large post it note, about the size of a poster, and every day I would put a word on it, next to the date, for them to look up when they came into class. Because they were always in the same place the students knew where to look for them as soon as they sat down. Also, because they were on the post its, instead of the white board, they were there for an entire nine weeks so any student who was absent could find what words they missed easily.

Now you may be wondering why in the world a student would do work for no reason. They wouldn’t. That’s why the second part of the plan includes using the BATs as a test grade. I usually made a multiple choice test at the end of the nine weeks that used some or all of the BATs and they could use their BAT notebook to answer the questions. This was an easy A that students could look forward to which encouraged them to actually complete those BATs daily.

That’s great, but how does it affect classroom management? In my experience the way your class starts is the way it will end. If the kids come in loud and unfocused they will stay that way throughout the class. If, on the other hand, they always have an assignment to do as soon as they walk in the class will be quiet and focused from the very beginning. A quiet class that is working is never going to have behavior issues. This one thing can improve the discipline in your class without you ever having to say a word of reprimand. Of course I do have a tendency to stand at the door and bark out BAT BAT BAT BAT BAT BAT as they walk in, so maybe you will have to say one word.

How do you start your classes?

In this speech she Hillary Clinton talks about No Child Left Behind and early education.  I particularly like the bit about little test takers!  I haven’t had to think about the price of college lately but I really like what she has to say about how to pay for college.

I have several teacher friends who are still paying off their college loans five and ten years after they graduated.  It will be interesting to see what kinds of changes are made in the next four years.

What do you think about the government taking a more active part in helping students go to college?

I was surfing around the Internet last night looking for new books to read and came across a reference to books that were frequently banned.  I’ve heard of such things of course but when I saw the list I couldn’t believe it!  Some of my favorite books are in the list of 100.  What are people thinking?   Now I can’t speak for all of the books listed below but there are a few I’m sure shouldn’t be banned. (Of course I don’t understand why you would ban a book for any reason in the first place).

The Top 10 Most Frequently Challenged books of 1990-2000

1.  Scary Stories (Series) by Alvin Schwartz

2.  Daddy’s Roommate by Michael Willhoite

3.  I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou

• What is this about?  This is a great book by a woman who is one of the greatest American authors of our time!  Who would ban this?  I get that there are graphic parts of the book but it is autobiographical and life isn’t always pretty.  Especially the life of a black woman during the 60s.  Hmmm…maybe we should just pretend that all of history has been pleasant?

4.  The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier

5.  The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

• Are there ideas and terms about race that are offensive, sure.  Does it matter, not really.  First, you aren’t going to read anything you don’t hear daily from music, television, movies, and games.  Second, it isn’t as if the book is promoting that behavior and even if it was what good is it going to do to keep children (young adults/ high school students) from reading it?  Is the purpose to pretend that race relations in the South are and have always been great?  Because that would be a lie. 

6.  Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

7.  Harry Potter (Series) by J.K. Rowling

• Ok.  Magic.  I get it.  Magic = non Christian = bad, right?  Wrong.  It is fantasy.  One of the things we have to teach children is the difference between fantasy and reality, if we start taking away all fantasy how are we going to teach them the difference?  Above and beyond that children LOVE the series.  I saw kids who hated to read get drawn into the world of Harry Potter and read books that were hundreds and hundreds of pages long.  They’d get done and ask me if there were other books out there like Harry Potter.  Why, yes there are!  Here let me introduce you to Lord of the Rings.  These books made an entire generation find the joy in reading.  No way should they be banned.

8.  Forever by Judy Blume

9.  Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson

10. Alice (Series) by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor

I suppose I keep coming back to the argument of if you don’t like it don’t read it but let others read in peace.  I cannot fathom how anyone could try and tell me or my child what they are or are not allowed to read…in America.  Freedom of speech and all that.  Banning books is one step towards revoking the right to speak or think freely.

What do you think?  Do you think there are books that should be banned?  If so why and which books?  If not, why?

As long as I’ve been a teacher the No Child Left Behind laws have been around so I don’t really have anything to compare it to. All I know is there has to be a better way. I like the idea of holding schools and teachers accountable but I don’t think this is the way to do it.

Barack Obama’s Opinions About No Child Left Behind

• He likes the idea but feels it was under funded and has not given all students highly qualified teachers and is not paying or supporting the highly qualified teachers that are there
  • I agree with this. I’ve seen many wonderful teachers leave the profession because of the obstacles that are put in front of teachers that make it harder to teach. Additionally, in most areas teaching does not pay well. This is another reason my school lost so many teachers over the years. That’s the good teachers. The bad teachers stay because they can for the most part get away with just being babysitters. The government needs to reward those that want to teach and boot those that don’t.
• He says too many students are not prepared to go to college and that a third of high school graduates don’t go to college at all.
  • I can’t argue with that but at the same time I can’t help but wonder why this is a big deal. Part of the reason I hate No Child Left Behind is because it assumes that every student can learn at an equal level, they can’t. Maybe I’m the only person in America that thinks that isn’t a big deal, I don’t know. I do know that some of my learning disabled students were much happier and more productive when they weren’t reading ‘on grade level’. A teacher of mine once told me that being fair isn’t giving everyone the same thing it is giving everyone what they need to succeed. College isn’t what everyone needs and everyone won’t be successful in school. I’ll rant more about this sometime in the future.
• He thinks teacher retention is a problem and says thirty percent of teachers leave within five years.
  • From what I’ve seen it’s less than three. Yes it’s a problem. Teachers are poorly compensated for their level of expertise. Don’t tell me it’s a calling. It’s a job and if you don’t pay your teachers what they’re worth why would they stay?

This is just a brief overview of some of the items he is concerned about. For a more comprehensive list you can go here.

“I don’t want to send another generation of American children to failing schools. I don’t want that future for my daughters. I don’t want that future for your sons. I do not want that future for America.”

— Barack Obama, Jefferson-Jackson Dinner, Des Moines, Iowa, November 10, 2007

What do you think about No Child Left Behind? Do you think Barack Obama is the person who can get Education back on track for the United States?