Wow. *wipes off the dust that her live journal has collected* Okay! So, I am…a teacher. A very busy one. Thus, my journal has been neglected. I have pictures of my classroom. I hope to post them soon.

Um… to saaay… *thinks* I’m busy!! ^_____^;;;;

School is going okay I suppose. My kids know the rules.. they just don’t always follow them. I make them move down the behavior ladder. I have raised my voice so much I have come home with a sore throat. I’m doing all I know to do. Apparently, one day it will just “click” with them and all will be well. (Hopefully. This is what my KTIP resource teacher told me anyway.)

I don’t necessarily agree with the way everything is done at school. The things involving my kids anyway. I am team teaching with two other teachers who have different ways of doing things. That’s fine. Everyone is different. One of them has tried to convince me that if the kids called me “Ms. Bratcher” instead of “Ms. Ashley” that any behavior problems I have would go away. Apparently she feels that she earned her college degree and the right to be called Mrs. She-Who-I-Will-Not-Name and I should feel the same way she does. Well, I don’t. So there.
Our kids switch classes. So, I have all my second graders and 2 thirs graders for literacy (reading and writing). I have kids were are very low. Some of them can’t read or write very well. I’m not complaining, but grouping the kids based on ability was supposed to make it better for the kids and teachers too. It’s not really. I might as well just have my whole homeroom and not even switch kids with the other teachers because I don’t see what the difference is. Oh well. We lose so much time in switching classes.

Then there is recess. I don’t believe in taking a kid’s recess away. I don’t think that a kid should have to sit all by themselves in the cafeteria just because they moved down the behavior ladder more than once in a week while all the other kids get to eat in the classroom. Kids move down the ladder every day and they don’t have to sit by themselves, so why on Friday when we eat in the classroom? It makes no sense to me, but the two teachers I work with make their kids sit by themselves…

It’ll get better. So far, my first month of teaching has included me testing kids like crazy, not having a clue what to teach, and being stressed out. It will get better, but I hope it gets better sooner rather than later.

And then I killed my fish. Or, the water killed my fish. Something killed the fish. I have a clean, empty fish tank full of water at school. I hope to buy a few fish tonight. Flashy is still alive though. There are moments where I feel like I’m dying and moments where Colin feels like he is dying. I’m putting it rather dramatically, but it’s funny how this summer I was stressed out about not having a job, and now I am stressed out about having a job. ^__^; Funny.

I’ve been working on my class website. When it’s done, I’ll post the link (and hopefully, those pictures of my classroom too!).

Bye bye for now. I shall return again…one day! ^_______^