Our Walbridge family, my 206 WHOs, are saying goodbye today to our sweet little girl Mia who passed away. It was a day of shock, pain, mourning, and family support.

Mia was a second-grader in my classroom, a 206 WHO, and a young spirit. She had the lightest  smile, the most innocent face, and the sweetest voice. Every day she promised to do her best and showed happiness in the little things. I cannot believe she's gone. A few months ago we almost lost Mia to a seizure at school, one of the many struggles she has had to face in her short time on this earth. In this time of incredible pain when it is hard to understand the meaning behind a life stopped so short, all I can do is look to God and find comfort in the blessings. I know Mia has her smile on her face in heaven, leaving behind her the pain and struggles she found in this life. There, she can always be the beautiful little girl who saw the world as the heaven she deserves.

Never before have I felt the gravity of the situation in which my kids were born, or of the challenges I took on in his position in this life. Today was a kind of difficult I have not felt before, the difficulty of being the grown up who can hold it together to tell a classroom of sweet faces that one of our own will not be coming back to class, and why. This loss is a kind of loss I've never felt, and I'm not sure what how to describe it. All I can think about is my love for this little girl, and pray to God she feels that love, pray that she spent her last moments with that smile on her face.

I was told today during lunch, when my principle pulled me into her office and broke the news of Mia's tragic death. For the next few hours I tried my best to keep my composure and put on a smile for my kids until the time came to, for the first time in my life, be the one to tell. Children have this incredible way of understanding and not understanding at the same time. At first, they didn't understand why she wouldn't be coming to class, one student even asking, "So this means she's just going to a different school, right? Like all the others who leave?"

But I was proud of their cards, of their comforting each other. Many of them are too well-acquainted with loss, but several more have not grasped the loss of their classmate. The real hard part comes when the rest of the class returns (as most of our class was absent due to a blizzard on St. Louis). And moving her desk out. And taking her off the roll. And taking the cards to her dad. And seeeing her sisters. And the funeral ...

But really, it's not about how hard this is for us or how it makes me feel, what it's about is so much more. It's about how this is exactly the kind of, well, the kind of challenge I signed up for in this position. Like I told my kids, the pain is good because the more we miss her, the more it reminds us how much we loved her. And now God has one more angel in heaven to watch over our little angels on earth.

The last time I saw Mia was only two days ago when she stayed with me afterschool. She had just gotten her first 100% on her spelling test for the whole year, a feat she was desperately grasping for with each weekly attempt. Mia stayed after to help me clean the room, eat extra candy from our tootsie pop bowl, and shine that smile of hers for finally reaching the biggest of her goals.

And that's how we'll remember you, sweet baby girl. Smiling because of how amazing you were.

“There is no greater challenge than to have someone relying upon you; no greater satisfaction than to vindicate his expectation.” - Kingman Brewster

Every now and then, it's important that we check ourselves. We check that we are treating our relationships fairly and fully, we check that we are taking care of our bodies and keeping a balanced life, we check that our priorities are straight and that we are where we want to be. For me, this year, this experience, has kept me checking and re-checking myself every single day.

I am constantly struggling with my priorities, the ways in which I am moving my students (am I moving my students at all?), how am I teaching, am I treating them fairly and responding with patience and understanding, am I doing anything right at all? What impact am I having on my children, and will it be a good one?

After a series of exhausting afternoons with my class, I (again) pulled one particular student out from the group. Persistence - one quality Teach for America was right in finding within me during my application process. Because even after talking with this same student throughout the day and every afternoon after school for the last two weeks (let's just call him Cory*), I decided to give it another try around 3:02 p.m.

And by "Pull him aside" what I really mean is hold him back as the other second-graders finally transformed back into children and filed out of my classroom. For the past 2-3 months, Cory has been the most struggling part of my schooldays. He walks in angry and welcomes the day with a refusal to take off his red hoody or pull down the hood, a defiance against all attempts at work, an angry shout at every instruction to stay seated or quiet in class, and a temper that hourly (more like every 5 minutes these days) sends him barreling across the classroom, out into the hall, or shouting in my or a classmate''s face. This child is what we call "challenging."

But before this sounds like a horror story, let me explain the story behind the surface - because if I've learned anything, there is always a story. Those "horror stories" you imagine when you think about inner-city schools or anything that you've considered about TFA experiences, are truly tragic stories that deserve a happy ending.

And this student's story breaks my heart every time I picture his face. The first time I met him, I saw it - that unavoidable look. You look into this child's eyes and see pain, complete pain. There is an unspoken anger, sadness, misunderstanding, confusion ... just pain. I didn't expect Round 20 of our afterschool chats to go any differently today, but it did. Persistence paid off today, but in a way that launches me into the first round of the hard part.

After a painful last hour of class and dismissal, Cory ran away from me, slamming the door for the umpteenth time. But then he came back in. And we were set.

I took my voice down to the most soothing I've ever talked to another person, and we began maybe the most heartbreaking conversation of my entire life. But what counts is that he opened up. We talked about his emotions and how he struggles with dealing with his sadness and anger. We talked about his life and experiences - experiences no person should ever go through, but less one 9-year-old suffering all of them. And by the end, we were crying and he told me he knew I loved him and he wanted to do better. He cannot read and he has severe learning challenges, but this boy is extremely bright. He doesn't believe it. We talked about how special he is, how much he means tot his class, and what we can do together.

Our new plan: individualized lessons and behavior plans. He will sit by my desk in the back of the class where he can feel safe. He will stay with me every day after school for at least 30 minutes (I asked him to pick a day, if that'd be okay, and he said "Ms. Davis, let's do it every day! My mom won't mind! She'll say yes! And the weekends too?" I'll give him his own workbooks for extra homework at home to practice. He WILL learn to read, because then he CAN be in third grade.

And when I gave him my cell phone number to give his mom to call me, we made an agreement. To help with his speech, our relationship, and his confidence, he can call me. He was excited to have my phone number, and we walked home together.

Tomorrow will be better. In all honesty, it will probably be the hardest of all because we are now on the road, but I'm not giving up on this kid. My kids have challenges against them that no child should ever have, challenges that created this achievement gap. This student has EVERY single one of these challenges against him. But that means that overcoming them will make him the brightest, sweetest, and strongest boy in the world. God, give me strength.

I came to school last week ready for my new communication arts unit only to find that we don't actually have those textbooks for my class. What started out as a minor freakout became a wonderful impromptu Martin Luther King, Jr. unit. I walked in Monday remembering the Holiday Book Series I got from DonorsChoose (thanks again donors!) and put together a community-building, writing-focused commarts/social studies week lesson plan. And I'm loving it!
We first talked about what they know about Martin Luther King, Jr. (as it is his birthday coming up soon) and the answers tickled me pink. My favorite? :

Me: "Exactly, he had a dream. Just like we have our big goals. And he had to work towards that dream. What was it that he wanted?"
D: "He wanted to bring the white people and black people back together again."

We talked about how his big goal (the dream) was like their big goals (pictured above). Then we talked about how when we have a dream, or a goal (like the resolutions we talked about last week) we have to take certain actions or follow a plan to reach those goals or dreams. So what can we do to reach ours? What did he do? Tomorrow is my favorite part.

Tomorrow morning my kids will walk in and the class will be split in half by their desks. One half will have green apples and the other red apples. Their assignment will be to work with a partner to come up with all the descriptions they can about the apples on the outside (it's a details and observation lesson I learned about in a science professional development lesson). I'm hoping students as if they can switch with someone else because they don't like red or they don't like green, and I will simply say green have to stay on one side and red the other.

Then after we talk about how they are different, we are going to cut them in half and see how they are different looking on the inside. We will have a discussion about how our skin is just our outside and has nothing to do with our insides, which are the same.

I'm excited too because in reading we have been reading about the life cycle of pumpkins, going from a seed to growing full and becoming pumpkin pie! Cutting open the apples will help them see seeds and we already read Johnny Appleseed so I'm excited to tie in all the different things they are learning.

And last but not least, I am taking them to the computer lab tomorrow to read, hear, and watch MLK Jr's "I Have a Dream Speech." Then we will read a short Langston Hughes poem about the importance of following dreams. And finally, we are going to write individually what our dreams are for the students at Walbridge and the neighborhood, and write our final drafts on pre-cut white paper in the shape of clouds. The hall outside 206 is going

I got us a class pet last night! The 206 WHOs officially have a beautiful beta fish in a cute little tank in our classroom. I hear they are resilient, but we'll see if the poor guy can survive my kids and Walbridge! After team name suggestions and secret ballot voting, the gangsta babies decided to name him ...... Nemo! How appropriate! (considering my post only a couples months ago was "Just keep swimming ...")
Today was a big day for our class because we talked about goals, goals, and more goals. We talked about reading goals, we talked about our individual goals that were once written in our warm-up and now part of a per-child sticker chart system, and we talked about team goals, class behavior goals, and learning/assessment goals. How did I keep them engaged? Awesomeness.
360 minutes of reading for fun gets free Six Flags tickets (I can't wait to take them!). Every 5 stars on their individual charts (plus a chance for "makeup stars" after rough days with completed weekend extra credit) gets them a small prize. A full sticker chart (20 stars) gets them McDonalds lunch from me!
Class behavior? This week 10 checks gets us Fun Friday. Starting next week, we get Fun Friday for one of the three: perfect attendance, no office referrals, or 80% of the class getting 80% on post-tests. If we get all three? FULL FUN FRIDAY (and maybe party at my house when it's warm??!)
My new behavior plan is positive consequences as much as possible and limiting negative ones. Cards start off more gradual now with a warning card. The kids love it because they get discouraged less. It's great.
And must I say, even when they are crazy in that classroom, my kids in the hallway are better than any class I have ever seen. ABSOLUTELY PERFECT. Perfect lines, perfectly silent, and not only when I'm standing right by them continuously (and I mean CONTINUOUSLY) providing behavior narration. They've been so awesome, I can't describe it. I even left class for a few minutes today to make quick copies (when the copier jammed, of course) and came back to everyone in their seats quietly waiting.
Whoa.
So five more months with my babies, and I'm geared up. I even had a chance to work with my 4 nonreaders exclusively using whiteboards to work on our letters and their sounds. We focused on the short a today, wrote short a words, learned sounding them out, and they looking around posters in the room to find their own.
And my most difficult with a severe speech impediment had a breakthrough today. We discovered he has trouble reading new words (learning to read new words) because his stuttering confuses him when he's blending. I taught him how to blend silently ("talk in your mind where your stutter can't hurt how smart you are!") and then he could do it! He read CAT!!! One of the proudest I've been yet since teaching Amari how to add and subtract this summer.
Maybe I can do this.

Today was the first day back after Winter Break, a time notorious for misbehaving, forgotten material, and all-out crazy students ... So of course considering my children are already "challenging" on a regular basis, I was fairly terrified. I'll totally admit it. But today they showed me a side of them I haven't seen since their peaks in mid-fall ... they were even better than that really! Don't get me wrong, I know how this works. I don't want to jink myself and I know this is just Day 1 of a long semester, but thank the Lord today went the way today went! I needed the spirit jolt and so did they. With both teacher and students engaged, trying to out-perform their last semester selves, and positive energy exploding, the classroom was a fine place to be today. Several students told me they missed class over break, and even one held tight onto me after dismissal not wanting to go home.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
I am scared in some ways though, because I had very low attendance today. Yes that contributes to the excellent behavior so I enjoyed the benefits, but given the new semester all I could mull over was why those students were missing. One is a constant suspension problem, another is homeless, and another is caught up in very terrible circumstances at home. The final one is all of the above.
I'm so scared they are gone - moved, relocated, kicked out. I want to see them so much it hurts, to know they are coming back and they are okay.
We'll see what tomorrow brings, but I'm crossing my fingers for my students more than I am this amazing day. Proof I love these crazy kids.

Here I am about to start my second semester of teaching! That means I am halfway through my 2 years as a TFA corps member! I can't decide if it's going by crazy fast or exceedingly slow ... I guess that's how it always is!
Each day so far has been a journey in and of itself and a celebration of survival, and the anxious feeling in the pit of my stomach I have about tomorrow is hard to describe. I missed my children dearly, I missed the challenge, I missed my new home. But I feel just as terrified and unprepared as ever. I spent the break with the people I love the most, discussing the achievement gap with every stranger who dared to listen, and freeing myself from some of the stress that has become my fuel each day as a teacher. And all I kept thinking was I should be planning ....
This is when I need to be the teacher I can be and should be without the terror of inexperience I felt in August. This week is start over week, and while I'd love to say more, I have to get ready for a big big day!