If you are an educator, you have heard of Achievement Gap, in banking and economics there is the Economic Gap, and there are multiple different types of gaps to describe economic conditions in the stock market, and I’m am sure there are other gaps out there…descriptors used to describe a state of being, where a Gap exists between high and low. In schools achievement gap is used to describe the difference between a cluster of high performance and low performance with regard to student outcomes. Often this measure is used to rate, or define a school. But there is another…
Parenting growing pains
Anybody who tells you parenting is easy is lying. Parent IS a verb. No matter what age and stage your child is at, if you are actively parenting you are physically or emotionally tired….sometimes both. One thing I will say is that parenting teenagers today is very different from when I was parenting my teenagers 10 years ago. How is that even possible? It has only been one measly decade!!! It is a different world we live in from ten years ago. The fifteen year old boy I had 10 years ago was in a very different place emotionally and…
Happy New Year…wait where did last year go??
In the next week, we will ring in 2020…but I’m still wondering where 2019 went! I swear this year just flew by…and maybe it was a case of time flies when you are having fun, but it still went by too quickly, and I’m not sure I’m ready for 2020. Highlights from 2019 The year in sports….middle and high school sports that is! Wrestling is always a favorite and you can tell by my loud mom voice on my Facebook videos. I have to say this year, I really enjoyed football season. This was Jake’s first year playing football. He…
Not Your Ordinary Dickens Story
As we progress through the season of Merry Hallowthankmas…we are at Christmas, and every mall is in full Holiday decor with festive holiday music playing in the background, Holiday commercials enticing shoppers are on every channel, and everyday I have a new sale in my email inbox. My snail mail box is stuffed with holiday catalogs. Ahhhh…consumerism. In an elementary school this is a hard time of year. Kids are making their lists and sending their letters to Santa. For some kids, this is a time of shopping, present wrapping and anticipation. And for others this is a time of…
Reflections of a Thankful Principal
It’s thankful season, but that’s not the reason I am reflecting on all the reasons I am grateful in this moment. Life’s in the principal’s office is sometimes hard, sometimes frustrating, and sometimes I feel like I am not accomplishing anything. There are days where sometimes I am a firefighter (metaphorically) and not really an educator….at least the to the eye that doesn’t know. But right now, and in general, I am grateful. I am grateful for Dawn, my administrative assistant. I joke that she I saw my work wife, because next to my husband, she is probably the person…
Reset/Refocus
If you have been following me, one of the things you know is that we have been working on self regulation and teaching students to identify their feelings, and practice strategies that help support ‘being on green’ emotionally. But sometimes, kids end up in red….and can’t get back to blue or yellow, much less green. What does all this mean? See below for information. When a student is in red, they can’t focus on learning, and chances are they are disrupting their classmates from learning as well. When a student is in red, their brain isn’t problem solving rationally, they…
The Importance of Self Care
As moms, educators or not, working out side the home moms and stay at home moms, we work hard. We are often the first ones up, and the last ones to bed. We do the work that doesn’t really count as ‘work’…meal preparation, house cleaning, laundry, organizing, yard care, child care, grocery shopping (ugh HATE grocery shopping), paying bills, running errands. If you work outside the home, you have 8 less hours in a day to do all the same tasks….and it is HARD. Some women make it look easy, some women have hired help- someone to come help with…
Crackhead Uncle John…and stories of addiction
Addiction carries such a heavy stigma, yet the affects of addiction reach far and wide. The Surgeon General estimates that one in seven people are directly affected by addiction, with only one in 10 seeking treatment. This means that more than 50% of the population is directly related to an addict. I am one of those 50%. This problem of addiction isn’t new or news. Years ago, when I was a classroom teacher, I started seeing the affects of addiction in my classroom: Parents in active addiction, care givers in active addiction, and children being raised by grandparents because their…
Why I cancelled school Holiday parties…and why I think other schools should too
Just call me the Grinch who stole Halloween. I didn’t really, but judging by the reaction I had from some parents and families the first year I cancelled holiday parties, you would have thought I was. Yes, yes, I know…school parties are fun….the kids look forward to them….it is just one (5 days) day…I have heard all these reasons and more about why school parties were necessary. My favorite was the parent who was upset because I was taking away her opportunity to volunteer…How about popcorn Wednesday? Reading log Thursday? Daily reading buddy….or any of the millions of little tasks…
Apple trees…
Why is she writing about apple trees? Seriously? Yep. Read on. You may see the connection here. I need to preface this post with the statement that although I am employed by Jackson Public Schools, this is purely my opinion and does not reflect the positions or opinions of JPS. As a teacher, I always had a pack of paperwork that I sent home on the first day of school: the forms from the office, a personality inventory, and my discipline procedures. My discipline procedure letter started out to the effect of, ‘This is the letter that is my least…