Yukon Chatter Bug

After looking over a spelling assessment I administered recently to my third graders to try to figure out where to start with them, I came across one word on the test that made me smile. Instead of writing We, one student wrote Wii.

They are keeners!

The biggest shock at work this week came when I spent time with one of the high school groups. On my second day with them, and after telling them a little bit about myself, I asked them to write a short bio.

The first kid asked, “Can we do it on our laptop?” (Every student in the secondary wing gets a laptop on loan from the school.) There were only 15 minutes of class left, so I said no, that we didn’t have time for all of them to go out, get their laptops, and get started.

“But we all have our laptops with us,” piped up another student pointing to his bag on the floor.

“Really? How long will it take you to get set up?” I asked.

“Like, thirty seconds!”

After giving them the go ahead, I had 20 students sitting in front of me with open laptops. Wow! I think it’s wonderful, but that’s only half the story.

The next day, I wrote a tongue twister on the board as a warm-up before the students were to do mini presentations.

“Some of us can’t read what you wrote on the board,” a kid on my left exclaims.

“Oh, is there not enough light? Or maybe the sun is reflecting off the board?”

I start walking toward the light switches when a few of them say, “No, no, it’s the writing…the letters like that, all connected!” I was floored.

Cursive writing is a skill usually taught in grade four, but apparently these kids either didn’t learn it or forgot how to do it. When I asked whether or not they had learned cursive writing, I was told, “Yeah, a little bit, but we don’t need it anymore!” The kid points to his laptop.

So, is cursive writing going by the wayside? When I told my story to another high school teacher, she mentioned that many kids don’t know how to write cursive, although some can read it.

Interesting discoveries this week, and this was only one of them. I’ll have to keep using this font for my blog!

A high-fiver from a colleague on Friday afternoon felt good. “To surviving your first week of teaching,” he exclaimed with a smile on his face.

“Yes, I survived,” I sighed.

“No, I didn’t survive my first week, I lived it. I prefer to to say I lived it,” smiled another newish teacher.

When you understand the colour of the French language, it gets even more interesting. In French, the past tense survived is rendered SURVÉCU, and lived (or experienced) is VÉCU. Therefore, she said: “Pour moi, le l’ai vécu plutôt que survécu.” I liked that. Add three little letters at the beginning of the word, and the whole perspective changes.

I walked away reflecting on the short encounter. I honestly felt like I survived my first week. Nothing, and I mean NOTHING prepares you for teaching. I had four years of educational psychology, child psychology, pedagogy, practicums practica in the classroom, and the list goes on. By the third day, I felt so overwhelmed with information coming at me a mile a minute, I just couldn’t get my brain to stop rolling.

I have about three long lists of things to do, ideas, and resources, and a couple of pads worth of sticky notes glued to every available surface. I have paper, books, and stuff scattered on my desk I don’t know what to do with. I have kids whose names I need to learn, let alone wanting to build a rapport with. I keep running downtown with lists of things I need to buy in order to help the classroom run more smoothly. I have curriculum I need to cover, and 45-minute periods fly by so fast, I barely get down to business*. As a result, stress got the better of me, which meant my emotions were hard to hide. In 24 hours, I think I must’ve shed tears as many times.

Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t just sit there and cry all day; I was fine in the classroom. But the slightest questions from colleagues as to how things were going brought on anything from watery eyes to downright sobbing. So, it was time to reach out.

I approached superman a super-organized teacher for ideas/suggestions.
I met with a high school teacher for help with planning.
I met with a primary teacher for suggestions with my fourth graders.
I talked with the school “counsellor” and simply unloaded…super-nice, understanding guy, by the way.
I even talked with my principal who is so there for everyone. I like his style, but that’s for another post.

And my husband, oh, my husband. He has been the most caring, understanding, and loving person in the whole world. He has taken care of breakfast, lunch, and dinner all week. The house was kept tidy with my whirlwind comings and goings. He held me when I sobbed at 3am. He gave me practical advice about dealing with the bursts of information hitting me like pop-up windows on a cheesy site.

Now, I feel ready to start my second week. Yes, while other people are going on their last camping trip of the summer, hiking the Chilkoot before winter sets in, or closing down their summer cabins, I’ll be organizing. Prioritizing. Planning. Working.

Most importantly, I’ll be living from now on. Yes, living my first year of teaching. Experiencing it. Learning from it. Tasting it. And hopefully, loving it.

______________________

*Kids in grades 3-6 come to my room for their English class in the mornings. Afternoons, I go to the secondary wing for grades 7-10.

My Mosaic Quilt

A recent post by English Mum gave me the idea of trying this in the classroom with high school students next week. We’re always looking for ways to break the ice and get to know everyone. I will/did change some of the questions like, “What school did you go to,” for obvious reasons.

So, within the first week of class, this is one of the assignments I’ll give to students in Grades 9/10:

First you take a list of questions:

1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favourite food?
3. What school did you go to? [I'll have to change this one]
4. Where was your mother born (town/city)? [Used this and #10, as most were born here]
   
5. What is your favourite thing to do?
   
6. What is your favourite drink? [How I got the old man when entering "red wine" is a mystery]
   
7. If you could travel anywhere in the world, where would it be?
8. What is your favourite dessert?
9. What do you want to do when you grow up?
10. Who/ what do you love most in life?
11. Choose one word that describes you?
12. Where was your father born (town/city) [Again, adapted to the kids]
    

Next, type your answer to the questions into a flickr search, then using only the first page, click on an image. Copy and paste each of the urls into the Mosaic Maker.

If you have any suggestions, please let me know.

Why I haven’t blogged lately (if you care):

• We went camping at Liard Hotsprings for three nights.
• We went from a family of two to a family of seven with my brother’s recent visit.
• Even though kids haven’t started school yet, I had four days of school-related workshops, meetings, and conferences last week, one of which was from 9am to 8pm.
• I’ve been spending time in the classroom getting cleaning, getting organized, and pulling my hair out, which meant more cleaning.
• I’ve been doing some school planning to get started in my first year of teaching.

Now I think I need to go back to Liard Hotsprings for a week, but I know that can’t happen. So, with the school year starting this coming week and my lack of experience, I probably won’t be blogging as furiously as I have been this summer. Things will really slow down (just a warning). I’ll still be around and checking it once in a while, and I’ll definitely still be reading your blogs.

So, off to a new start!

Do you like to read? If you’re a teacher and/or a parent, do you want your kids to understand what they read? Of course you do, but what some people fail to recognize is that there’s a huge difference between reading fluency and reading comprehension. They’re both important, but sometimes we tend to emphasize the former over the latter.

Here’s a wonderful resource that was recommended to me by a local teacher:

Reading Power: Teaching Students to Think While They Read – (you can see the book online by clicking on the link)

Written by Adrienne Gear (from Vancouver)

The book is only 144 pages (means you can get through it in no time) and breaks down five strategies (or “powers”) to help with teaching reading comprehension:

1. Connecting
2. Questioning
3. Visualizing
4. Inferring
5. Transforming (Synthesizing)

There are sample lesson plans to help teach each strategy with the use of picture books, and this with primary and intermediate levels. By using picture books, the stories are short, and students focus on the strategy more than the story. Once students learn and practice using each strategy, they apply them to other readings (i.e. novel studies, literature circles, etc…).

The bonus here, is that if you plan on buying picture books for your classroom or your personal library, you can buy with a goal in mind. Included are lists of books that are ideal for each reading power (strategy) for primary and intermediate. Many of the books recommended are already in our elementary school libraries – I checked!

Reading Power is based on and adapted from another longer work called Strategies That Work: Teaching Comprehension for Understanding and Engagement by Stephanie Harvey and Anne Goodvis.

Check it out! This book is a real gem.

“Service à la clientèle, Carole à l’appareil, comment puis-je vous aider?” This was a daily refrain for five years of my life. Sitting at my desk in my little grey cubicle, headset on my ears, computer screen in front of me, I was surrounded by about fifty other people doing somewhat the same as me. The companies changed, but the verses remained.

This time, the grey walls of the cubicles were low enough that everyone could see the cityscape that surrounded us. Looking out my window from where I sat, I could see the drab flat roof-top of the mall just down the street, the one I would go to for my daily work-out routine after work. It was the same thing, day after day, of driving forty minutes, working nine-to-five, and another forty minute drive home.

My family was impressed with how far I had come. I grew up in Timmins, a small Northern Ontario mining town. Finding employment proved difficult due to my lack of skills and education. I was a high school dropout. I tried returning on three separate occasions, each time with the same result, even though I told everyone I wanted to become a teacher someday.

Whether you were out shopping at K-Mart, eating french fries at the London Café, or simply filling up at Sunny’s Gas Bar, you could hear broken French everywhere around you. Being bilingual wasn’t a big deal in Timmins. When I moved south to the big city of Toronto, however, I quickly realized that my language skills were an asset. Demand for French speakers was high, which put me at an advantage. I managed with what I was making working in that postage stamp-sized cubicle, but there was little opportunity to move forward.

For several months now, I was seeing someone, and I admired his sense of adventure. He worked as a consultant in car dealerships helping them get back on their feet. He would live in one place after another, helping companies in dire need of his services, but it was always a temporary gig. He announced, one day, that he had received an offer to work in Whitehorse, Yukon for a year, and asked me to come along.

When I was a child, my uncle lived in Whitehorse, and when he and my aunt would visit, they always talked about the Yukon. I remember a lapel pin I received as a gift. It was the Yukon’s coat of arms, and my aunt explained every little minute detail, down to the two sharp peaks representing Yukon’s beautiful mountains.

It didn’t take me long to pack whatever belongings I could fit into my little red Corolla. I sold some larger pieces of furniture, and simply gave the rest away. My car was packed with my life. I showed up for my last day of work, luggage corseted in the back and on the rooftop, ready to leave at 5pm. To make space for a gift-basket I received from my co-workers, I had to leave behind a couple of ceramic vases in the office. They still embellish a co-worker’s little grey cubicle almost six years later.

When five o’clock rolled around, I eased out of the underground parking garage, the yellow-striped gate moving up for me one last time. I drove past the brown brick mall up the street and the smoke-mirrored office building on the right. Concrete sidewalks pushed up against concrete buildings. People walked along going about their usual business: expecting mother pushing a blue baby stroller; a couple jogging toward nowhere in particular; a man smartly dressed in a business suit, briefcase in hand.

My life, at thirty-three, was going to change forever… I hoped for the better.

It was a long drive to the Yukon. The road led from the lush greenery of Ontario, across the endless fields and skies of the prairies, and through the snow-capped mountains of British Columbia. After finally reaching Mile Zero on the Alaska Highway we still had almost another 900 to go (or 1400km).

When we finally arrived in Whitehorse and unloaded the car, tears came to my eyes. The realization that I was the furthest I could be from home without leaving the country terrified me. I couldn’t just hop in the car and visit my family after a day’s drive, it would be more like a five-day road trip, one-way.

I gradually settled into the tiny furnished basement apartment across the river. I knew that my life would be forever changed, but I didn’t know if I would regret my decision. Different scenarios and questions came to mind. The sense of adventure of moving across the country had attracted me, but what would happen if I didn’t find a job? How hard would it be to make new friends and acquaintances?

I spent the free time I had driving around the Yukon to experience its beauty, but worry started hanging around like an unwelcome visitor. Four months and thirty-four résumés later, only two interviews were granted, and I was still without a job. There was no way around it; I simply couldn’t rely on my bilingualism anymore. I eventually found work as a teller, but the pay was low and supervisors treated us like high school kids.

One afternoon, I went up to the local college to see what some of my options might be. A dark blue sign with light blue lettering hanging from the ceiling caught my attention: “Yukon Native Teacher Education Program (YNTEP)”. Would they accept someone who was simply Métis, and not a full-status Native? What about the fact that I was a high school drop-out?

I turned into the narrow hallway and entered the office holding my breath. When I found out that I could apply into the program, I was elated. Determined to get started, I enrolled with a full course load in January in anticipation of getting into the program. In the fall I was accepted and was on my way to becoming a classroom teacher.

Less than a month into the fall term, my partner announced that he was offered work in Manitoba. Knowing the kind of work he does, I knew things would eventually come to this. We tried to keep things going despite living apart, but I still had almost four years of full-time studies ahead of me. Could a long-distance relationship last that long? During a holiday visit, I inadvertently discovered the answer to that question and eventually cut the ties with him.

Post-Christmas music was still warming Main Street speakers when I started having problems with my laptop. I e-mailed a former computer instructor to enlist his help and was grateful that he accepted. A while later, upon our second meeting for more help with my computer, I planned to ask him out for coffee and dessert. He was a soft-spoken guy, very tall with soft blue eyes. He was about my age and had a good sense of humour. I wanted to get to know him better.

It was -47°C that morning. I slipped on my huge Sorel boots and bright yellow winter coat – fashion is not an option at those temperatures – and managed to get the reluctant engine to start. The first few minutes of driving felt like I was on the worse pot-holed road you can imagine, the tires being frozen square solid. Nothing was going to stop me from going to school that day. There are no electrical outlets in the student parking lot, so I reverted to letting the engine run while doing my business inside the college.

While doing a few computer techie things on my computer, I mentally replayed the question I would ask him. Before I could manage to get the words out, HE invited ME out for coffee. The coffee turned into a dinner date, a relationship, and on summer solstice of last year, we exchanged vows on a friend’s wooden deck overlooking a valley and Cowley Lake in the Yukon.

Six months later, I completed my studies in the YNTEP program.

Now I look out my window, and I see mountains in the distance, pine trees and fireweed, and salmon-coloured skies. This fall, there will be little grey desks in a room filled with students. The alphabet will line the top of one wall, and in place of a telephone, there will be a new vase with fresh flowers on the corner of my desk.

♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦

As all Yukoners know, a common question we ask each other is, “What brought YOU here?” and “What made you stay?” So tell me.

In order to raise funds for our graduation soirée, our group of students hosted a silent auction at the Boiler Room in the Yukon Inn. It was a bash and a huge success. So, thanks to the following businesses and organizations who supported the Yukon Native Teacher Education Program in our fundraising efforts, including direct monetary gifts:

• Air North
• Clean Choices Carpet Cleaning & Rentals
• Coles Bookstore
• Eagles Landing Log B&B and Historic Cabins – Crag Lake, YT
• Earls Restaurant
• Monica Barr – Feng Shui Consultation
• G&P Steakhouse & Pizza
• Gray Fox Media
• Kluane First Nation
• Mitzi’s Closet Pet Boutique
• First Nation of Na-Cho Nyak Dun
• Pizza Hut
• Shoes R Us
• Shoppers Drug Mart – Main St.
• Starbucks – Chilkoot Centre
• Sundog Retreat Carving Program
• Tokyo Sushi
• Wharf on Fourth
• Wines by Design
• Yukon Inn
• Yutopia Bar & Grill

YNTEP logo designed by
Vernon Asp

Since I’ve been in YNTEP, these are the most common questions I am asked.

1. Do you actually get a degree? YES! You get a Bachelor of Education upon completion.
2. Is it Yukon College that issues this degree? NO. The program is done in conjunction with University of Regina, and that is where you get your degree from.
3. How long is the program? The program is four years long, full-time.
4. How many people from your year graduated? Eight students (out of an original fourteen) graduated, plus one student from a previous group. Two students from our original group are still studying, one still within YNTEP, the other in a different program.
5. Do you have to go out of town for some of your studies? Absolutely not. Students can do the whole four years of studies at Yukon College, plus every practicum here in the Yukon. It is strongly recommended that students do at least one practicum in a community outside of Whitehorse. Also, with special permission, some students may choose to complete some courses at U of R. One student spent last summer on U of R campus.
6. Where can graduating students teach upon completion of the program? Students qualify to receive their teaching certification in the Yukon and Saskatchewan.
7. What level can they teach? The program is K-12 with an emphasis on K-8. Depending on their skill set, some graduates end up at the secondary level, but most work with K-8.
8. I heard that non-Aboriginal students can apply into the program now. Is this true? Yes. As of Fall 2004, there are six (out of fifteen) seats open for non-aboriginal students. Our group was the first!
9. There was so much controversy surrounding the decision to open up seats to non-Native students. Since you were the first group affected by this, how did it go? It went extremely well. In fact, our group was very tight-knit, and students learned a great deal from each other.
10. I guess you applied for one of those open seats? Actually no. I have Métis ancestry, which means I could apply for a regular seat in the program. However, my cultural heritage, the one with which I identify, is French-Canadian.

The biggest time wasters in elementary schools are transitions. Changing from one subject to another, moving from one classroom to another, and coming in and out for recess are some examples of the many transitions that happen in a typical school day. Teachers are always looking for ways to make these transitions go smoothly and get students engaged as soon as possible.

Last week, there was a visitor at our school who literally emptied it in record time. Students rushed so fast out of the school, you could’ve sworn there was a fire. Yes, lights were flashing in the parking lot, but they weren’t from a fire truck. It was the Christmas garbage truck with no one other than Santa at the wheel. You’ve probably seen it around Whitehorse, with the truck decorated with Christmas lights, these stuck on with bright red and green duct tape.

Thank you to “Santa” who made the kids’ day and volunteered his time to come way out to our school to say a big “Ho, ho, ho.” Maybe we should hire him all year long.

Santa’s Garbage Truck

Santa is Leaving