Final Performance!

I'm going to be honest, I was a bit nervous for our final performance because Mrs. Larsen got sick with the flu and had to get a sub, so it was all up to me to make sure the performance went smoothly! It was a big job, but I was very excited it turned out as well as it did!

Thankfully, the substitute was wonderfully enthusiastic about our performance and was able to help get all our costumes and props ready for the performance. We headed down 15 minutes early and even got a chance to do a quick run-through for each of the plays so the kids could get a quick refresher on their blocking! 

They did a wonderful job. The parents and the four second-grade classes who came were absolutely thrilled by the kids' performances. Here are a few pictures from our Anansi performance:

And here's a few from the Twelve Dancing Princesses:

One of my second-graders wanted to introduce the show at the last minute. How cute!

And here are the videos of the two final performances!





Thanks to Mrs. Larsen and all her wonderful students. I had so much fun and learned so much!

Week 8--Storytelling

This week I decided wanted to implement some of the feedback I got from Doug Allen when he came and observed me last week. So I started by moving the desks in the room out of the center of the room so we would have more space to work in. I also thought this would help the kids by changing up our regular routine with something a bit different.

Once we had the desks moved, I separated the class into their two different groups. On opposite sides of the classroom I had 2 posters waiting where I instructed the children (before we separated) that we were going to write/draw the story from the following week on the poster.

I had the kids raise their hand and say what came next, and if it was right, they got to come write it on the poster (but they only had 10 seconds to do it). The rest of the group and I would count down from 10 so the kids had something to do while waiting.

Here's what they came up with:

 Mrs Larsen's group had to have 2 different posters because they drew so big.

After we got the whole story on the poster, we started acting out the story and I wrote down the people who were in charge of narrating the different parts of the story. We almost got through the whole story before our shortened time today was up.

I was very lucky to have Becky there with me today to observe and she helped me recognize that I need to be more authoritative when I'm working with the kids. Some of the kids in my group seemed to be testing me to see how much they could get away with and I needed to be more strict with them.

I learned today that I'm a bit too nice sometimes and I need to make sure that the students know that I'm in charge and they are expected to behave.

Becky also brought up the point that part of the problem is that the room is so noisy in trying to work with two different groups. I'm going to talk to Mrs. Larsen and see if we can find a different space for the kids to work in during this time. It's hard for the kids to concentrate when the other group is making noise too. Sometimes it's even hard for me to think! So I'll see what we can do for next time.

We didn't get to the "Talking Sticks" this week. Stay tuned for next week when I'll bring those out!

Week 5--Folk tales From Around the World

Lately I have noticed this class as a whole has had some problems listening when either me or Mrs. Larsen is speaking and I wanted to find a more imaginative way to help the kids know they need to listen so they can get instructions.

I found some great ideas in a book called "Creating Meaning Through Literature and the Arts; An Integration Resource for Classroom Teachers." It gave the idea to have students listen to grass grow or to the clock tick. It also suggested having a call-and-response phrase. The kids already know the "[Teacher] 1-2-3, eyes on me. [Students] 1-2, eyes on you" call and response and I needed something quicker, so I came up with "[Teacher] Tick! [students] Tock!"

That worked very well, and we'll see if it stuck next week. 

We then located ourselves and on a map and I showed the class the places on the map where the next two stories were from (China and the Philippines). I split the class into two groups (the classic 1-2-1-2 way) and then I had Mrs. Larsen choose two narrators, one from each group (to ensure that they would be able to read the story).

Each group got a story from another country. One was "The Empty Pot" by Demi.

And the other was "A Crocodile's Tale" by Jose and Ariane Aruego.

We had the students read the stories and then create a short performance for the class. Originally my idea was to have them perform it so the class would be able to hear two different stories from different parts of the world, but I underestimated the time that it really took. 

However, I am always amazed at how creative these kids are. They have incredible imaginations!

Having those big groups made it very hard to act out the story when coordinating so many kids in such a short amount of time. I also found that having the student narrators were tricky because they were unsure of when to keep telling the story and when to stop to let me work with the kids.

I was also very grateful to have Becky Wallin there to observe what I did and give me pointers afterwards. She pointed out that my overall objective needed to be more clear and present in the whole lesson. Part of my objective was to have them work on their own fairytales that they are writing (although we didn't actually have time in the end to do it) and that weakened the overall objective. I needed to focus more on the theme (folk tales from different countries) for my objective and let the kids write their stories during their writer's workshop time.

I'm also going to incorporate more theatre core concepts into the curriculum. It's a tough balance to get the core curriculum in there AND weave them together with drama concepts.

I'm starting to really understand the life of a teacher. Woof.