Holiday Believes

Holiday Believes

My mission in this Holiday Season has been to educate my students about the major Holidays in December: Ramadan, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa and Christmas. By educate I mean I have tried my best to explain what each holiday is and the traditions behind it. I always look for books, videotapes, and creative arts and so on in order to teach my 1st graders the meaning behind the Holiday. I enjoy having the freedom in the school that I teach at to be able to educate my students about variety of cultures and believes, which I believe is very important for all students.
Recently I had a very unique experience at my after school program with the 3rd grade group that I teach. We were talking about Hanukkah and after I was done reading a book about it, we were getting ready to move on to a Hanukkah activity I had prepared for the class. While everybody was engaged in his or her activity work, I saw that one girl sitting on her chair and trying to scratch off the Star of David out of her activity paper. I asked her why she is doing that and she said that her family would not be happy if they saw the Star of David on her writing paper. I was very surprised by her answer so ask why that is, she said that it is because of their religion. Then I asked what religion she is and she said Mormon. I felt like I had to say something to her about being able to except all people and having an open mind and willingness to learn about cultures and so I told did. But then I thought to myself that it was not her fault that her family was close minded, she was just part of the family and she was brought up with certain values, which might be racist and discriminatory but she was just trying to protect her family from being upset; or she was just trying to protect herself. I also told her that she could decide whether or not she would like to take that paper home or leave it in the classroom before she goes home. She made the decision to take it home.
I feel very proud that the education system in America is doing their best to teach children about variety of world traditions and celebration. I am proud that I was able to educate a student like the girl in my 3rd grade group that would have not been exposed to Hanukkah and Jewish believes at home.

Poor Schools vs. Rich Schools Achievement

Poor Urban School’s Academic Achievement vs. Suburban Rick School’s Achievement

Our in class discussions on Tuesday night has led me to think more about poverty in our school system. I am not talking about the background of the students who attend our schools, I am talking about the poverty within the school district or particular school building.
I remember watching a special on Oprah in regards of the reasons behind low test scores in Urban Schools and the reasons behind Urban student’s lack of preparation for college. I remember she compared the test score of students who attended a poor Urban Chicago High School to the test scores of students who attended a rich Suburban Chicago High School; the schools were located within miles of each other. Oprah stated that the graduate rate from both High Schools was pretty high. She also stated that the rate of students who continue on to college from both schools was very high. The only difference was that students from the Urban Chicago school did not feel prepared for college and were failing their Sophomore year in college.
Oprah took a group from the Suburban school students and brought them over to the Urban school for a day. The camera crew and the students went inside the Urban School and filmed how the school looked and functioned within the school day. The Suburban High School students were amazed to see the condition that the school building was in. The painting on walls was falling; the ceiling was cracked; the bathrooms were dirty and not taken care of. The school did not have a computer lab nor did it have gym. The Urban school students were using very old textbooks and the teachers were the once providing the reading materials for their students.
Then Oprah took a group of the Urban students and brought them over to the Suburban School to see how a school day goes on there. The students got teary when they saw all of the privileges the Suburban students had. They had three different computer labs, with bright new computers and software. The school had a large gym, with separate swimming pool and basketball courts; tennis courts; football courts. The students were using new materials and technology was available for each classroom.
When I watched the show I couldn’t help but wonder why is there such a big cap between those two schools? The reason behind the differences of student preparation for college were obvious to me. The Urban students had less resources available to them and that is why their preparation for college in comparison to the Suburban students was lacking. The question that remains is why our government allows such differences to exist? Why are our Urban students left behind? Is there a way out or are we letting our next generation suffer because of our ignorance?

Steps for learning a second language

Steps for learning a second language
This past week we had an awesome in school training about English as a second language teaching strategies and English Language Learners myths vs. truths. One of the myths that we discussed was that the process of learning a second language for a child is the same as the process of learning their native language. We argued and discussed that the steps for learning a second language as a child and even an adult are the same as the steps everyone of us had to take in order to learn our native language. The conversation got headed up because my co-workers and I were thinking beyond the spoken language; we talked about the learning of the English language grammar, phonemic structure as well as the pronunciation and reading.
English is my second language, I speak fluent Bulgarian which was my native language, but in the same time right now I am in the process of learning Spanish which would be my third language. Based on my language exposure and experience I felt like I can speak about whether or not the steps for leaning different languages have been the same or different within my personal experiences. I have noticed that as I am learning Spanish right now the steps that my brain follows tend to be similar to when I was first learning English. First I was able to understand English before I could speak it, I am noticing the same pattern with Spanish now; I understand Spanish better than I could speak it. After I learned to understand English very well than I felt more comfortable speaking it and eventually I was able to lean the grammar and structure of the written English as well. I am noticing that learning Spanish now comes in the same order for me. I am starting to slowly feel comfortable understanding Spanish and I am hoping to soon get to the point of being able to talk back in a conversational Spanish. I shared that experience with my co-workers and some of them disagreed that the brain follows the same steps for each language.
The point of that ELL training was to understand what kind of struggles and steps our ELL students are going through in order to be able to learn English as their second language. I thought it was beneficial to know that learning a language take five years and that there is no way for us as teacher to speed up the process, even though many of us might want to try to do so.

Holidays in schools and education beyond the turkey and the gravy

Holidays in Schools and Education Beyond the Turkey and Gravy
Since the Holiday season is here, I have been thinking about how different schools approach the Holidays Celebration issues differently. I have been working as a 1st grade teacher at my current job for the last 4 years and by being a Charter school we have a lot of freedom to pick and design our own curriculum, which gives us the opportunity to embrace every culture and every Word Holiday and learn about the particular culture and Holiday traditions of different people. Our students, I believe, I very fortunate to be exposed to the opportunity to learn about diverse cultures and holidays. I take pride in the fact that as a 1st grade teacher I have the freedom to educate my students about Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Ramadan, and many other holidays throughout the school year. I enjoy the opportunity to show my students that Holidays mean more than just the presents and the food. I take that opportunity by heart and really try my best to show my students that the world is a place for everybody and everybody in the USA is free to celebrate their holidays in their own personal and unique way.
I am proud of my school but in the same time I have to opportunity to work at two additional public schools where the administrators have chosen not to educate their students about World Holidays and Traditions. I found that to be alarming and depressing. Recently as I taught my after school class, I ask the students the question what do they know about Thanksgiving. I did not ask whether or not they celebrate it or whether or not their school celebrates it, I just simply wanted to know if the students were aware of the story behind Thanksgiving. For my disappointment very few of the 15 third graders knew what Thanksgiving is all about, beyond the turkey and the gravy. Most of them told me that their family gets together to eat turkey and pumpkin pie. I found it to be sad that third grade students would not know the story of the First Thanksgiving and where the holiday originated from.
In the Holiday Season I hope that my student will learn about each culture’s traditions and celebrations; I hope that I will be able to educate my students about the history behind each holiday and give them a little bit of knowledge about this big world we all live in, because after all is Thanksgiving only about the turkey and the gravy or is their more to it than that? I wonder!

Skin color

Black vs. African American; Skin color vs. A person
Many times in my life I have been faced with terminology struggles. First of all because English is not my native language, and second of all because accepted racial language and terminology is constantly changing.
When I first came to the United States around 10 years ago, there was a big move around the issue of how people of color and different minority groups prefer to be called. I remember learning in High School and College that Blacks should be called “African American” and that Indians should be called “Native Americans” or “ The First People”. Never before in my life had I been aware that people might get offended by the way others refer to them. I never had to deal with issues like that prior to coming to the USA. In Bulgaria ( Eastern Europe) I don’t remember even thinking about how important language is. I am glad that my coming to the USA, education and life experiences have taught me how to be mindful and respectful to people’s cultures and backgrounds.
Recently, I had a conversation with one of my friends that happens to be “African American“. He told me that every time he hears somebody referring to him as “African American”, he gets offended because he doesn’t consider himself to be African; he was born in the USA, and he feels like he doesn’t belong to the African culture. He told me that he is Black and that he wants others to refer to him as such. When he said that my I started to wonder and I thought about college and High School and all of the people who do use the term “African American” with the intension of being polite and respectful. I wondered if there really is a way to be respectful based only on language, or if it is really deeper than that. I believe that we as Americans should understand that how we refer to the color of our skin is not the most important issue; what really matters is how we treat each other based on who we really are beyond the color of our skin.

Election 2008

Elections 2008
I am so proud to be able to sit here and write a Social Justice and Equality blog based on this year’s Elections. I am so exited and happy to be a part of such historical time. I am amazed by the number of people who come out and voted but especially amazed by the number of young people who were extremely involved in this year’s election. I watched the news when Barak Obama was declared a winner and I watched him give his speech in Chicago; I saw how Jessie Jackson cried full of joy and how everyone couldn’t believe the success of our county being able to elect the first ever Black President.
All of the above happenings made me think about how much it really means to all of us to have Obama as a President. I believe that President Obama’s elections was not only a political win for the democratic party; I believe that President Obama’s election is a break through; it is a change that many people prayed for and a chance for America to come out of the shell of racism and discrimination not only against Blacks but also against every minority represented within the USA and around the world.
Last week before the elections I had a conversation with the site director of our school. He is a Black man in his late 60’s who has been through a lot in his life. His grandfather was a slave and he himself has experienced the injustice and cruelty of the “Whites Only” signs and attitude in America through out the years. We discussed how important it is for America to be able to elect a president of color and what that means to him personally. I was amazed by everything he shared with me, how he has overcame a lot of injustice and discrimination in his life in order to be able to see the change and to see the day when America would elect the first Black President and the day when American people would agree that change is needed. I know that the time for change has come and I believe that my son’s generation will be more open minded and willing to except people no matter of their cultural or economical status. I am proud to life in a time such as this!

Are teachers ready to educate others about racism and discrimination issues?

Are teachers ready to educated others about racism and discrimination issues?
As I go through my busy professional life I meet a lot of educators who are responsible for teaching adults or children on a daily basis, and lately I have been struggling with an issue that I am very passionate about, a question that I hope to be able to help answer in my future educational career. The question I have been thinking about is whether or not the majority of K-12 teachers and college professors are really prepared to educate their students to be culturally aware and sensitive; to educate them about racism and teach them anti discriminatory values.
By anti discriminatory values I mean teach young students about immigrants in a way that brings awareness to the fact that all of us have immigrated to this county at one point of our family three, except the 1st Americans- The Native Americans. Teach our students that racism is wrong by using our life as an example to the best of our abilities. Be able to have the same high expectations for all of the students who enter our classrooms through out the school year. Are we really prepared to introduce our diverse world to students in a way that would get them ready to be a productive member of society? Is it really up to us to establish the mentality of anti racism and anti discrimination or to build upon the values students enter our classrooms with?
As an educator and a person who is deeply passionate about diversity, anti discrimination and anti racism, I truly believe that yes we as teachers are the once responsible for modeling and helping our students become aware of issues such as fairness, equality, the power of our spoken language and communication with others. I know that such awareness begins at home but defiantly carries over to school and if we have our students for the majority of their day we are the once who share the responsibility with parents to educate their children and lead them towards becoming non hurtful members of society.
But are we really ready to do so, are educators themselves culturally aware and sensitive or do we think we are when the sad truth is we are not even aware of our own ignorance, prejudice and discrimination against others? My personal goal is to always be open minded and willing to examine my own self in order to realize what I need to do to change my self in order to be able to teach others.

The disadvantage of having challenging/exceeding siblings in the same school

The disadvantage of having challenging/exceeding siblings in the same school
Lately I have been thinking about an issue that seems to be very difficult for me to handle and I have not found a lot of information on. In the school that I work at we have a lot of families who bring more than one children to our school. It is great for students to have their siblings attending the same school but sometimes if one or two of the siblings is acting up severely and one of them is not it is hard for me and other teachers to not associate the “good” student with their “nutty” siblings. In the opposite case when one of the siblings is extremely talented in one area, it is hard for me to not expect the rest of his/hers brothers and sisters to be talented as well.
I have a student who comes from a big family of 4 boys and 2 girls. All of the boys attend our school and 3 out of the 4 boys ( the older once) are having major behavior problems to the extend of being suspended on a regular basis. This year I have the youngest of the brothers in my 1st grade classroom. He was in our school last year as a kindergartener and he showed perfect behavior with a few exceptions. His 1st grade year started off great, he was tying his best and behavior seemed not to be an issues. I started the year with high expectations for him and his behavior, I still have the same high expectations but something started to change in him. I noticed that he started doing more and more silly things that get him in trouble and he has a very hard time connecting his actions to consequences. I have tried my hardest not to think that he has started to copy his brother’s behaviors and tries to be just like them and that the older he gets the harder his behavior is going to get.
The same goes for students who have exceeding siblings attending the same school. Teachers subconsciously expect them to match up to the achievement of their siblings or to exceed in the same areas that their siblings are and that is not always the case, every child is unique and they have their own strengths and weaknesses.
As a teacher I am struggling with this issue and I am still learning how to overcome it, knowing that every student is unique.

Gifted and Talented Students Posted October 20th

Gifted and Talented Students posted on October 20th

I would like to talk about another disadvantaged group within my 1st grade class that not many teachers necessarily know how to work with. The group I am talking about is Gifted and Talented students.
I have always tried to meet my student’s individual learning needs but my number one priority has always been to bring my students to grade level reading and math. Within my classroom of 23 students, there has always been at least 2 or 3 students who were able to achieve on a higher level than the rest. My gifted and talented students, the once who are already functioning on a grade level; the once who are already reading chapter books in 1st grade and doing three digit addition and subtraction math in 1st grade. How can I really meet their needs of advance learning and success?
There are many different ways to challenge the gifted and talented students within a classroom. What I do is I always make sure I am prepared with additional challenge math work and advanced books for students who are in 1st grade but functioning on a higher grade level. I have also try to use my gifted and talented students as helpers to others who might be still struggling with the concept being taught. Student love to have the opportunity to go and pretend to be the teachers and help out classmates who need the help.
I always encourage my gifted and talented students to reach higher, to try harder. I talk to their parents and recommend Gifted and Talented Programs that the students might benefit from.
These are some of the things I have done to accommodate Gifted and Talented students within my classroom. I hope to be able to learn more on the topic so that I could be even more effective teachers.

Disadvantage groups

Homeless Students

Urban Academy is located in the heart of downtown St. Paul, MN and it is surrounded by a few homeless shelters. Because of the location our school is an elementary school that welcomes a lot of students who are disadvantaged by not having a home, children that are homeless.

In my 1st grade classroom I have had a hand full of homeless students throughout the years. I have always thought about how a 1st grader can understand the concept of being homeless. Then I thought about the fact that most of my homeless students don’t know better, that they have a different definition of a home. For them a home is a place where you sleep, not necessarily a safe place; a place where you stay for a while and then you have to leave behind. Based on that I have changed my way of thinking about what the meaning of a “home” is.

I have always tried to encourage my homeless students and help them as much as I can. Openly communicating with the parents is the best way to reach the child and really get to know them and their needs. Some homeless families are just in a temporally situation and are in the process of finding their own place. I had a family that was staying in a close by apartment shelter because of a recent divorce; the mom was trying to get a way from the dad and was in the process of finding a stable job after moving to St.Paul MN from Chicago. The homeless apartment shelter they were staying in was just a temporary situation for them. The children were taking the move hard but were very optimistic about the future.

In the same time I have had families that are staying in a different shelter every night not knowing where they will sleep the following nights. In a situation like that it is most likely to see behavior problems related to their life conditions; students like that simply need stability in school that they don’t get from home; they need a steady schedule and a follow through discipline.