The Life and Times of 4th Grade Teacher

I’m now in my second year, same school, but now I’m teaching third grade!

I get requests to do cyberchase for review days and if they can watch Liberty's Kids during social studies work times, to them its retro and fun, but it's also super educational! We've paused them before to discuss vocabulary terms and amswer really great kid questions! (Last one was what was the sabbath and does it still exist today)

Older materials also have great social emotional learning potential. This morning, as a treat for finishing our last ELA test of the year, we watched a clip of the old Dr.Seus animations and watched "The Sneetches", in which the star bellied sneetches treat the plain bellied ones like they're not as special, and capitalism comes in to save the day.

Make yourself an easy to use slideshow you can use over and over again for daily reminders. It's so easy to be able to walk in and just change the day of week on my morning routine slide and they know to check it for what they need to get out to prep for our first lesson instead of writing it out.

I also have slides for group work reminders, and there's also the specials slides. Since my grade does specials--return to class for 5 to 10 ish minutes--go to lunch, I have basic instructions and a timer to have the kids quickly get set before we leave for lunch. If everyone at the table does what they need to they get puff balls for their jar (full jars can be traded in on store days and everyone gets a free pass of their choice).

Sometimes I edit it to add more instruction slides, like to take out their math books or I make a quick slide so I have brain break videos prepared (my 4th graders love ted ed animations, but always watch before you show, the leaning tower of Pisa one has a surprise sausage).

For example, kids will say the weirdest shit without meaning to, and this is an actual conversation I had with my class

I like to show my 4th graders (age appropriate) Ted Ed videos, and I relate them to questions we have about life or things I think they’d like to know. The one I picked that day was the one about cracking knuckles and joints, partly because I have super loud joints for a 25 year old, and some kids wonder why

I introduce videos to get them in the mood and it quickly spiraled

Me: okay friends, today’s video is about something you might notice I, and others, do pretty often

Kid 1: have babies!

Me: what? No, (kid 1) we’ve been over this, I don’t have any kids and I won’t anytime soon.

Kid 2, sitting up: but doesn’t your husband want kids?

Me: I’m a Ms. not a Mrs, I’m not married

Kid 2: boyfriend?

Me: I don’t have one of those either—

Kid 2, visibly confused: Ms E, how long do you plan on staying a maiden?

You think it'd be easy to get some books really quickly but No, you need to dig deep into the hoarder instincts (all teachers will have these) right away and start stocking books away like you're trying to survive the winter.

If you're just starting out and need cheap ways to quickly get books, here's 5 of the best ways I did it

Half-price books. This is your new god, HPB has decent prices and if you go to the clearance section they should have a supply of 5 dollar and under books, most only being about 2-3 bucks. Are they always good books? No, but someday some kid may fall in love what that seemingly crap book from the eighties. I can get around 10-15 books for under 25 bucks on a good day.

Library sales! Libraries toss out old books pretty often, sometimes you can get a paperback for as cheap as a dime! School libraries will also toss old books too, so befriend those librarians so they slid you the good stuff.

Ebay and Amazon. I'm not saying buy them new on Amazon, but you can get some older books (or new ones) for pretty cheap from people selling books they don't want online. The good and acceptable books are just right for destructive children, and where else could I get the whole Series of Unfortunate Events in hardcover for only 30 bucks?

Scholastic. Ah, the cash cow of books, the twice a year visitor. Scholastic has books for pretty cheap, and if you have a teacher friend they can get you the bundles of books for cheap. Sometimes they have 20 books for 20 bucks boxes, 10 for 10, and you can get multiples of books for cheap if you want to build a class set. They're also good for variety, it's good to get books you wouldn't think of for the kids.

Goodreads Giveaways. It's not always a win every time, but hey, FREE BOOKS. I've gotten some sweet books off of goodreads giveaways that the kids always want to borrow, and you can look for yourself too. Goodreads is also a great website for finding books and reading reviews in case you want to see if it's appropriate or not.

There are tons of ways to get it done, bit these are my 5 most frequent (I say like I don't prowl for these on a regular basis).

Fourth grade seems to be handling it well

From today

One kid: hey Ms. E

Me: yeah?

Kid: can i scream into my microphone during break

Me: what

Kid: can i scream into my mic

Me: no? Thank you for asking tho?

Every kid who ends up being my student is going to know the words and dance moves to this by heart.

They will also have the same passion for it that i have at 22, and have had since age 5

https://youtu.be/maKLV3jd81w

As ya’ll know, I’m an elementary education major, but for one of my methods classes I am in a classroom dedicated to helping ESL students with literatures

It’s at a high school, which is...Great!

Usually the kids don’t really want to talk to us during class, last time we were in I had force them into doing their Socratic seminar by telling them “if you all aren’t going to talk, I’m going to stand here and smile the smile I save for working with little kids getting on my nerves until you start talking to one another.” I circled them, smiling the smile you make when kindergarteners are going wild around you and you’re twenty seconds from yelling “E N O U G H”

Took a minute and a half before one kid finally cracked and said he’d talk if I stopped.

The victory for today was that i was working with two students, and one of them is known for always being silent during class, and our topic was overcoming challenges and persevering despite difficulty

She was quiet at first but opened up when I started telling her stories about the things I did at her age, everybody loves the story of when i fell off my front porch but still ran (ran-limped) to my bus to play my part in this project going on and walked in with bloody leggings, concrete burns/scrapes, and a twisted ankle.

That and the story of how I gave myself a black eye in the dumbest way possible

But still! She opened up! She and I spoke for well over ten minutes and she enjoyed herself!!!!

—one of my first graders in response to “where are you from?”

Few years ago I was teaching in my very first classroom experience in a second grade class. I would spend an hour and a half each day in there, helping the teacher, leading groups, working one on one with students who were having issues that day.

Now, it’s important to note that I tend to dress up when I’m being observed. I usually wear a lot of dresses, sparkley jewelry, and I have long wavy hair I like to wear with clips that look like little flowers. I think it’s nice to show the kids and teacher that I dress up to see them, that and I hate wearing pants (important note for another story set in the future times).

On this seemingly quiet day we were moving the students between classrooms for a math lesson since the day’s schedule got messed up because of the assembly in the morning, and this was the first time I got to encounter the other second grade class.

As soon as the line leader walks into the doorway, he sees me and freezes in place. I send him a smile and say hello, when he throws out his arm to stop the other kids from entering and says

“Princess”

Instantly I was swarmed by 20 second graders telling me a I was a princess and that I was very pretty and smart. Weirdest ego boost of my life.

After we got them settled I looked to my teacher, still doubled over in laughter, and she told me that the students, seeing the way I dress and with how my teacher voice sounds, assumed I was a princess and told the other second grade class that I was a princess. She meant to tell me but had forgotten up until the first child screamed “PRINCESS”.

My friends thought this was hilarious, and it’s become a running joke that I’m an actual disney princess among mortals with how I act, dress, the weird way animals come near me (cool at the zoo, not so much with geese and random squirrels), and my weird luck.

Always a fun story tho

Greetings and Salutations to anyone who happens to find their way here, I’m Kat the El Ed Major, and these are the weird stories and happenings that come with becoming a teacher in our modern age, some will be full length stories, others will be little snippets, quotes, and weird things I’ve seen as an Ed major. Perhaps the occasional vent, but eh that’s life

I’ve taught in 2nd, 4th, and 5th grade classrooms (lesson plans and all), tutored children aged 4 to 13, and I’m currently tutoring 1st graders as part of one of my classroom experiences. I’ve gotten a taste from each section of the grade pie, and it’s been an experience.