I started this blog post a month ago so I want to finish it and start blogging regularly again.
The days fly by when 43 high school students come and go through your classroom in a day. At the middle school the regular ed teachers would congratulate me on my ability to work with 8 difficult students. I have always admired teachers who can work with a 100 students a day.
I was able to get rid of the desks in my room and replace them with tables. What a radical idea. The desks were these large metal and plastic traps that gave the room a somber feeling. They were not inviting at all.
The most challenging aspect so far has been to try and meet the individual needs of all the students. Alison, Melinda and I re-shuffled the students into more homogeneous groups and that has made it a little easier. I also decided that most of the students need to develop their basic math skills before moving on. There is a basic math textbook in the classroom, but there are only 10, and it does not include enough repetition for real learning to take place. I have a math series that breaks down basic skills and has plenty of practice. Most of the class has moved through division and is now working on fractions, a few students are still learning their multiplication facts. Three students are “testing out” and moving onto algebra.
Keep moving forward.
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