Dear Miss Karen

Recently, among the writing choices I offered my students, was for them to write a letter to me. It could be about anything they liked. One of my students wrote a huge list of questions, and since they were mostly fairly basic facts that anyone who knows me well might know I thought it might be fun if wrote an answer to her letter here and then shared it with the class.Something I've learned is that children are often fascinated by their teachers, and it really doesn't hurt to let them get to know a bit about who you really are.

First of all, her letter:

Dear Miss Karen,
What do you like to eat? Do you have a pet in your house? Have you ever been to Canada before? What country do you like most? Do you have brothers or sisters? What colour do you like most? What book do you like most? What movie do you like most? What do you like to wear? When is your birthday? How many friends do you have? Can you eat kimchi? Where is your house? Do you like to wear glasses? How many cousins do you have? Have you ever taught grade 12 before? Who do you believe? Did you have a nice Winter break? Do you like to read books? Do you like to watch a movie? Did you ever go to Korea before?

At that point I think she was told to stop writing as it was time for Khmer class. So here is my answer to her letter. Enjoy!

Dear Student,

Thank you for your letter. What a lot of questions you have. Let me try and answer some of them.

I like to eat all different kinds of food. My favourite meal in Australia is Roast Lamb with baked potatoes and sweet potatoes, broccoli, carrots, and lots of mint sauce gravy. For dessert, I like apple crumble with custard. Here in Cambodia I like sweet and sour tofu from Ms S, ginger chicken, and lots of other things. I have tried kimchi, but I don't really like it. I do like kimbap though. 

I have never been to Canada, but I would like to one day. I think I'd find it very cold. I have never been to Korea either. Maybe I will go there one day, since it is quite close to Cambodia. My winter break was very quiet, with no students, and I enjoyed going to Bangkok. I have to say that I like Australia best of all, because that is my home country, where I was born. I have a house there, in a city called Toowoomba. Sometime I might show you on Google Maps where it is.

I have one sister who is married, seventeen cousins and many friends. My family mostly live in Australia, with a few in New Zealand. Some of my friends live in Australia, some in Cambodia, and others in different places around the world. I don't have a pet in my house, but I used to have a dog. One of the families I stay with in Australia has a dog that I love. 

My favourite colour is blue, but I like lots of colours. My birthday is in January. I like wearing glasses, but only because they make it possible for me to see well. Without my glasses, I wouldn't be able to read, write, play on the computer, ride my moto, or drive a car.
I love books!!! I love reading them, and I have quite a collection of books. My favourite series is The Chalet School series by Elinor M. Brent-Dyer, and I also love The Abbey Girls books by Elsie J. Oxenham. These are books I read when I was growing up, and I still love reading them. I also like reading mysteries, especially Christian ones. The best book I have ever read and will ever read is The Bible, because it helps me to know God, and how He wants me to live. You might guess from this that I believe in Jesus. The movie I like the most is "The Sound of Music". I like to wear clothes that are comfortable and that cover my body in a way that is respectful. Mostly I like to wear clothes that have lots of cotton in them.
Next time you write to me, I'd like you to answer your own questions so that I can get to know you better too!
From Miss Karen

What's new around Room 16

It's been a while since I posted any pictures of my classroom and the hallway outside, so I thought I'd do a quick update. I recently asked our school director about the possibility of some extra bulletin (notice) boards for the hallway outside my classroom and one more for inside. He said yes, and they were installed a couple of weeks ago. It took quite a bit of time to move material around, freeing up one board for the Khmer classes that meet across the hallway from my classroom to use if they desire. If they don't use it, I will no doubt find a way to fill it up again. Meanwhile, here's a glimpse of the bulletin boards for Grade 4K.

This board is at the front of the classroom,

right beside the whiteboard that is the main focus of teaching,

and where I also project onto, making PowerPoint presentations interactive.

Our IPC units require various resources and student thinking to be displayed.
That's what this board is for.

This is a the other end of the room, and changes regularly.
As the year progresses, I plan to include more Khmer language on this board,
to help increase the children's vocabulary in both languages.

This board is next to the door and holds classroom management material
as well as our IPC Personal Goal material

This photo is the hallway outside my classroom.
As you can see I've now got three bulletin boards
on which to display important information about what we're learning as well as student work.
Board 3 is waiting for student book reports which are almost finished.
I hope to have those displayed before parent-teacher conferences this week.

This is first of the two boards together.
The focus of this board will be what we are learning about.

These cute posters were created during the first week of school
using some foam dolls I picked up at KMart when I was home.
The students loved making these.

First major writing task of the year are our "All About Me" posters.
This was also opportunity to teach students about writing Personal Narratives.
The smiley faces cover photos of the students!

This year we have an improved system in place to follow-up students who are absent. It requires teachers to complete a slip and put it on the door outside our classroom to be collected by one of the guards/drivers during the first part of the morning. I got tired of sticky-taping the note to the door, and then finding sticky tape left on the door, so I asked our maintenance man to screw this cute little character to my door. I was given four of these some years ago, but I hadn't really used them very much. Now I'm really happy to report that, although the first one was broken when they tried to use an electric drill to screw it up, I had another one AND an ordinary screwdriver. Now this cutie is happily doing the job. No more sticky tape!

Why I do what I do!

When I became a teacher I wanted to make a difference for the children I taught. Sometimes you hear about it, and other times you don't. Today I was privileged to receive the notes below from a student and his Dad. I've blanked out the names to protect their identities. It is little notes like this that make the long days and sometimes nights preparing work and marking it, and just thinking about the children. I've received various notes from students and parents over the years, but this one was really special. I should add that not all parents want their children in my class. There are some who don't. That's OK. Meanwhile, I can only hope that they've seen Jesus is me, because on my own I'd be the mean, scary teacher this boy thought I was before he joined my class. I thank God for the opportunity to make a difference in the lives of Cambodian children. I thank God that He has softened me, and helped me become a kinder, more caring, while still strict, teacher. I pray that He will continue to guide and lead me to make the difference in the lives of the children He brings in to my classroom.

Something that delighted me this afternoon

One of the activities students in my class do is free writing. They have 10 - 25 minutes depending on the day and what else we are working on to write about anything they like. I try to do it every day, but somedays it just doesn't happen. Teaching's like that.

Managing to read and provide feedback on students' writing has always challenged me, so this semester I decided to try something new. I divided my class into five groups, labelled their book boxes, reading journals and writing notebooks with a coloured sticker on which I'd written M, Tu, W, Th, or F. Now students hand their books in on the correct day and I tackle 4 reading journals and 4 writing notebooks each day instead of having a pile of 20 at the end of the week. So far that strategy is working well. Wednesday can be a bit tricky when I leave school as soon as the class does in order to get home for my uni "Collaborate" session, but either they get done on Thursday morning (early start) or I bring them home (and do them when uni is finished).

So today I had 3 sets of books to read, from 3 totally different students. One set was from a very capable, confident and creative young lady, who had written some very creative fiction. The second was from a student who still struggles to put sentences together correctly, who had told me about races they ran in their PE lesson, and the third was from a student who has made huge strides in reading this year. As I read the third student's writing I was thrilled. Here's what he had written.

Reading is fun.
Reading is fun, at the beginning  of the year I know that reading was hard for me, and I keep saying that reading is hard, then when I do more of RAZ-Kids it become easier and funner to read. Reading is very fun and easier for me now, because I read lot's of books in RAZ-Kids and at school too. My favourite author is Suzy Kline, because sometimes she write funny book and sometimes sad book. My favorite book is about Horrible Harry, he always do horrible thing, but sometimes not. I love reading now, and I even read at home too!

Reading that piece of writing filled me with delight. This is one of those intangible things that makes teaching a joy and a privilege. Yes, it isn't perfect writing, but how many of us write perfectly first time anyway? This student's first language is Khmer. This was written directly in English. I couldn't do it! These kiddos amaze me.

If I could change one thing in the world, I would change … because …

I haven't posted anything about school lately, so I thought I'd share some of my students' thinking.

On Fridays we have a 40 minute time slot called Journal Writing. During that time we sometimes work on completing unfinished writing tasks and other times I ask students to reflect on their learning. Sometimes I'll give a "big question" for them to respond to. Last Friday, after the students had finished writing their "procedures", I asked them to complete two sentences, and then write a story about what the world would be like if they changed that one thing. Today I read their responses and thought I'd share them with you.

Some interesting points:

• For 9 - 10 year olds, one thing can be a very big thing.
• While some of the responses were similar, the writing was unique.
• Many of the students were able to look outside themselves at the world as a whole, while a few were more self-focused. This is neat because it shows that we are making progress toward our school-wide goal of growing great thinkers.

So here is how they completed the sentences (compressed into a single sentence but without any other editing):

 

I would change the people will be kind to each other in this world because there are not many kind people in this world.

I would change people would be nice and be helpful to each other. I would change this because I want people to be happy.

I would change everybody into a happy life. I would change this because some people would have a lot of unhappy life.

I would change that the world was filled with peace and happiness because people all around the world wants happy, and it our duty to make them happy.

I would change that everyone is rich because I don’t want to see people on the street asking for money and the person that ask for money feel shy too.

I would change everyone is not poor because I don’t want all the people poor because when we poor our life is hard to live...

I would change the robbers or thieves. I would change this because I don’t want to see anyone got killed by the thieves or robbers, and I don’t want them to go to jail.

I would change everyone to have many money because I saw the crook steal the people everywhere.

I would change all the bad people like robbers, murderers, and lots more because I don’t want anyone to be robbed or murdered.

I would change how people treat animals. I would change this because I mostly see people treat dog by hitting it.

I would change a rain in foods, a drink, because the homeless people can eat and everyone don’t need to care about no food again.

I would change the environment because it’s good for us and there won’t be a lot of trash.

I would change the environment to be clean no trash and no pollution, because that keep us healthy and make fresh air.

I would change bad water to fresh water because we need fresh water to survive and right now we go only 0.6% of fresh water and everybody was worry that fresh water will disappear.

I would change about garbage and trash. I would change this because every time I ride my bike near the smelly street, it’s so smelly and dirty.

I would change that only Sunday was a weekend. I would change this because when I have tow weekends, I am so bored and there is nothing to do.

I would change so I have super national powers so I could be number hero and luckingest person ever.

I would change cars, so all the people in the world can dive a sport cars and not drive in old cars or small cars also poor people can drive new cars.