Getting creative...

So I have been spending the last several weeks writing lesson plans that I don't necessarily love- but wanted to do efficiently. I won't say that I'm completely comfortable in front of the kids at this point- but I am comfortable enough to start spinning some of my own personality into the lesson plans at this point. I'm very blessed to have teacher's manuals that basically tell you what to say and when to say it- but I don't want to be spoonfed all the time. Tomorrow and Wednesday I'm teaching different styles of math lessons. Tomorrow I plan on introducing numbers as words by reading "One, two, buckle my shoe" and then having them find show me the value of each word by coloring or circling the number of shoes related to the written number. Then on Wednesday we are doing an artsy lesson where I'm having the students create their own names using base-ten number blocks. I did my own last night as a sample and learned quickly that I need to have the blocks cut out before we do this to cut the time needed in half. We are going to use that lesson for our new bulletin board- so I'm excited to see how the students do with them. 

It seems the "honeymoon phase" is over in our class. I had two students today point-blank refuse to do something I asked of them. I backed down both times because I didn't want to push the envelope but I did return to both of them and explain that when I'm asking them to do something or telling them that something is incorrect, they should listen to me. I'm sure that went in one ear and out the other-- but at least I said it! 
My struggles with lessons are getting smaller. I'm still working on keeping the student's attention. We have three friends in particular that are always an issue. And I'm moving along too fast- not giving them enough time to do what I have asked of them. So I have to speed up my presentation, slow down when I'm asking them to do something, and keep those three friends invested so that they don't daydream. That's all I have to do. Yeah. Yikes!