The sun is shining.
Apr. 15th, 2005 07:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
velvetpageIt is going to be warmish today - or at least, warm by the standards of Hamilton in April. I will probably have Games Day outside today for French class. It's in the afternoon, right before second break, and the day will be at its warmest by then.
I learned a lot more details of the provincial package to teachers through the newspaper this morning than I have yet learned from my union. The only disappointing thing I saw was that the 200 minutes prep time is to be "phased in" over the duration of the contract. That means some people will get it next year and some won't see it for two or three years after that. Still, it will happen. It's unlikely to change our staffing numbers much for next year, though. I might as well get used to the idea of finding a way to teach the assignment I'll be given.
The problem is this. We will have three classes in the junior division next year: a four, a four/five, and a five. That's three French classes. I want to teach French and love teaching French, so I'll get two of them. The other French teacher, theoretically, would get the other one - probably the straight four.
The other French teacher will have the grade 3 class, not the grade 4 class. She would be quite happy to give up the French and take up, say, art and drama. More likely, the three junior teachers (which do not include her at all) would arrange a rotary of French, Science+Art, and Social Studies+Drama, between the three of us. This leads to some problems. Effectively, I would be teaching three periods of French, two of literacy with a class made up of kids from all three junior classes, and a bit of something else besides. I would end up seeing the grade fives, who are theoretically "my kids", for French and that something else only - two, maybe three periods a day. Less than half the time.
If it weren't for the streamed literacy, this system could work just fine because I'd have my fives for their language class. As it is, I'm not sure I want to teach all the French if it means losing the connection with my own kids.
On the plus side, having the junior literacy groups that include only two grades makes possible something I've been dying to do all year - integration of social studies into the language curriculum. It would be more than possible to integrate medieval times and ancient civilizations into that time, since we now have the resources to do it in guided reading. I'm picturing a Research center in the class, which kids would work on twice a week, and guided reading, and one period a week with their own class where they got the direct instruction that is sometimes necessary. This has not been possible at all with three grades in those classes, and I've been going crazy trying to cram all the social studies into two periods a week.
Anyhow. I'm going to go injest some caffeine and mark a few more math tests before the kids come. Happy Friday, everybody!
I learned a lot more details of the provincial package to teachers through the newspaper this morning than I have yet learned from my union. The only disappointing thing I saw was that the 200 minutes prep time is to be "phased in" over the duration of the contract. That means some people will get it next year and some won't see it for two or three years after that. Still, it will happen. It's unlikely to change our staffing numbers much for next year, though. I might as well get used to the idea of finding a way to teach the assignment I'll be given.
The problem is this. We will have three classes in the junior division next year: a four, a four/five, and a five. That's three French classes. I want to teach French and love teaching French, so I'll get two of them. The other French teacher, theoretically, would get the other one - probably the straight four.
The other French teacher will have the grade 3 class, not the grade 4 class. She would be quite happy to give up the French and take up, say, art and drama. More likely, the three junior teachers (which do not include her at all) would arrange a rotary of French, Science+Art, and Social Studies+Drama, between the three of us. This leads to some problems. Effectively, I would be teaching three periods of French, two of literacy with a class made up of kids from all three junior classes, and a bit of something else besides. I would end up seeing the grade fives, who are theoretically "my kids", for French and that something else only - two, maybe three periods a day. Less than half the time.
If it weren't for the streamed literacy, this system could work just fine because I'd have my fives for their language class. As it is, I'm not sure I want to teach all the French if it means losing the connection with my own kids.
On the plus side, having the junior literacy groups that include only two grades makes possible something I've been dying to do all year - integration of social studies into the language curriculum. It would be more than possible to integrate medieval times and ancient civilizations into that time, since we now have the resources to do it in guided reading. I'm picturing a Research center in the class, which kids would work on twice a week, and guided reading, and one period a week with their own class where they got the direct instruction that is sometimes necessary. This has not been possible at all with three grades in those classes, and I've been going crazy trying to cram all the social studies into two periods a week.
Anyhow. I'm going to go injest some caffeine and mark a few more math tests before the kids come. Happy Friday, everybody!