Probably around the time of my last post I was given an added challenge. I now teach my Bridges group (6 strong!) at the same time as I teach an 8 student learning centre group.
Yes, at the same time.
I am teaching in the original one room school house, with ages ranging from 12-19.
8 periods of the cycle I have the Bridges group on their own and 3 of those periods are on the same day, which happened to be yesterday. I arranged that so that we could have a day reserved for travel training. It is also a fabulous chance for us to bond as a group and for me to create connections with them, my most vulnerable of all of my students due to their age and literacy levels – Bridges students range in age from 15-19 and are all at risk of dropping out of school because of their literacy levels.
We had SO MUCH FUN YESTERDAY! We took the bus and the metro to an area in Montreal called The Plateau (“it’s just like New York, eh, Miss?”) and then walked over to Mont Royal where we hiked up to the top and saw panoramic views of Montreal. We coached one of our members up the steep steps at the end of the hike – he’s afraid of heights – and I was so proud of how empathetic the others were to his fear.
We then rolled down part of the way – got covered in mud and banged up a bit but we were laughing the whole time.
Today I will be back at work multi-planning and multi-teaching and multi-caring. It is definitely difficult for me to try to create this program at the same time as manage the work and classroom management for 14 students with the range of special needs that mine have. I am worried that I am not doing what I had planned, or even planning what I am doing sometimes!… for the Bridges group. I’ve started to use some tools to help me keep organized though.
for long-term planning. I am basically filling it in with bits of curriculum as I go. I see it more as a place to store information and thinking for years to come. I am trying to match the curriculum they need with QEP (Quebec Education Program) competencies. My goal is to create curriculum for students who fall into Bridges programming (and not off the bridge…) that is recognized by the government and allows them to qualify for something! It is pretty bare bones for now, but it is a start.
to communicate with all of my students, to promote the use of blogging tools for reflection and connection.
and most recently
Room W125 Wiki
which so far seems to be a good place to organize individual student work assignments as well as to put assignments that are more collaborative.
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