Back to Work or How I Really Never Left Work...

Well, it's once again that time of year - time to go back and grind out those last 9 weeks of classes before a 6 week summer break. Tomorrow is completely planned. I have to administer (and score!) a "Correct Writing Sequence" test to ALL of my students. (1st - 4th grade this year) The fun of the CWS is not that I have to read and score 400 + papers. The real fun is that I have to explain to the kids that EVERYTHING I HAVE TAUGHT THEM THUS FAR is to be flung out of the windows of their minds. All this CWS is interested in is HOW MANY WORDS can they write in one minute. Yeah, brilliant test, eh? It's this whole package of cure-all goodies that my district adopted from this chick I lovingly refer to as "The Little Dr." She stormed in straight from some state like Alabama, Mississippi, or Louisiana and we paid her bags o' money to tell us how to teach (although she never ONCE had to write a lesson plan or manage 30 - 7 year old for even so much as a full day) and one of her bad leftovers is the supposedly fantastic way of assessing whether or not a student is where they should be in their writing skills. Never mind that our state has adopted the Six Traits Analytical Assessment and that I am a writing specialist who teaches the students about Six Traits, and our state tests (A.I.M.S.) are assessed using the Six Traits Model. Nope, never mind that. The CWS is also unique in that the writing can make absolutely no sense whatsoever but as long as it is spelled correctly, it counts. We count words. So a kid can write : I like ice cream very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, (you get the picture) much and get a really high score on the word count because he spelled the word right! and he had commas! and he is a brilliant writer! But a kid who pours their heart into this lousy one minute of writing but doesn't have his conventions quite yet (i.e. first and second graders) will not score high at all even though he might be a really great writer according to Six Traits assessment.

Wow - I did NOT intend to go off like that! Breathe in... breathe out.... ok.

So my little ones will come back from a 2 week spring fever break and have to take the CWS. I plan to have them make some lovely bookmarks using the language of six traits when they are done with the silly test. I will read them a book and remind them that good writing takes time, and effort, and you visit it and revisit it but you don't try to write for one minute and say you are done.

On to other things.... I finished two Prescott classes today. That's a little more money in the bank for Little L. And by the way, I DID work the first week of break so that is a little more money in the bank for Little L. I have two more Prescott students to teach in the coming months so that is a little more money in the bank. Sweet Pea said something really cute when we visited her - She told Little L "Mom is sending you to college a $1000 at a time!" Yeppers, that is indeed what I am doing! And it will work. I know that it will!

I should label this post the most disjointed post of all time. That's what happens when you feel pressure to update but are not quite feeling the love in the creative part of your brain!