Hi everyone, and thank you for following my blog, I really feel my writing has an audience and that makes it so much easier to keep me typing things every now and then.

It’s Halloween and students are soooooo excited! We have all taken part in a parade around the school. I was dressed up like a flamenco girl, I made a flamenco hat and a shawl, the Spanish mantón de manila, out of colored paper. I was sorry to hear a toddler asking me if that was a Halloween costume. My disguises are never good enough, as you can read.

Snow is here already and it scares me somehow. I am not ready for cold weather yet. I still have to purchase some warm stuff before it gets worse. Will I survive to the looooong winter snow that is looming before us? I doubt it. But I will have to struggle for survival, only this time it’s for weather reasons.

I am getting more and more confident as time goes by with regards to my classes. My kinders are awesome, they can write such good stories. I have been able to transmit the objectives for the day in such a way that students can name what they’re doing straight away. They know what I want from them. Repetition as well as visuals as suggested in the last training session have helped me do so. Suggestions from the mentor teacher to put the objectives at students’ eye level and the picture of a dartboard next to the objective of the day, are working too. They can tell a story across their fingers and write it in their paper, it seems incredible but it’s absolutely true. They come up with small moment stories which are a thousand times better than the ones I use to model for them when teaching the strategies writers use. Every morning I feel like I am taking a risk. I never quite believe they are going to get the new strategy. But to my surprise they have done so and are building up in their skills as writers as they add more and more strategies to the ones they already know.

I am looking forward to your visits. Some of you will be flying to see me soon. Thank you for making such a big effort in so many ways. It’s a long way from Spain and you will suffer from jet lag when you get here, trust me! Besides, it’s extremely expensive. So thank you again for your support. It’s a long way from California too, Just for those who will be visiting from a neighbor state.

It seems like ages since I started my blog. That was more than a month ago. Ooops! That means it’s October already. Time flies and I feel like I’m always rushing to do things and catch up with every teacher in the school. I think I would have needed two additional months devoted to training before actually entering the class.

Those training days come to my mind as exciting days in which my head will not stop dreaming about the wonderful things I would be putting into practice with my students. The days we spent in Beaver Creek were the best of them all. I wish some Spanish leader in education matters could have been there, just sitting and experiencing how exciting it is to create such an atmosphere of commitment. In words of the Commissioner of Education here in Colorado, “What a big deal being a teacher here is!” The whole event was overwhelming. The focus was on motivating and engaging students with the aim of saving the achievement gap and I’m sure the audience of teachers sitting there are now hoping to do so in their classes. All the sessions I had the chance to go to were extremely helpful.

Still there are bits and pieces I need to get further training on. I miss some information about the content to be taught and on how the whole system works. Sometimes people take for granted you already know things and the truth is I have not a clue of what they are talking about. There are acronyms for instance which letters I have to guess what they stand for. I am getting used to those and to a thousand of other things that are new to me. That Lucy Calkins and her method on how to make students become writers is driving me crazy! That’s one of the many things I wish I had had the opportunity of browsing through before the beginning of the school year. It would have clarified a lot of what is being done in the class. The actual lay out of the class would have made sense to me from the very beginning. I do not want to sound like I am complaining, it is worth the effort, I am learning a lot! Besides, I get my mind into something because I am starting to feel homeskick!

Last Friday we celebrated Spirit Day in the school. Everybody had to dress up like a cowboy and scream as many yee haws as possible. I did my best to look as a real one, wore my jeans and what I thought looked like a western shirt, the only pair of boots I brought from Spain and a bandana. I really felt fit for the party, but I guess I should have needed an extra touch because the moment I stepped in someone asked if the Spanish girl had no western clothes for the day.

My expectations are now a little more down to earth, there is a complete new system ahead and I know I cannot master everything in just two months. However, I can feel my students growing with me and that makes the effort worthwhile.

Bee is still struggling for survival and will be doing so if that helps her and her students grow.

I will be putting up pictures of my class as soon as I take them, I never remember to bring my camera with me and the ones I've done with the computer are weird.

Bee is struggling for survival

Greetings everyone to my brand-new blog! B SURVIVAL! as you all know technology is not my thing and so I am trying to survive. I feel like the year is 2030 with all this advanced technology and frankly I am not used to it. I am having an AMERICA overload but I'm getting by. This morning I had a welcome meeting with all the newly hired teachers to the eagle county district. I had to wake up bright and early and now I am tired; more like exhausted. I thought we would be hearing more about methodology or classroom management the "traditional" way, instead I was bombarded the "how to" use technology, this LCD system is driving me mad or bananas or simplemente LOCA.

This morning I was chatting with my co-workers and instead of being served a nice cup of coffee (or as they say in America, a nice cup-of-joe) i was served a nice apple mac bookPRO! i feel very honored to have been lent a computer.

The real reason why I am writing is because after having been taught how to use this LCD system, how to take attendance online etc. etc. I was told to create my own blog as part of the assessment process to take place while I am here in CO. So there you have it, my first blog. ( I feel like Julie & Julia!) I'll be giving updates at least once a week...así que ya podéis animaros y empezar a leerme porque creo que mi sueldo aumenta en relación al número de visitas. Dejad algún comentario porque no sé si también cuentan ¡JAJA!