Flexible

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Every two weeks we change desks. This limits disorganization to a short cycle, and for all the good it does (I currently have no voice), every two weeks we clean all the surfaces in the room with antibacterial wipes. I "assign" seats with a random pull of sticks, so it moves the students around the room and leaves the responsibility for behavior with them.

Last year, we started a new addition to this routine. Next to the ceiling on my big bulletin board, I started the year with a 12x18 paper that said, "Be..." and we added a word beside it on another 12x18 paper that would tell what we would be. We started the year agreeing to be "awesome," and we changed the word at random intervals until late in the year when I tied it to the desk change.

Now, in addition to a new spot every two weeks, we have a new way to be.

This week, Diana chose FLEXIBLE. It seems like a message from the universe. Without a voice, not only have I had to be more flexible in what I teach and how I teach it, but the flexibility of our classroom community has been tested...and has proven to be solid enough to carry us through.

This week, we are looking for structures (chronology, comparison, cause/effect, problem/solution, etc.) in informational texts. Rather than whisper the science lesson I had planned, we had a TKSS (The Kid Should See This) Film Festival, watching videos and identifying the overall structure of each video, as well as the use of multiple structures within a video.

Flexible.