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How Full Is Your Bucket?

The second and third chapters in this book focus on how positive and negative behaviors and incidents affect productivity and the impact that every interaction counts.  As one might expect, negative people can hinder and cause great damage to any organization, even schools.  Positive people and interaction can improve orgnizations and make them more productive.  The statistics in chapter 2 are very compelling. 

I have seen negative behavior at work in my classroom from students and the impact causes students to become angry or give a comeback and others to shut down.  The older students often thinks its funny and say that it doesn't bother them but I think it really does.

Chapter three focuses on the fact that every encounter or interaction we have has an impact, be it good or bad.  Praise and recognition for hard work and effort builds people up and makes them more productive.  Negative criticism does the direct opposite and cuts much deeper. 

As a teacher, there are little things that can be done to make classrooms a more positive place.  Verbal praise in front of other students builds a positive atmosphere.  Teaching students to say positive things to classmates also helps.  When correcting papers, indicating the number of correct answers instead wrong answers is a positive approach we can utilize.  I think the "Good News" cards we send also help tremendously.  I know that we are all over taxed time wise and we don't take the time to recognize students or each other as much as we could or should.  Just having a positive outlook or frame of mind and deciding to keep the negative comments to ourselves will help.  There are a lot of negatives in and around schools today but we as educators have got to stay focused on the positive things we do that impact the live of students.

 

How Full is Your Bucket?

The author of this book,Tom Rath, worked with his grandfather, Donald Clifton, to write this book.  Tom's grandfather was dying of cancer at the time.  The fist draft of the book was completed only a few weeks before he died.  Donald Clifton was a psychologist and decided one day that his profession needed to look at what is right with people instead of what is wrong.  Through his case studies he began to look at the positives and not the negatives.  The first chapter simple explains the meaning of the title.  Interactions with others that are positive fill our "bucket" and negative ones "dip" water from our "bucket."  When we interact with others in a positive way we add water to their "bucket" and when it is negative, we "dip" water from their bucket.

This book has caught my attention.  There is not enough in the first chapter for me to apply anything to my personal life but I like the book. 

Fish Sticks!

Pages 38-77 unfold the plan Rhonda has to get and hopefully keep the sixth floor on track.  After meeting with Ishy, making notes and contemplating about her experience at Ishy's sushi restaurant, Rhonda begins to converse with her co-workers.  She wants to find out how they feel about the job they do at the hospital and what responsibility they possess in the fullfilment of this obligation.  Rhonda's goal is to discover the role each one of the staff members plays in the overall goal of the sixth floor which is to provide quality care to patients within a warm and friendly environment.  Everything seems to be rocking along until a new vice-president of nursing is hired by the hospital that does not agree with what is going on and she immediately questions what Rhonda is doing.  Miss Scallpell ditches the visual reminders that Rhonda has in place and she has to take another approach.

This book brings up a very important point related to our school.  What is the vision we have for the students at East Central and what role do the individual faculty members play in that vision.  For me, the role is clear cut.  I am to teach the gifted resource students to the best of my ability and make sure they are engaged in activities to stimulate their minds outside the regular classroom.  I am also their advocate and my hope is that I can acquire some materials that will be helpful to the regular classroom teachers that will take the burden off of them in the teaching and enriching of these higher level students.

 

Craft Lessons Teaching Writing K-8, pp. 30-43

Pages 30-43 of Craft Lessons continues with more aspects of writing that can be taught to K-2 students through teacher examples, student examples and good literature.  I have not mentioned up until that each lesson also includes a resource material box where the materials needed for each lesson are listed.  This is a great help and expedites preparation.  I was really fascinated at some of the aspects of writing that are introduced at this level.  Some of them, for example cause and effect and personification, seem very advanced to be taught to K-2 students but the writiers present the craft lesson on a level this age child will be able to grasp.  The craft lessons in this section of the book have been very good.  I am looking to forward to seeing what aspects of writing are taught at 3-4.

Craft Lessons Teaching Writing K-8

This book was written to be a resource book for classroom teachers that could be used to give them ideas for writing workshops that are age-specific.  Teachers have a difficult time knowing what to expect in a child's writing as well as what editing skills should be taught.  This book explains that there is no fixed scope and sequence to writing development but that teachers that are knowledgeable about writing will have a sense of how writers grow toward proficiency.  This book states that the most important part of the writing process, crafting and recrafting, or drafting and revising, is the part teachers assist with the least.  If students are going to learn how to write and write well, teachers much teach them the skills that are need.

The writing skills in this book are referred to as "crafts."  The crafts are broken down by grade level and prior to each there is justification for teaching the craft.  There are also resources listed to be used to teach the craft to students.  Suggestions for extending the crafts are given at the end of each craft lesson.  The writers of the book point out that teachers should focus on a few crafts or issues concerning their students' writing each year and not bombard students with a lot of issues that they are not ready for and can't master in a year anyway.

In order to learn to write and write well, students must be given the opportunity to write daily. Practicing writing and understanding what the students do well and don't do well in their writing should be the basis for what is taught to the students in terms of their writing.  Students that play sports practice playing and coaches teach their players the skills they lack to play well.  Teachers should do the same when it comes to writing.

As a pull-out resource teacher, writing daily is impossible since I only see my students once  week.  However, developing a set of writing skills that I will focus on at each grade level and expect students to demonstrate in their writing is a great idea.  I have taught second through fifth grade in the regular classroom setting, so I have some idea about what should be expected in children's writing.  I have also learned from the first part of this book that students cannot and should not be left to do the drafting on their own.  Teachers should keep a close watch and assist students during the drafting phase and help them make decisions about their writing.  In order for my student to become good writers, I will have to give them time to write, respond to their writing in a positive way, teach them the skills need to be a good writer and use literature as much as possible to illustrate good writing.