Door Decorating

I'm a little late in getting this post together. At the beginning of December the STUCO (which I am in charge of) sponsored a Christmas Door Decorating Contest. I mentioned it earlier. The school I was previously at did this every year and they really got in to it with some elaborate and creative doors. It was the first year to do such a th

ing with this staff and students. I think they did a job!

The doors were so cute and it was fun to walk down the hallways for the remainder of the month and see them! The winning door (Grinch), with lights on every point of the star at the top and an actual recording of the song, "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch." It had a Christmas tree made from students' hands. The Grinch was "inside" the tree with only his legs poking out (lime green tights). A leg lamp door, of course, from the movie "A Christmas Story." It was all three dimensional with real fishnets! A brown box top on the bottom said, "Fragile." There was a snowman door which was made of cups and was created by a freshman class. There was a santa door, just the mid-section including belt, white fur and buttons. the door said, "It's a Claus-on Christmas." the teacher's name in that room is Clawson, so she made a play on that with the Santa Clause theme. I didn't show a door decorated with Rudolph. It was made with a light up nose, nor the Griswold door with a ton of lights. There was also a redneck door with an actual deer mount w/rope on it and shot gun shell lights on a tree with muddy boots sitting next to it. The winning class received a pizza/pop lunch.

To This Day Project - Shane Koyczan

I had forgotten about this video until today when it came up on my FB feed from the counseling group. It is intense without being graphic or using inappropriate words. It is a great video for students (I believe) 7th through 12th grade.

Christmas Break

Christmas break is almost over. It has been a very restful break for me. Most of my shopping was done online (Amazon prime is a wonderful thing) ahead of time. It was so nice coming home to a package waiting on the front porch nearly every day in the weeks leading up to break. The first Monday out of school I did have to make a trip to the local Wal Mart. It was also my only trip for the entire holiday season. I made a trip to the mall the weekend before this, and it, too, was my only trip there for the entire season. Can you tell I loved shopping online from my recliner or couch, in my pjs? We put our Christmas decorations up a little late this year since we were out of town for Thanksgiving and that was a little later than usual. Because of this we left a few things tucked away until next year. Since everything was put up later, we left it up a little longer. I often start taking the decorations down Christmas night or the day after. It is past January 1st and everything just came down today. Today was a pajamas day. I stayed in them literally all day. Days like today are rare. Christmas breaks like this one are unusual, too, so much time at home to rest, reflect, and rejuvenate. I had many days at home, though they weren't pajama days. Between Thanksgiving and Christmas our garage broke, nearly falling off the track onto my car inside the garage. Our kitchen range also gave out. So, my husband and I bought each other a new garage door, complete with new tracks and springs and also a new kitchen range for Christmas.

I took a break from thinking about or doing any work during this break. The time disconnected has been much needed. Today I posted a scholarship on the school's website, a notification on the Facebook page and will have something else posted on the school site tomorrow. I return to school Monday and that day brings many changes. Some I'm looking forward to and some I'm not.

Tomorrow we leave for a quick trip out of town. It's just a short trip to a place we enjoy going. Instead of just going over night in order to be back for church on Sunday, we're staying until Sunday this time and attending church there. We both just need this quick get away, the change of scenery, to disconnect a little more before we hit it hard next week. I have pictures from the door decorating contest to post. However, those will have to wait until next time.

So much positivity

Wow, time has gotten away from me. The first week of this (December) month, we had an assembly. It was recommended to me by two of my STUCO girls who had seen the group at a 4H conference. The assembly was put on by a group called Project Elevate. They were amazing! It is usually a group of five that put on each assembly. There are videos, dancing, crowd interaction, testimonials/speaking, loud music, dancing and lots of silliness all within an hour. The kids totally loved it. These young men completely reached out students, grades 7-12th. It was all about making positive decisions, treating others with kindness, anti-bullying, anti-drugs and many more things.

I can't believe I haven't posted anything since October! Afterward, some of our students hung around while the guys were tearing down to leave. Some were there to just take pictures. Others were there to talk. Students really opened up, felt comfortable talking to these guys! These guys had never been to our school and the students didn't know any of them. It was amazing. Through the talking/testimonials and video stories, things that these young men said really reached some of our students and they wanted to talk to these guys about it! This week has been almost as exciting! I attended a training at our state's Regional Food Bank. While there we also got to tour the facility and learn about it's operation. It's amazing to thing that a warehouse the size of a Sam's Club, stocked full of food is emptied every week to go throughout our state to feed hungry people. The Food Bank is run entirely by volunteers (other than the skeleton staff that are permanent and there on a daily basis.) The STUCO had mentioned conducting a food drive. However, after doing some research I found that those didn't go over well. After calling the food bank and looking at all our options we decided to open a food pantry for our school. The Regional Food Bank sponsors Backpacks for Kids for those elementary students who might not have enough food. Backpacks are filled and go home one Friday with food for the weekend since students won't be in school to eat breakfast and lunch there. The backpacks are meant for the individual student but, it is a known fact that the students share with their entire family. Once out of elementary our students don't have any assistance. A food pantry allows MS/HS students to receive the same food service for the weekend. It will be housed in our building in a secure location. Students will be identified or referred by staff and could be a permanent or temporary situation. Students are made aware of what is available and either are told when the pantry will be open to come choose their food or they choose what they'd like to have from a list and their supply is gathered and bagged for them to pick up. I am thrilled to be a part of the ground breaking on this! STUCO will still play a huge part in that they will help stock the pantry when the food comes in each month. Who is being served, as well as the pick up, will be confidential. What a wonderful feeling to know that students in our district will not be going hungry, no matter what their grade. The same day that I went to this training I returned to school for the remainder of the day. After school I took four girls from STUCO (that is all that could attend due to work, ball games and recitals), to our local Wal-Mart. One of our local youth services organizations gave us a debit card and 18 kids names (Angel cards as they were called). Each student and I took cards with kids ages, gender, sizes, likes and needs and shopped for them for Christmas. We had $80-90 to spend on each kiddo. The girls had a great time! They got so excited learning what their kids wanted and then trying to find things. It wasn't easy, many things were the needed size, but wrong color, or just too expensive! The girls stacked things in groups on the conveyor belt and bagged items with each Angel's assigned number on the outside. They got very excited to see the total we'd spent. They quickly whipped out their phones and took pictures of the grand total (over $1,600). We shopped for about 1 1/2 hours then went to eat. For some reason we ate at the slowest restaurant in our town (LOL). Afterward we got frozen yogurt. After it was all finished it was after 9 p.m. when I returned home! What a long, but amazing day! Though we shopped for 18 kids I wasn't sure we made even a dent in the number. We were told there were 63 kids to buy for. One of the STUCO girls game in to my office today to get the contact's name. She said she was going to call to see if she could go shop for some more kids. Amazing!

Red Ribbon Assembly

Today, we held our Red Ribbon assembly. Our STUCO (which I sponsor) chose to celebrate RR week starting today, going through Friday instead of last week through Thursday. They worked so hard getting everything together! I'm so proud of them! We met last week to decide on general ideas. I previewed video clips for a couple of days and gathered supplies for games. I asked one of the girls to put together a power point on drug use by the end of last week. I added to it over the weekend. I decided it would help with the presentation if there was music added, but couldn't get the song to attach. This morning I went in to work stressed about not having the song. My STUCO president, a senior, came to the rescue! She played the DVD with the videos in her laptop. She suggested we choose one of the clips I'd passed over, as the celebrity was more relevant to the kids. By the way, the DVD with the celebrity clips came from Natural High. It was free and I highly recommend them for middle school/high school ideas. The celebrity clips and toolkit are updated each year. The toolkit includes activities and lesson plans for all grades. We also chose a student story from the DVD. So, once the power point was played with the song "This is Your Life" by Switchfoot, we watched three 5-6 minute video clips. STUCO kids stood and told what their natural high was, which went along with the video clips and we played to minute-to-win-it games. We planned three, but the batteries were dead in my donated pedometers so we cancelled one. The games were a hit and included students from every grade plus two teachers. Everyday we're dressing according to some theme like so many other schools. Monday: tie-dye, color your world; Tuesday: Camo/Duck Dynasty; Wednesday: wear red, don't let drugs twist your mind and so on. We're taking a count each day of the number of students dressed up in each class. The class with the highest percentage of participation for the week will get a prize next week. I was touched by some of the students' comments while planning everything. One student said and others agreed or made additional comments to go along with what was said which impacted me greatly. This is what was said, "Thank you for everything you're doing for us and with us. You have these ideas and are trying to be supportive and incorporate our suggestions, too, to make our school better for us. We appreciate everything you're doing for and with us." Wow! I was almost brought to tears! I've been struggling with being in a new school, disconnected from all the teachers and administration due to my role at the school. Right now I feel I have just one real friend at work, who I knew previously (all my life), and who is retiring at semester's end. The principal doesn't care for me and I'm not sure the secretary does. The secretary thinks the principal hung the moon and she knows he doesn't care for me. If you follow this blog you know I'm new to the district, but so is the principal and several other teachers. The secretary has only been there one year and she is someone I've also known almost my whole life. So, many days I feel I'm in no-man's land, working by myself, no one to confide in, no one to conspire with, no one to joke and be silly with. The principal comes in now and then to give me a task to do with no other interaction. The secretary has gone around me to avoid me doing things when the principal is gone, though I had instructions from the superintendent to carry on a certain way in the principal's absence. The principal is gone often and never lets me know, though he communicates this with the secretary regularly. Sometimes the secretary tells me when he is already gone and won't return, sometimes she doesn't. The kind comments from the STUCO kids were perfectly timed, though they have no idea how much so.

Test, test, test

This week we (I) gave the EXPLORE and PLAN test. There were quite a few absent or on activities so I'll have to have a make up day next week. I was told by the helper from our local technology center that other counselors in the area don't give make ups. WOW! It does take extra time which is a precious thing this time of the year. However, if students who were absent are allowed to test on another day, everyone wins. Students in my state take EOI exams from 9th - 12th grade. They are required to pass four out of seven, with two being Algebra 1 and Eng. 2. If they don't pass, the score in that subject area on the EXPLORE or PLAN may be substituted if it's high enough. If there is no score, students have to retake he EOI exams until a passing score is achieved, or they complete a very involved project. Those things expend as much, if not more, time as the EXPLORE or PLAN. I couldn't imagine not allowing make ups. Through this testing I discovered 8th graders don't know their addresses, appalling but true. I corrected or filled in more addresses than ever!

STUCO, which I sponsor, is gearing up for Red Ribbon Week! We're not doing a single theme for the entire week, but a different theme each day with goodies and a dress up contest. I love seeing the kids creativity in how they interpret the dress up days! We're going to have an assembly with a short video from Natural High, a short speech by a student and a few minute-to-win-it games. Fun for all! We got all our goodies today, except the Twizzlers.

There will be one round of games for students and one round for teachers. I hope the teachers participate. Kids love seeing that!

It's Fall Break today and tomorrow. Besides spending time with family and my precious (and only) grandbaby and daughter, I have several projects for home to do, the hutch for my office to paint (I've had it since early September), housework, preparation for the class I teach in the evenings, uploading some scholarships onto our school website and previewing a video and movie for school. It is going to be a busy couple of days. However, I'm so looking forward to it. Hopefully there will be some rest in there somewhere as well.

Success!

I hosted my first Lunch Bunch Tuesday and it was a huge success! It was a group of six freshman girls. They were all students who are new to our district this year. They wanted to know why I chose them and how I chose to group them together. It was based on their lunch period really. I asked them questions about organizations they've joined and how or if they've gotten connected with other students who weren't new.

There was time for me to just visit with them, too, in an effort to get to know them a little bit. I was very pleased that all six said they were involved in an organization and to hear they'd made other friends. This will provide great data for documentation on my evaluation. We had lots of time after eating and chatting, so I broke out the checkers and rice crispy treats. Whenever I have a group in my office for something I always try to provide a treat for those attending. I was able to snap a picture before they left. For the next eight weeks, all my lunch bunches will be a combination of new students. Next week the group is small, only three. I'm going to ask them to bring a friend. I have sticky darts and bingo to play also. One of the computer classes made my invitations for me.

I'd seen them posted on another blog. I forget whose, so if you follow my blog and one of the invites looks like yours, first of all, thank you for the terrific inspiration! Second I give you all the credit for the idea. The students decided the picture on one looked like all boys and if girls were going to attend we needed one with girls on it.

I have one more being made it's an idea I came up with and I'll post pictures as soon as it's finished. Tomorrow I'm hosting my first Career Cafe of the year. A group of six will attend. I'm very excited to finally get this going!