I was reading about Liz's fifth graders antics with the English language, and I thought perhaps it was time for my blog to feature another "my crazy students" story.

In the time that we have our students we have to administer a standardized test called the "qualitative reading inventory," three times, to test reading growth. If you are blessed enough to have your kids for a year you give it in September, January, and June. If you only have them for a semester, you give it in September, November, and January. I gave mine in the days before Thanksgiving, so that I would have enough time to grade the millionty questions that are involved in taking this test. During the test, the kids must read a text and then answer questions about it. The text for the 4th grade reading level is about Amelia Earhart and one of the questions is "What do you think Amelia Earhart was doing right before her plane crashed?"

The answer the test is looking for: Anything mentioning the Bermuda Triangle or flying over the ocean.

Answers my ninth graders gave, included, but are in no way limited to:

* Trying to fix the plane
* Trying to jump out of the plane
* Calling for help
* Praying
* thinking "oh shit, I'm gonna crash"



Dear Standardized tests,
Do not ask students "what do you think..." questions, because while none of those answers is right, all of those answers are reasonable.

Much Hate, Make yourselves less grading intensive,

Miss Bos

So some things happened this weekend that were less than pleasant. I was the closest I've been to telling TfA to take a long walk off a short pier, and take their minions with them. But instead, I know the bigger person would calm themselves down, draw on the words of Col. 3:12-13*, and move on with their lives. So here I am moving on.

It was a decent weekend complete with a coffee house, book store, grading, tv watching, and doing the dishes I'd been putting off all week. We have half days tomorrow and Thursday and the day off on Wednesday. While most teachers are turning Wednesday into a "catch up day" for themselves. I've decided to make it a "I never get to..." day. I'm turning off my alarm clock, staying in my PJ's, knitting, reading for fun, writing for fun, and refusing to let things stress me out. Somedays you need just that. But in order to be prepared for that I have to make it through the rest of the day today, and tomorrow.

Also the Christmas break count down has begun. I'll be arriving in Grand Rapids in 40 days.

I literally can't wait.

Much Love-
Kim








* Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.

I spent last night trying to make the cake pops that I've been seeing all over the internet, but I’m pretty sure that there was something wrong with the chocolate because it kept coming out all goopy instead of nice and smooth. So while I’d intended to make ghosts and skulls, these are still pretty hilarious.

Here’s looking at you kid!

Also, I scored very high on my first teacher evaluation done by the TCHS Principal. He said he was very impressed by my "ingenuity in lesson planning, enthusiasm for the subject area, and ability to manage THOSE students in a way that pushes them forward."

In the words of the volleyball team.... "BOO-YAH!"

I've been not putting up pictures here for a while, but these are kind of awesome.

Over Native American Day weekend, (known as Columbus day to some) I had the pleasure of travelling with another teacher down to Rapid City. We shopped, we ate out, and we ended the night by going to the Black Hills Pow-Wow. It was awesome, so I thought I'd show you some pictures.I live here.


The Pow-wow started with a ceremony to honor the victims of domestic violence, which has been a problem here for many years.

The "tiny-tots" will always be my favorite category at the pow-wow. You can't tell in this picture, but the little boy in the blue bandanna is in traditional regalia and light up shoes. WIN.



These three little girls flirted with Emilie and I all night. Later we found out that they were hoping we had candy.

These two got engaged during the pow-wow, (and I think this is just a really cute picture).

If I'd been a little guy, this man's regalia would have frightened me. He was eerie and also he glows in the dark.

So that was my day in Rapid.
It was a really cool experience.
I'd do it again.

let me tell you about the "credit recovery" kids

I get defensive some days. 

Some days, when people imply that my kids are dumb; 

Some days when my administrator implies that there is nothing I can do to help some kids, that they are lost causes and I should stop thinking about him or her; 

Some days when they hurt each other or themselves, I want to shake them and find a better way to explain to them how much value each of them has as people;

Some days its just a lot to stand up underneath and I get defensive. 

I am not defensive that I am a good teacher. Some days I’m just barely teaching anything. Some days I’m not a very good teacher. 

I’m not a great teacher, but let me show you how smart they are. Let me show you the amazing level to which my kids are able to talk about race and stereotypes in their lives.  

Go ask my kids about civil rights. 

Ask them about THEIR civil rights movement. 

Go ask them what they want from the NEXT civil rights movement. 

My kids are BRILLIANT. 

No, not just the ones that passed my unit assessment. No, not just the ones that participate. Not just the ones that hand in their assignments. All of them. The things they say, the things they notice, the things they’re willing to put on the table. ALL of my kids are SO smart. 

Some days they’re tired. 

Some days they’re angry. 

Some days I’m talking too fast and giving them too much. 

But every day, at least once, they shock me with their brilliance. 

I told a student that he would "make my blog," and I intend to hold fast to that.

Last weekend, I had tonsillitis. I was miserable and was struggling to breathe because my tonsils were so swelled up. So when we started school on Monday, I began a whole new cleaning regiment with every single class wiping their desks with disinfectant at the end of the hour. Most classes appreciate the three minute distraction but my fourth hour has now taken to calling me a cleaning nazi. In that 4th period I have a student who undeniably likes to be the center of attention, for the sake of privacy, lets call him Joe. While the students were set to working on their independent practice Monday, he asked loudly into the silence "May I go to the bathroom." "Only if you wash your hands before coming back," I replied, scribbling a pass for him. He left and re-emerged a few minutes later, making a big scene of not touching the doorknob with his hands, and holding them up like a doctor waiting to be gloved before surgery. Everyone looked up as he loudly managed to get the door open. As he finally entered the room, he announced loudly and proudly, "I am now sterile!" Then sat down. I cracked up, and then continued to crack up as my class, including Joe, looked at me bewildered. When pushed to explain what was so funny I delivered the patented dodge of "I'll tell you when you're older."

Reason #546 I like teaching high schoolers: unintended double entendre.

It has been pointed out that I do not post here often. Not pictures of my classroom. No pictures of my house. Not pictures of my beautiful face.

Unlike working in Detroit, where one could depend on my blog for a story a week. Either a story of my amazing housemates, the terrible and terrific kids of the outpost, or at very least a story of something I was noticing in my own backyard. I'm sorry dear readers, for not being a more active bloggers as my travels take me to educating America's youth in South Dakota. It isn't that there aren't stories. There are stories. Some are great stories of students who blow me away with their brilliance and curiosity, and staff members who floor me with their commitment to student achievement. (TFA is in good company in Mission, South Dakota-these teachers love their students.)

There are other stories too. After a month, there are already stories of days I'd prefer not to think of every again. Stories of faces I'm still trying to forget, of students who sat in my class for one hour, because I failed to engage them and have yet to see them again. There are students I'm trying not to think about because their lives have taken turns that have pulled them out of my sphere of influence. And to worry about what will become of them would do nothing but make me feel more powerless. Oh yes, there are stories, the good, the bad, and the haphazard.

Part of the reason I'm not telling these stories is that there is no time. In between planning for 2 different classes, coaching, grading, taking a masters class and doing the things I need to do to survive (like cooking, dishes, and laundry). There's just no time to tell these stories the way I'd want to tell them. I'd want to tell them in a way that makes you see and feel exactly what I was seeing and feeling. I'd want you to be on this adventure too.

The other part of the reason that I'm not storytelling is that I'm carefully negotiating how to best accomplish that feat, while still maintaining my professional anonymity. One of the things we commonly forget is that while we assume these blogs are being read by family and friends, putting things on the internet means putting them out there to be read. So for the safety, well-being, and pride of my students and their families, I'm still negotiating how to tell these stories that have made me laugh and cry so much in the last 28 days.

So that's where I am. I have not forgot you dear readers, all 6 of you. I'm just measuring my time, and my skills to find the best way to relate my little world to the great big world. But never fear, I'll be back.

-K

Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good.

-Romans 12:9

The last few weeks (6) have found me in South Dakota, Iowa, and then five weeks in Chicago. In all that time, I haven’t written. Not because I haven’t thought of my people at home. Rather because I wanted my first real entry to be a statement of faith in the cause.  I did not want my early entries to be sessions of complaining into which people with blogs so commonly find themselves falling.  

I have in the last two weeks learned a little about how I think this life in education should be compartmentalized. I’ve found myself asking my co-workers about their “teacher day” which while it may seem like a weird question is simply my way of acknowledging that we are all people with fascinating lives. But that some days our day in the classroom went really poorly, but life in general is going well. Or our lives outside of the classroom are lonely, or frustrating, or hurt, but inside the classroom we’re closing the achievement gap and seeing progress.  I understand that this duality will undoubtedly feed into each other, but I also understand that my worth as a person is not decided by my skills as a teacher, and my skills as a teacher are not determined by my worth as a person. There has to be a line, a fine line, but a line all the same.  

My people days, as of late, have been lonely days. Feeling excluded in this community and distant from people who love me.  These days it has felt like I only have teacher days, and even my weekend which should belong solely to me as a person, are all consumed by my teacher life, sometimes out of defense from the lonely. 

But my teacher days are far more interesting. I have good days and bad days and our little class that started as 5 then went up to 6 then down to 3 is now back up to being 8 students strong. Tomorrow is the last day of summer school, it’s test day, and truth be told short of something terrible happening, I KNOW they will do well. The progress that they’ve made in the last 4 weeks, in 16 days of teaching totaling 64 hours of instruction, are astounding. They have worked so hard and mastered SO many things. But I think the result that I am most proud of from our fourth grade classroom, is not the individual skills that they have managed to overcome, but rather the change in their feelings about school. Being in summer school usually has some torturous connotations, but the classroom investment and weird things we’ve done in the class have made this “not so bad” as one of my students said yesterday. But more interesting, has been seeing the change in their beliefs in their own genius. We started with kids who were both behind and discouraged, and constantly messaged that different things were hard for different people. We talked about malleable intelligence, and how no one is born smart. We get smarter by working on things we’re not good at and practicing the things we are good at. 

Yesterday was a good teacher day. Monday I had taught finding or differentiating between facts and opinions, Tuesday I had to teach using facts to support an opinion. My kids killed this objective. They answered questions during the intro to new material. They ripped through the guided practice. The correctly supported other people’s opinions with facts. They were given an article and they made their own opinion and supported it with facts from the reading. I gave the WHOLE class the “bonus activity” and they finished in a matter of minutes. With 7 minutes left in my class, having thrown every tiered up activity I could at them, I had to think on my feet. The kids had been working with a template that looked like this: 

____________ believe(s) ______________________________________because

1.________________________________________________________________

2.________________________________________________________________

3.________________________________________________________________

Realizing that they had a template left blank on their sheet I said, “ok now we’re going to write an opinion about ourselves, and support it with facts. I gave the example, 

Ms. Bos believes that she is awesome because: 

1. She graduated from Michigan State 

2. She teaches fourth grade

3. She lives in South Dakota

We then came up with how we would check each of those facts, then I cut the kids loose to write their own opinions. Of my 7 kids, (we were missing one) 6 came up with 

“I believe I am smart” as their opinion and “I work hard in class every day” (or some variation of it) as their first point. I can’t lie. I was so proud of them and their declarations of malleable brilliance. 

A beginning

You know one of my favorite "Jesus things" is all the titles that man had. He was the vine, the light, the word, the lamb of God, the King of Kings, the Messiah, and a host of other things. But one of the most contentious titles he had was "The Door," and maybe it wasn't contentious, then but it is now. And it isn't that I have a problem with being contentious, friends and family will tell you that I can rattle cages with the best of them. But what I mean to express is that this blog was not titled after Jesus, for the comparison would be an unfair one to make. I am far from perfect. Rather the title and address of this blog have to do with a poem I've always loved.

"So I Stay Near the Door"
“I stay near the door.
I neither go too far in, nor stay too far out,
The door is the most important door in the world—
It is the door through which men walk when they find God.
There’s no use my going way inside, and staying there,
When so many are still outside, and they, as much as I,
Crave to know where the door is.
And all that so many ever find
Is only the wall where a door ought to be.
They creep along the wall like blind men.
With outstretched, groping hands,
Feeling for a door, knowing there must be a door,
Yet they never find it . . .
So I stay near the door.

“The most tremendous thing in the world
Is for men to find that door—the door to God.
The most important thing any man can do
Is to take hold of one of those blind, groping hands,
And put it on the latch—the latch that only clicks
And opens to the man’s own touch.
Men die outside that door, as starving beggars die
On cold nights in cruel cities in the dead of winter—
Die for want of what is within their grasp.
They live, on the other side of it—live because they have found it.
Nothing else matters compared to helping them find it,
And open it, and walk in, and find Him . . .
So I stay near the door.

“Go in, great saints, go all the way in—
Go way down into the cavernous cellars,
And way up into the spacious attics—
In a vast, roomy house, this house where God is.
Go into the deepest of hidden casements,
Of withdrawal, of silence, of sainthood.
Some must inhabit those inner rooms,
And know the depths and heights of God,
And call outside to the rest of us how wonderful it is.
Sometimes I take a deeper look in,
Sometimes venture a little farther;
But my place seems closer to the opening . . .
So I stay near the door.

“The people too far in do not see how near these are
To leaving—preoccupied with the wonder of it all.
Somebody must watch for those who have entered the door,
But would like to run away. So for them, too,
I stay near the door.

“I admire the people who go way in.
But I wish they would not forget how it was
Before they got in. Then they would be able to help
The people who have not even found the door,
Or the people who want to run away again from God.
You can go in too deeply, and stay in too long,
And forget the people outside the door.
As for me, I shall take my old accustomed place,
Near enough to God to hear Him, and know He is there,
But not so far from men as not to hear them,
And remember they are there too.
Where? Outside the door—
Thousands of them, millions of them.
But—more important for me—
One of them, two of them, ten of them,
Whose hands I am intended to put on the latch,
So I shall stay by the door and wait
For those who seek it.
‘I had rather be a door-keeper . . .’
So I stay near the door.”

Sam Shoemaker

The poem was written by a man who would later go on to found Alcoholics Anonymous, and I think in my "early twenties" this poem has very much embodied who I WANT to be. Now I'm not saying that I live my life to bring thousands or millions of people to Christ. I think that's a tall order to fill, and occasionally, I think that it would be impossible. More so, I think that the numbers aren't important. They don't count, and it wouldn't matter if they did, because I don't think anyone is keeping score.  I think that one of the biggest problems with Christianity as it's lived today is that it is an old faith, I think we're not just in the door, but we're seated, reclining, and maybe even watching TV.  We've set up camp deep on the inside of our religious communities and we refuse to become involved or invested with those on the outside.  Now don't get me wrong, I would never say that we mean to be this way. I'm just saying, I think we fell off the wagon somewhere. We know we're called to fellowship and evangelize but I think we have a hard time reconciling these two things.  It is good for us to find comfort in fellowship with those who believe what we do, but we're human so it's hard to pry ourselves out of it.  We want to evangelize but that word has so many negative associations with it, that we don't want to be those Christians. 

So as I get ready to set out on the next leg of my journey, for better or worse, I'm working hard to define what kind of Christian I want to be.  I want to evangelize, and not just "bring good news" but bring hope with it. I want to live a love that is revolutionary, long suffering, and undeserved. I want to grow in my spiritual gifts, and cultivate those I am lacking. I want to pour in to the people around me complete. I want to go to bed every night and sleep the sleep of someone who evangelizes with their actions, which I imagine to be exhausting. 

And so dear readership, what journey are you on? Who are you hoping to become? And how do YOU evangelize?