Week 8 - Happy Halloween!

We started this week off with our Terry Fox event on Monday afternoon.  We canceled classes in the afternoon and used the time to show all the teacher challenges.  The school really pulled together to raise money and the total was way above our goal! We had donations of cash and also donations of items that people bid on or bought raffle tickets for.  Our goal this year was $1000, but what we actually made was:

Although I should say that this was the total at the assembly.  There were still a few things that were for sale that hasn't been totaled.  Its possible that we actually made $3000.  This totally beats last years total of $1600!

Some of the cool events that were included were: Gillian got a mullet, Mark got his leg waxed, Josh got his head shaved and Anne took some pies in the face! (students totally enjoy abusing their teachers..)

I love the creativity that some of these kids have :) Here's a poster that they made to remind everyone to donate so Gillian could get her mullet.

Here's a great action shot of Anne taking one to the face.  I love the expressions of joy on everyones face! I actually took a 5min video of her pies in the face, so I'll have to upload that to youtube asap.

After the challenges we all went on a 4Km walk around town.  It was nice, although it was a little bit cool.  On the plus side it didn't snow/rain and the winds were calm!

For the rest of the week there was a big focus on decorating for Halloween.  There were some great doors from the secondary classes.  Although as Josh would point out, his and my doors were the crappiest...which was soo true.
Here's some of my favorite doors!

This is Ali's door.  He's the new secondary french teacher that we had been missing.  I like how his kids used a picture of his head for the scarecrow!

This is Jeanne's door.  Another Secondary french teacher.  I like how she is pacman and is eating her students!

And finally, this is Heather's door.  if you're wondering what the mummy's are, they're toilet paper wrapped barbies! lol

It's been a pretty good week so far.  The kids I was having a lot of trouble with finally calmed down and are actually progressing quite well!

In my Secondary 4 class I have actually been able to maintain a 3 week advance on the material we need to cover.  Given that we are ahead I have been making them learn extra stuff that isn't in their curriculum....muhahaha! If only they knew they would be rather upset.  They are struggling a little bit with some of it since its a little bit harder than what they are used to.  I have come to the opinion though that this is a great way of running the program for the following reasons.  First, it will make them more knowledgeable.  For the kids that actually want to go to Montreal to go to College, they will need the extra skills to do well.  Second, having harder material requires them to become experts at the easier material (which they are actually graded on).  If I stopped at what they only needed to learn they would think it was too hard.  If I give them something much harder, they start  thinking the other stuff is easy!

I ended up talking to the Ped councellor about being ahead on the material.  She was surprised and wanted to know what I was doing that was working so well.  As I sit back and think about it, I don't think I'm actually doing anything special.  My room is layed back.  I want them to learn and will help them to do so.  They eat in class, talk to each other, help each other and we all talk.  It's not a matter of cracking the whip and making everyone follow a rigid schedule.  These kids come ready to learn and ready to succeed.  I believe that it is their attitude and the fact that they want to do well that had been allowing them to do so.  Not to say that they don't get off track and have lazy days, because that would be a lie.  It would also be a lie though to give the impression that I am also not the same way at times.  How can I get upset at them for being human and being themselves?